Selling the Proposal

Selling a water treatment program seldom happens quickly. It requires not only the correct products, services, and prices for the job, but also the buildup of a working relationship between the service company s field personnel and the buyer. 

The development of a prospective account toward an eventual sale usually follows a number of basic and identifiable steps, which can be taught in professional sales training classes. (Although, in practice, the sales sequence is seldom as smooth as the classroom lectures may make out.) All buyers have different needs and respond differently to sales calls. 

When selling cooling water programs, the sales sequence will certainly get bogged down and may totally fail unless a comprehensive and instructive survey of the cooling water system has been carried out. 

The survey takes considerable time and some cooperation between buyer and seller if it is to be of any genuine value and not merely a gesture to appease the field representative s selling efforts. There should be some good information produced from a survey, with identifiable benefits accruing to both buyer and seller, as a result. 

It is seldom possible, however, for the seller to proceed quickly to the next stage of the selling sequence, with a proposal in hand, merely because the survey phase has been completed. Rather, the results gleaned from 

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