Why is there no section on this forum for sales engineering? 11

[HydroScope]

Hi There,

I have fairly recently become a sales engineer, for a industrial automation company. having sucessfully found this website usefull for technical issues in the past. I thought I would come back for some so called side issues as an engineer in my case "selling" as a profession. The products that my company deal with are the usual, servo/stepper motors, screw jacks, linear motors, through to linear bearing, worm drive slew rings. We have a broad range of clients from the defence force, mining, aerospace, theatre and factory automation. Obviously we make our money from advising our clients on our products. Before I became a sales engineer I had no experience and no "sales training" now my company would like me to get involved with some sales training. Assuming there are many sales engineers on this forum, I would like to ask two questions? 1) Is sales engineering not seen as a branch of engineering and hence does not exsist as a branch on this forum 2) Do you know of any usefull sales training that a sales engineer can make use of? as the boss needs an answer soon on a training course I would like to do. ;O) I'm struggling to find a course because I don't understand the so called skills I need apart from the obvious "knowing our product range very well". Thanks in advance for your help ;o)

 

[HydroScope]

I guess I was refering to the half formed ideas, incomplete ideas, that need more fine tuning, this is fine! why else would they contact us??, thats what engineering is all about!!. Concept throught to completion. I wasn't tring to say I was better than them (Actually never with cleintelle we hang with), you dont actually prove them wrong, you simply explain this is going to cost $XXXXXXXXX, if you want that spec. but if you do it this way it will cost $XXXX, saving $XXX. thats my job in a nut shell. ;o), most of the time they have alterative way of doing the same job themselves, i just do the leg work.

 

[rbulsara]

Hydro:

I can tell you one thing, you would not be visiting my office too many time, if you keep telling me how to save money on my specs. What I want is to meet my specs and let the Owner/User tell me that he cannot afford it.

 

[jmw]

The real world for a salesman:
dealing with three worst case scenarios managers never understand:
[ul][li]losing a sale to an inferior product[/li]
[li]losing a sale to a more expensive product[/li]
[li]losing a sale to a more expensive inferior product[/li][/ul]
It also happens in engineering sales.
It isn't bad selling.
It isn't poor buying decisions.
There are more factors at work than price or spec. You need to find out what they are.




JMW

http://www.ViscoAnalyser.com

 

[SomptingGuy]

@rbulsara,

My "customer isn't always right" scenario is probably specific to the business I work in (engineering software). It's very rare for customers to request new features, they more often demand inappropriate extensions to existing features.

Customer: We need you to extend this existing feature in your software like this. If you don't do it, we'll jump ship.

A feature request goes into the system, gets a life of its own and gets debated to death. Commercial people pushing it, technical people resisting it because of its long-reaching side effects.

Ultimately someone asks the customer why they need this feature extended, what problem are they trying to solve, and gets a sensible answer: "We want to be able to simulate this situation". There is usually a much cleaner and better solution than the one demanded.

- Steve

 

[IRstuff]

The most important thing is to LISTEN to the customer, followed by "gentle" prompting to get him to describe what functionality he needs or wants, and not what piece of hardware he thinks will do the job, followed by more LISTENING.

Your task is the solve your customer's problem, and, ideally, selling him a product that will do that job.

TTFN

FAQ731-376

 

[hokie66]

All the above advice is good, but the absolute worst thing for a salesman, applications engineer, regional project engineer, or whatever is for his company to not back up his promises. It happens all the time with both big and small companies, and when it happens, the business doesn't come back soon.

 

[vc66]

All the above advice is good, but the absolute worst thing for a salesman, applications engineer, regional project engineer, or whatever is for his company to not back up his promises.

I would add that, at least for my present company, this falls solely on that salesman, applications engineer, etc. This is where the engineering background really comes in handy. If your customer asks for an over-unity machine, and the salesman has no engineering background, he could promise them one for next Thursday... doesn't mean it's possible.

V

 

[KENAT]

rbulsara, I've had customers ask for things that fundamentally defied known laws of physices for known materials.

I'm pretty sure they were wrong.

KENAT,

Have you reminded yourself of faq731-376 recently, or taken a look at posting policies:

http://eng-tips.com/market.cfm?

 

[plasgears]

I was informed many moons ago that we are all salesmen. Explanation to the customer is a sales function. So is a cost reduction idea. Another is showing several viable alternatives. We are all salesmen.

 

[GregLocock]

That's one of the laws of spacecraft design.

A bad idea, well presented, lives to fight another day. A good idea poorly presented dies.



Cheers

Greg Locock

SIGlease see FAQ731-376 for tips on how to make the best use of Eng-Tips.

 

[TenPenny]

One thing you'll find, as a sales engineer, if you're doing your job properly, is that you'll spend time doing work for nothing, that consultants will then charge their customers to present.

It's part of how the game is played, and if you do it carefully and consistently, will let you be involved in the early parts of some projects.

