DMP · Decision Making Process
Decision Making Process
What is the DMP?
- A staged process leading to purchase
- Problem recognition → Research → Evaluation → Selection → Review
- Tailor your sales approach to each stage
The DMP changes the question sales asks. Instead of “How far have we proposed?”, you ask “How far has the customer come?” The two answers often differ. You may have sent two proposals while the customer still hasn’t set up a budget line. Choosing your next move by the customer’s clock is the reason to use the DMP, and once you apply that standard, you can tell when to push and when to wait.
Depending on the buying situation, whole stages are skipped. In a simple repeat purchase, such as the same statutory training run every year, the order goes to the existing vendor with no search or evaluation. In a modified rebuy where only the instructor changes, comparing two or three vendors is enough. A new, first-time initiative, by contrast, goes through all seven stages and takes 6 to 12 months from problem recognition to purchase order. Early involvement pays off only for new initiatives. If the DMU is the people axis (who is involved), the DMP is the time axis (what is decided when). Overlay the two, and you know whom to meet this month.
At each stage, the customer produces one document internally: an internal briefing memo from the team lead at problem recognition, a requirements list at specification, a vendor comparison sheet at evaluation, and an approval request for sign-off at selection. Sales’ job is to draft that document for them. Don’t hand over a company brochure; hand over material the manager can use to get internal approval. One page of evidence to attach to the approval request is often needed before a 50-page proposal.
In practice, these stages don’t run in a straight line. If the budget is cut after evaluation, the customer goes back to problem recognition; if the manager changes, everything starts over. A more common mistake is assuming the customer’s words match their actual stage. “We’re reviewing it” can mean they are drafting specifications or just gathering information. If you treat the moment you receive an RFP as the starting line, you end up bidding as a token competitor against a spec a rival wrote in an earlier stage. Conversely, if you push a quotation and contract terms on a customer still at problem recognition, the reply is “We’re not at that stage yet,” and then they go silent.
John KimAuthor of B2B Marketing Design and CEO of Nanum Consulting
Jaehyuk ParkHands-on instructor in B2B technical sales and AI-driven sales strategyWebster & Wind outlined the purchasing process as a series of stages in their 1972 organizational buying behavior model, and marketing theory, such as Kotler’s, later formalized it as the “B2B buying decision process.”
Consider a hypothetical case. Company A makes electronic components, with 420 employees and annual revenue of KRW 110 billion (≈ US$82,298,400). Of last year’s 38 new hires, 14 left within a year, most of them around three months after starting in their roles. It began with a one-line email: “What onboarding training do you offer for new hires?”
- Instead of sending a quote, we asked Manager Kim on the management support team whether we could see exit interview records from the past two years. They were still at the problem recognition stage, so we started by getting the numbers for the report right.
- Two weeks later, we set up a 30-minute briefing with the HR director and put together a slide showing that 9 of the 14 employees who left cited “being placed and then left alone.” The director took that slide straight into the report to the division head.
- As the requirements took shape, we proposed a 3-month OJT course and on-site mentor training as one package, and that structure made it into Company A’s RFP as an evaluation criterion. Two competitors were measured against it.
- At the evaluation stage, the finance executive asked, “We spent KRW 120 million (≈ US$89,800) on training last year. What do we have to show for it?” We built a one-page table calculating the KRW 18 million (≈ US$13,500) in rehiring and retraining costs per departure, and they attached it to the approval request.
- The contract was signed at KRW 64 million (≈ US$47,900). The following year, only 5 of 41 new hires left within a year, so the first-year attrition rate fell from 37% to 12%. Company A went on to order a second-year advanced course as well.