The 5 Basic Sales Strategies – part 2 of 5 – Flanking

The 5 Basic Sales Strategies – part 2 of 5 – Flanking

This is the second part of my series discussing the five basic sales strategies. To remind you of the list, they are:

  1. Frontal
  2. Flanking
  3. Fragment
  4. Defend
  5. Develop

Every sales manager and salesperson should be familiar with these strategies. They should understand which approach they should use in various situations.

2. Flanking

A flanking strategy shifts the focus of the customer’s buying criteria to new or different issues that favor your solution. It means you are not playing by the rules. You are taking a completely different approach then your competitors expect.

The challenge with a flanking strategy is that you need to truly understand the dynamics of the prospect. You must understand both the personal and organizational needs. It can only be used with opportunities where the salesperson has an influential inside advisor (a Coach). Ultimately, the strategy needs a strong Champion. The strategy requires you to have multiple value propositions that are relatively unique to your offering.

Trappers and Gatherers excel at this strategy. They tend to be the most efficient at convincing the customer to include other criteria. This extra criterion was not immediately obvious to the initial decision-making team. Trappers and Gatherers innately understand the prospect’s internal politics and long-term goals. This understanding is the power of a flanking strategy. The goal is to remind the customer of a more extensive set of issues than just the immediate need to purchase a specific type of product or service.

A Farmer salesperson rarely uses this type of strategy effectively. As the Farmer increases his or her individual sales skills, the use of flanking becomes more natural, and the Farmer evolves into a Trapper.

A Hunter salesperson will rarely use a flanking strategy initially. The Hunter may turn to it after the successful use of a different approach such as Fragment. It usually takes too much innate knowledge of the prospect to pull off for a Hunter that has just recently started calling on the company.

If you don’t know what a Hunter, Gatherer, Farmer or Trapper is, you should read my book. You may purchase my book Eliminate Your Competition from your favorite book retailer. The ebook version is available at the most popular retailers such as Apple, Amazon, Barnes & Noble. The paperback version is also widely available at such retailers as Amazon, Barnes & Noble, and Books A Million.

Header Photo by O12 (Pixabay)

This post is the second in a series of posts covering the five basic sales strategies. I cover the five basic sales strategies in these posts:

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