Anyone ever win a deal above someone's head? (deal scenario)

This deal that I'm working was going great until we had to reschedule one day. I was in communication with the main evaluator who is leading the project, alongside two people in the c-suite. As far as I knew, everyone saw tons of value in it. I got great buying signals from both c-suite members (I met with them separately, the evaluator was on the line each time).


Now, the evaluator is being shady af. She won't really communicate with me or schedule time with me. We're having some end of quarter incentives and I emailed them all asking if the timeline would work and, if so, they wanted me to touch on this in our next scheduled pricing call. The evaluator replied to me, but didn't reply all, and said they're still shopping and aren't ready to commit to a vendor - and followed this with a decline to my invite. She won't answer or reschedule.


Meanwhile, the two c-level executives still accepted the invite. I sent an email yesterday pointing out the discrepancy and asked if the meeting was still on or if we should reschedule/push the timeline back since their still shopping. Nobody replied, but today the one who would sign the agreement declined last minute apologizing for a late reply and said he and the other executive can't make it due to being stuck on another project, and said they'll need to reschedule.


The evaluator leading this project here is giving me real bad, sketchy vibes. Meanwhile, it seems like the c-suite wants my product because they told me it looks like they need it and want to figure out how to move forward (they said this when I met with them originally).


I can easily see the evaluator ruining the deal for me, especially since it's technically her project. At the same time, the c-suite has the authority and want to further discuss a partnership. I'm not really sure what to do here or how to approach this... but I don't like it.


I would appreciate any thoughts or past experiences!

📈 Closing
😤 Conflict Resolution
🧠 Advice
4
poweredbycaffeine
WR Lieutenant
10
☕️
Let's go full candid with this evaluator. 

" I don't want to waste your time or mine if you feel like this is bad timing, but based on your executive team's urgency and buy-in I feel like we're headed in the right direction. 

Do you still intend to move forward with our solution, or have other priorities cropped up that would stop you from moving forward?"

See what they say.
Sunbunny31
Politicker
1
Sr Sales Executive 🐰
That's what I would do.  Great advice.
newsalesguy14
Politicker
0
Account Executive
True - worth a shot
HeStoleMyTwix
Valued Contributor
0
AE
She's already essentially replied to this question: " evaluator replied to me, but didn't reply all, and said they're still shopping and aren't ready to commit to a vendor". 

Your best bet is isolating the execs and going back to value, imo
UrAssIsSaaS
Arsonist
2
SaaS Eater
I like what @poweredbycaffeine laid out. Only other approach I could think of would be some sort of temp check on buy in since she mentions that they are shopping around. Something like:

"I dont want to waste anyone's time here, but based on our last conversation, you and your exec team seemed bought into our platform being the proper solution, has that changed?

Are you looking for an additional feature set to solve X issue that we have not discussed up to this point?" 


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