How do you prepare for potential prospect meeting?

Imagine this....

You've finally decided to reach out to your prospective potential customer organization.

You master the confidence to send out your first email.

Two minutes later, 'ping'- you get an email.

You quickly start reading.

Dear Gregory,

Thank you for your email. We are actually looking for a reliable supplier for product X. Can we have a meeting tomorrow at 10.00 am? I will gather the involved people for you to do a demo.

You head to the meeting the following day. You know the location of the company and get there 30 minutes early. In the meeting, most of the faces are familiar. You know 95% of the people in the room, at least by face, name and their role in the organization. Because you spent the previous night researching about them.

30 minutes later, you walk away with a clear next step: John, the admin, will send you a draft contract for you to review and sign if you are aligned'.

Nothing stops you from having this selling experience.

In today's Quest Writing Edition of Sales Discovery Simplified, we explore: How do I go about preparing a plan to meet a prospective potential customer?

Last week, when I was delivering my online sales training course, how to get from 0 to 20 sales appointments in 7 days, Kennedy Otieno asked me a great question.

This is the question:

“I am really curious if you can give an example of a plan. Say, I am going to meet a prospective customer. I want to meet person X or I want to prospect. How do I go about preparing a plan?”

Today, I dive deep to answer this question.

But first, here is a book I found interesting.

In Chapter, 13 of Unlocking Yes: Sales Negotiation, Lessons and Strategies, Patrick Tinney explores the topic, True Genius in Reconnaissance.

Great sellers are deliberate and disciplined in their sales activities.

They dedicate time to research, prepare and understand prospects and customers before reaching out to them.

Great sellers always block time for sales discovery or sales reconnaissance. Patrick calls it genius recon.

Why spend time in discovery?

1. To know as much information as you can about your industry, prospect organization to increase the odds of closing smart deals.

2. Time is money. Money is lost at the bargaining table, when sales discovery is compressed in a short timeframe.

3. You get the best of a deal when you spend more time in sales discovery (sales recon).

4. Develop knowledge of the influential people in your prospect organization to minimize risk, quality and close smart deals.

According to Patrick, these 5 topics provide timeless information about prospects and customers.

1. Shared business economics- What are the economic futures and potential pressure points for your prospect business?

2. New business issues and opportunities- What new business issues and opportunities can you uncover about your prospect organization? Are they launching a new product? Opening a new office? Expanding or rightsizing?

3. Points of Difference- How is your product different? Can you use it to justify your costing and pricing model?

4. Cost offsets- What are you willing to promise, give away or offer the prospect on phone or during a meeting without crippling your business? Access to technology? Relaxed delivery timelines? Warehousing? Payment schedules?

5. Profile of prospect contact person – Who is your prospect contact person? What is their business ethics, reputation, likes, dislikes, values and affiliations? Can you build a profile and persona of this person?

Let me tell you a story...

Recently, I decided to explore the concept of deep sales.

I wanted to deepen my relationship with 5 existing accounts to unlock and achieve profitable growth.

Therefore, I explored these two critical questions:

1. How do you map out key people in the customer organization that influence the purchase decision?
2. How do you figure out which person will be important in your sales success when reaching out?

Here are some facts:

• The most influential people are not always the most senior people in the room.
• Important decisions are not always made by the senior most person in the room.

What did I do? I set out to identify the voice(s) of influence in the customer organizations that shaped the purchase decisions.

Here is my short answer to Kennedy's question: How do I go about preparing a plan to meet a prospect?”

Answer: Spend more time in prospect recon. How?

• Research your customer organization.
• Map out key stakeholders that influence on the purchase decision.
• Identify and target key voices of influence.
• Develop an effective outreach machinery to get a sales meeting and close smart sustainable deals.

Here is a challenge: There are hidden influencers in an organization who have a voice people listen to and who shape the final purchase decisions.

How to you target and persuade these people?

Until next time. Happy sales discovery.

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With lots of love from Gregory!

Quest Writing Newsletter.

Helping B2B sellers, SMEs and Startup founders to learn sales discovery in 3 minutes.