Creating linearity for your next sales opportunity

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Before writing this blog post, I want to give a quick update on my personal life.   A few weeks ago my wife and I welcomed our first child Isabel Maria Pena and we are so thrilled to have her with us.  She is doing great and keeping us super busy!

Isabel Maria Pena - Born September 26, 2019

Isabel Maria Pena - Born September 26, 2019

I mentioned in my previous post “Five ways Sales Engineers can make an impact at the end of a quarter” that one of the ways pre-sales teams can impact an opportunity is by partnering with the account executive to create linearity in closing an opportunity.  This concept of linearity is centered around developing a complete sequence of events for when a customer plans to launch with your platform.  Developing this type of partnership with the account executive team helps create consistency in strategy, roles & responsibility in sales execution, and alignment in deliverables for the customer.  So how does a sequence of events potentially look?  Below is a sample template on the main tasks needed for this type of alignment.

 

Discovery Tasks

  • Engage  with customer on Strategy Alignment (AE)

  • Develop Sphere of Influence and map out cohorts of participants for pilot (AE)

  • Schedule Executive Demos (AE)

  • If needed, Value Discovery Session (SE)

  • If needed, Value Presentation (SE)

Solution Development Tasks

  • SalesPreSales - Pilot - Success Criteria Creation (AESE)

  • ProServ or PreSales (Depending on scope) - Skill Strategy - Creation of Channel/Skill IQ (SE)

  • PreSales - Pilot - Schedule Discovery Call (SE)

  • PreSales - Pilot - Kick Off meetings (SE)

  • PreSales - Pilot - End User Touch Point 1 (SE)

  • PreSales - Pilot - Mid Point Executive Feedback (SE)

  • PreSales - Pilot - End User Touch Point 2 (SE)

  • PreSales - Pilot - Post Pilot Survey Start (SE)

  • PreSales - Pilot - Post Pilot Survey End (SE)

  • PreSales - Pilot - Executive Presentation (SE)

Negotiation Tasks

  • Review Security Risk Assessment (SE)

  • Review MSA & DPA (AE)

  • Agree on Pricing (AE)

 

Closing Tasks

  • Align Professional Services Resources for production live (AE)

  • Transition account into CSM (AE/SE)

Having a clear vision on how opportunities will close as well as having role clarity for each of the tasks, helps to create predictability in your sales cycle. As I continue to leverage this template with my team and account executive, I continue to find great success in this model. I hope you will find success as well.