Trish Bertuzzi, my good friend who heads up The Bridge Group, has written an exceptionally detailed playbook for sales development, that part of the sales process that is so often treated superficially. I love how it integrates seamlessly with The Whale Hunters Process, adding much-needed depth to Scouting in ways that I have not begun […]
You’ve made the cut! Your proposal was selected, and now you’re on the short list to present in person. You get the call on Thursday; they want you and your team at their place next Tuesday for a 45-minute presentation. NOW what do you do? Two business days to prepare! If you’re like most midsize […]
My monthly blog post for Nimble this month features connection as the substitute for cold calling. Here’s the link. If you want to know more about Nimble and what it’s doing for The Whale Hunters–here’s my review You might also like my article on How to Scout Whales Using LinkedIn. … This content is...
Too many small companies try to be all things to all people. Well, we can do this, and that, and the other thing too! Why not offer all of our things to all of our people? The problem is this: if you do all kinds of things, no one will think of you when […]
I had a very happy phone call today–the kind that pleases me more than all others. One of my clients called to report that on the previous night, the school board of his customer (a 50,000 student school district) had unanimously approved a five-year, $6.3 million contract for educational software that my client’s company sells. […]
Whenever you hold the position of “the best” for a period of time, you become vulnerable to many kinds of attacks. You can’t afford for your team to become complacent about your #1 position.
I’m up to #6 of my Ten Ways to Lose . . . Even When You’re the Best. Here’s one that I see far too often: You are out of touch with your changing market.
Complexity in the sales story is a common flaw of young companies as they are growing. You’re afraid to turn away any business, so you try to do almost anything that any prospect wants you to do. Big mistake! First off, it doesn’t work, and it will cost you money and anguish before you finally learn that hard lesson.
I have several clients whose products and services are demonstrably better than those of their competitors, based on independently verifiable measures.
Nevertheless, these clients do not always win their deals—in fact, when we first meet them, they are typically losing out on many deals where they offered a superior solution.
Why is that? How can that happen? If you base your sales strategy on “we’re the best,” you’re bound to lose.
So what’s the lesson? The asset is a customer walks into your office. How much more of an asset do you want? So don’t blow it by getting in the way. Leverage that asset by being a human being with them. Be present. Give them freedom. Don’t take it away.
Chad Root discusses why marketing should not be left to your sales department.
Whale Hunting is a great strategy to grow your company fast. But even fast-growing companies make on average 80% of their revenue from existing clients. So it’s much more important to keep existing whales than to hunt for new ones. How do you find out if there is a high probability that existing whales will work with you next year, too?