 

[uGlay]

sorry but "Sales Engineering" is a mickey mouse title just like a janitor is called a "sanitation engineer".

SW2008 Office Pro SP4.0
Intel Core 2 Duo CPU
2.2GHz, 2.00GB RAM
QuadroFX 3700
SpacePilot

 

[CorBlimeyLimey]

At least a sanitation engineer (janitor) will clean up a mess. Sales engineers often create them.

 

[mizzjoey]

I haven't had much involvement with "sales engineering" but my project manager was explaining to me two days ago the difference of being in an engineering world, selling products vs "selling projects". (I've just joined compressed air industry, now in my 5th month).

A salesperson selling products doesn't even have to understand much about how the product works; but a sales engineer trying to win a tender to supply a project or working system must have a working knowledge of every aspect within the system. So my understanding is a sales engineer (with a legit engineering degree) who can, with back of the envelopes calculation @ estimation, figure out how many compressors, dryers etc a customer would need should be recognized as an engineer as well.

In my presently small branch office comprising my manager, myself as an asst. project engineer and another regional saler manager.. I'd say that the sales manager has the most engineering knowledge. Of course, he thinks more like a salesperson compared to my manager and I, and he has a brash, slick air about him which makes me regard him as not one of the people who knows Joseph... but how much he knows about compressed air systems does make me feel sorry about the "Sales" tag in his job title...sometimes.

jo

 

[csd72]

Sales engineer, like project engineer, is a job title not a discipline. As this is a technical forum it is divided into disciplines rather than roles.

 

[KENAT]

Good answer csd72.

KENAT,

Have you reminded yourself of faq731-376 recently, or taken a look at posting policies:

http://eng-tips.com/market.cfm?

 

[FACS]

Well, I have had a problem lately with my sales.

Could someone Engineer a new one for me?


Thanks,
I'll need it by next week.

Charlie

http://www.facsco.com

 

[JavaJim]

There is no such recognized discipline as "sales engineering". However, many degreed engineers take positions as sales representatives or "application engineers". The best thing you can bring to the table in that role is a good grasp of engineering principles and practical applications of the product(s) that you are trying to sell. If you know your product well and you are very familiar with the practical applications of the product, selling it in the right places should come naturally to you if you are enthusiasic.

I am a master degreed EE and I work full time as an electrical engineer. However, I realized early on that I lacked that interpersonal touch that often can make the difference between success, failure and mediocrity in business.

Keep in mind that success in business is really all about relationships and about putting your customer's needs first. To cure my interpersonal issues and my tendency to be too analytical, what some people might call too nerdy, I forced myself to get involved in business outside of my regular job. I obtained an MBA degree and a real estate license. Now, I sell real estate part time and I have really learned how to work the interpersonal side of business. My customers don't know that I am a degree engineer until I tell them.

Unfortunately, engineers are stereotyped as anti-social and lacking in business acumen. This is not true but it is just a stereotype. We emphasize calculations and equipment over the human side of things.

I think the solution to your dilemma is to start emphasizing the human side of your nature but leverage that with your engineering knowledge. Most business people would rather deal with a great humanist who has average engineering skills rather than a great engineer who has average humanist skills.

When you get along easily with people, it is easy to sell things to them.

 

[BRGENG]

Which sounds better, sales engineer, salesman or Professional Engineer.

If I was talking with someone at a industrial automation company, I would listen to the Professional engineer. Not the other two.

 

[jmw]

The reason we have sales people is that they are needed and do make a valuable contribution to the success of the company as do marketing types and even, dare I say it, managers (some of them).

The question here is should salesmen be called sales engineers and should engineers ever become salesmen?

People will tell you:
Salesmen sell things the company doesn't make and often can't make;
Engineers make things people don't want or which are too expensive.

These both have elements of truth and it is why companies depend on balancing different disciplines and different skills. Do not neglect a salesman's ability to provide essential technical information.... you don't have to be an electronics expert to sell a TV....just don't expect him to be able to design you a better TV.

The main reason why salesmen are not engineers (no matter what the title) is because there aren't enough engineers to go round, at least, not who also have sales skills but then, you don't need them for all sales, just for the few special cases and that is when you need an engineer or a salesman with access to engineering skills.

Whenever you ask a salesman a difficult engineering question or get him pout of his depth he is not lost because the company provides for that, it provides a number of specialists to provide sales support. These guys may well be engineers or merely better salesmen with specialised knowledge. In a well run company if the sale needs engineering skills they will be provided.

If every sale requires them then the company will necessarily have to recruit more carefully to provide those extra skills but in most cases selling, even by sales engineers, doesn't require engineering skills.

In some cases, more often than you might imagine, successfully selling relies on the clients own skills. It is not unusual for a refinery engineer to know more about the salesman's products and applications (in the refinery) than the salesman... and in which case all the salesman has to do is take the order and address any non-technical issues. The smart salesman is one who knows when he is dealing with a client who knows more than he does.



JMW

http://www.ViscoAnalyser.com