Is your sales or customer success team struggling to prove ROI to customers? If so, you’re not alone.
Today’s buyers demand data-driven proof of a solution’s impact before making purchasing decisions. Transitioning to value-based selling requires more than product features or projected ROI; it demands concrete evidence, case studies, and testimonials validating business value.
However, implementing value-based selling is easier said than done. Organizations face several key challenges when trying to execute this approach effectively:
Key Challenges in Value-Based Selling
1. Collecting and Utilizing Value Data
As someone who has built and implemented a value realization program, I understand the difficulty of gathering and leveraging value data. Unlike traditional sales, where product features take center stage, value realization requires:
- Strategic planning
- Data collection from real-world usage
- In-depth analysis
- Storytelling to convey impact
Value realization happens at the end of a journey, meaning organizations must work closely with customers throughout their lifecycle to track and demonstrate tangible benefits.
2. Data Fragmentation Across Systems
Even when organizations establish the right processes, another major obstacle is where to store, update, and extract value-related data. Most companies struggle with:
- Scattered data across multiple teams and tools
- Disorganized document management systems
- Lack of integration between CRMs, customer management platforms (e.g., Gainsight, ChurnZero), and marketing automation tools (e.g., Marketo, HubSpot)
Without a centralized approach, sales and customer success teams waste valuable time searching for data instead of using it to drive customer engagement.
3. Creating Effective Business Review Reports
Another major hurdle is generating Quarterly Business Review (QBR) and sales presentation reports. These reports are essential for demonstrating ROI but are often:
- Time-consuming to prepare
- Difficult to format in a compelling way
- Dependent on specialized skills that only a few team members possess
Organizations struggle to communicate value effectively without efficient tools, limiting their ability to strengthen customer relationships and close deals.
Finding a Solution: How ValueCore Helps
To address these challenges, I explored different solutions and discovered ValueCore. After collaborating with their team, I saw firsthand how their platform streamlines the entire Customer Value Management (CVM) process, enabling organizations to manage value realization in a single, integrated tool.
Here’s how we structured our business process using ValueCore:
1. Guided Discovery Sessions
Sales teams conduct structured sessions to identify and document opportunities that deliver value to the customer. This ensures that customer goals are well understood from the start.
2. Setting SMART Objectives
We define Specific, Measurable, Achievable, Relevant, and Time-bound (SMART) objectives based on the customer’s business goals. This aligns expectations and ensures clarity on desired outcomes.
3. Month-to-Month Tracking
Teams can provide tangible proof of progress and impact by continuously capturing and analyzing data. This eliminates guesswork and allows real-time visibility into the value being delivered.
4. Automated Value-Based Reports for Business Reviews
Instead of spending hours manually preparing QBRs and sales reports, ValueCore’s platform automates the process. It generates professional reports that clearly present business outcomes, ROI, and key performance metrics, making it easier to showcase impact during meetings.
Conclusion
If your team struggles to showcase ROI and prove business impact, it’s time to rethink your approach. Implementing a centralized, data-driven Customer Value Management process with tools like ValueCore can help overcome the challenges of value-based selling, leading to better customer relationships, higher retention, and increased sales success.
