Do you Qualify?

Qualifying your potential leads/prospects correctly and early avoids wasting resources on deals that you have little chance of winning, or are not good business for you. This then means your sales team have more time to concentrate on better, more profitable business.

Here, we look at three methodologies that can be used to devise a version to meet your specific needs. Bear in mind that in our experience one size does not fit all, different sales cycles types require their application in different ways. There is a big difference between an add-on sale, a telephone order, a complex solution sale or an invitations to tender.

To avoid frustration, the CRM system should be configured to take into account the differences in sales cycle type.

Solution – Do they like our solutions? Are we bidding a new service? Competition – Are too many firms bidding? Does the prospect express a negative bias? Does the competition have any significant advantage? Originality – Has the prospect committed our USPs to his selection criteria? Has the prospect committed time to examine our strengths? Timescales – Has the prospect accepted our timescales? Are the prospects plans realistic? Is the decision or implementation too far away to be worthwhile? Size – Is the job or account potential big enough? Will the job demand more resources than we can offer? Money – Are the fees within the prospects budget? Is the budget realistic? Are we much more expensive than the competition? Authority – Are we talking/can we talk to the decision makers? Do the decision makers know that there is a decision to be made? Do we have a bad history/rapport with the decision makers? Are consultants involved in the decision? Do we have an inside salesperson? Need – Have we agreed the (business) case for the engagement? Have we agreed a decision timetable with the prospect?