About this episode
If you’ve only sold sexy products with cool demos and unique features, you’re probably missing the fundamentals that separate good salespeople from great ones.
Marcus Chan, CEO of Venli Consulting and recent guest on the Sales Gravy podcast, learned to sell in the trenches of commoditized selling: uniforms, facility services, telecom. Industries where you’re locked in multi-year contract cycles, competing against five other vendors who offer the exact same thing, and selling at two to three times the market price.
“In order to get really, really good at selling in the commoditized market, where price seems to be the only factor… you have to learn how to get really good at the sales process,” Chan explains. “You have to be able to take someone who has what I call a latent pain—pain they don’t realize—get them to active and create urgency to move.”
No flash. No sizzle. Just selling.
And that’s exactly why it works.
The First-to-Market Delusion
Chan was talking with a client recently. They’ve closed $5 million in revenue in 12 months. Apple, Fortune 500 companies, massive wins. They’re first to market in a brand new category. Zero competitors.
Their sales team is flying high.
“That’s fantastic,” he told them. “Now what’s your plan for when competitors show up in three years?”
Silence.
Here’s what happens: you get drunk on the product. You don’t have to build real sales skills because the product does the heavy lifting. Then the market matures. Competitors launch. Your “unique” features become nothing new.
Most teams operate under the belief that they’re different. They talk about their proprietary technology, their best-in-class service, and their innovative approach. Meanwhile, buyers are looking at five vendors saying the exact same things.
This isn’t just true for uniforms and telecom. It’s true for SaaS, consulting, financial services. Any market that’s been around longer than 18 months gets commoditized fast.
The question isn’t whether you’re in a commoditized market. The question is whether you know how to sell when you are.
What Commoditized Selling Actually Teaches You
When Chan was selling uniforms at three times the competitor’s price to buyers locked into five-year contracts with other vendors, he had nothing to lean on except process.
He couldn’t say, “Look at this cool new feature.” The uniforms were uniforms. Same fabric. Same colors. Same everything.
He had to learn three skills most salespeople never develop:
