They remember their impression of the details.
They remember your analogies.
They remember that you understood their vision.*
They remember you.
You.
*If a leader in the room has a vision you can articulate, it almost doesn’t matter what your product can do. When you can help someone achieve their vision, you’re the most valuable person in the room.
We are Pre-Sales.
We are discerning, considerate, persuasive, and contemplative. We are thought-leaders, roadwarriors, salespeople, demo-builders, presenters, geeks, and entertainers rolled into one.
We know our customers’ pains and our solutions. We know industry processes, best practices, and the power of a single, well-placed click. We know how to position, win, lose, recover, and fight another day. We know our competition, ourselves, and everyone in every organization.
We are not shy, afraid, uncertain, unwilling, or incapable. We are not fools, yet we suffer them with grace.
We create consensus, alignment, vision, analogies, value, and action.
We deliver RFPs, demos, proofs of concept, and successful meetings. We deliver the impossible and the art of the possible. We deliver the goods. Hell, we even deliver the coffee.
We can take a punch and we can punch back. We say no when we should and yes when we must.
We simply can.
We are Pre-Sales. We are rock stars.
This is the focus and fundamental purpose of sales engagements. Your company is solid, your customers are thrilled, you have unique capabilities, you’ve articulated your value and messaging. This is your case to your prospect.
But let’s look at it from their perspective: why would they buy from you?
Because they see in you a path to something better. They trust in you, your company, and your products to help them achieve their goals, to realize their vision. They see that you understand their problems and have the insight to help them solve their problems. You are an expert, available to consult with them.
As you review your discovery notes and look at your solutions, as you prepare your demonstration systems and fine-tune your positioning and value, be sure to pause and ask yourself the all-important question:
Why would they buy from you?
I punched the hotel into TomTom and pointed the nose of my aging Audi towards the end of the driveway and towards, in fact, just the beginning of our shared 365-mile journey. Jane, the voice of TomTom, prepared and thought and planned and warned me as best she could, usually a half-mile in advance, of intersections and of their imminence given my current pace, and she advised me and suggested when to turn right and when to turn left and of when the highway would split ahead and even of which lanes it would be best for me to stay in. Together, Miss Jane and I made our way south from my home in Maine, the remoteness of which many consider to represent, and speak volumes about, me (and I cannot disagree with them). Heading downwest, we crossed the Piscataqua River Bridge and in turn traversed the No-Man’s-Land of Interstate 95 in New Hampshire that is evermore, for me, in addition to a convenient pair of state-subsidized liquor stores, a protective barrier from civilization (as its inhabitants refer to it) and a place to visit and a place to return from as best I might and as soon as I may. West, south, into the dark we went, over turnpike and Berkshire, through hamlet and along parkway, and even across major bays on tolled bridges to reach eventually our hotel.*
I had a customer to see the next day. Continue reading