Ep.4: Leading The Big Meeting

Startup Selling: Talking Sales with Scott Sambucci

SalesCast #4: Leading the Big Meeting

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In this episode, Scott and Robert discuss the different strategies and tactics to use in a meeting and demo with executives at a prospective client.  Key areas covered:

Casting Call: knowing the right people to bring to the meeting with you and the importance of everyone knowing their roles. How to successfully demo your product while maintaining the interest of your audience (*tip: don’t bring handouts). How to handle side conversations during a meeting and avoiding a trip down the rabbit hole from impertinent questions. Dealing with objections and obstacles: knowing when to head them off ahead of time versus letting them come up naturally. Making sure you push the sale forward by establishing action items in two key areas.

We hope you enjoy the podcast and would greatly appreciate feedback!  Any suggestions on future topics you would like to hear covered and/or podcast guests you’d like to hear would be great!  Enjoy!

Podcast Notes

1:00 – Bringing the wrong people to a meeting: how to properly cast the participants you bring with you.

2:45 – How to start a meeting by utilizing good research ahead of time.

5:20 – Getting background information and vetting out ideas during your informal start.

6:00 – Procedure for taking the start of the meeting from the informal stage to the formal.

7:15 – Don’t give handouts!  How to guarantee focus stays on yourself.

8:45 – Successfully demoing a product while maintaining interest from your audience.

9:45 – Establishing that it’s not a demo, it’s a conversation.

10:45 – Using a round robin to find out the ideas and questions your audience want covered.

12:45 – Allocating and prioritizing time on the right people during a meeting.

15:30 – Handling side conversations and avoiding the rabbit hole of impertinent questions.

19:45 – How to make the transition from demoing your product to moving your sale forward.

22:20 – Dealing with objections and obstacles: knowing when broach them yourself versus letting them occur naturally.

25:30 – What to do when the end of your demo is greeted by silence.

27:45 – How to close out the meeting by maintaining control.

30:45 – Making sure you push the sale forward by establishing action items.

33:40 – Approaching the procurement process and finding out how much interest you’ve actually generated.

37:20 – Number one piece of advice for meetings and demos.

 

38:40 – Wrap up.