Video transcript included for your convenience.
Question: What do you tell someone who’s got a Prospect Stuck in the Pipeline?
Answer: You know its interesting companies today are really struggling with that more and more because what they have is all these tools at their fingertips –their SFS system (Sales Force Automation system), their CRM system (Customer Relations Management), their databases, their pipeline, etc.
Business owners, Executives, Sales Leaders and Marketing leaders are making business decisions based upon the size and quantity of a pipeline and when those deals get stuck or delayed, they’re always saying: I made a decision expecting this business to close and it didn’t.
Here are some of the things we found regarding why those deals get stuck.
I talk about having an IDEA of who you’re selling to.
IDEA is an acronym: Are you talking to an (I)nfluencer, a (D)ecision-maker, an (E)nd-user or an (A)pprover? Now in some small companies that can be all rolled up into one but in medium size and larger companies, that could be multiple people. In fact, that could be a very wide web. You need to think about that. So if you have an idea of who you’re selling and you can get to the decision maker earlier, that can really help.
The first part is who am I talking to? Are they at the right level? And my talking to them about the right things?
Let me give you an example of one of our clients is a technology company and they were having a lot of accounts get stuck in their pipeline when we started to work with their people. Now the person they normally talked to was the Chief Architect, who was a tech person. We said: you need to talk to the person has the budget because the tech person will look at all the technology you want to show them but if you are going to get them to buy, you’ve got to get to the person who has the power of the pen.
We offered to help them get hirer in that Pyramid of Power. We can get you talking to the decision maker. We did. The unfortunate thing was they kept having the same techie conversations that they were having with the Chief Architect instead of talking the language of their buyer. You get delegated to whom you speak most like so picture this — if you’re talking to a decision-maker who has the budget but is not a technologist,and you keep talking about ‘bits and bytes’ and ‘speeds and feeds’, they think who in my organization sounds like that and they send you to the air conditioning room with the raised floors so here are couple of checkpoints for you if you have something stuck in the pipeline.
Ask yourself these questions:
Do I have the decision-maker? Am I at the right level? Has that person admitted need or have I created a vision for a new way of doing things with them? Have they agree to take a serious look at my product or service? And lastly am I talking their language and talking about things that they worry about?
Back to the earlier example our client had significant improvement after our engagement with them because not only were they talking to a different level, they weaved a web so that they also able to stay connected to the Chief Architect and and they got to the person who had the power of the pen and understood how that solution would help that person look good.
Have an idea that you’re selling to make sure you talk a language that connects with that person.
