PE M&A Activity ↑12.4%│ Industrial EBITDA Multiples 7.2×│ B2B Buyer Trust Index ↓31%│ SEO Click-Through Rate ↓44%│ LMM Deal Volume ↑8.1%│ Sales Hire Failure Rate 67%│ Organic Growth Gap 2.3× plan│ PE Dry Powder $2.59T│ PRESS: Ed Marsh at PE Operating Partners Summit│ DEAL: Midwest controls automation acquired at 7.8×│ PE M&A Activity ↑12.4%│ Industrial EBITDA Multiples 7.2×│ B2B Buyer Trust Index ↓31%│ SEO Click-Through Rate ↓44%│ LMM Deal Volume ↑8.1%│ Sales Hire Failure Rate 67%│ Organic Growth Gap 2.3× plan│ PE Dry Powder $2.59T│ PRESS: Ed Marsh at PE Operating Partners Summit│ DEAL: Midwest controls automation acquired at 7.8×│

Five Buying Decisions in Machinery

Complex sales is hard and getting harder. The key to winning is understanding how buying decisions are actually made — and hiring reps who can sell.

Ed Marsh
Ed Marsh
INDUSTRIAL REVENUE GROWTH
5 MIN READ

Complex sales reps in industries like capital equipment and machinery, enterprise software, and high-value business services often focus on a decision that has nothing to do with whether a project actually happens. They focus, as they're trained to, on the technical features, capabilities, and specifications of their product or service. 

They meet with technical buyers whose job is to vet exactly those details — so they're asked the questions they love to answer. They talk about their stuff. That's a problem.

Not that they're technical experts. In specialized, scientific, and highly technical industries, buyers expect deep expertise and hesitate to trust a vendor who can't clear that bar. It's common in capital equipment sales and conceptual business services to hear buyers say that talking to sales reps simply wastes their time.

The problem is that the technical details normally figure in the last of the important buying decisions — the fifth. That fifth decision is vendor selection. And fighting to win vendor selection while ignoring the real buying need is exactly what produces the epidemic of deals that end in "no decision."

"Fighting to win the vendor selection while ignoring the real buying need is what produces the epidemic of deals that end in no decision."— Ed Marsh

The five decisions, in the order they actually happen

Most complex industrial purchases have to clear five separate hurdles before a vendor is ever chosen. Sales teams and marketing departments pour their energy into the last one — endless talk about what they make and do — while the decisions that determine whether a purchase happens at all go unseen.

Here's the part that matters most. Participating meaningfully in the second and third decisions doesn't just win more deals and head off "no decision" — it's the key to differentiating your company in a market where most products and services are, honestly, good enough.
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KEY TAKEAWAYS
  • Most complex industrial purchases must clear five separate buying decisions.
  • Decisions 2 and 3 determine whether a purchase happens at all — and most reps don't know they exist.
  • Most big-ticket B2B industrial forecasts are fantasies because they ignore those decisions.
  • Buying teams typically include eight to twelve people.
  • Reps need business acumen — not just product knowledge — to engage decision-makers early.
Ed Marsh
Ed Marsh
Ed was going to be an architect because he loved the nexus of engineering and design. That was before was going to be an engineer; before he graduated from Johns Hopkins; before he was an Army Infantry Officer (Airborne Ranger); before he set B2B industrial sales records; before he was partners with a German capital equipment manufacturer; before he founded a distribution/rep company for industrial products in India; until he decided that managing a business and employees wasn’t what he enjoyed. Now that Ed’s got all of that out of his system he runs a consultancy that helps US manufacturing companies grow by applying process excellence to business development – completing the full circle back to an engineering & design combination. His practice is built on a unique methodology which combines powerful digital marketing methodologies (a HubSpot partner) with his extensive international biz dev experience.
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