Deal Stuck in the Mud? Try These Plays...
Do you have a deal stuck in the mud right now? Tired of the followups that lead to nowhere? Always on the forecast call but never closes? Flooding your pipeline for the quarter? Always the bridesmaid but never the bride?
We have ALL BEEN THERE so you are not alone. I could never really comprehend buyers who just kept hanging in there and stringing the deal along. I have had my fair share of war stories about buyers just not being active in the deal cycles.
So what do you do? Great questions… Here are some tried and true plays that work to get the deal moving in or out.
Play 1: Rattle the Cage
I loved running this play as a rep. I would ghost write notes for my Estaff team to write to the executives at the prospect company. Send them through email or LinkedIn. The next step was to let my point of contact (notice I didn’t use the word champion) know what my executives were reaching out. If I or my execs got a response then that’s great news. All silent.. then a big red flag.
If they got upset or it didn’t make a difference then I could conclude one thing…. There is nothing here and dead it out. I could also measure their inactivity against my established timeline.. If they have missed several steps or behind schedule then I have 100% certainty nothing is happening.
Now on the other hand if one of my executives got a response then this completely changed the trajectory of the deal. We could talk to a person of authority and power to understand where the deal truly is at.
The idea here is to wake up your sleeping POC. Get them to stand to attention or force their hand on the deal. It works.
Play 2: Wizard of Oz
This is when the “quid-pro-quo” balance is off. The buyer is constantly asking for things but not giving anything back in return. For example; asking for a trial extension or a price discount but not giving me access to their boss… or letting me know if we are still committed to our Go-live date.
My move here was always I couldn’t get it approved….. Not without filling out the “FILL IN THE BLANK” form. If it was up to me then I would do it… but the guy behind the curtain won’t approve it without the “FILL IN THE BLANK” form. I would use this to get information that the buyer was reluctant to give up. See below as an example
This was a great stress test to see if my buyer was motivated. If they didn’t do what I asked then I knew the deal was gone. I could stand my ground and run a Rattle the Cage play to double check. Or they would be forthcoming with information and fill out the form. This is a solid move to make when you have some leverage…also great to validate a deal you have committed to your number.
Play 3: Climb the Mountain
Have you ever come across that title where you aren’t sure if they have buying authority? The most common is Director of IT. Not enough power to buy but enough power to tank the deal. I can make assumptions about who the authority is from my sphere of influence work…. But we’ve all made that mistake on assuming the actual buyer and been burned. So what do you do?
Send them an NDA. This does a few very powerful things:
Can your champion sign a legal doc (good sign if they can/bad if they can’t)
Whoever signs it has the authority to buy and that’s who I need to speak to
Do they redline it? Gives me a sense of how tedious the legal process will be
I also love getting an NDA in place to incorporate into my timeline. Post demonstration but Pre-Proof of Concept is a huge gray area. This was always a good step to incorporate into your timeline to keep things moving.
Play 4: Grease the Wheels
The idea is to get the deal moving towards an end date. If they need something then you can put a deadline on it. Great play to combine with the Wizard of Oz. Here are some examples of internal compelling events:
I can extend the trial 15 days but the deadline is the 26th of this month (pro-tip: never make the final date the 30th or 31st)
The discount we discussed is expiring on X date
Pro-Services backlog and only availability is the week of X
Again, you have some leverage and you don’t want to give it away. The goal here is to create a finish line to motivate your buyer. Sometimes they need ammo to sell it internally and these are great items to GIVE them to help out. You are actually helping them out.
With any one of these plays you can figure out if your deal is real or not. Moving it in or out of your monthly pipeline is what you are looking for here. To be able to speak strategically about the deal and have command on owning…. It is a hard skill that needs to be learned.
Give them a shot and let me know if they work!
