Here’s a counterintuitive truth about B2B sales: The skills most companies prioritize in their sales training aren’t what buyers care about most.

Your sellers might have deep product knowledge, industry expertise, and polished selling techniques, but are these capabilities truly driving their success? 

To find the answer, we waded through real buyer feedback from more than 100,000 deals. And what emerged might surprise you.

Why Traditional Sales Training Falls Short

Most sales organizations take a broad-brush approach to skill development, investing heavily in training sellers on general capabilities like:

• Product knowledge
• Industry expertise
• Standard selling methodologies

These foundational skills are important. But they’re not enough to differentiate your sellers in today’s complex buying environment. 

In fact, research shows that traditional competencies like industry knowledge and product expertise are up to 31% less predictive of sales success than more specific, buyer-validated skills.

What Actually Drives Deal Outcomes?

After analyzing more than 100,000 B2B purchase decisions across won, lost, and no-decision deals, a clear pattern emerged. Eight specific selling skills represent critical moments in your buyers’ decision-making process.

We call these the Great 8 – evidence-backed competencies that directly influence whether deals are won or lost. 

What makes these different is the skills’ predictive power. 

Using sophisticated analysis called Area Under the Curve (AUC), we measured how effectively each competency predicts deal outcomes. AUC scores range from 0.5 (random guess) to 1.0 (perfect prediction), with scores above 0.8 considered highly predictive. 

The Great 8 don’t just clear that bar – they soar over it, proving up to 31.6% more predictive than traditional sales skills.

Three of the Most Predictive Skills for Winning New Business

While all eight skills are crucial for sales success, these three are particularly powerful predictors of winning new business, especially in competitive deals.

1. Provide Expert Insights

With an AUC score of 0.88 in competitive deals, this skill is one of your strongest predictors of success.

Your sellers must do more than understand your buyers’ industry – they need to challenge assumptions and introduce prospects to unconsidered needs. When sellers provide unique, provocative insights about problems or opportunities buyers haven’t yet recognized, they’re viewed as trusted advisors rather than commodity vendors.

2. Align Solutions to Needs

Scoring an impressive 0.91 AUC in competitive deals with similar pricing, this skill is your highest predictor of success.

While basic discovery questions are important, they often lead to commodity conversations, since all competitors ask similar things. Top performers go beyond surface-level needs to uncover and address the real problem that’s driving the buyer’s decision.

3. Demonstrate Clear Differentiation

With an AUC score of 0.86, this skill is particularly effective in competitive scenarios.

In well-defined categories, many companies can solve the same problems with similar capabilities. Winners excel at highlighting their unique advantages compared to both the status quo and the competition.

They focus on what makes their solution meaningfully different, not just technically better, especially when competing against lower-priced alternatives.

The Bottom Line

Organizations that focus on developing these specific competencies see dramatic improvements in deal outcomes.

Sellers who receive targeted feedback and coaching on these skills achieve up to 40% better win rates. They perform significantly better in competitive deals and maintain stronger margins, especially when price is a factor.

Your buyers have specific expectations for sales conversations. You can either continue with broad-brush training that may or may not improve outcomes or you can focus on developing the skills your buyers say matter most.

When you help your sellers master these skills, you’re giving them exactly what your buyers need to make confident purchase decisions.