Mothy

Account Executive

Valued Contributor

Pre-Qualifying Meetings

Hello wise AEs of the War Room. I come to you humbly for advice on the best way to pre-qualify prospects for you.

I sell EdTech, and our current qualification questions involve asking about their current tech stack, if there has been discussion to replace the piece that we offer, and if there are any initiatives that might get in the way of an implementation. I want to provide the best meetings to my AEs, and make sure that the initial qualification is complete so they can spend more time on other aspects.

What would a perfectly pre-qualified meeting (within reason) look like for you?

Caveats are most of the meetings I schedule are done so through 1 call, maybe a couple more if the prospect was busy at the time. Most of my prospects are fairly eager to get off the phone because they are extremely busy throughout the day, so I want to make sure my questions are valuable.

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👨‍🌾 SDR

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9

12 comments

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InQ5WeTrust

Arsonist

8

No marketing, mayo isn't an MQL

Have you asked your AE's this question?

What we say really doesn't matter if it doesn't align with what they want.

Ask each of them that you feed meetings to. They may well give different answers. Note that down.

Ask them what makes a hot prospect, what has a higher close etc etc

Build that into that your questions.

When you've screened for those things, and they trust you, then they'll be happy to run with what you pass them.

Mothy

Politicker

1

Account Executive

That is true. I was mostly looking for general things that make a hot prospect, but you are right about it being different across the board.

InQ5WeTrust

Arsonist

2

No marketing, mayo isn't an MQL

General things in a perfect world - they have a genuine need, have evaluated competition and think you're bae.

If they have an allocated budget for a solution that's great

If they have a defined initiative to solve x thing that you solve then that's a winner

etc

it's mainly about them being that next step further than whatever your qualifying criteria are.

Mothy

Politicker

0

Account Executive

That’s the perfect reply I was looking for. Thanks mate. I really hope that our team (SDR) will take over the Cold Call->Discovery meeting process, and perform the handoff when the prospect is qualified for demo.

SaaSData

Catalyst

3

VP of SaaS & Unit Economics 🏴‍☠️

Never. Your job is to get them to the AE. Let anything through.

Sales Leaders will lie to you and say you don't want to give stuff over. Always send stuff over. That's how you get paid.

Unless you get punished, just get it to your AEs. No one gets mad for booking meetings with their AE counterpart.

Always just say you're learning etc..

The average SaaS SDR booking to the person having a problem then or in the next 3-4 months is about 80%. That means, 80% of those meetings should go to opportunity.

Starts with someone who has a problem that you have a conversation with.

The SDR job is "The Conversation" the AE job is a "The Discovery".

The Discovery is the #1 call in SaaS and most important. If your AE is good, they will provoke the person into understanding the problem is bigger than they thought and they should act on it.

SaaS is bought on impact. The rep that can provoke on the Discovery Call is the #1 rep on the team always. This is when you find out the emotional pain/impact to the person and get them to move off the status quo.

-SaaSData
lmk if i can help

text: (908) 676-SaaS - reach out anytime... 24/7

Mothy

Politicker

1

Account Executive

Thanks mate. I am definitely going to save your number. A big part of my desire to pre-qualify is so that meetings go to Opp in a more timely manner, since I get paid on Opps created. I guess it’s mostly a desire to have more control over my income. Right now, it’s really just a volume thing (minimum of 5 mtgs booked per week, 10 was my highest in a week.) Forecast is 25-30% of meetings booked should go to opp, but in my head if I can skew that conversion higher while keeping the same quantity, that would be ideal.

Diablo

Politicker

2

Sr. AE

You got to discuss with your AEs. Best is to sit with them and jot down top 3 important questions that can help you know the quality of prospects.

Doesn't matter what you sell, you will always find prospects busy 😀

CuriousFox

WR Officer

1

🦊

Have a 1 on 1 with your AE. They will give you a few general questions they really need the answers to that you can use on every prospect.

cw95

Politicker

1

Sales Development Lead

No one silver bullet for this unfortunately as it really does depend on your criteria! However, the main ones in any qual are whos the decision maker? Is there budget? Whats the time scale? Is there a genuine need? The rest is more so defined by what you sell.

thebuckhunter

Politicker

1

AE

Prospect on the phone: "Can I steal 2 minutes of your time to ask a few initial questions to make sure we make the most of our time together when we meet?"

Work with your AE/BDR Manager on 3-5 prequalification questions.

Even if you set it via email, you can probably call them, thank them for booking a meeting and ask. They should be willing to spare 2 minutes today if it could potentially save them 30-45 minutes next week if its not a fit.

AnchorPoint

Politicker

0

Business Coach

The AE should be helping you. That is where to start.

Flippinghubs

Opinionated

0

Account Executive

It really comes down to the preference of the AE and team you work on. Once you get an understanding of what information they need to uncover youre going to be golden

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