rep1988

Business Dev

That first meeting, incentivizing with wine !?!

Trying to land initial meeting, or maybe even a follow-up post demo/pricing and everyone goes silent. Have you used gifts/wine/etc to land a first meeting or later in cycle? If so, what seems to resonate well, how do you distribute, has it ever backfired?

🔎 Prospecting

👑 Sales Strategy

📈 Closing

26 comments

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Kosta_Konfucius

Politicker

Sales Rep

Alcohol is a risky play for cold out reach.

I am more of a fan of hand written notes and coffee mug for cold outreach mail. Maybe talk about fall and send something pumpkin spice related, even a candle.

Wellss

Tycoon

Channel sales

Agreed! You have to be careful with alcohol as that is one thing I could see backfiring.

I used to have a colleague who would do donuts in the morning and that worked well for him! Didn't always get the meeting booked but it got some form of response. He would look up local donut shops & have them delivered with Doordash

Kosta_Konfucius

Politicker

Sales Rep

100%

Fenderbaum

Politicker

Retired Choirboy🪕

Love donuts.

NotCreativeEnough

Big Shot

Professional Day Ruiner

I cover Kentucky, Ohio, and Indiana. I offered people a bottle of bourbon for taking a meeting for awhile. It worked VERY well lol. Pretty sure everyone in that area has been drinking bourbon since the age of 3.

Sunbunny31

Politicker

Sr Sales Executive 🐰

That's knowing your audience! This wouldn't work in Utah. :)

NotCreativeEnough

Big Shot

Professional Day Ruiner

yep, definitely gotta cater to what works. like the guys in my company who cover Texas send steaks lol. make the gifts a little more relevant to the clientele you serve and they will be more productive than a generic gift card or whatever like your competitors are doing.

Sunbunny31

Politicker

Sr Sales Executive 🐰

See, I'd be afraid of inadvertently sending the wrong type.

And getting "we don't eat THAT here. Go on, git".

Sunbunny31

Politicker

Sr Sales Executive 🐰

If you send a big ticket gift, you should make sure it's going to be well-received. For cold outreach, you're probably best playing it safe with something that will generally be accepted, such as snacks of any kind with a personalized note. I've sent coffee cards with an invitation to "meet" over coffee (when you're remote), or a doordash certification to have a lunch meeting.

I've also used gifting platforms like Alyce and Sendoso - cheese plates were very effective. Also if you happen to know that they follow a specific sports team, branded mugs are really great to get attention.

Kosta_Konfucius

Politicker

Sales Rep

You should make sure it's going to be well-received........Thats why I send Trader Joes 2 buck chuck!

Sunbunny31

Politicker

Sr Sales Executive 🐰

$3 now with inflation. :(

Fenderbaum

Politicker

Retired Choirboy🪕

Ahh, the things you learn here in the WR. I've never seen this.

Sunbunny31

Politicker

Sr Sales Executive 🐰

Legendary! TJ's is awesome.

CuriousFox

WR Officer

🦊

I learned about this recently.

CuriousFox

WR Officer

🦊

Check out pinata grams.

Fenderbaum

Politicker

Retired Choirboy🪕

I've never heard of this either! I guess I should leave my cave a little more. Sounds like an excellent idea.

butwhy

Politicker

Solutions Engineer

Ok, this is fucking adorable.

Sunbunny31

Politicker

Sr Sales Executive 🐰

Oh, that is such a cool idea!

antiASKHOLE

Tycoon

Bravado's Resident Asshole

gifts, yes. Alcohol, no.

ThatNewAE

Big Shot

Account Executive - Mid enterprise

I’d say a big No to wine, please.
Gifts, if you know them even okayish- You can figure out what they’d like. Yes.

I’ve never tried anything more than “a coffee to discuss this over”. But yeah. You do you.

punishedlad

Tycoon

Business Development Team Lead

Brother, every morning I'm on the road my first stop is to a local bakery to grab some cookies that I can gift to prospects. I charge the company card at least $120 a week for baked goods.

Wellss

Tycoon

Channel sales

I've seen baked goods do so much good! Who can say no to fresh bakery cookies

Fenderbaum

Politicker

Retired Choirboy🪕

I start slurring my words with fresh cookies!

Rallier

Politicker

SDR Manager and Consultant

I'd probably go with something else other than alcohol for first outreach. I've seen people use gifts, but I've personally never done it

ARRisLife

Politicker

Account Executive

We have a gifting platform- and also have several virtual events a number of them are wine tastings with aSommelier.. So I've used this method a lot-

The platform we use allows exchanges so even if I select a bottle of bourbon I always let them know they can exchange it.

Its usually well received, Ive only had one person say they don't really drink and exchanged for another gift.

Sunbunny31

Politicker

Sr Sales Executive 🐰

Yeah, I like the platform where you send something with a personalized note and they can exchange for something else if it's just not right.

I used it for my cheese samplers - not one was exchanged.

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rep1988

That first meeting, incentivizing with wine !?!

26 comments

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