I am always amazed at how some people in the organization (quite often members of the senior management team) who automatically believe that a prospective buyer who views one of our product demonstrations (in person or via webex)feel this company is going to buy and become a client within 30 days. They know nothing about the qualification process - for example asking simple questions about: authority, budget, timeframe, applicability, needs, and client requirements.
It literally drives me insane. I had a recent experience where a CEO of a small software start up placed a large Financial Institution into the sales pipeline after one demonstration of his product. I informed the CEO that he neglected to ask any of the important qualification questions (as noted above) - he just went heads down and presented - presented - and presented and because there were no questions from the prospective client - thought the call went rather well. The real danger here - in situations like this is your executive team can sometimes sabotage the overall sales effort. Some of us (sales reps/managers) may just let it go and let the executive team enjoy their false impression of the would be account.
As sales people, we need to bring this to their attention and correct them - otherwise - this account will end up as an opportunity on your pipeline report and the executive team will be upset if it doesn't close in 30 days - and we look really bad.
Let me know if you've had any similar circumstances and offer solutions for us sales dudes.
1 comment:
tIt sounds like your executive wasn't selling but rather pitching.
In fact, the true mark of good salespeople is their ability to understand why customers buy!
If you know why clients buy, you'll never have to SELL again. That's the advice I would pass onto the would-be executive.
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