BARRETT/FRACTIONALA deal in commit for end of month, an eval going well, and one question that ended it. "What happens if you don't choose a product by the end of this month?" "Nothing, really." Eight signals that a deal is going sideways, and how to tell a recoverable one from a dealbreaker.
QualificationDeal politicsIn most enterprise evaluations there's a tester whose objections keep landing outside the scope everyone agreed to. Telling the difference between someone with a real concern and someone protecting their territory changes how you handle the room, and usually the concern turns out to be legitimate.
Deal politicsPre-writing the success criteria for your own proof of concept sounds like rigging the eval. It isn't, for the same reason a bike shop telling you to look for knobby tires for off-road use isn't rigging your purchase. But there's one rule that has to come first, or it becomes exactly what the skeptics say it is.
POCs & success criteriaA founder who joins every demo may think the extra "personal touch" is going to make the customer feel special and help close the deal. What they're really doing is teaching them that real service only happens from the top, and simultaneously capping the sales motion at the number of tables they can actually serve.
DemosBuilding the SE function