Employees within great SaaS companies adore their own technology; so much so that they seldom ask prospective clients what outcomes they need in order to view their investment as a success.
More importantly, most prospective clients leave meetings without a clear understanding of how to put your solutions to use in their world. Enormous amounts of financial and human capital are applied every day by SaaS companies to create scripted presentations which focus on features of their technology and their companies’ strengths.
Worse yet, significant amounts of capital are also dedicated to train and prepare their sales teams to deliver messaging using this scripted approach. What is even harder to believe is that these presentations are typically built by a combination of people within Marketing, Product Management, Sales Operations, and even developers.
What’s missing is insight from those employees with the best understanding of how your client’s business will improve the day your solution is operational.
Their competition follows the same strategy, so if you change your ways, even if it is costly or hard to do, you will close more deals.
The 3-STEP GAME PLAN
Offense, Defense, and the 2-Minute Drill
More than 30 years of experience leading sales teams within the software industry shows that building messaging that excites clients right from the start, keeps them engaged in the middle, and ends in a flurry is a winning game plan. The good news is you can leverage a lot of the scripted messaging within this game plan, so your previous efforts are not wasted.
Step 1: Start Scoring Points Early
Have a clear understanding of the specific business issues that cause your prospect the most pain. Complete this discovery process prior to the meeting, so during your opening, you can demonstrate how you will solve those issues.
Ask the following:
- What are the most significant issues you are
trying to address today? - Can you share the most extreme examples of
how these issues impact your business? - How does this impact you personally?
- What are the most important takeaways you
want from this discussion?
Your goal is to address these questions within the first 10 minutes of your meeting. Organizing your presentation this way will help clients visualize how your solution will address their problems. They will now view you as someone willing to put the customer’s best interest before what you are trying to sell them.
Step 2: Show Them That You Are More Than Just Flash. Defend Your Value.
Now that you have their attention it’s important to demonstrate how they can use your solution in their daily life. Take them on a virtual tour so they see themselves using the product to solve business, management, and executive issues. Practice this with your colleagues. If they can’t see how it makes someone’s life and job more satisfying, your prospect client certainly won’t see it.
Step 3: Be Ready To Move Fast & End Strong
No matter how much time they give you, and even if they’ve committed to an agenda, prospects tend to end meetings in a hurry. The main reason is usually that all the scripted pitches end the same: “Let’s discuss next steps,” or “When are you going to buy my solution?”
This is not an uncommon problem, as you can see here:
http://firstround.com/review/Your-Product-DemosSuck-Because-Theyre-Focused-on-Your-Product/
Now is the time to go back and remind them how you addressed their issues in Step One. But this time, make it fast, make your points very clear, and most importantly, build out the timeline from contract signing to implementation. This does not have to be a full project plan but should be visually clear enough to show them how daily life will improve for them and their company.