This month a reader and veteran sales rep articulated a question which prompted an important reminder. As accomplished as we may be in our profession, circumstances frequently call for an adherence to 'basics'. One such basic practice is proper Account Qualification.

Let me know what you think,

Dan

Q:
Dan: I just lost a major deal I had been working on for months. I'm devastated and depressed. I realize now that I never really qualified this prospect yet I spent a ton of my time working with them. After they made their decision to work with my competition they told me that the reason for going with them was speed. Problem was I never knew that speed was important to them.

Sam

Sam: Great question. I'm sorry that you are devastated over your loss. Recovering psychologically from a loss like that can be challenging. Believe me, I've been there too. You learn to develop a healthy paranoia -- a keen awareness at all times of what's going on around you. When I lost a sale, I would internally say to myself, "I was outsold. That is unacceptable, and it won't happen again."

My losses were actually helpful, because they taught me how to prevent future pain for myself, for my workshop participants, and for you. In response to my pain, I developed one of my 'secret weapons', called the Be My Purple Cash Cow (B.M.P.C.C.) account qualification tool. It is a very simple reminder of the 5 key areas you must understand early in your selling process.  Understanding these questions will help to insure that you are deploying your company's scarce resources on opportunities you will win.  Additionally, knowledge of these five inquiries is essential for the proper selection and deployment of your major account strategy (See Building Trust, Growing Sales chapter 4).  Here is how it works.  

Be My Purple Cash Cow (B.M.P.C.C.) 

When qualifying an opportunity, you need to ask questions which will provide valuable information to you regarding five topic areas:

▲ What is the customer's Budget?  

▲ Who is the key decision Maker? 

▲ What is the customer's buying Process?  

▲ Who is the Competition? 

▲ What are the customer's decision-making Criteria?

An easy way to remember these questions is with the acronym BMPCC- - Or as I say, " Be My Purple Cash Cow."  As you found out, I can guarantee that you will lose deals if you don't know the answers to these questions early in the buying process. If you discover the answers late rather than early, there's little hope of developing a strategy to compensate.

Let's take a deeper look at each one:

B: What is the customer's Budget? 

Key Question To Ask: My experience with other projects like this tells me you will need a budget. Where are you in the budget process?

M: Who is the key decision Maker?   

Key Questions To Ask: My experience with other projects like this tells me that they are rarely successful without a strong and committed executive sponsor. Who is the executive sponsor and what is his/her primary goal for this project? Who is responsible for making the final decision?  If it is a "group" decision, who are the group members and who has the power in the group?  How have similar decisions in the past been made?  Who will influence this decision?  Who are the gatekeepers? Who are the users?  Who will evaluate the decision from a technical standpoint?  Do I have an internal coach?  Who has the final authority to sign off on an investment of this size?  

P: What is the customer's buying Process?  

Key Questions To Ask: What does your timetable for this project look like? What if you are late?

You  are aware of your own company's own "selling process".  It is probably a 5-8 step process that sounds like Prospect, Qualify, Present, Address Objections, Negotiate, Close. You must know that internal sales process to help your company forecast correctly and to keep your job.  In order to be a true sales superstar, you must know your customer's buying process!  Knowledge of your customers buying process also requires that you must know your client's critical event. That is, exactly why, and by what date she must make this investment. If she does not have a critical event, you must assist her in creating one.

C: Who are your Competitors?  

Key Questions To Ask: Your time is valuable. Rather than discuss all of my solution capabilities from A-Z, I would like to highlight key trade-offs among your alternatives. What other solutions will you be considering?

Who are the vendors under consideration by your customer? You must also discover the solutions they are offering as well as the strategies they are using to compete against you. Don't forget your number one competitor is always: DO NOTHING - Status Quo.

C: What are your customer's decision-making Criteria? 

Key Question To Ask: If you had to finalize your decision today, what are your key decision criteria and their order of importance?