Yes, it’s advanced technology. Yes, customers may find it confusing at first and may even be intimidated by it. And yes, it seems to be changing everyday. But there’s no secret formula or magic about selling it.

Precision farming equipment and systems require the same attention to the basics of selling as any other pieces of equipment your dealership handles every day. To do it well — and that’s the qualifier — your salespeople are going to have to dig in and figure it out for their customers. If they’re not willing to delve into and understand the technology and how it works on the farm, don’t let them sell it.

Our featured dealer in this issue of Precision Farming Dealer offers some of the simplest, yet sound advice you can get on selling precision farming, and it’s the same advice he’d offer on any other piece of equipment you’re selling.

Brandon Harris, equipment salesman for Ohio Valley Ag, Owensboro, Ky., has taken the same skills he’s honed over the years selling sprayers and adapted them to selling precision farming.

His first piece of advice: “The worst thing you can do is sell something and the customer calls back with a simple question and you don’t know how to answer it ..."

That’s simple enough, right? The least a customer should expect is that his salesman will respond to his inquiry as quickly as possible. If your sales guy doesn’t have the answer, he needs to know who does and connect the customer to him — as quickly as possible. If your dealership doesn’t have an “answer man,” well that’s an entirely different story.

And this leads to Harris’ second point, which is, “If you spend a little time with somebody and share a little knowledge, you are going to gain their confidence and eventually gain their business ..."

Nothing is more basic than this. Salesmen should have enough gumption to want to learn about the new precision tools, just like they did about tractors and planters.

Precision farming is not black magic, but for many customers it’s very new. If your salespeople can’t support your customers at this most basic level and can’t take the mystery out of the technology for them, salesmen like Brandon Harris will be happy to work with them.