What to Expect from the Sales 101 Training Program

We are Peter Kuhn and Guy Barbier from Baku. We support B2B companies on how to find, and maintain their go-to-market footing. We’ve spent the last 6 months in the weeds with Gradient Metrics, helping Kyle start new conversations, advance existing conversations, and bring on new partners. Because Kyle has done so well selling the past 6 months, we all feel strongly it is time to teach these skills to the rest of the organization to drive growth through our strongest customer conduits, which is you!

We believe in investing in relationships, we believe in a consultative selling approach. We do not believe in a transactional or cold sales process.

This memo is a brief on the basic building blocks of B2B Sales, and what to expect over the coming months with these training sessions. What constitutes success for us, is we demystify what it takes to sell Gradient Metrics products, and we impart on you some tactical and practical skills for how to effectively run the Gradient Metrics sales process.

At Gradient Metrics, you are far more than a Research Manager. You are trusted advisors to our clients. You are storytellers, and problem-solvers. Your ability to dig into our customer’s goals, and whatever is getting in the way of them reaching their goals in a consultative way, is part of our competitive edge. It is your attention to detail that makes those relationships great. So, in many ways, you are already practicing much of what it takes to bring new business into our organization. Some things a B2B Salesperson does, that you are already practicing.

• You are a reliable key point of contact, balancing the customers needs with business objectives. You serve as a bridge between our company and the customer, advocating for both sides.
• You navigate complex customer relationship processes, engaging multiple stakeholders.
• You act as trusted advisors, understanding and addressing client challenges, and articulating the Gradient Metrics approach to solving those challenges.
• You create value in every interaction, articulating our unique propositions and differentiating us from competitors.
• You build and nurture long-term partnerships.
• You challenge the customer to think differently, educating them on their misconceptions based on what you know, in an effort to help them achieve their goals in the best way possible.
• You recognize that time, for our customers, and our business, is our most valuable resource.

Our training program is designed to equip you with the tools, strategies, and mindset needed to excel in B2B sales. Here’s a glimpse of what we’ll cover:

1. Training 1: How to Start New Conversations/ How to Prospect: The size of our network, and the pipeline we create from it, is the lifeblood of a business. We’ll dive into effective new customer prospecting techniques, how to leverage referrals as an introduction source, and when a referral isn’t possible, how to reach out to strangers on LinkedIn and other channels. You’ll learn to manage your prospective customer target list and develop a workflow to stay on top of the conversations you start, and any opportunities you bring to the business from those conversations
2. Training 2: Defining BANT and How to Use it: We will teach you strategies for how to prepare for a call, how to ask questions to qualify an opportunity, spur deeper conversations, and how to use BANT to evaluate the risk in an opportunity of becoming a new customer. Time is our most valuable resource. For both our customers, and for us. So we will teach you how to thoughtfully qualify an opportunity quickly, discerning a good fit, from a bad fit, so that everyone’s time is spent well.
3. Training 3: Storytelling and Demo Skills: Kyle is going to lead this session. In it, you’ll learn to deliver the Gradient Metrics story in an interesting and consistent way. We’ll teach you how to tailor presentations to different Ideal Customer Profile types.
4. Training 4: How to Keep Control of a Deal: We’ll cover how to assess if you have lost control of the deal, or more simply, the conversation, And if so, how to regain control. We will teach methods to assess, develop and maintain momentum in a deal.
5. Training 5: How to Close a Deal: From delivering pricing proposals to creating leverage and negotiating effectively, you’ll gain the skills to bring deals to close.

1. What Constitutes Success (WCS): You’ll often hear us ask “WCS” or “what constitutes success? This is a focusing question to get to the root of what the logical next step, or ideal outcome we want to drive towards.

2. Ideal Customer Profile (ICP): At its most basic, your ICP (Ideal Customer Profile) refers to the attributes of companies and individuals who buy our products. These are the accounts that represent the types of companies that benefit most from Gradient Metrics products and have a high likelihood of buying from us. We sell our products and services to three types of ICPs:

   • ICP 1: Household Brands: There are large, well-known companies needing help with high-risk strategic questions. Examples: Nike, Amazon, Google, Microsoft, Brooks.
   • ICP 2: Brand Strategy Agencies: These are firms that need support in answering their clients' complex strategic questions. Examples: Red Scout, C-Space, Media Monks, Bread & Butter, Co:collective, Lippincott.
   • ICP 3: Philanthropies, Think Tanks, and Political Organizations: These are organizations seeking insights on public policy and public opinion. Examples: CZI, Populace, The Just Trust, ACLU, City Fund Action.

