Building a Consensus in Your Prospect Accounts

So I want to just level set and start with what we mean by that. What does it mean to truly be multi threaded? So how about we start there?

is going to be. And depending on what you're selling, whether you're selling commercial or an enterprise sphase or the public sector, when we really think about it, there could be five, ten, fifteen, twenty people that need to be aligned, or at least they need to be aligned to move forward.

And if we know that there are that many people involved, why would we allow ourselves to get stuck talking to one, two, or maybe three people and not making it our mission or goal to expand and connect with as many people as possible. But it happens more times than it should. So whether it's the fear of asking, or you're concerned of disrupting the Apple card, or we get comfortable with

a couple of stakeholders. We in essence, are putting ourselves in a huge disadvantage right from the start because we know that there are stakeholders that are part of the process that have a point of view, and we have no line of sight into that. When I say depth, it really means understanding the problems and the goals from each individual stakeholder perspective, and then connecting the dots to a bigger, overall initiative. Because getting in front of them

is just part of the battle. They need to believe that you understand them, that you can actually help them. So it's about getting that data from each and every stakeholder, analyzing whether you can or can't help them solve their problems, and then helping them all connect to a bigger initiative they can all agree on. And when I think about this, I think about it in terms of like an analogy I'll kind of use to explain this. I live in

North Carolina, so NASCAR is really popular here. It's like running a NASCAR pit crew trying to win a race. You could have the best possible driver, and I relate the correlate the driver to a champion. In the deal, you can have a strong champion. But if everybody else is not in sync, the pit crew, the tire changers, the fuel guy, the jackman, the crew chiet, there's zero chants are going to finish first. Every stakeholder in the

deal is like a member of the pit crew. They all have roles, they all have a point of view. If one of those key players is misaligned, the deal slows down, or maybe it never like maybe falls off track and it never gets back on track, and therefore and you can't win the race. Right, knowing this is the case, why would we want to try to win a race relying on only a couple of people and

what's important to them. Winning closing deals, it takes coordination, It takes timing, it takes strategy, it takes trust, and it takes getting alignment across the whole entire crew. No multi threading means no real alignment and means no deal.

to check out that podcast. I've linked it in the show notes, so breadth and depth, and we talk a lot about what you just kind of went through antonella of really like understanding the points of view of the variety of stakeholders in the deal once you get that connection, like really seeing what their point of view is. But we don't talk as much about getting them to agree on your solution. Right, that's a lot of people. You got to get on the bus and align with what

you need. And in our conversations we can often uncover some internal conflict that you need to come in and almost correct. So how do you what tips do you have for helping to drive that collective agreement?

agree something. People in that process need to just concede and be willing to come along for the ride. So when I think about in our world, how do we make this happen? Few things that really stand out, like Number one, As somebody in a customer facing role, I would charge the political landscape like a roadmap, like who are the players? Who has influenced, who doesn't, who's got who's ear who likes who? Who is you know, focused on costs, who's focused on? More of the technical aspects

like understanding, like the dynamics of the people involved. I think has to be the starting point. If you don't understand who you are working with and what's important to them, you're just going to be spinning your wheels like pitching stuff the whole entire time. Like you really need to understand how those dynamics play out. Once you do understand

those dynamics, be a facilitator. You're not the boss in those scenarios, right, We're not, But we can facilitate, And so we know that we need to be multi lingual in every single opportunity. So if I'm talking to certain stakeholders. I need to know that when I talk to them it's about cost savings. I might talk to somebody else

it could be about like making their everyday job easier. Right, So I have to hear what each stakeholder is saying and understand what matters to them and talk in their language, and then I can set up either one on one conversations or smaller groups where maybe I'm bridging gap and making sure that I'm getting certain people aligned. Like if I have a tech team that's really hung up on certain speeds and feeds, like I need to get them and maybe a separate conversation and connect them to the

bigger overall initiative. But like I need to understand what matters to who and just be a facilitator to try to gather those people to a yes. I'll also say, you need to have a really effective influencer. And I know very often we refer to this person as a champion, and a lot of the times they are hopefully in our case, but sometimes we can find people who just know like the dynamics really well, who really is kind

of seen as the go to persons. They have tremendous credibility, They care about the outcome and they're willing to help you. Get them on board. If you find this person, develop them into a champion whenever possible, and give them what they need to really make the impact, whether it's a one pager or like a script of sorts, give them what they need to pitch your case internally. I remember seeing like a REP who was coaching like a mid level manager to like really stand out in an upcoming meeting.

And it was that individual who got that VP as well as the IT team to stop like fighting over certain things by just getting them like focus on like one big issue that they're trying to solve as a whole. And so those people could be critical because so much is happening behind the scenes that were not privy to. So you need that influencer internally to help you out.

