LETTER ULYSSES GRANT AND ROBERT LEE

--Enable staff headcount reductions? Does it allow your customer to make headcount reductions in staff or support personnel?

--Avoid impending or predicable expenses? Does it help avoid expenses altogether?

--Increase their products' and services' perceived value. Does it increase the perceived value of your customer's offering?

--Increase productivity? Does it increase your customer's productivity or the productivity of his staff? Does it increase manufacturing production or throughput?

--Give them greater control? Does it offer some way for your customer to track results, lead generation, sales, profitability, productivity, or any other key success factor?

• Next, review the list and for each of the ways you create value, figure what each is worth. This could be in terms of absolute amounts of money, some percentage of revenues, or some percentage of expense reduction.
• Create proof for each of your value assertions. Proof can be in the form of worksheets, testimonials, case studies, success stories, printed statements, even survey results.
• Add up each of the value elements to come up with a total value, combining earnings and savings into one number. Again, the total value can be an absolute money number, such as $645,000, or it can be a percentage of sales.

Lastly, calculate your return on investment by comparing the total value to the cost of your product. You may come up with either an ROI (return on investment) or a "payback period." Either way, you've quantified your product's value in concrete terms, justified your price, and made it far, far easier for your prospects to make a buying decision.

• Success Story.

One of our clients sells enterprise software in the $150,000 to $250,000 zone. After 9/11, their sales cycle began to get longer and longer and stretched out as much as eighteen months, with most prospective deals ending in "no decision." Prospects knew they needed to replace their old software, but they simply couldn't justify the expense in a no-growth economic climate.