How Customer Champions Can Be Your Secret Weapon to Skyrocket Sales

As a salesperson, you‘re always looking for an edge – that special something that lets you break through the noise, forge real connections, and ultimately close more deals.

Sometimes that edge comes in the form of a perfect pitch or a particularly persuasive case study. But often, the most powerful selling happens when you‘re not even in the room. That‘s the magic of customer champions.

What is a Customer Champion?

A customer champion is someone within a prospective or current customer organization who believes in your product or service and is willing to advocate for it internally. They‘ve experienced the value firsthand, or have done their research and concluded that your offering is the best solution for their company‘s needs.

Champions come in a few distinct flavors:

• Users: These are the people who will actually be using your product day-to-day. They care about features, ease-of-use, and how your solution will make their lives easier.

• Mobilizers: These champions are often power users who coach others on how to get the most out of your product. They‘re always looking for new ways to drive adoption and value.

• Influencers: These are the people with clout within their organization. They may not use your product directly, but they have the ear of decision makers and can sway opinions.

The best champions often blend elements of all three types. They have the hands-on experience to speak credibly about your product, the passion to rally others, and the influence to make decision makers listen.

The Power of Customer Champions, By the Numbers

Just how powerful can customer champions be? Let‘s look at some data:

• 84% of B2B decision makers start the buying process with a referral (Source: Heinz Marketing)
• Advocates are 2-3x more effective than non-advocates at persuading others (Source: Zuberance)
• Leads generated by advocates convert at a 4-10x higher rate (Source: Influitive)
• Advocates spend 2x more than average customers (Source: Bain & Company)

In short, champions can help you close more deals, close them faster, and maximize their value. They cut through the skepticism and distrust that often greets traditional sales and marketing tactics.

But how exactly do they do it? Here are 10 ways customer champions put their superpowers to work throughout the sales cycle and beyond:

During the Sale

1. Penetrating the Inner Sanctum

One of the biggest challenges in B2B sales is simply getting in front of the right people. Decision makers are busy, and they‘re often shielded by layers of gatekeepers and naysayers.

A well-placed champion can be your secret passage into the inner sanctum. They can not only connect you with decision makers, but provide invaluable context about their needs, preferences and pain points.

According to CEB, the average B2B decision making group includes 6.8 stakeholders. A champion can be your sherpa to navigate that treacherous terrain, making sure your message resonates with each stakeholder along the way.

2. Shaping the Evaluation Criteria

When a company sets out to make a purchase, they‘ll often define a set of criteria to evaluate the options. This is where champions really flex their muscles.

Because they‘re bought into your solution, they can ensure the evaluation criteria play to your strengths. Let‘s say you offer a marketing automation platform that stands out for its ease-of-use. Your champion can push for user experience to be a heavily weighted factor.

By the time you enter the picture, the game is already half won. You‘re not just another vendor trying to check the boxes – you‘re the clear frontrunner in the criteria that matter most.

3. Guiding You Through the Maze

Large organizations can have byzantine purchasing processes, with multiple levels of approval and sign-off required. It‘s like a high-stakes game of chutes and ladders, and one wrong move can send you right back to square one.

A good champion acts as your game board, helping you plot the most efficient path to a closed deal. They can identify the key stakeholders you need to win over, and in what order.

They can also alert you to potential roadblocks or competing priorities that could derail the deal, so you can proactively strategize to overcome them. With a champion as your guide, you can navigate the maze with confidence.

4. Putting Points on the Board

When it comes time for the buying group to evaluate their options, you want your champion suited up and on the field.

They can speak to how your product has driven real results in their world – increasing efficiency, cutting costs, boosting revenue. Those hard numbers hit differently coming from an internal voice.

Your champion can also run interference if concerns or objections bubble up, providing critical context and counterpoints. They can frame your product as more than just another line item, but as a strategic investment in the company‘s success.

5. Building the Business Case

Ultimately, every B2B purchase comes down to ROI. What‘s the financial case for making this investment now?

Building that case requires access to internal data points – things like current spend, headcount allocated to the problem, missed opportunity costs. External vendors often struggle to get this information.

But a champion can be your data detective to uncover the numbers you need. They can also pressure test assumptions and help you refine the case to be as compelling as possible to decision makers.

Have you ever submitted a proposal, only to have it picked apart by finance? A champion helps you bullet proof your business case to withstand that scrutiny from the start.

