You may have clicked on this article thinking: “What is Don talking about? Is he crazy? I’m trying to win every deal I can! I have to make my number!” But here’s what I mean…Of course, we should always be striving to win deals. And yes, that’s how we make our quota (really important!). But the question is: Is the deal you’re trying to win really the deal you want?
I’ll explain. Let’s say you engage with a prospect, qualify a valid opportunity, do your discovery work, determine there’s fit and present your proposal. The prospect says they like it, but with some changes. Maybe they want a shorter contract commitment, additional services, customization, whatever; things you haven’t included in your proposal. And they aren’t willing to pay more because, of course, they tell you they have competitive offers and your price is already “high”.
These could be legitimate issues or they could just be negotiating ploys. Either way, you’re feeling pressure. This is a sizable deal for you and you’ve already invested significant time and energy into it. In retrospect you may realize that maybe you could have surfaced these sticking points earlier in the sales process; that your discovery wasn’t as thorough as you thought. Or maybe it was unavoidable; the prospect simply had a change of heart late in the game. Either way, it’s water under the bridge. You “are where you are” so to speak.
So, what do you do? Do you desperately try to save the deal by taking whatever you can get? Do you walk away? Is there another option?
It’s important to remember that every deal must be a “win-win”. It’s an exchange of value by you (your company) and the customer that is profitable for both. Sometimes we lose sight of that as we get deeper and deeper into the engagement. Winning at (almost) all cost becomes the goal. After all, we salespeople hate to lose! And we have a quota to make. But if these new demands make the deal lopsided (a win-lose favoring the customer at your expense) you’ve got to either negotiate to rebalance the deal or walk away.
This may seem heretical to some, but I believe you shouldn’t be shy about letting the customer know you’ll have to walk away if you can’t make the deal reasonable for both parties. This sends the message that you’re not desperate. When customers sense desperation they become even more intractable in their position. And if you’ve really done a good job earlier in the sales process, you should be confident because the customer has already acknowledged that your offer provides value and is preferred over other alternatives. So they lose something if you walk away.
Obviously, rebalancing the deal so it remains profitable for you and still helps the customer achieve their desired business outcomes is in your best interest and theirs. But if you can’t do that you should walk away. Taking a deal that is bad for your company may give you a bump toward your quota, but you’ll almost certainly end up with an unprofitable deal that you probably can’t deliver on and a dissatisfied customer; a “lose/lose”. And your chance for future business with that customer goes right down the drain, not to mention the negative impact on your reputation (customers talk, right?). Yes, it’s a “loss” and those sting. But the alternative is much worse.
How do you reconcile the dilemma posed by letting go of a deal and foregoing the gain against your quota? The answer? Having a pipeline full of qualified opportunities makes it much easier to walk away from the bad deals and focus on others that are good for both you and the customer. And to fill your pipeline you must proactively prospect. That’s a topic for another post.
