Courtesy of Gailjadehamilton via flickr
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"Post-Endorsement" Dialogue
By: Jay Spielvogel
Courtesy Of: Venator Sales Group
12. Jun. 2008
For most sales people, it is not uncommon to meet with a person who has the power to accept or reject a subsequent meeting with the next-level decision maker. Unfortunately, this next meeting with the additional decision maker does not always work out well.
For example, you meet with a person named John to discuss his issues and concerns, as well as the possible solution you can provide. At the end of this meeting, he expresses a high level of desire to work with you and enthusiastically suggests a subsequent meeting with his manager Mary and himself. Upon receiving this approval you rush to establish some dates and times for the three of you to meet. One week later, in this meeting, Mary starts questioning the severity of the problem and the need to work with your firm to fix it. Apparently, John has failed to pre-qualify Mary and has had little or no discussions with Mary regarding his issues or his prior meeting with you. He simply asked Mary's secretary to schedule a one hour block of time. What's worse is that John is sitting back silently in the meeting, forcing you to do all the "selling". You feel like John has failed you.
Has he really failed you? Whose fault is it that this meeting resulted in grid lock with Mary? Hopefully your answer is, "It is my fault, because I did not spend any time coaching John." All too often, we get so excited when we are endorsed to the next level that we forget to secure a collaborative position with the previous level.
A critical step in multi-level selling is to have a "post-endorsement" dialogue with the primary contact. After receiving approval to introduce you to the next decision maker, it is important to respond with some questions. Using the above example, here are just a few sample questions to ask John, prior to the meeting with Mary.
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