Last week, I had the privilege of speaking at the Web 2.0 Summit in San Francisco (more on that here, my presentation here). And with the leading-edge thinkers and builders of the latest Web 2.0 technologies in attendance, it might be hard to get an interesting conversation going about selling in a collaborative world.

But there was a very interesting conversation that started as I laid out the themes for Sales 2.0. As I talked about how sales reps, managers and organizations had to change to adapt to a new type of buyer, someone asked me: “what about Buyer 2.0 – is that new type of buyer here yet?”

You might imagine that my short answer was “yes!” and in fact I think buyers have already made the shift to a 2.0 world. In fact, I think that’s what all of the Web 2.0 technology has allowed to happen (among many other things, of course).

So what has changed? One key change is buyers are more educated:

It used to be that an on-site visit from a sales rep involved that rep educating the buyer on the product, the market, the options, and creating an atmosphere where the buyer learned everything from the rep, and therefore according to that reps bias. The goal for the rep was to get the buyer educated and convinced before the competition could re-educate her

Now, buyers do their homework. It’s so much easier to find basic product information on the web. And not just product information. Market information. Information about the issues around this kind of product, this vendor’s product and all of the alternatives. The business problems it solves – and doesn’t solve.

Buyers are joining communities and talking about their issues with products – good and bad. What works and what doesn’t. Which vendors are good, and which to stay away from. 

And all of this is just as true for small consumer packaged goods as it is for the most sophisticated enterprise software

(By the way: Don’t think you’ve ever joined a community – other than this one? Have you ever posted a review of a book on Amazon.com? Or even read the collective reviews of others? Then you’ve participated or benefitted from a community)

The point is that when the buyer and the sales rep meet for the first time, the buyer now comes armed with questions, issues, challenges and more, and now demands that the sales rep be prepared to answer the challenges, to explain the business impact of the purchase (license, subscription, etc.) and be prepared to answer for not only her own company’s history, but all about the competition as well.

And if the rep doesn’t, the buyer feels like their being treated as though they are stupid. Not really a recipe for success.

That’s “Buyer 2.0”

The question that I pose when I talk about Sales 2.0 is: “Are you ready to sell to Buyer 2.0?”