If you’re an entrepreneurial company selling to bigger companies, you need to understand how negotiating with procurement professionals really works. It’s vital that you understand their unique needs and how they are different from other stakeholders.
In this guide, I’ll break down the most common pitfalls of negotiating with procurement, the tactics to watch out for, the mistakes that are too often made, how you can prepare, and secure more profitable deals for your business. Every time.
To improve your deal conversion rate and get better outcomes, these are the key things you and your sales teams need to understand:
If you apply the tactics and lessons in this article, you’ll make better deals immediately and win more opportunities. I’ve refined these insights over hundreds of deals negotiated worth over £400m, with experience on both sides of the table.
Think back to a time when you were working on a big sales opportunity.
Does this scenario look familiar?
Hence, negotiating with procurement professionals is different. They are different personality types to your typical decision-maker. They have different objectives and very different ways of working. If you want to succeed at winning deals with bigger companies, you need to develop new strategies for dealing with Procurement stakeholders. It must become a standard part of your sales management process and sales training. If in doubt, find a sales coach to act as a sounding board.
I wrote this guide to help you understand the complexities of negotiating with Procurement professionals during a sales cycle. You can use it as a practical tool to re-frame your discussions with Procurement and get the outcome you want.
When you first meet -procurement professionals during a sales cycle, you will come across new challenges to getting a deal done. If you go in unprepared, you’ll quickly see the deal collapse. Or, you’ll walk out with a bad deal for you and, ultimately, the client.
What’s the problem? Procurement teams have a different agenda to the main person you are selling to. You need to see the world from their perspective in order to know how to deal with them.
Have you faced any of these problems when trying to get a deal through procurement during your sales negotiation?
Your first reaction is often outrage. What you do next and how you behave will have a significant impact on your success. To understand Procurement’s perspective, let’s look at the Procurement Success Equation©. These relate directly to the objectives of procurement in negotiation.
Let’s start by considering the question:
“What does success look like from the perspective of a Procurement Professional”?
The reality is: when a Procurement professional is negotiating a deal, they’re managing a number of complex variables – they’re not just being difficult for the sake of it.
The relative importance of each variable is different on every deal they negotiate.
Procurement’s objectives are to:
There is no simple, single answer to the question “What does success look like from the perspective of a Procurement Professional”? Like any other sales process, you need a clear value proposition when negotiating with procurement.
Later in the guide, you’ll learn how to work out what is really going on, and some insights about what you can do about it.
| Perception They only care about beating me up on price. | Perception They don’t care about innovation and creativity. | Perception The RFP is only used to beat up the incumbent supplier, we are never going to win. | Perception The T&Cs sent by Procurement are non-negotiable. |
| Reality This is untrue. It’s about how much they paid last year, how much is in their budget and how they can maximise ROI to the business. | Reality This is untrue. Innovation and creativity have been on the top 10 list of Procurement challenges for the last decade. | Reality This is untrue. There are easier ways to do this than run an RFP Process. | Reality This is untrue. There’s a secret no-one tells you… the schedules at the back of the Ts&Cs usually override the Master Agreement, so put your variations in there. |
So, next time you are frustrated with Procurement, take a breath and look at it from their point of view. The underlying issues are much more complex than it appears on the surface.
Whenever I negotiate a large deal, I always think about which levers I am going to use to get the deal done. These are the kinds of levers, or negotiation tactics that I think about for every deal:
Way before you meet me, I have multiple levers I have thought about to deliver the Procurement Success Equation©.
Imagine you’re down to the last two suppliers shortlisted for a piece of work. When you’re preparing to negotiate with procurement, these are some of the things to consider before engaging in the next round of discussions:
When preparing for your negotiation, have answers to all these questions in advance. If you have just received an RFP and not sure what to do, you can also use our Consultancy Support.
It would seem obvious that if you offer a reduction in your price, or you give the customer something for free, then it’s a saving, right? Unfortunately, this isn’t true. It’s certainly of value to your client’s Decision Maker, but it may not help Procurement deliver their objectives.
Here’s a simple example of different types of savings and what they really mean:
| Cost-Saving | Cost Avoidance | Value Proposition |
| Is this a contract renewal or re-negotiation with downwards price movement based upon like for like volumes? | Does the saving include a discount against a list price or standard rate card? | Does the negotiation include free additional licences? |
| Is this a contract termination with services delivered in a new way or service no longer required? | If we have no experience of buying this service (i.e. no baseline cost), then any savings will be “cost avoidance” | Are we being offered something that we didn’t have before for free? |
| Have we got a comparable, actual set of prices and volumes based on invoices? | Are we expecting a price increase from an existing supplier on an existing service and a reduction in the increase is achieved? If yes, this is “cost avoidance” | Are we being offered “free implementation support?” |
There’s a wealth of evidence that points to a direct improvement in business performance if negotiators are professionally trained. This chart is one of the most compelling indicators that “Organisations with high negotiation maturity post significant increases in net income”.
That’s why your clients train their negotiators, and that’s why you should too! If you want more information, have a look at our Negotiation Training Programmes.
In any negotiation, be it a business deal, buying a car or your relationships, there are common traits to the negotiation itself:
You need a framework to think through the negotiation and optimise success for all parties. This is particularly important in procurement negotiations as you are dealing with highly trained buyers.
Given all the negotiations I’ve been involved in, I’ve made some mistakes and learnt from them. These are some of the lessons learned:
This is by no means a comprehensive list. However, this, combined with “avoiding the common negotiating mistakes” is a good place to start planning your next negotiation:
When you’re at the negotiating table, you need to be aware of some common negotiation tactics used by trained professionals.
To recap, here are five essential steps you should take as part of the procurement negotiation process.
Five Steps For Successfully Negotiating with Procurement
What does a perfect deal look like for you and your company?
This will help you understand how they operate.
80% of your success will depend on your preparation. Define your negotiation strategy.
Ask open questions, listen actively, and work proactively to create win-win solutions.
This is important as they define what you will be measured against.
There is a famous saying “seek first to understand before being understood“. This is 100% true when dealing with Procurement professionals that you aren’t used to dealing with.
If you’re new to dealing with Procurement professionals, take on board the principles and ideas in this guide. It will demystify what Procurement really want and reduce any anxiety you may have about them.
Ultimately, understand your audience, know what they want and prepare before you engage in a meaningful negotiation with them.
I hope this guide has proved useful and debunked some of the myths about professional Procurement buyers. We are, after all, only human!
About the Author: Mike Lander
Mike Lander is a successful entrepreneur and expert negotiator, with a proven track record of buying, growing, and selling businesses for seven-figure sums.
He has a uniquely valuable perspective on negotiating commercial deals, having worked on both sides of the table as a Procurement Director and an entrepreneur.
He now uses his specialist knowledge and experience negotiating hundreds of deals worth £400m+ to empower leaders and sales teams to negotiate more profitable deals with procurement.
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