6. Neutralizing the Competition

Unless you‘re incredibly lucky, your deal isn‘t happening in a vacuum. Your competitors are out there, and you better believe they‘re trying to install their own champions to tilt the playing field.

But by aligning early and often with your champion, you can fortify your position and box out the competition. That starts with the evaluation criteria and business case. It‘s much harder for a competitor to change the rules of the game after they‘ve been set.

Your champion can also run recon on the other options being considered. They can flag where competitors are applying pressure or exploiting perceived weaknesses, so you can adjust your strategy and messaging.

Think of your champion as your eyes and ears – they can alert you to flank attacks and give you the intel to win the battle.

After the Sale

Closing the initial deal is a major milestone worth celebrating. But for complex B2B solutions, it‘s really just the beginning of the customer journey. To drive maximum retention and growth, you need champions more than ever.

7. Driving Widespread Adoption

Change is hard. Even when an organization invests in a new solution, there can be a lag as teams struggle to adopt new workflows and let go of old habits.

A champion acts as an internal evangelist to drive adoption. They understand the downstream benefits and can rally their colleagues around the "why."

For resisters, they can listen to concerns and either address them head on or escalate to your customer success team. They‘re the rising tide that lifts all boats and helps your product take root throughout the organization.

8. Expanding Into New Use Cases

A champion achieved that status because they saw the full potential in your product from the start. Where others saw a point solution for a specific pain, they envisioned broad, transformative impact.

That visionary mindset helps them spot opportunities to expand usage into new teams and use cases. They‘re always thinking "who else can benefit from this? What other problems can it solve?"

Every new use case is a chance to deliver more value, and to grow your footprint in the account. A champion is your pathfinder to turn a small initial deal into a flourishing partnership.

9. Sourcing Glowing Reviews and Referrals

When your champion starts seeing real results, they usually can‘t wait to tell the world. They‘ll happily provide glowing reviews and serve as a customer reference.

And since they likely know other folks in similar roles at peer companies, they can also open doors to new accounts. A full 91% of B2B buyers are influenced by word-of-mouth when making buying decisions (Source: USM).

One champion success story can sow the seeds for dozens of new opportunities. But it‘s up to you to harvest that potential with a formalized advocacy program that makes referring easy and rewarding.

10. Becoming Your Biggest Defender

Even after you‘ve become embedded in an organization, you can bet competitors will keep sniffing around, looking for any opportunity to plant doubt.

A champion acts as your loyal defender. They‘ll shut down any "grass is greener" discussions and continually remind colleagues of the value you‘ve delivered.

If issues do come up (as they inevitably will), a champion gives you the benefit of the doubt and partners to find solutions, rather than using it as an excuse to reconsider the relationship.

That loyalty isn‘t just personally gratifying – it has major financial implications. Increasing customer retention by just 5% can boost profits anywhere from 25-95% (Source: Bain & Company).

Finding (and Keeping) Your Champions

All this is not to suggest that champions just magically appear. Like any relationship, it takes work to build trust and alignment. Some key tips:

• Be generous with your expertise. Freely share relevant content, best practices, and honest advice. Show that you‘re invested in their success, whether they buy or not.

• Co-create the future. Champions want to feel ownership over the solution and its impact. Loop them in early for input on things like implementation, rollout and success metrics.

• Make them the hero. Find ways to celebrate and elevate your champion both internally and externally. Help them get recognized for the results they‘ve driven.

• Keep the spark alive. The relationship doesn‘t end when the contract is signed. Keep finding ways to add value and make your champion look good long after the sale.

And remember, not every champion is created equal. 80% of your future profits will come from just 20% of your existing customers (Source: Gartner).

Focus your efforts on those champions who have the passion, influence and success potential to truly move the needle for your business.

Unleash Your Champion Network

In the end, champions can‘t replace the need for a top-notch product and a skilled sales team. But they can be an incredibly effective force multiplier at every stage of the journey.

By finding the right champions and empowering them as partners, you open up a whole new world of possibility:

• Shorter sales cycles
• Larger deal sizes
• Deeper account penetration
• Negative churn
• Abundant referrals and references

So if you want to take your sales to the next level, look beyond your own team. Your future champions are out there, ready and waiting to tell your story. It‘s up to you to find them, cultivate them, and unleash their full potential.