Amongst all the business books I read, I also read sales books. 😜

It’s strange isn’t it, how selling has this icky reputation. Even to the point that people will avoid writing positive things on their own CV for fear that they come across like they are selling themselves!

This week I finished the excellent book “Demand-Side Sales 101: Stop Selling and Help Your Customers Make Progress” by Bob Moesta and Greg Engle. The book offers a clear explanation of how to utilise my all time favourite sales methodology “Jobs to be Done” (JTBD).

Developed by the renowned Harvard Business School professor Clayton Christensen, JTBD is about mapping out the journey (and literal time line) from the point a person decides they might have a problem to solve; how they then select a product to resolve that problem; and how they use the product or service.

I witnessed first-hand the power of JTBD when a flagship product at a former company failed, and no one could figure out why. JTBD provided the clear answer, but no one wanted to know about it!

My two favourite effects of the methodology are:

First, it reveals that products in the same category don’t always compete with each other. My favourite example of this in “Demand-Side Sales 101” was that Snickers doesn’t compete with chocolates like MilkyWay; it competes with energy drinks. Once Mars understood this, their new marketing campaign for Snickers (“You’re not yourself when you’re hungry”) led to tremendous sales gains.

Second, JTBD allows you to identify moments of customer anxiety and eliminate them. Addressing these pain points has a bigger impact on sales than simply touting a product’s features and benefits. One example shared in the book is how a home builder saw significant gains after they stopped selling features like marble kitchens and instead focused on helping people get over the anxiety of downsizing their belongings – something that would not traditionally be considered the home builders’ problem.

Ultimately, JTBD reframes the goal of selling as helping customers make progress on a problem instead. The book “Demand-Side Sales 101” is an excellent introduction to the theory and comes highly recommended. 👍