Justatitle

Account Executive

How do you get around someone saying they can sign off on this knowing they can’t

We’ve all had it happen, you get intro’d to someone and they tell you yup I’ll be the DM and signer here you go further along and all of a sudden mr./mrs. high and mighty sees pricing and has to “bring their boss in” and you find out you’ve been talking to the janitor the whole time. The question is what are some strategies you use to get ahead of this in advance without insulting the person you are speaking to who might be gatekeeping their boss

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funcoupons

WR Officer

👑

Titles are always the first clue. Middle management does not normally have full DM power, and entry level definitely doesn't. Do some hunting around on LI for other people in the company and on your prospect - does their experience line up with what they're telling you? For example, an experienced and tenured HR Manager may very well have DM powers, but if they've been working there for four months and are right out of college it's highly unlikely.

If you work with any charities/non profits be sure to ask about boards of directors and their involvement with projects like this. Same goes with unionized environments.

If it's a family business, if Dad is the owner, it's likely that even if mom/kids are in lower level positions that they're going to have some influence into decision making.

Ask questions around decision making early on in the process.

- Is there anyone else involved in making decisions about this?

- When was the last time you made a big change at your org, who was all involved?

If it's discovered that other parties are involved, getting them on the phone ASAP or at the very least cc'd on relevant emails is a non negotiable step. If the person you're talking to doesn't want this to happen, be prepared to walk away from the deal.

UrAssIsSaaS

Arsonist

SaaS Eater

@funcoupons nailed it. If you do your HW before the call and ask the right questions in discovery you won't get to this point in the sales cycle and find out they cant pull the trigger.

Finesy

Valued Contributor

Account Representative III

Have them sign and let their company deal with the blowback. Not my fault they hired someone with cheez its for a brain

CaneWolf

Politicker

Call me what you want, just sign the damn contract

But clawbacks, man. Fucking brutal.

Justatitle

Big Shot

Account Executive

Claw backs or they never pay and you never see a dollar and the CSAT score plummets.

funcoupons

WR Officer

👑

Yup. Clawbacks or the deal never goes through and you've just wasted your time.

paddy

WR Officer

Director of Business Development

^This

dcarb

Good Citizen

Account Manager

I learned this in a Sandler Sales Training class not long ago but I’ve not used it yet. You ask the customer to walk you through the decision making process. If they say they are the DM you can ask them “so in your experience with projects similar to this, is there anything that could cause this project to NOT get approved?” That’s when you find out if a board has to approve it or a Next level boss has to look at it. 🤷‍♂️

CuriousFox

WR Officer

🦊

That's what I do. I've been through so many damn trainings I have no clue where I pulled info from. 🤷‍♀️

CaneWolf

Politicker

Call me what you want, just sign the damn contract

I've had success with this before "If we get two signers on your end and one has X title, we can offer (discount you were going to offer anyway)."

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Justatitle

How do you get around someone saying they can sign off on this knowing they can’t

10 comments

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