How to Sell HR Software Pt. 1

Why is it tough selling HR software? 

Overall, I think the one issue that makes selling HR software so hard is that the people we are selling to are usually not the ones who have the ability to approve the final purchase. With other types of sales you are selling to the individual who can make the final purchase decision. HR sales don’t work that way. HR has the need so, ultimately, you sell to them and then they sell the solution to someone else. 

Numerous HR sales managers will disagree with me on this concept but I am basing my opinion on 15 years of experience with selling these systems. At some point, you will work for a sales manager who will insist that you try and involve the purchase decision makers in the process. This is a little bit of a dangerous road. If you are able to contact the decision maker directly, they will likely tell you that it’s HR’s decision so your contact is with them. Or it is likely that you may tick off HR by going behind their back to the decision maker. Be careful with this process. My approach was to work directly with HR and ask HR if those making the final purchase decision wanted to be involved in the process or the demo, but rarely did they want to be involved. Instead, the vast majority of time I worked directly with HR on the process and then worked to assist them with justifying the decision to upper management. 

I recently received a comment from a HR sales rep that said the problem with some of the leads he was receiving was that many of the contacts were low level HR people. It’s important to note that this person’s background was mostly in payroll sales as opposed to HR. The two work differently. With payroll, it may be the decision maker driving the purchase but with HR only systems, that is rarely going to be the case. My advice to this individual would be that there are no “low level HR people” in this process. The HR assistant did not decide to go investigate these systems on their own. It is likely that the HR assistant was asked to start the process by the head of HR who then, will likely become more involved when it comes to later stages of the process or the demo. 

Getting the approval for an HR software system also depends on how valuable HR is perceived to be by those holding the purse strings. If upper management believes that HR is important for meeting future organizational goals, then the system has a better chance of getting approval than if upper management believes HR is mostly a clerical position or more of a cost center than a revenue center. How do you tell the difference? If you are dealing with a HR professional who has a degree and is certified, you are more than likely dealing with an organization who believes in the value of HR. If you perform an on-site demo, see how well the HR department is staffed. The national average is one HR person for every 100 employees. If you have two HR people in a five hundred employee company, that organization may not see much value in HR. If they did, they probably would have already invested in additional HR resources.