As a salesperson, do you qualify your opportunities against niche solution criteria that boast competitive advantage?

Your competitive advantage correlates with quantifiable business value received by your customer, such as:

• migration made easier
• implementation made affordable
• technical resources and expertise leveraged
• TCO lower
• ROI faster
• time to market

Always be qualifying and place proper onus upon developing and executing your close plan.

Let’s assess this tactically per a subset of basic communication skills.  Consider the following:

• ability to listen
• ability to converse professionally with proper lexicon
• ability to write, including formal proposals
• effective email étiquette
• ability to present, including diverse, large or small audience in-person or via web
• ability to author presentation and organize effective agenda

The more I think about it, the more I’m convinced.  An obvious correlation is often overlooked.  I’ve worked in Sales at companies such as Oracle, Microsoft, and GE and with consistency a correlation is frequently supported.

Familiarity or “course knowledge” is a differentiator for hiring managers.  You may want to triangulate when formulating your response.  Therefore, before you can answer the question you should ask your own questions to enable necessary due diligence.  Example discovery topics might include:

• which industries and/or LOBs are best suited for the solution?
• what size of companies represent best-fit candidates?
• read all current testimonials and case studies

It is easy to identify big brand companies like Starbucks, Boeing, and Costco.  But, it is far more relevant to cross-reference company demographics based upon pre-qualification and probability of converting prospects to customers.  Triangulate 1) brand-companies, 2) companies-by-industry, and 3) proven size-industry-best-fit-companies and target your demand generation efforts, accordingly.

In technical sales, there’s a big difference between selling applications versus technology.  In my opinion, the persona-based behavioral economics are strongly differentiated between these roles.  Ability to successfully sell application solutions requires a different (perhaps more sophisticated) set of skills.  Whereas, successfully selling technology products demands an alternative set of unique skills.

Selling application solutions requires the customer recognize quantifiable business value.  Whereas, selling technology solutions requires technology value differentiation with less emphasis upon ROI.  If you are in Sales for a technology product-based Sales organization, theoretical and practical analyses are warranted.

For example, have you triangulated market aspects of saturation, fragmentation, and commoditization?

• How many years has competitive technology been adopted by customers?
• What % of companies (as of today) has adopted same technology?
• Is product’s market segment fragmented with many vendors?
• What is vendor’s position within Gartner Magic Quadrant (if followed)
• Is your product disruptive and unique…what is your niche?

These findings may help direct your career path or at least make an informed decision, based upon actionable insights.

• What is your company’s growth strategy?
• What is their current revenue ratio of new/recurring business?
• How many new customers were added in past quarters?
• Is # of new customers increasing or decreasing?
• Is average sales ticket increasing or decreasing?

The answers to these questions provide powerful insights.  If your company’s growth strategy is upsell, cross-sell, annual maintenance, and/or litigate compliance you work for a company with negative cultural growth strategy.  However, if your company meets table stakes including new business growth strategy, Sales and Marketing alignment, as well as compelling solution differentiation you work for a company with positive cultural growth strategy.

For example, consider a software company that contributes open source software.  If the company concentrates on selling commercial upgrades to new customers, Marketing campaigns are aligned to identify and convert open source application/users candidates for commercial upgrades, and no other vendor can match the business and technical value proposition…that company embraces and embodies positive cultural growth strategy.

Why does this matter to you, the Sales individual?  Consider both how Sales is measured by management and how individual contributions are assigned value.  For example, a hunter of new business should be perceived differently than a farmer of recurring business.  Accordingly, quotas should be allocated and overall compensation should reflect specific individual contributions.  Unfortunately, pay-for-performance with said granularity is not the norm.

But, there is an inherent pitfall with this model. Closing activities are obviously not the same as closing business. This model fosters myopic behavior, where semi-distracted emphasis is upon activity goals versus strategic opportunity management. Again, while potentially problematic there is an elegant solution.

The solution resides squarely upon the individual sales contributor. Play the “numbers game” and embrace your activity goals. But, most importantly expend your cycles pursuing well-qualified target business. Don’t allow yourself to be unproductively distracted for sake of a tally.

