SalesSpectre

Unethical or Savage?

Making up a convincing fake story and going through an entire sales process with a rep from your biggest competitor to get all the competitive intel and positioning that they use against you including assets and comparison one-pagers.

Non-ethical or savagery?

Attached poll

Super Shitty - very unethical Savage AF

*Voting in this poll no longer yields commission.

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37 comments

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softwaresails

Politicker

Sales Manager

I hate this. There are so many other ways you can get this information that turns out to be way more valuable to you.

Work with prospects who are deciding between you and your competition. Talk to current customers that switched to your system from the competitors software. Gather real data from those that have looked at / used both pieces of software.

SalesSpectre

Opinionated

I agree. Sucks really bad too for the other rep as they waste time and forecast a deal.

Savagedoge

Tycoon

Account Executive

Absolutely agree with this one. Especially sucks cuz you’re wasting a fellow sales person’s time knowing you’d be fucking pissed off if someone pulled that shit on you.

Salespreuner

Big Shot

Regional Sales Director

I can completely agree with this view!

SalesPharaoh

Big Shot

Senior Account Executive

That is the more ethical approach but it's not as easy to get your customer to share this with you. Some will fear that they are violating former NDAs.

HarryCaray

Notable Contributor

HMFIC

I don't know if I could mess with another Savage's money like that. Who knows if you're the "deal" they need to get across the line or get off a PIP. Don't need that on my conscience.

CuriousFox

WR Officer

🦊

Hellllll noooo...to the no no no....

This thread has made me nauseous.

SalesSpectre

Opinionated

Yea im with u

SalesSpectre

Opinionated

Yea im with u. For the record i didnt do this and wouldnt

Salespreuner

Big Shot

Regional Sales Director

Great 💯

CoorsKing

WR Officer

Retired King of the Coors Knights

Seems pretty unethical to me.

HarryCaray

Notable Contributor

HMFIC

Free Meech!!

Salespreuner

Big Shot

Regional Sales Director

Yes, it def is

Coffeesforclosers

Notable Contributor

Director Sales and Market Development

Sell your product and the value, dont drop fud or stoop to their level

beerisforclosers

Politicker

Account Manager

Even if we're competitors, we're all in the same boat trying to do our jobs. I wouldn't waste another savage's time and energy like that.

SalesSpectre

Opinionated

agree here

Telehealth_2the_Moon

Notable Contributor

Director of Business Development

Getting into an actual sales cycle with them is pretty screwed up. I will submit requests for their marketing materials though, just nice to have it to know what their messaging is like.

SalesSpectre

Opinionated

yea agree.

Telehealth_2the_Moon

Notable Contributor

Director of Business Development

Especially since we learned a competitor was putting marketing material out where you selected from a list of competitors you were considering (us included) and got marketing material specifically comparing the two.

Needed to grab that one to see what they were saying about us, and make sure it wasn't made up!

paddy

WR Officer

Director of Business Development

Fair game. If they are too stupid to discern the pretenders from contenders than that's on them.

SalesSpectre

Opinionated

fair enough. Im personally on the fence

paddy

WR Officer

Director of Business Development

"Baseball has rules. Mud-wrestling has rules. Sales has no rules." -Gandhi

Lumbergh

Politicker

Sr Account Exec

I think that was Abraham Lincoln

StringerBell

Politicker

Account Executive

I had a colleague leave for a management position in a totally different space and I joked he should do this. My boss said someone at his old company did that and there were legal ramifications when caught.

1nbatopshotfan

Politicker

Sales

Seems unethical and a giant waste of time. I get enough competitive data anecdotally from clients or from simple monitoring competitions websites and news releases. If you’re ok competitive RFPs etc you can gain the info you need.

SalesSpectre

Opinionated

Agree

DonDraper

Politicker

National Sales Manager

Yeah no deal for me. At the end of the day that Rep has a job to do and family to feed. I couldn't do that, it is ok to compete but do it in the right way.

Chep

WR Officer

Bitcoin Adoption Specialist

Interesting question

Lumbergh

Politicker

Sr Account Exec

I would be beyond pissed off if someone wasted my time for intel, especially a competitor. This is beyond unethical.

YoungMoney

Good Citizen

Director of Sales

Wait? Are you not on LinkedIn? How can you avoid you’re identity being found out? The least a rep can do is check out their “clients” LinkedIn page...bad idea because it’s unethical, bad idea because you got a lot of coverup to do.

Beans

Big Shot

Enterprise Account Executive

I prefer to build rapport with an opp we'd both be chasing and probe for info that way.

Knowing their value props and pitch would be the best way to come out on top.

CaneWolf

Politicker

Call me what you want, just sign the damn contract

You're fucking over that person's time. Would you want somebody to do that to you? No.

SalesSpectre

Opinionated

Agree

TheLaughingWolf

WR Officer

Business Development Manager

I haven't done this, but I did take a demo with a prospective company once. I was really curious about their product and was really interested in learning more to start a side gig. That was until I learned it was 21 k per month. Lol I did find out some industry info that I used to book a demo with one of their competitors.

Still going after the company, just haven't had any luck getting a meeting yet.

JuicyKlay

Celebrated Contributor

That’s a no from me dawg

SalesPharaoh

Big Shot

Senior Account Executive

Imo, i think sales is war and all is fair, if you manage to collect this information good for you and more power to you. If you are in a desperate situation that you had to do this, then obviously do it like The Founder movie mentioned we are in a dog eat dog world.

It's easy to say not to do it. It is also different if this is the only practice you do. If it's a one off those opportunity are hard to come by so take it.

goose

Politicker

Sales Executive

Don't be a dick.

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SalesSpectre

Unethical or Savage?

Non-ethical or savagery?

37 comments

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