Quantifying your business benefits helps you sell more

One of the ways to strengthen your value proposition is by using quantifiable benefits. They help customers and prospects understand what the actual impact could be for their organization, and are especially helpful when trying to sell to the C-level within an organization. (For more information on selling to the C-level, see my recent blog post).

Not convinced? Which point sounds stronger to you?

• We helped a financial services firm increase customers and revenue.

OR

• We helped a financial services firm increase customers from one to 40, and more than double revenue.

The second one is more powerful and it happens to be from a VA Partners success story.

If creating quantifiable benefits was easy, everyone would be doing it, but it’s actually easier than organizations think. Here are some tips to help you quantify the benefits of your solution:

• Focus on the right metrics. Your benefits should help to support benefits for revenue, decreasing cost/expense, improving employee productivity or avoiding something bad. For details, check out my recent blog on this.
• Start tracking things.  Look at information that supports the before and after. One of the metrics that many companies want to track is the increase in pageviews. You can use a simple, free tool like Google Analytics to track your page views, so why not do it?
• Follow up with customers. Sometimes you are not aware of the impact your solution has had on a customer until after it is rolled out. Follow up with your clients and work with them to understand and quantify the benefits they have realized. Most customers are happy to do this and can use that information internally to support a successful project.
• Estimate the benefit. Sometimes it may be difficult to get an exact number for the benefit that your solution can provide. In this case, use an estimate and the specific inputs. And be conservative to better defend the solution’s benefit.

The value proposition is one of the most important sales tools, and quantifying the benefits that you can provide makes it even stronger. Take the time to try and quantify as many benefits as possible, and good luck selling!

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