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#101 - 3 quick changes that will dramatically improve your first meetings

#101 - 3 quick changes that will dramatically improve your first meetings

3 quick changes to dramatically improve your first meetings

January 27, 2023

Reading time: ~2 min

Proven strategies to grow your cybersecurity company

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3 TIPS TO IMPROVE YOUR FIRST MEETINGS

I've listened to thousands of first meetings, and one thing is clear; there are some simple but impactful changes we can all make to the questions we ask.

First meetings with your ideal prospects take work to come by. For some, they are way too rare (am I right?!). Let's ensure we do all we can to maximize each and increase the chances they convert to an opportunity.

Here are three quick changes you can make whether you are a founder or in the sales team.

1. Ask fewer but more thoughtful questions

The best discovery sessions happen when we ask a few outstanding questions that get longer, thoughtful responses from our prospects.

Do this:

Look at the questions you ask.
Challenge yourself to cut half of them.
Change the rest to be more insightful to get more thoughtful answers.

2. Ask the right questions for the persona

Imagine you are a CRO, and a seller asks you how many fields you have integrated between your Salesforce and sales engagement tool. Stupid, right?

But that happens when we focus on our product and ask CISO questions about product-level stuff.

Do this:

Think through what each person you meet cares about in their role.
Tailor your questions for them.

By the way, if you need help figuring out how to tailor your questions to the persona and get better outcomes from your first meetings, I can help you with that.

3. Get to the impact of problems as fast as you can

We spend way too much dancing around the real issues, focusing on facts and situation questions. (e.g., how many, how often, who does this, etc.) and don't spend enough time on the big topic.

What is the real impact of the challenges they are facing?

Do this:

Challenge yourself to get to a discussion on the impacts of their problems in as short a time as possible.
Can you get there in 4 questions? Three questions? How about 2?

ACTION FOR YOU:

Try these small changes to make a significant impact on your results.

BTW, If you're looking for additional support, here are some ways I can help you grow:

LEARNING: I go in-depth on hot GTM topics and interview great cybersecurity company leaders on the Sales Bluebird podcast. Subscribe in your favorite podcast player or at Sales Bluebird.
CONVERT MORE FIRST MEETINGS: Do you feel like the sales deck you use on early-stage sales calls is missing the mark? Get me to review it and provide actionable, in-depth recommendations to help you convert more first meetings. Take a look at First Meeting Deck >>>.
GROW SALES FASTER: Want to build a repeatable sales process based on proven frameworks? Which have worked for other cybersecurity companies? Find out more about Unstoppable >>>

TIME FOR A DAD JOKE

Q: What’s the difference between a hippo and a Zippo?

A: One’s really heavy and the other’s a little lighter.

Tate Buffington, Director - Southern US & South America @ XM Cyber

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Rooting for you,