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Who’s Who – Screener vs. Buyer JAMES LORENZEN


As the B2B sales environment continues to shift, the real buyer may become more elusive than ever. In many cases, the so-called “buyer” you’re dealing with is actually just a “screener” whose job is not to select, but to eliminate from consideration all proposals that do not conform to the true buyer’s needs and criteria.


The true buyer – the economic buyer – makes decisions based on a set of criteria that may not be available even to the screener. These criteria


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are usually expressed in a language seldom spoken by salespeople or their managers.


In many cases, this buyer is the


president or other executive in the organization with profit-and-loss responsibility. But most salespeople don’t feel they can, or should, call on the company president. They errone- ously think the president won’t have the time to make buying decisions or consider proposals.


The fact is, though, that most


presidents spend their days listening to nothing but sales pitches! That’s a major function of a president’s job. The economic buyer sees his or her company as a money machine. This buyer’s job consists almost entirely of seeking and locating opportuni- ties that will maximize the return on investment of allocated resources,


ANDREY_POPOV / SHUTTERSTOCK.COM


Help reps find the real buyer


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