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You were probably talking to the wrong person: either through research or chat you need to ensure you are talking to someone who has the authority to pay you.

You were probably talking to the wrong person: either through research or chat you need to ensure you are talking to someone who has the authority to pay you. Also hidden in your text is "perhaps even written custom code"... could it be that they got what they actually wanted from you and no longer need you? Finally - sorry if this sounds harsh - if you've exchanged 75 emails and not made a sale, you need to learn to sell better. Read "Demonstrating to win" (cheesy title but absolute gold for enterprise solution sales), and "Start with No" by Jim Camp (fantastically logical and easy to use way of negotiating that will appeal to techies) Good luck!

ajeet_dhaliwal 7y ago
I can see the first two points being something that could easily happen but I don't think they apply in my case. Thanks for the book references, do you think 'Demonstrating to Win' applies to modern SaaS type apps too or more Enterprise/high touch/on site sales?
- scarface74 7y ago
  What’s the practical difference between “Enterprise/high touch/on site sales” and B2B SAAS? Either way, you’re asking a company to pay you for a service that plays a part in their business process that will cost them money in terms of up front costs, training, and probably changing some of their business process.
  - notahacker 7y ago
    Enterprise/high-touch/on-site sales assumes you go and see everyone involved in the decision, understand every element of their business process and design a solution to fit that, obviously using a massive pre-sales budget to do so. And yes, you probably do end up exchanging 75 emails as well as an awful lot more minutes of time, but if the sale fails after that you know why. Lower-cost B2B SaaS means the solution already exists, and you've got to understand how/if their business process will adapt well enough to it to make it worth the money to them based on a lot less information. You'll miss a lot more, and get 'ghosted' a lot more as a result. But you do get to speak to a lot more prospective buyers.
    - scarface74 7y ago
      I worked for a company involving HIPAA compliant messaging for health systems. Everything was hosted by us from the server side and the mobile apps were in the app store -- not provisioned via MDM. We still had to have onsite "implementation managers" to train employees.

ajeet_dhaliwal 7y ago

I can see the first two points being something that could easily happen but I don't think they apply in my case. Thanks for the book references, do you think 'Demonstrating to Win' applies to modern SaaS type apps too or more Enterprise/high touch/on site sales?

scarface74 7y ago
What’s the practical difference between “Enterprise/high touch/on site sales” and B2B SAAS? Either way, you’re asking a company to pay you for a service that plays a part in their business process that will cost them money in terms of up front costs, training, and probably changing some of their business process.
- notahacker 7y ago
  Enterprise/high-touch/on-site sales assumes you go and see everyone involved in the decision, understand every element of their business process and design a solution to fit that, obviously using a massive pre-sales budget to do so. And yes, you probably do end up exchanging 75 emails as well as an awful lot more minutes of time, but if the sale fails after that you know why. Lower-cost B2B SaaS means the solution already exists, and you've got to understand how/if their business process will adapt well enough to it to make it worth the money to them based on a lot less information. You'll miss a lot more, and get 'ghosted' a lot more as a result. But you do get to speak to a lot more prospective buyers.
  - scarface74 7y ago
    I worked for a company involving HIPAA compliant messaging for health systems. Everything was hosted by us from the server side and the mobile apps were in the app store -- not provisioned via MDM. We still had to have onsite "implementation managers" to train employees.