What B2B sales means for service providers (and how it can increase your revenue)
Are you new to selling your own services as a coach/ consultant/ speaker/ trainer or done-for-you service provider?
Then you may have heard about creating a B2B revenue stream – but have no real idea about what that is (and you don’t want to ask publicly in case you look daft!)
I get it. When you arrive on the internet to sell your coaching/ consulting services, it’s easy to want to (and feel like you have to) appear like the expert in all things. Luckily that’s not actually true – and I’m here to help you understand all things B2B sales so that you don’t have to worry about asking ‘silly’ questions.
In this article, I’m going to answer all of the most common questions about selling your services in the B2B space including understanding what B2B sales actually is, knowing how to differentiate yourself in the marketplace and having a complete overview of what it really looks like to sell your services to corporate clients.
At the end of it, you should have a really clear idea of whether or not you want to break into the B2B sales space (and sign lots of fabulous corporate clients!)
What is B2B sales?
People often get caught up in their own definitions of B2B (business-to-business) sales or have pre-existing beliefs about what it looks like to sell coaching/ consulting or other services to corporate clients. But I always think that it’s good to have a clear definition to work from when you’re learning about a new topic.
B2B sales is simply sales from one company to another, rather than selling to an individual consumer. In other words, if you’ve just started a coaching/ consulting/ speaking or training business, you’ve likely seen a lot of paid advertising (thanks Meta!) that has encouraged you to sell to individuals and change their lives in some way.
B2B sales is about selling your services to organisations – where it’s most likely that the end-users of your services / the people who’ll benefit most from your expertise will be the employees themselves but the work is paid for by the company.
Now you’re probably wondering things like;
But isn’t it dull to sell to corporate companies?
Doesn’t it take ages to close a deal?
Do they really work with small providers over the ‘big-name’ firms?
Isn’t it much harder to sell to companies than to individuals?
And we’re going to explore some of that in this article. Because, in case you hadn’t guessed yet, I’m a huge B2B sales nerd… so I’m here to help you understand what the B2B world really looks like – and support you in making the decision to either sell to companies or to avoid it like any UK beach on a sunny day!
So, what is a corporate client and why should we be interested in selling to them?
Most of the entrepreneurs who come to me, have predetermined ideas about what it really means to ‘work with corporate clients’. Some service providers will have preconceived ideas about what a corporate client ‘really’ is… and I’m here to bust some myths.
The definition of a corporate / company is:
‘A company’ (Cambridge University Dictionary)
‘A commercial business’ (Oxford Dictionary)
(Not that helpful right?)
When we talk about corporate clients from a sales perspective, what we’re actually talking about is a legally recognised organisation that is separate from the founders and that has the intention to generate revenue for some purpose.
Often, entrepreneurs will make quick assumptions about what industries aren’t considered corporates. For example, people will often say that charities/ public sector organisations/ not-for-profit or third sector organisations aren’t corporates. And whilst they technically do not operate in a ‘for profit’ way… the sales process to engage with them is exactly the same because as companies in their own right, they require a B2B sales process, rather than a B2C (business to consumer) process.
So, what types of industries are commonly thought of as target corporate clients?
- Technology (including SaaS, wearable technology, streaming and cyber security)
- Healthcare (traditionally private sector healthcare, pharmaceutical, supplement businesses)
- Public Sector (including public sector healthcare, government departments, front-line service providers such as the police force or publicly owned travel organisations)
- Not-for-Profit/ Third Sector (including charities, membership organisations/ associations, educational institutions)
- Financial Services (traditionally banking, hedge funds, asset management, wealth management and can include insurance companies)
- Retail (Yep… everything on the high street but can also include e commerce environments)
However, there are hundreds of different industries that get far more niche. My own B2B sales training consultancy for example; we specialise in supporting sports organisations with a particular focus on sports technology companies… so it can get super niche.
Which brings me onto another key B2B sales myth; that there will be one industry that will be more profitable than any other to sell to.
Whilst it’s tempting to imagine that you’ll make far more sales/ money in an easier way if you can just sell to the ‘right’ industry or worse, sell to all industries… I promise that you won’t.
(And after successfully training over 20,000 people in the last ten years? I know a thing or two about successful niching!)
In fact, I spent a good thirty minutes talking about whether or not there’s a ‘money-making niche’ that would be best for coaches/ consultants/ speakers and trainers to target. Click here if you want to take a listen (and hear more about other industries that you could start looking at!)
Do large companies really buy from small businesses?
When you start your own business, you’ll come across a lot of myths about selling your services (and not just when you’re considering selling them to corporate clients!) but the biggest one is often that large companies just won’t buy from small businesses and honestly?
It’s complete and utter rubbish.
(Probably made up by huge companies who don’t want epic experts stealing their business!)
Here’s the thing, there are lots of small businesses who have successfully sold to corporate organisations for years… and I myself teach hundreds of entrepreneurs each year, how to do best practice B2B sales through my accredited self-paced course, The C Suite ®.
And despite public perception, there are a number of really important reasons that organisations like to work with smaller providers, particularly in the coaching/ consulting/ speaking/ training and done-for-you service areas.
- Large companies aren’t as agile as smaller providers: Which means they’re often restricted to the services that they can offer and the ways of working that they already have. Smaller providers can customise and tailor their services to create better experiences and outcomes for the companies that they work with.
- Paying for genuine expertise: When a company pays a large organisation to come in and offer consulting/ coaching or other services, they’re not just paying for the expertise of the coach/ consultant who comes in. They’re also paying for that organisation’s branding, for their large offices in cities around the world, for their graduate training programmes and more. And often, the person who shows up to deliver the services is a graduate, fresh out of the training programme, rather than an experienced service provider.
