The Hidden Opportunities in Your Proposals
When writing proposals many sellers find themselves hemming and hawing over which options to include and which to leave out. It may seem as if a beefy proposal might overwhelm customers and prospects, but often this is the best route to take if you want to keep your opportunities open as a seller.
Instead of presenting a single solution in your proposals, consider taking a multifaceted approach. Offering a number of options within your proposals is a great way to increase your chances of filling your pipeline down the road.
Consider this: Customers and prospects likely will be quick to say they’d prefer to wait until a later date to address the “other things” you noticed should be addressed. They may like your ideas, but time, budget and other constraints can easily get in the way. They then decide to hold off on pieces of your proposal, and move forward more conservatively. Being a savvy seller, though, you’ll do what it takes to set a later date to discuss these.
Now you have some future opportunities just waiting for you. And these can be some of the easiest opportunities to win. Here’s how you can leverage them to close.
Revisit Your Proposals
Take a look at each proposal you’ve presented within the past 12 months. If you included a variety of solutions or recommendations, pay attention to those which have been implemented by the customer and those that have not. With the account knowledge you already have:
- Consider how the implementation has been going.
- Determine the progress they’ve made in solving the issues they chose to address first.
- Identify the changes that still need to be made.
It doesn’t matter if you won the initial proposal. Customers and prospects alike can be opportunities. Identify all those issues that have yet to be solved, then set appointments to see if now is the time to help.
Set Review Meetings
Review meetings are great opportunities to address issues that have been on the back burner. Bring along the proposal and discuss the progress that has already been made, as well as the things that they’ve chosen to “hold off on until later.” Now is the time to discuss the issues behind them in detail.
Your customers not only will remember these aspects of the proposal, but will appreciate the fact that you’ve been paying attention to their situation. They may still be hesitant to move forward, but if the issue has gotten worse, the timing could be right.
Even if customers only choose to implement one solution at a time, a beefy proposal will provide you with a host of future possibilities to capitalize on.
Kendra Lee is a top IT Seller, Prospect Attraction Expert and author of the award winning book “Selling Against the Goal” and president of KLA Group. Specializing in the IT industry, KLA Group works with companies to break in and exceed revenue objectives in the Small and Midmarket Business (SMB) segment.
