Want to Sell More? Help Buyers Agree With Themselves First.

I’ve sold through some tough markets—after the dot-com crash in 2001 and during the Great Recession in 2008, when I launched Menemsha Group.

If there’s one thing I learned from those experiences, it’s this:

Risk aversion is high.

Companies don’t just avoid risk—they avoid change.

Even when they know the status quo is costing them, they’d rather do nothing than take a chance on something that could help them win big.

Why?

Because no one wants to be the one who approves something new if it fails.

A significant loss caused by someone who tried something new is far worse than a loss created by sticking with the way things have always been done. Over time, employees internalize the art of avoiding failure more than pursuing innovation. 

And that means your biggest sales challenge today isn’t competition.  It’s fighting the status quo.

To win in this environment, you must do more than find pain—you must frame a problem worth solving, align the buying team around that problem, and prove your solution is safer and more cost-effective than doing nothing.

Step 1: Find a Problem That’s Already Costing the Business

Start with pain that’s already happening: missed financial targets, manual workarounds, technical debt, low adoption, resistance to change, poor morale, burnout.

Don’t stop at the surface—ask questions that uncover the root cause.

• “What happens if you do nothing?”
•  “Who else feels the impact of this?”
•  “What changed that made this an issue now?”

Step 3: Align the Buying Team Around the Problem

Most deals die not because a competitor wins—but because the customer sticks with the status quo. That’s a failure of alignment, not persuasion.
Here’s how to align the team:

• Interview multiple stakeholders. Get different perspectives on the same issue.
• Write a simple problem statement.

 “Despite trying [X], we still can’t [achieve Y] because of [Z].”

Validate it. Ask each stakeholder, “Does this reflect your perspective?”

Co-create the narrative. Share it back in a collaborative doc or slide deck. People champion what they help build.

When at least three stakeholders agree that the problem is real, urgent, and worth solving—you’re no longer selling. You’re leading an internal alignment process.

Why Framing Matters More Than Pitching

Product knowledge, objection handling, and demos still matter. But they don’t move deals forward if the buyer isn’t internally aligned.

A well-framed problem defines what type of solution the customer will see as a fit.
Frame it poorly, and you’ll lose later—no matter how good your offer is.

What Top Sellers Do Differently

Top sellers don’t chase interest—they create consensus.  They help buyers see that doing nothing is the riskiest move of all.  They guide the buying team to define, document, and agree on a shared problem statement. Once that’s done, the rest of the sales process flows naturally.

When you master the art of finding and framing problems, every discovery call becomes a catalyst for change—not a Q&A session.

Final Thought
In uncertain times, customers don’t need another vendor who can “solve problems.”
They need a partner who can help them see their problems clearly—and align their organization around solving them.  That’s not just selling. That’s leadership.