Complex Insight: Questions and Statements to Qualify a Deal
Chief Revenue Officer| Executive Advisor| SaaS & Enterprise Software| Financial Technology (FinTech)| Turnaround and Market-Share Growth.
A CRM system is critical to most enterprise software and SaaS companies because it reflects whether or not you have an offering that meets the demands of the marketplace. Most CRM systems are full of unqualified leads and most weekly team meetings seem to reflect "we wish" meetings. In essence, the seller has not qualified an opportunity before entering it into the CRM.
If the company is funded, and most are, then the investor could be working off of a false sense of security with regards to the CRM pipeline. Complex insight, done right, is the art and science of making sure the seller asks the right questions and makes the right statements to stakeholders. This enables the buyers (stakeholders), to convey accurate information needed to help the seller truly know if they have a real deal.
The questions a seller asks in a face to face meeting or a video call is imperative for creating impact for the stakeholder. It is crucial to test these questions with enough prospects to know that they get to the heart of a stakeholders pain point. There should be questions geared specifically towards email, video or in-person communication.
The same holds true for statements that are being made. There always has to be statements about the value of one's product offering to reflect conviction. If the conviction makes logical sense to the stakeholder/buyer, the seller is on the path to qualifying a deal because persuasion has kicked in.
When you marry the information between questions asked and statements made, you have complex insight! This is the detail that qualifies a deal for the CRM system and prepares the sales team for the next phase. The objective of the next phase is to perform the steps necessary to accurately forecast when the deal will close.
Please don't hesitate to add your comments below as I'm interested in gaining your perspective. You can also reach me directly at jeff@jeffhoffmancro.com
Jeff Hoffman is the Founder and Principal of Jeff Hoffman, CRO. Hoffman is a fractional and interim Chief Revenue Officer working with companies around the globe.