Win Your Next Sales Deal with Value-Added Benefits

Think of the last time you won a close, competitive sales opportunity. What tipped the scales in your favor? 

In sales situations where it’s difficult to differentiate your solution from the competition’s, you often win by offering your buyer extra services, or Value-Added Benefits. These are extra services above what you provide with your primary product or service at additional cost to the buyer.

Chances are you're already providing your buyers Value-Added Benefits, but you're not getting credit for them.

Categories of Value-Added Benefits

Here are a few types of common Value-Added Benefits:

• Support services: services provided by your company, not by you personally. Such services include free training or a 24-hour customer service hotline.
• Consulting services: services that you offer, such as providing your expertise on use or implementation. But be careful! Consulting services can require an extensive time commitment on your part, so offer these only to high-potential accounts.
• Personal services: enhancements that you bring to an account. For example, you make an urgent delivery yourself. Some sales professionals simply tell their customers, “If you have a problem, just give me a call.”
• Promotional services: help you give to buyers to help them grow their business or do their jobs more efficiently. Examples include point-of-purchase materials, advertising, free samples, Job aids or tools, and technical guides

Use these categories to trigger your thinking and help you identify which Value-Added Benefits you can offer buyers. Of course, any such Value-Driven Selling should relate to the buyer’s needs otherwise they won’t see the benefit.

Quantifying Value-Added Benefits

To maximize the competitive advantage that Value-Added Benefits give you, it’s important that you quantify their value. Buyers will have a greater appreciation of your total offering when you identify and present the importance of Value-Added Benefits.

Not all value-added benefits (e.g., personal services) have an obvious meaning. However, whenever possible, make Value-Added Benefits tangible and memorable by quantifying them.

Here is how to quantify Value-Added Benefits:

Whenever possible, quantify the value the buyer receives. As a backup, quantify the cost to your organization of providing the benefit. For example, “Based on your volume, our free shipping will save you $500 per month.”

Try to quantify using dollars rather than percentages or time when possible. “This could save you up to $8,000 a month,” is more impactful than “Your efficiency will increase by up to 10 %.”

Look for as many value-added benefits as possible. Often when you identify one benefit, it leads to others that you might not have considered.

Here is an example:

“To save you start-up time, which was one of your priorities, I’d like to offer you training and access to our high-priority technical support. If you do have problems, you’ll be able to get access to a technician within one hour without any extra charge. Of course, if you have any urgent issues, you can always call me directly.”

Value-Added Benefits can make the difference between winning and losing in a competitive situation, and help reinforce why selecting your solution is a good decision. So, before your next sales presentation, identify and quantify specific Value-Added Benefits for your buyer, and train your sales team to recognize those Value-Added Benefits.

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