Interdependencies in the buying proces

• September 30, 2019

Organizational development has evolved to become more efficient and collaborative than in the past. Different departments in companies used to work more in silos, where departments such as product development, sales, marketing, and delivery didn’t have to communicate much with each other and were more focused on creating efficiencies within their own areas.

With digital transformation, systems, tools, and processes are now interlinked to a larger extent and different parts of organizations are becoming much more customer-centric, with common goals. Companies take a more holistic approach to organizational development, become lean, and eliminate waste in the workflows. The consequence of this is that more interdependencies are created in the companies and there is a greater need for cross-functional communication, and to make joint decisions on matters that now affect several areas.

This results in that the customer decision process takes more time, since the complexity increases in the buying process. The buying criteria were before limited to involving one or two areas, but now need to take more factors into consideration. This has increased the duration of the buying cycle with approximately 25% on average, and more persons representing different areas of the company are involved in the analysis and the buying decision.

From a sales perspective, it is no longer enough to be an expert in the product, or even on the benefit that the product has for the customer’s business. It is now necessary to have the ability to advise and guide the customer in a consultative way throughout the buying process, and together with the customer identify dependencies and consequences of introducing the product, or service. Much deeper relationships are needed between the buying and selling organizations.

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