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Think! Inc. - business negotiation, redefined

Corporate Negotiation Turns About-Face: Trend Indicates Art of Winning Deals Becoming a Science

Global Businesses Adopting Rational Negotiation Systems to Dramatically Increase Corporate Selling Power

CHICAGO – Businesses across the globe utilize more complex, systematic sales processes than one can count. And yet, when it comes down to the final negotiation, sales teams often shoot from the hip, relying on situation-dependent tactics or the personal talents of an individual negotiator. However, big businesses are finally making the move to more sophisticated methods, switching from the art of negotiation to the science of deal making, according to Brian Dietmeyer, founder and president of Think! Inc., a progressive business negotiation firm, and author of Strategic Negotiation.

“While professional sales people often are aware they need a proficient approach to negotiation, many resign themselves to the belief there’s nothing they can do,” stated Dietmeyer. “However, Fortune 1000 sales teams are beginning to take the reins and radically change the sales landscape by building and integrating an internal negotiation blueprint that will easily travel from sales opportunity to sales opportunity and help them win deals.”

What do these companies know that others don’t? While each negotiation may be different, all negotiations follow similar patterns. Whether a company is selling tires in Ohio or computer hardware in Nepal, there is a blueprint that can be utilized during the negotiation. This trend toward systematic deal making is wiping away the simplistic viewpoint of negotiation and creating a street savvy approach.

“Strategic negotiation allows us to think further and deeper into our accounts, expanding the value proposition we bring to the table. Before, we would give items away during negotiation. Now, we find common elements we share with our customers and present trade opportunities,” commented Brian Graham, senior vice president of enterprise and staffing sales for Monster.com. “By focusing on the shared elements, we are producing better deals for both Monster.com and our customers. And in the end, not only are our customers happy, but we develop an even deeper and solidified partnership with them.”

“In the course of our consulting, we see people involved in very complicated negotiations that include a variety of different items, such as price, length of agreement, service, payment terms, legal terms, volume and so on,” said Dietmeyer. “Before the concept of negotiation blueprinting infiltrated some of these organizations, they often had a limited view of their customer’s needs. When we asked them what negotiation was about, they would often just say price.”

Sales professionals only need to answer two simple questions to create an effective blueprint, according to Dietmeyer. First, what happens to both parties if they don’t come to an agreement? Second, what are the likely terms if both parties do agree?

Although the solution may sound simple, constructing the negotiation process can be complex. By examining what would happen if the businesses do not come to an agreement, sales professionals garner impressive insight into all of the facets of the negotiation, not just the surface issues such as price. From there, they can safely predict the specific terms their client will want and prepare to trade against those terms to secure a better deal, ultimately creating a win-win for both parties.

About Think!

Think! Inc., headquartered in Chicago, Illinois, delivers high-performance negotiation systems to optimize the sophisticated sales processes of Fortune 1000 companies. Through strategic negotiation, Think! helps companies align their deal-making initiatives with their corporate goals. In addition, the process of strategic negotiation helps businesses understand negotiation from both the buyer and seller’s perspective, as well as act on that understanding to integrate negotiation more fully into the sales process, helping all sides achieve an agreeable outcome. Think!’s clients include Federal Express, Monster, Ryder, Honeywell, Coke, Microsoft, Johnson & Johnson and Lucent Technologies. For more information, visit www.e-thinkinc.com.

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