How many of your online auctions are successful? Tensions certainly get high and you’ve got a lot to manage to ensure your business negotiates the best deal possible. Here we cover 3 things you NEED to remember to have success time after time!
Successfully conducting price negotiations with suppliers is essential for your strategic sourcing process. If you can’t get this right, your whole strategic sourcing plans go down the drain… don’t worry, just follow these steps and you’ll be fine.
Make Real Comparisons
Let’s start with a metaphor. You have apples. You need apples for your business to succeed. You set up your online e auction to get those apples from suppliers… but one of the suppliers starts talking in pears instead. You then discover several other suppliers only offer crab apples (miniature apples that are sour). You have a dilemma here.
To successfully run e auctions with multiple suppliers at the same time, you need to lay down some ground rules. Let everyone know from the off what currency you’re dealing with, the number of stock you’re looking for and the specific type of stock. Then you can make real comparisons!
Be Simultaneous
This simply means that you need to multitask like you’ve never multitasked before! Some suppliers might offer you time limited deals with others need to discuss things here and now or they’re going to be supplying elsewhere. You need to manage all of this at once so you never miss a good deal but at the same time, can monitor your deals against one another.
This is a lot for one person, so if you’re in charge of managing the whole e auction yourself, you’re going to want to find help. Start with the Scanmarket software for e auction here. This innovative platform allows you to manage e auctions in real time without any training! They also offer support for suppliers and managers plus the platform is capable of handling even the most complex of e auctions.
Definitely go take a look at Scanmarket if you’re serious about good strategic sourcing for your business.
Treat Suppliers Equally
To get the best deal out of everyone, you need to make every single supplier feel valued and special… without them knowing you’re treating everyone like this. Using the Scanmarket platform you can do this with just a few clicks, but if you want to try it manually, here’s how it can be done:
Start with an email (bcc everyone in) highlighting the things you want and need. Outline the ground rules for the e auction and be friendly! That is step one – making sure everyone knows how the e auction is going to go down so no one is at a disadvantage.
Next, make some phone calls and try to sweeten the negotiations with suppliers, give it the personal touch! Combined with Scanmarket e auction platform, you’re going to have the best e auction in your business’ history.