Conduct strategic planning. Break down your quota. Calculate how many deals you need to close. Don’t waste time chasing bad business, rather pursue opportunities which have qualified upside potential. Remember, the only metric that matters is your % of quota.

Therefore, the onus is on you to assimilate your environment and most effectively prioritize your cycles.

1. hits for average
2. hits for power
3. can steal bases (speed)
4. can throw runners out (arm)
5. can field their position (few errors)

What’s the equivalent for technology salespeople?

1. closes new business with Fortune 500 companies or equivalent organizations
2. closes $1 million+ deals
3. gains access to C-level executives, establishes credibility and secures sponsorship
4. sophisticated territory management, complex account planning, opportunity management, team selling, and lead generation skills
5. demonstrable listening, verbal and written communication skills

Do you have any 5-tool-players in your sales organization?

Problem: for most entrepreneurs the fundraising process (and I speak from experience) is time-consuming and can break your spirit

Solution: while fundraising in parallel, make your company more attractive to potential investors by insourcing strategic sales and marketing

Examples: closing initial “showcase” accounts, developing qualified sales pipeline, establishing strategic partnerships, refining consistent messaging, initiating press coverage, optimizing web and social media presence

Results from targeted initiatives and campaigns will increase your chances for funding. 

• Opportunity Name, Description
  • Which line of business? (business unit)
  • Scope of initial deal? (pilot, multi-site, enterprise-wide, global)
  • Primary product family or service solution
  • Which industry solution?
  • Direct or indirect account?

• Stage, Close Date, Probability, Forecast Category, Amount

• Next Step
  • How are you moving deal forward? (action item)
  • When are you moving deal forward? (date stamp, due date)

• Products

• Activities (open and historical)
  • Are we driving or reacting to evaluation? (RFI, RFP, functional specification)
  • Have we asked for and obtained org-chart?
  • Sales interactions/meetings? (face to face, discovery, demos, presentations)
  • Conducted white spaces mapping? (underlying technology, extended supply/demand chain applications)
  • Provided and facilitated references? (phone, site visits)
  • Identified purchasing details:
    • What is funded?
    • Who owns budget?
    • Procured from where by whom? (departmental/divisional vs. corporate, U.S. vs. int’l)
  • Proposed ROI study? (broker payback discussions to build financial justification)
  • Conducted bridging? (executive and sales leadership)
  • Discussed importantance of professional services? (change management, program management, and much more)
  • Positioned our vendor credentials, explored vendor partnership, corporate visit?

• Sales Team
  • Engaged virtual sales team?
  • Engaged with indirect channel?
  • Identified our internal exec-sponsor?
  • Coordinated with int’l counterparts?

• Proposals
  • Have we linked out solution and outlined potential bill of materials?
  • Delivered pro forma proposal?

• Partners
  • Does customer have de facto consultant and/or system integrator?
  • Have we engaged our extended partner ecosystem?

• Contact Roles
  • Primary point of contact?
  • Coach?
  • Business and technical decision makers?
  • Executive sponsor?
  • Who have we met with?
    • Contacts/attendees
    • Influences (positive, negative, neutral)

• Competitors
  • Long or short vendor list being evaluated?
  • Installed base and level of satisfaction?
  • Major incumbent applications vendors and implementation partners? (ERP, CRM, and others)
  • Chances they do nothing or build? (#1 competitor by default)

• Notes & Attachments
  • Contracts, quotes, discovery docs, presentations, RFI/RFP, functional spec?
  • Recurring or new business opportunity? (cite previous wins, existing contracts)
  • Parent or subsidiaries, LOBs (lines of business)
  • Publicly-traded symbol or privately-held
  • Annual revenues, # of plants, other aspects
  • Industry category and segment ranking
  • Corporate imperatives (letter to shareholders)
  • What is assessment of customer’s IT organization? (maturity, expertise, home grown tendencies, resources, influence)
  • What is our close plan and how are we imposing our will, call to action?
  • Internal/external pressures, compelling events?
  • Proposal options being considered?