Understanding Buyer Enablement and Its Importance

Marketers feel under attack because things that used to work aren't doing the trick anymore. The channels are up, the content seems to work, but conversion rates were better and deals stall. Now what? It’s difficult to buy from you (and that’s why >40% of deals end in no decision). We're more than 2 years into this and in most cases things break in one of two places (according to a few years in the biz+18months of client work and nonstop convos with other marketers) : 1️⃣ Solid positioning strategy -Who is the ideal audience -Who else they’re considering -Distinct capabilities -How to win The disconnect happens when you aren’t sure of these things yourself, and when you’re not communicating them clearly to the rest of the org and, subsequently, to the market. It can be messy (see image) but that’s no excuse to ignoring these questions. That's critical because it literally dictates everything else you do in marketing. Sure, the blog post about you vs. <irrelevant solution to your ICP> might get decent traffic… …but not from your ideal audience. And your booth kicked butt at that conference and everyone loved the socks but… …you got zero meetings. Answering these questions defines your content pillars, talk tracks, training, outbound messaging, competitive campaigns,… not just things that keep you top of mind, but things that get you first, second and third meetings. 2️⃣ Buyer enablement / in-opp marketing This is the marketing you do deep in the sales cycle. Most of us put together a bunch of sales assets and then complain when sales don’t use them, or when they ask for ad-hoc support. But marketing to convince someone to consider you as a vendor is not the same as getting the deal across the finish line. I bet you have plenty of deals where you won the buyer but lost the deal. Because as much as marketing and selling is harder now, buying is too. Buyers don’t know how to explain to their CFO why your product is necessary. And they don’t know their CTO is worried about SCIM integration and job security. Your good sellers might, but good luck getting those folks on a call with them. We need to take it up a notch with sales assets that speak to rest of the people on the buying committee. Material that helps your buyer, aka your champion, to sell you internally at their company. 👉👉👉 Here's how I know it's a real pain: When I started consulting I focused on 1️⃣ But when I’d share work samples, almost every client wanted 2️⃣ (which made sense, because these were the highest-adopted sales assets at every company I was at ever since I started making them). I recently made that official in my offer but frankly I'm mad it took me this long because it makes perfect sense: One is the strategy, the other is the execution, the goal is the same: make it easier to buy from you. PS Check out Down to a T [dot] co if you’re curious about the sausage making.

Being a professional seller doesn't mean you know how to be an enterprise buyer. Ionatan A. nailed it last week when he commented: "𝑀𝑜𝑠𝑡 𝑠𝑒𝑙𝑙𝑒𝑟𝑠 ℎ𝑎𝑣𝑒 𝑛𝑒𝑣𝑒𝑟 𝑏𝑒𝑒𝑛 𝑐ℎ𝑎𝑚𝑝𝑖𝑜𝑛𝑠 𝑜𝑟 𝑏𝑢𝑦𝑒𝑟𝑠 𝑡ℎ𝑒𝑚𝑠𝑒𝑙𝑣𝑒𝑠. 𝑀𝑜𝑠𝑡 𝑡𝑎𝑙𝑘 𝑓𝑟𝑜𝑚 𝑤ℎ𝑎𝑡 𝑡ℎ𝑒𝑦 𝑙𝑒𝑎𝑟𝑛𝑒𝑑 𝑖𝑛 𝑒𝑛𝑎𝑏𝑙𝑒𝑚𝑒𝑛𝑡 𝑏𝑢𝑡 𝑐𝑙𝑜𝑠𝑒 𝑡𝑜 𝑛𝑜𝑛𝑒 ℎ𝑎𝑣𝑒 𝑒𝑥𝑝𝑒𝑟𝑖𝑒𝑛𝑐𝑒𝑑 ℎ𝑜𝑤 ℎ𝑎𝑟𝑑 𝑖𝑡 𝑖𝑠 𝑡𝑜 𝑏𝑒 𝑡ℎ𝑒 𝑐ℎ𝑎𝑚𝑝𝑖𝑜𝑛 𝑎𝑛𝑑 𝑠𝑒𝑙𝑙 𝑖𝑛𝑡𝑒𝑟𝑛𝑎𝑙𝑙𝑦." Here's an idea to help you improve your 'buying game': Pick a tool you want to buy for yourself if you are a field seller. If you are a VP, pick a team subscription to Pavilion. Something significant that requires approval. Then pay attention to these 4 things: 1. How the seller follows up (and when) 2. What they focus on vs. what you actually care about 3. How they help (or don't help) you build an internal business case 4.Whether they understand your company's decision-making process You'll quickly realize, just like yourself, your champion faces battles you've never fought: → Navigating internal politics for budget approval → Justifying ROI to stakeholders with different priorities → Managing the fear of making the "wrong" choice → Presenting to executives with their credibility on the line → Balancing this request with a dozen other priorities Your champion isn't just buying your solution. They're selling it internally. The best enterprise sellers don't just sell TO buyers. They teach buyers HOW to buy. They become internal sales coaches, helping champions navigate politics, build business cases, and win stakeholder buy-in. Cool idea for an internal "buyer battle" For Sales Leaders: Pick 3 tools with some overlap that you want to buy this Q and assign one of them to each of your sellers so each one can make their case and try to build consensus. Shoutout to Ionatan A. for the perspective that inspired this post.

