From Doug’s journal, Sue and Coops have learned the importance of early ‘engagement’ — the first ‘E’ in EDVANCE.
As explained in Chapter 6, early engagement aligns the sales process and the buyer’s journey. It begins discussions at the STATUS QUO CHALLENGED stage, before the buyer has begun to INVESTIGATE. By engaging at, or soon after, the point of status quo being upset, you have a much better opportunity to influence the customer’s thinking than if you enter later.
You can often identify when the status quo has been challenged through effective trigger-event monitoring, and in some cases introduce the trigger before the customer is aware of it. The following list is adapted from Leveraging Trigger Events by Jill Konrath.
Internal trigger events
- A change in quarterly profit or loss
- New product or service release
- Change in management
- Change in ownership
- Company rebranding
- New injection of funding
- Opening new market segments
- Entering new geographies
- Obtaining a significant contract
- Gaining a new client
- Losing customers or market share
- Real estate and construction activity
- Layoffs, downsizing or rightsizing
- IPOs (initial public offering)
- New relationships, affiliations, partnership activity
- New appointments in key roles
- Job openings
- Corporate relocation
External trigger events
- Legislative changes: new laws, regulations
- Natural disasters
- Changes in the competitive landscape
- Trends impacting the customer base
- New technologies
- Market impacts — imports, housing cycle, construction volume
‘Engagement’ encompasses all activities deployed to establish initial and meaningful contact with the prospect, to the point where they agree to further meetings. The formal outcome is agreement to a meeting to begin the next stage: DISCOVER AND DISRUPT.
Methods applied
To engage effectively, a salesperson needs expertise in the customer’s domain and a strong personal brand demonstrating they bring unique value. With Doug’s influence, Sue has worked hard at this. She has developed differentiating viewpoints (one being ‘cyber-crime is leading the cyber-security industry in terms of innovation’), expressed them through social media and blogging, become recognised as an influential thinker, and been invited to guest-speak at a security event. She has now begun the ENGAGE stage — invited by a Wentworth staff member, Raf Singh, to meet and discuss further.
Some questions for you
- Do your customers see you as an expert in some aspect of their business domain?
- Do you proactively plan and manage your personal branding? Does it project the unique promise of value you bring? Is it strong enough?
- Have you written and published content that reflects your domain expertise and provides value to targeted customers?
- Do you avoid posting content about your own company and offerings, which is generally of little value until late in the buying journey?
- Do you use a wide variety of channels (phone, email, text, social media, video, articles) to engage prospects?
- Are you a content blaster, or a thoughtful curator?
- What do you stand for, and is it differentiated from your competitors?
- Are you known for a portfolio of viewpoints? Do they challenge the status quo?
- Are they targeting the right people (influencers, decision makers)?
- How do you gain insights valuable to your customers? Are you using the same channels as everyone else?
- How do you monitor trigger events? Are there some you’ve missed, and how could you avoid this in future?
- How well do you put yourself in the customer’s shoes and frame your approach to gain their attention?
The Wentworth Prospect
Continue reading from Chapter 9, ‘Hello and Goodbye’.
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