3 WBE Secrets To Landing a Sale

So you’ve got your WBENC certification and you’re looking forward to all the business that’s going to come rolling in from the big corporations. If you’re not sure how to put your shiny new’ diverse supplier’ status to work for you, here are the 3 secrets I’ve found in working exclusively with WBEs in landing corporate contracts for the last decade.

Have A Super-Niche

If you are not a specialist in any one industry, interest group AND solve a very specific problem for them, you just blend in with everyone else who is trying to sell to them. After all, my IT consulting client super niched in helping Healthcare companies reduce the call wait time in their call-centres and this super niche paid them $805K in just a few months!

Talk About Their Pain

Sadly 70% of humans purchase to solve a problem. If you’re not using pain-language in your elevator pitch, you’re losing them at “hello”. The other key thing is that most WBEs only talk about themselves when they meet the corporate buyers at a Roundtable or a matchmaking meeting. Instead, why not make the whole conversation about them and THEIR pain?

Use The Diversity Officer

When you use the diversity officer at the WBENC events you meet as a?conduit?rather than a?target, you’ll win every time. Here’s what I mean: my clients and I find and target our?actual?department buyer outside of the WBENC events. Then we create something of value around their topic of pain (which we’ve positioned ourselves as a specialist in). This could be a white paper, a physical sample, a jump stick with an educational video etc. that features a solution to their pain. Lastly we use the diversity officer to take this solution package to the actual department buyer. Of course, we follow up with the actual buyer and have a built-in excuse to engage them.

Don’t let your WBE status go to waste. Use these tried and true secrets to land that coveted huge corporate contract with the buyer of your dreams.

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Visibility is everything in marketing folks. So even if you're not speaking on a platform like me, get out there. Figure out who your target is and what problem they have and you're golden.

In honour of next week's WBENC conference in Nashville, this week's article is called the 3 WBE Secrets to Landing a Sale. I can't wait to tell you about how I made out in Nashville and all my adventures.

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