12. • What are your company’s most significant challenges that
you’re dealing with and how have you been solving them
so far?
• What is driving your interest in our solution?
• What are your personal challenges when trying to do your
job?
• How long have you had this challenge or problem?
• What made you decide to solve this problem now?
• What objectives are you looking to achieve by solving this
problem?
• What are the costs or risks associated with staying the
course?
• What are the likely consequences if the pain is not solved?
Answers to these questions will allow us to determine if we
are the right fit for any given prospect.
QUESTIONS TO ASSESS CHALLENGES
14. • Many salespeople believe that “Authority” means
you should dis-qualify leads with low-influencing
contacts. This is the old BANT approach.
• Power does not correlate perfectly with
organizational rank.
• With the CHAMP approach, you must ask your
prospect questions that help you map out their
company’s organizational structure, buying roles,
and buying behaviors.
AUTHORITY
15. • Who, in addition to yourself, is involved in making this solution happen at your
company?
• How are purchasing decisions made for products like ours and who is involved in looking
at this solution?
• Who, in addition to yourself, has a lot of clout over this process and decision? And next
to that person, who is the next person? How important is it that they be on board with
the decision?
• What concerns do you think they may have? If they have any potential concerns, how do
you think we should handle them?
• Would it make sense for us to schedule a call together with them to answer any
potential questions they may have?
• Are you comfortable, perhaps prior to our next meeting, if I call (Name of Decision-
maker / Influencer) to have a brief conversation? My experience has been that while
everyone in the organization is pretty aligned on the needs, typically everyone has got
a little bit of a different perspective as to what they are looking for in a solution like
this. And, by the way, if I get a different perspective from him/her, would you mind if I
give you a call? What I hope is that you all have a consensus as to what the solution
should look like for our next meeting. Fair enough?
QUESTIONS TO ASSESS AUTHORITY
16. • Someone who can recommend the evaluation
team spend more time with you
• Could be someone with little formal power
• Such a person could be able to stop a purchase
or hinder its completion
• Why not just start at the top of the org?
• How can you tell if someone is influential?
WHAT INFLUENCE LOOKS LIKE
17. • “You can’t make omelets if you’re
not wiling to break a few eggs.”
• People with Influence AND Authority
to get a deal done
• They forcibly demand action with
conviction
THE “EGG BREAKERS”
18. • No Influence AND No Authority
• They are the easiest people to book
meetings with – and the MOST dangerous
• They make you feel like you’re doing your
job (when you’re really wasting your time)
• How do you know you’re working with a
NINA?
• When you ask for help with the next
step they won’t help
• They are tire kicking while they
continue to work with a competitor
• Are Event Managers NINAs?
NINA
19. • Innovation: Some champions are visionary types with deep domain focus. They
want to explore, experiment, and break new ground. They are motivated by
progress and exploration.
• Competitive Advantage: Other champions hope to use the deal to improve
their company’s competitive position within an industry. They are motivated by
a desire to advance their company’s competitive position and aggressively
dominate an emerging trend or market.
• Advancement: These champions strive to improve their own career prospects.
They are motivated by opportunities to solidify their position within an
organization or gain a lead over a rival individual or business unit. They often
want to improve sales or productivity.
• Respect: Many champions are seasoned professionals who feel underutilized by
their organization. They are the heart of every company—valued for their
know-how but universally under-celebrated. These champions are motivated by
status: they want someone to pay attention to them and value their experience
and input.
• Organization: Many champions simply want the numbers to work. Deeply
rigorous, they are motivated by logic, evidence, and proof of concept.
UNDERSTANDING A CHAMPIONS MOTIVATIONS
21. • This is where you capture
the variables needed to
calculate an ROI that can be
generated by using your
solution
• Important: This is not about
budget
• We are selling a
differentiated solution into a
market of 5 million events
that has only deployed
10,000 native event apps.
• Recognize that money is
being spent on things far less
impactful.
• Your #1 goal here is to follow
the money
MONEY
22. • What money does your marketing team spend on this event (or all the events
you host)?
• What are your expectations for the investment necessary to purchase the
solution?
• How do you allocate budget for your events today? (Note: find out what
they spend on printed guides, food and beverage, venue, AV, etc. )
• Is your finance team or CFO involved in approving this? (Note: While this can
come off as an “Authority” type of qualifying question, it is equally
indicative of how the approval process works at the company depending on
the prospect’s answer)
• At what level of expenditure do you have authorization to approve?
• Do you evaluate the ROI of a decision to leverage technology/software for
your event(s)?
• When do you plan to ask for budget allocation for this investment?
• What expectations do you have for being able to generate incremental
revenue via the mobile app from sponsors and exhibitors?
• NOTE: Never ask: What’s your budget for this project/mobile event app?
FOLLOW THE MONEY
24. • When a prospect says they need to solve this problem by their board
meeting in 2 weeks, what they’re really saying is “this is a top priority.” So
ask your prospect: How important is solving this problem relative to other
priorities? What date or event is their priority attached to (end of month,
end of quarter, by a certain event)? Is it a top priority for Q2, or is it a goal
they want to solve at some point before the end of the fiscal year?
• If they don’t need a solution until the end of 2015, that means it is in a
queue of other priorities. Find out what their priorities are to get an idea
of your prospect’s business plan.
• How do you create a sense of urgency when their appears to be none?
PRIORITIES
25. • Are you currently under contract with another provider in our space? If so, when is it
due for renewal? Is there a cancellation fee?
• When were you planning on starting the implementation?
• When is the latest you would want to make a decision? And ideally, when would prefer
to get this done?
• So what’s a realistic kind of time-frame that we should be targeting here? When would
you like to have the problem solved?
• How important is this to you and where does this stack up in terms of priority and
urgency?
• What are some of the other departmental priorities now? What are some of your own
priorities right now?
• Do you have the time and bandwidth to begin implementation now?
• Prioritization can also be related to how you are ranked relative to your competition.
Here are questions that will help you find out:
• Are you looking at or evaluating any other similar solutions to help you solve the
problem?
• Where do we stack up in terms of functionality and pricing when compared to these
other solutions you’ve been looking at?
• What is your relationship like with your current vendor? (If they have one)
ASSESSING PRIORITIES
26. • Every follow-up meeting should have a conceptualized close plan as the last slide.
• It’s not an implementation plan – it’s a process to get to close.
• It’s ok to invite objections and request next steps. Some possible questions:
• Are there any aspects of our solution that concern you?
• Do you agree that our solution can help you accomplish (Challenge X, Challenge Y)?
• What is the best date and time to schedule our next meeting?
• Ideally, what would be the focus of our next meeting?
• What would be the best way to get to you everything that you may need such as
customer references and other information about the solution as a right fit for you
and so you feel comfortable making the decision in the timeframe that you
mentioned?
NEXT STEPS – MUTUAL CLOSE PLAN
27. EXAMPLE MUTUAL CLOSE PLAN
Task Due Date Owner
Confirm value in solution
and ROI calculations
4/10/15 DoubleDutch & XYZ
initiative lead
Confirm total # of events
on DD platform
4/13/15 XYZ
Legal review of DD ToS
and order form
4/15/15 XYZ’s legal team
Order form signature 4/16/15 DoubleDutch & XYZ
Partnership kick-off
meeting
4/18/15 DoubleDutch and XYZ
events team
App in app stores 5/5/15 DoubleDutch Customer
Experience team
Date of first event 6/1/15 DD and XYZ