3. Prospect: Before we identify an opportunity, we call contacts ‘prospects’ to differentiate between initial conversations and qualified conversations. A prospect is an individual at the account who we may be able to interact with to assess business fit. They may also be a potential champion to advocate for us within their organization, an influencer, or ideally, a buyer of our products. Our prospects generally have titles such as Head, Director, or Manager of Head, Director, Manager of Data, Head, Director, Manager of Insights, Head, Director, Manager of Strategy, Head, Director, Manager of Analytics, Head, Director, Manager of Research

4. Sales Funnel: The sales funnel is a visual representation of the customer journey from awareness to final purchase. It’s called a funnel because it typically starts with many potential customers at the top and narrows down to fewer actual buyers at the middle and bottom. The funnel is split into three main sections:

   • Top of Funnel (TOFU): Lead and Discovery stages
   • Middle of Funnel (MOFU): Qualification and Opportunity stages
   • Bottom of Funnel (BOFU): Proposal, Closed-Verbally, and Closed-Won/Lost stages

5. Opportunity: An opportunity is a qualified prospect at an account that fits our Ideal Customer Profile and has a high likelihood of becoming a Gradient Metrics customer.

6. Steps (stages) in the Sales Process: The specific steps we take a prospect through within our sales funnel, from first conversation to closed deal. Each stage represents a deepening of the relationship and intentional progression towards an eventual sale. The salesperson’s job is to act as a guide through these stages. At any stage, we may learn information that would cause an opportunity to no longer be qualified, which we then mark as “Closed Lost”. We have 7 steps in the sales process defined by the following stages:

   • Lead (top of funnel): Initial contact or potential customer identified. These are people we want to start conversations with, or have actively started a conversation with.
   • Discovery (top of funnel): Learning about the prospect’s needs and challenges. This involves getting to know the person, their business, what questions they’re trying to answer with research, and what problems are preventing them from reliably answering those questions quickly.
   • Qualification (middle of funnel): Determining if the prospect fits our ICP and has a genuine need for our services. We decide: 1) Is this the type of company and person we can do business with? 2) Do they have a real need for our services?
   • Opportunity (middle of funnel): A qualified prospect with a clear need that our service can address. In other words, someone who has a genuine problem that Gradient Metrics can solve, and they want to consider us for the solution.
   • Proposal (bottom of funnel): Presenting a formal scope tailored to the prospect’s needs, including how we plan to service that scope and what we charge to do it.
   • Closed - Verbally (bottom of funnel): The prospect has agreed to our proposal verbally or via email, but hasn’t signed a contract yet.
   • Closed - Won (bottom of funnel): The deal is finalized and signed.
   • Closed - Lost: The prospect has decided not to proceed with our services. (This can occur at any stage in the process.)

7. BANT: BANT is an acronym that stands for ‘Budget, Authority, Need, and Timing’. At its most basic, it serves as a guide for managing what you know about a customer through your conversations with them. We use BANT as a teaching mechanism for:

   • The types of questions we ask at different stages of the sales process, such as discovery and qualification.
   • How we manage transitions between different stages in the sales process.
   • How we predict the timeline to finalize a contract in our forecast.

8. Forecast: A prediction of future closed sales within a specific timeframe, eg: “this week, this month, this quarter, this half of year, this year”. The forecasting process involves both quantitative and qualitative elements. We estimate a forecast based on several factors:

   • The progression of a prospect through sales stages
   • The salesperson’s judgment on the prospect’s qualification
   • The prospect’s firmographic and behavioral characteristics
   • Specific feedback the prospect has given us related to BANT (Budget, Authority, Need, Timing)

We believe in learning by doing. Each training session will include:

• A pre-read memo to prime your thinking and comment questions
• A 30-minute walk through on the core concepts in the memo
• 15-30 minutes of Q&A and discussion
• Live role-play scenarios and practical exercises

What you get after the training:

• Recorded sessions for future reference
• Ongoing support for questions as you apply these concepts in the field

Remember, the method of how to bring new customers into our business is a learnable skill. You will find, you are already doing much of these things naturally.

The best customer facing folks are perpetual learners, they are curious to learn about a customer’s problems, consultative in their approach to solve those problems, and take a proactive approach to managing the direction of the conversations. This program is designed to kickstart your learning, but the real learning happens when you apply these concepts in your interactions with clients.

As we progress through this program, I encourage you to approach each session with curiosity and openness. Challenge assumptions, ask questions, and embrace the ambiguity that comes from stepping outside of your comfort zone.

Let’s get started!

-Baku