B2B buyers hate talking to salespeople. Gartner shows this trend getting worse every year. The solution? Companies need to invest in creating a new Buyer Enablement Playbook (here's what it could look like): BACKGROUND: Buyers engage with sales ONLY after 80% of buying process is over. By the time they talk to a rep, it is too late to influence them. Instead, buyers are speaking with 2-3 vendors up front, and leaving the 20+ other vendors out of the process entirely. The only way for companies to stay in the game is to influence the buying process, which is not *traditionally* the job of sales. Here are 5 ways this change in buyer behavior needs to cause a reset in GTM teams and Buyer Led Sales tool stacks: 1. Are GTM Teams Missing a Buyer Enablement Playbook? At any given point, only a handful of buyers in your TAM are looking for new vendors. Through intent data and website visitor ID tools, we can identify who’s in market. However, instead of handing these over to sales - companies could set up a buyer analyst team that assists buyers identify the vendor with best fit (even if it meant directing them to competitors). The top 1% sales reps already do this.   2. Where are the Buyer Enablement Teams ? : We already have plenty of teams that help sales sell better (AEs, Sales Ops, Sales Enablement). Where are the teams that intercept the buying process to enable the buyers to "buy" better - Buyer Ops, Buyer Enablement? Here is a quick search for US titles : - Sales Enablement : 10,000 - Buyer Enablement : 50 - Sales Ops : 53,000 - Buyer Ops : 800 We are missing buyer enablement teams. 3. Which team should Buyer Enablement report into? Buyer enablement teams could report into Product Marketing or marketing but ideally not Sales. BE teams can consist of in-house analysts available as a resource to enterprise buyers on demand. They can offer content or advisory with topics such as “industry & vendor landscape”. Think of a buyer analyst as a customer success rep but for top of the funnel and with great understanding of the industry landscape. 4. Exec presence : VP of Buyer Enablement: We need a VP of Buyer Enablement reporting to the C-suite to give the buyers a voice in the exec team, to ensure that some GTM resources go into enabling buyers to buy better and not just to enable sales to sell better. 5. We need more Buyer Ops Tool Stack: As buyers continue to change the way they buy, valuations of peer review sites such as G2 or Trustradius have steadily risen. Gartner has acquired several assets in this space (Peer Insights, Capterra). We need a lot more buyer enablement tool stacks to identify and assist buyers with their research. Several new billion $ companies will emerge in this space to assist the buying process beyond just reviews. What do you think? Will we see more Buyer Enablement teams in 2024? It's time for the sales process catch up with the buying process.

