6 ms·

I want to double on kirinan's question. I'm not quite in his shoes; I've had a few clients, I've got a couple theoretically lined up but the answers I keep hea

by laaph 14y ago

I want to double on kirinan's question. I'm not quite in his shoes; I've had a few clients, I've got a couple theoretically lined up but the answers I keep hearing are "we really want to hire you but we have to get the funding approved", which in the cases I fully pursue mainly seem to be some guy holding the purse strings and not caring if the project gets done or not. This just happens to be my current hurdle. I really wish there was a lot more written from the perspective of "I am trying to make it" than the perspective of "so now you are rich and famous and are looking for how to make a few more dollars...."

jdlshore 14y ago
I'm not patio11, but I have been a consultant for about 12 years. "We want to hire you but we have to get the funding approved" means you aren't talking to the right people. It's likely you're talking to technical buyers (who have the power to say, "no, don't hire this guy") and not the economic buyer (who has the power to say, "yes, you're hired, send the paperwork to this person in A/P.") The very first thing I do in any opportunity is make sure I'm talking to the economic buyer. I'm polite about it, but I don't want to talk to technical buyers. Period. There's no point in talking to someone who can only say no. This takes practice, and chutzpah, and I found it very difficult, and sometimes still do. But I have almost never sold a gig when I wasn't talking to the economic buyer, so I get over it. Questions to determine if you're talking to the economic buyer: "Who has signing authority on this?" "Once I send a proposal, who will approve it?" "Whose budget is this under?" Then you have to speak to the economic buyer. Be polite, but firm. Remember, time spent talking to a technical buyer is essentially wasted time. "Okay, let's schedule an appointment with X so we can discuss your needs further." "After you're done with the background info you wanted to discuss, let's schedule a time to speak with X about her expectations." "When will X be available to talk about this project?" It's a bit trickier than this, but those insights come with practice. For me, focusing on speaking to economic buyers was the single most valuable sales technique I learned, literally turning my consulting business from a failure to a success. Good luck!
- lincolnq 14y ago
  Wow. This is shockingly good and easily actionable advice.
  - bmelton 14y ago
    It is great advice -- to complicate the matter slightly, one should also be aware that pitching to the economic buyer is much different than pitching to the technical buyers. When speaking to technical buyers, they want to know that what you're going to do will work, from a technical perspective. If you're building widgets, will those widgets use LDAP to authenticate via our existing means? Will those widgets support the Oracle DB that we already use, etc. Your economic buyers generally care much less about this and much more about how much ROI they'll be getting. How will this save time? How will this provide the CTO more actionable insight into operations? How will this empower decision-making. This is why often the products that large companies buy are not the best technical solutions, because they can sell to those with purchasing power more effectively. If you've ever worked for a big company, you've seen it first hand -- "Why are we rolling out <product_x> when <open_source_product> does everything it does and far better?" - and the answer is that they were better able to speak to the concerns of the economic buyer, generally.
- j45 14y ago
  consulting for 15 years here as well.. Ths is great advice. At the end of the day you work for the people who sign your cheques. The sooner you learn and remember that the more you can focus on creating more value than which you're paid.

by laaph 14y ago

jdlshore 14y ago

I'm not patio11, but I have been a consultant for about 12 years. "We want to hire you but we have to get the funding approved" means you aren't talking to the right people. It's likely you're talking to technical buyers (who have the power to say, "no, don't hire this guy") and not the economic buyer (who has the power to say, "yes, you're hired, send the paperwork to this person in A/P.") The very first thing I do in any opportunity is make sure I'm talking to the economic buyer. I'm polite about it, but I don't want to talk to technical buyers. Period. There's no point in talking to someone who can only say no. This takes practice, and chutzpah, and I found it very difficult, and sometimes still do. But I have almost never sold a gig when I wasn't talking to the economic buyer, so I get over it. Questions to determine if you're talking to the economic buyer: "Who has signing authority on this?" "Once I send a proposal, who will approve it?" "Whose budget is this under?" Then you have to speak to the economic buyer. Be polite, but firm. Remember, time spent talking to a technical buyer is essentially wasted time. "Okay, let's schedule an appointment with X so we can discuss your needs further." "After you're done with the background info you wanted to discuss, let's schedule a time to speak with X about her expectations." "When will X be available to talk about this project?" It's a bit trickier than this, but those insights come with practice. For me, focusing on speaking to economic buyers was the single most valuable sales technique I learned, literally turning my consulting business from a failure to a success. Good luck!

lincolnq 14y ago
Wow. This is shockingly good and easily actionable advice.
- bmelton 14y ago
  It is great advice -- to complicate the matter slightly, one should also be aware that pitching to the economic buyer is much different than pitching to the technical buyers. When speaking to technical buyers, they want to know that what you're going to do will work, from a technical perspective. If you're building widgets, will those widgets use LDAP to authenticate via our existing means? Will those widgets support the Oracle DB that we already use, etc. Your economic buyers generally care much less about this and much more about how much ROI they'll be getting. How will this save time? How will this provide the CTO more actionable insight into operations? How will this empower decision-making. This is why often the products that large companies buy are not the best technical solutions, because they can sell to those with purchasing power more effectively. If you've ever worked for a big company, you've seen it first hand -- "Why are we rolling out <product_x> when <open_source_product> does everything it does and far better?" - and the answer is that they were better able to speak to the concerns of the economic buyer, generally.
j45 14y ago
consulting for 15 years here as well.. Ths is great advice. At the end of the day you work for the people who sign your cheques. The sooner you learn and remember that the more you can focus on creating more value than which you're paid.