And then I'll say last thing, like try to keep the trade on the tracks as best as possible, Like it's very easy for a deal to stall over the most ridiculous things like what a solution can or cannot do, like keep people focus on the overall initiative versus like little things that could be very easily like end up being blockers or can detract from what the overall goal is.

Just keep taking people back to the overall problem that you're solving versus like all the mini problems that you're trying to solve for.

maybe the COEO, but just really that sales persona. And we just launched this campaign and we had some great companies and some great sea level executives, but who came back with was CMOS Chief Marketing Officers. CIOs was like,

who are these personas? We're still trying to figure out what resonated with them with a campaign and you know, we had our sequence and our teed up to follow up with them and it was all ready to go, and we had to turn it off because I was like, these messages do not hit what these people care about at all, like that, it's just not the same interest. So we have to rework the whole thing, and it's the same thing what you're talking about here in those conversations.

And I love the tip you talked about of equipping them to do an internal cell right, give them the one sheet, give them the walk around deck aligned to what they need. The slides that the CIO might need are different than the CFO, and you've got to make sure you're tailoring your message appropriately you and your assets

as well. I think you kind of hit on this a little bit, but I wanted to bring it up again, maybe hit it at a different angle, because you're saying like deals can stall for like the simplest of reasons, and when you're trying to get people to agree, you might uncover some internal conflict.

we're trying to resolve. Because if you can get everybody to agree with that, it's much easier to get the smaller things taken care of. One of the things that I notice is sometimes we assume that because we've heard it before, that they'll remember it. Or I don't want to be redundant in my meetings, and so I don't want to start off with the same like here's the purpose, Like here's what we're trying to resolve, because at the end of the day, it is something everybody can rally around,

and so you're trying to get everybody aligne. You need something that you can rally everyone around. So if you want to talk about things like, oh, reducing costs by twenty percent or increasing arr right, I remember a rep that worked with me stop like a tech debate by asking, Okay, well how much are you losing when you actually get those orders stuck? Like taking it back to what's most important in terms of the overall initiative, like we're losing

money here. That's not something that we're trying to accomplish. So it focused the conversation back on revenue and revenue generation, and it squashed the whole conversation around technology. So when you're in these conversations, reset right around the big topic and then use examples to steal that opportunity. Share quick wins, how other companies use your solution to drive that revenue

or reduce the cost. People tend to really latch onto stories, they don't match onto speeds, and so if those technical questions are those weeds start to creep in, tie it back to impact. Always point to the prize right, increasing revenue, reducing costs, mitigating risk. Last, let the business leader drive the conversation. If the economic buyer or the champion right, people who are all about results can start the conversation. They tend to set the tone when they're upfront and

speaking aligned with you. Tech folks have a tendency of toning it down in those types of meetings, and so it's much easier to focus on the goals of the business versus some of the weeds that might present themselves normally during the sales cycle.

are in conflict, what's happening, what's driving it. I remember one time I had a seller who's champion let them know that the CFO was blocking the opportunity, not over the numbers, but over a personal grudge, so that intel allowed them to strategize and pivot to address, you know, the real issue, and help getting those people on the same page. The second thing I would say is leverage your champion to rally the team. They've got skin in

the game, they've got credibility that's on the line. They can obviously took up your solution inside, so you leverage them as much as possible, give them the tools to crush it internally when you're not there, they'll make your case.

I've seen many champions like take reps ROI or their pitch deck and really leverage those types of things to gain alignment from teams that they don't typically play with often like finance or IT and just using them to be the voice of reason and also connection and alignment internally. And then I'll say the last thing is use them

to bridge the gaps. Conflict is inevitable sometimes and very often it comes from people not really listening to each other internally, so they very often can be the glue that you need to pull people together. So if they have the ability to put potentially huddle certain groups up or giving you inside of what else other teams might need,

you can resolve some of those conflicts internally. And once you have somebody internally to run interference when you're not there, it really can help become a win not only for you but also for them internally, and really to demonstrate how they can shine and be a value to the organization all and all, Like you want to treat your champion like a partner, keep them in the loop, ask

their advice, make them look good. If they are shining internally, they'll work harder to help you settle any conflict and make sure that your deal gets through.

out like my tip. I was talking to a seller once who said, like her goal is in every meeting there is one new stakeholder that's involved, Like that's her goal, and so each and every meeting she asks for an introduction or that somebody else gets drafted in, and it says she was saying, like it helps keep her grounded in the importance of trying to interact, engage and understand what each stakeholders investment is and what in it for them, And it just has helped her close more deals, bigger

deals because she's able to better align the greater group around her solutions.