A sales director just told me: "My rep has a champion who loves our solution and wants to move forward!" I asked him two questions that changed everything… "What's your champion going to tell the CFO when they ask for detailed ROI calculations?" Silence. "How will they handle it when the CEO pushes back and says 'let's stick with our current vendor'?" More silence. This is the problem with 90% of sales teams today. Your reps think that having an enthusiastic champion means the deal is locked up. → But enthusiasm without enablement is useless. Here's what most sales leaders don't realize: Your champion will face internal battles your reps will never see. They'll be questioned by stakeholders your team will never meet. They'll be challenged on details your reps will never hear about. If you don't prepare them for this, they'll fail and your deals die with them. What winning sales teams do differently: 1️⃣Create champion enablement playbooks. One page business cases, ROI calculators, implementation timelines 2️⃣Provide objection handling scripts Arm champions for predictable pushback from finance, procurement, and IT 3️⃣Give competitive differentiation points Help them defend against "cheaper alternatives" 4️⃣Practice internal presentations Role-play the pitch they'll give to their executives What will end up happening? Champions who can actually sell for you, not just cheer for you. Stop assuming that a champion who likes your solution can automatically sell it internally. Start treating champion enablement like the critical sales methodology it is. Your win rates depend on it. — Want the exact system high performing sales teams use to hit quota consistent? Go here: https://lnkd.in/gFj3PUBj

I’ve studied dozens of B2B deals that died in the final stretch. Not to competitors. Not to pricing. They lost to the status quo. Why? The buying champion couldn’t carry the message forward. They believed in the solution. But they couldn’t build a strong enough case inside their own company. I’ve talked to many of these champions. Smart people. Respected. Motivated. But alone. They told me things like: ➡️ “I believe in your solution, but I can’t buy it alone. ➡️ “I need help connecting your product to what matters to leadership.” ➡️ “I’m navigating politics you don’t see.” Buying champions are more than cheerleaders. They’re translators, ambassadors, and confidants—trying to make change happen in systems built to resist it. They need support: ✔️ After the demo, not just before it ✔️ With data that proves cause and effect ✔️ With real materials they can hand to their boss Marketers, CXOs, and sales leaders: this is where you win or lose. The deal doesn’t close when your product works. It closes when your champion is equipped to fight for it. Let’s stop leaving them to do it alone. 👇 I created this visual as a conversation starter. What’s missing? What else do your champions say? #B2BMarketing #GTM #CustomerExperience #SalesEnablement

Lately, I’ve been hearing a lot of different perspectives on Sales Enablement from sales leaders. And honestly, it’s a mixed bag: 1️⃣ Some have completely abandoned the idea of Sales Enablement over the last 3-4 years 2️⃣ Others say, “Oh, we have Sales Enablement and all training is on a drive” 3️⃣ Then there are those who equate Sales Enablement with Learning & Development And yes, there’s a small group doing it really well. But the majority? They’re missing the mark. Here’s the problem: Sales Enablement isn’t about content management or training alone. It’s not about organizing case studies or ebooks. It’s not even about how fast your reps can find information. The most successful Sales Enablement programs I’ve seen focus on two things: ✅ Deal Execution: Helping reps close deals faster and more efficiently. ✅ Buyer Enablement: Simplifying the buyer’s journey and equipping reps to deliver the right information at the right time. Why? Because today’s buyers are overwhelmed. They’re coming to the table with more information, more stakeholders, and more confusion than ever before. If your enablement isn’t helping reps navigate this complexity, it’s not doing its job. Sales Enablement should: 🔹 Build buyer-facing assets that help buyers make decisions. 🔹 Equip reps to deliver relevant, digestible information that moves deals forward. 🔹 Focus on the buyer’s journey, not just internal processes. When Sales Enablement is done right, it’s not just about selling—it’s about enabling buying. I’d love to hear your thoughts: 👉 What are you seeing in the market? 👉 How are Sales and Enablement teams coming together to make this shift? #SalesEnablement #SalesLeadership #BuyerEnablement #SalesStrategy #salestable #sales #roleplays