- Customer care: Large organisations aren’t able to build the personal relationships with their customers that smaller providers are. Usually, there’ll be a large sales / account management team responsible – and if their usual salesperson or account manager moves on? It can be hard to get in touch/ raise issues or get support to embark on new projects whereas smaller providers have the ability to control their customer care process and make every client feel valued without the constant churn of a large sales team.
*Yes… if you’ve ever worked for a corporate company as an employee, you’ll recognise these immediately!
There are also certain rules and regulations that mean it’s much easier for organisations to work with small providers – and in the UK, our government even has targets to use smaller providers on key projects and programmes to provide higher levels of expertise, customer service and to change the economy.
On top of that, it’s well-known that companies pay much more than individual consumers for services. So when small businesses are working with organisations, they’ll typically see that they’re able to charge and get paid 5 X more than working with individual consumers and see much more flexibility in their business working hours.
For example, one of my clients Julie went from trying to sell her 1:1 menopause coaching services to women suffering with menopause symptoms – and found that despite having over 1500 women inside a Facebook Community where they talked about wanting help and support, that it was so difficult to actually sell them any useful services. Instead, she started to sell menopause training and consultancy to organisations who were wowed by the impact that she could make for their employees. Within 6 weeks, she’d signed her first corporate client and five years on? She’s one of the UK’s leading menopause training experts, works with huge organisations and has even facilitated panel discussions and change for organisations like the House of Lords and Coca-Cola… all whilst taking 6-9 weeks off each year to spend time with her family and enjoy clear work/ life balance.
What types of businesses can sell to corporate clients?
So, now we all know that selling to companies can be done by small providers and that there are some clear benefits (like more money, fewer payment issues and the opportunity for more flexibility in your work/ life balance) but… who can actually successfully sell to corporate clients?
Honestly, the world has changed a lot since the start of my sales career and companies are prioritising areas that I never thought we’d see. So the simple answer to this is that anyone can sell to corporate clients – but the common categories tend to be:
- Coaches: Executive coaches/ career coaches/ life coaches/ health coaches and more
- Consultants: In traditional areas like change management/ transformation/ communications/ HR but also newer specialisms like branding/ leadership/ health and wellness.
- Speakers: Keynote speakers both in-person and virtual on a huge variety of topics.
- Trainers: In traditional areas like sales/ marketing/ learning and development and also newer specialisms like social media and wellness.
- Done-For-You service providers: In traditional areas like web design/ personal or virtual assistance services/ finance services (like bookkeeping) but also newer specialities like podcast production/ video production/ graphic design and policy creation.
For example, I’ve got clients inside The C Suite ® who are selling services like;
- ADHD / Neurodiversity awareness and coaching
- Self promotion and visibility for female employees
- Menopause training and awareness
- DEI (diversity, equity and inclusion) consulting
- Performance coaching
- Fertility support
- Communications support / consultancy
- Project Management/ business analysis services
- Recruitment/ Redundancy support
- Employee engagement surveys
- Mental Health coaching/ awareness/ first aider training
- Podcast and video production
- PowerPoint trainer
- Presentation expert
- Spiritual healing and support
And a whole lot more.
So if you are a coach, consultant, speaker, trainer or done-for-you service provider that has thought about selling to corporate clients but has put it off because you’re not sure whether or not they’d buy?
Take comfort in this list – because it’s by no means exhaustive and corporate clients are a lot more open-minded than you’d imagine.
What does a B2B sales process look like?
So far, we’ve looked at what’s possible if you’re thinking about selling to corporate clients – and hopefully your brain is already buzzing with potential ideas! But you might be getting caught up in ideas for offers and services without thinking about the thing that scuppers most small business owners who want to sell their services to corporate clients;
Their B2B sales process. Or lack of one.
Now, I’ve been in sales for over 18 years… I’m a relative dinosaur at this point. I’ve also been fortunate through my career to train thousands of people in over 15 countries and there’s a common theme.
Most people don’t understand how sales works.
And most people (including professional salespeople) don’t operate with a clear sales process.
Which means that most people are not as successful as they’d like to be at generating corporate clients or increasing their revenue.
But – we don’t know what we don’t know. So if you’re getting all excited about the prospect of selling to corporate clients but have no idea how?
It’s honestly much simpler than you might think.
In fact, I recorded a really popular (as in, over 500 people signed up to watch it live!) training on the exact five step sales process that I developed over ten years ago and that our clients have successfully used to generate significant revenue in their own businesses.
You can watch the webinar just here.
It outlines each of the five stages of my best practice Selling to Corporate ® framework and shares clear examples from our clients who’ve implemented each piece so that you can;
- Troubleshoot your existing B2B sales process if you’re already trying to sell to corporate clients without success
- Understand exactly what you need to put in place in order to sell to corporate companies in 1-2 hours per week
- Learn from the mistakes our clients made before they started using the Selling to Corporate ® framework so that you don’t end up facing those obstacles.
- Hear from case study clients who’ve used the framework to make their first sale, have their first 100K month and who’ve worked with some of the worlds largest brands.
Take a watch by clicking here.
Hopefully after our time together today, you now understand exactly what B2B sales means for service providers – and you’ve got to the point where you can make a decision about whether or not you want to sell to corporate clients. But if you still have questions? Hit me up on LinkedIn and let me know what your particular B2B sales challenges are and I can recommend other free resources that would most benefit where you currently are in your B2B sales journey.
You can find me on LinkedIn by clicking here.
And the final thing that you definitely must do if you’re now interested in selling your services to corporate clients? Is watch that free webinar on the five step framework that I teach. There’s no point in developing bad sales habits – just give up an hour of your time and do things the right way from the beginning!