Last week I shared examples of actions I’ve taken to help win deals. Now I’m going to share some of the dumb things I’ve done that caused me to lose deals. Keep these things far away from your sales process!
Poor Presentation – I once did a demo with a couple of ancillary product partners where we went wrong in two key areas.
- Although our products were integrated, we did not demo the product within the same application. Instead, we each logged in to our own separate product during our segment of the demo. We thought it would be “good enough” to simply explain that the products were fully integrated. Our prospects thought our product looked completely disconnected. What were we thinking?!!!
- I’ve been in demos where my teammates showed an older version of the product. Although I’d noticed it before, I didn’t address the problem. My silence became a future deal killer. We finally ran into a group of savvy buyers who kept asking questions about items that shouldn’t have even been part of the discussion. We kept “assuring” them that those issues were not a part of our current version of the product. Pretty ridiculous huh?
Competitor Misinformation – I thought it would be a good idea to speak poorly about my competition. It killed my chances of winning the deal.
- My prospect was a big fan of my competitor. She had used their services in the past and knew their products well. When I opened my big mouth about something I thought my competitors couldn’t do, she corrected me and began defending my competitor’s ability to do the job. I may have had the better product, but I never even got a shot at a second meeting.
Can you believe all of these examples are part of one failed account? I had an inside source who provided me with all this feedback a couple of days after the meeting. I guess you could say I was lucky to have someone on the inside lay it out for me.
What dumb things have you done that cost you the deal?
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