A successful approach to winning opportunities for Microsoft Dynamics Partners

Course Description

A successful approach to winning opportunities for Microsoft Dynamics Partners

Participants: pre-sales, sales, sales-management, marketing, general management
Duration: 2 days

Subject Overview

This interactive 2 day workshop will provide participants with a tried methodology to efficiently win opportunities in the Microsoft Dynamics space with a “solutions” approach to selling.

Participants will be given a proven sales process to generate new opportunities – and will also be given guidelines to effectively win opportunities aligned with the software refresh cycle.

Day 1 will provide sales methodologies to win opportunities by focusing on how to develop “fresh” opportunities in advance of the customer going to the market for quotations.

Guidance will be given in areas including

• identifying “points of pain” and “triggers” associated with a customer’s need to introduce a new business management solution
• planning an effective promotional campaign
• attracting clients based on specific market positioning
• telephone scripts to obtain meetings with prospects
• meeting preparation tools
• optimum meeting structures
• qualifying opportunities (ie “should I continue with this”)
• developing strategies to win opportunities
• using the Microsoft platform as a key source of differentiation.

Day 2 will provide practical reinforcement of concepts learnt on the first day, including:

• case studies and role plays
• developing business cases
• developing project plans to “win the deal”
• writing reference cases
• developing a tender response strategy
• competing on price.

In addition, participants will be given a “bid/no bid” methodology, as well as a tool to develop a sales strategy for a major opportunity.

Course elements are designed to link into the Microsoft Solutions Sales Process (MSSP).

Objectives

Course objectives include:

• understanding why uncovering latent opportunities is a superior approach to simply responding to customer requests for quotation
• knowledge of and ability to follow a sales process – linked to MSSP – to uncover and convert latent opportunities within a prospect
• knowledge of and ability to use a number of templates and methodologies associated with mapping customer pains to product solutions, identifying prospects, pre-planning a call, holding a structured customer meeting, obtaining customer commitment, offering proof of capability and justifying value
• identifying the key pieces of information needed to pursue and win major opportunities
• introducing a bid/no bid methodology to drive more effective sales activity
• practicing and reinforcing key course concepts in role play situations

Target Audience

This session is designed primarily for business development resources – but is well suited to other roles within the Partner that are involved in the sales process, including pre-sales, sales management, marketing management, general management.

Prerequisites

There are no mandatory prerequisites for this session.

Partner personnel that have previously attended the 2 day Solutions Based Selling courses will recognise the sales process being used – but are advised that all examples have been modified for the Dynamics space, and that the basic course has been augmented by including the bid/no bid and the major opportunity strategy tools.

Useful but optional prerequisites include:

• some direct experience in the sales process..

Content Overview

Key topics covered during Day 1 include:

• a new philosophy of selling (ie find new opportunities based on customer pain)
• world wide research into weaknesses in the Microsoft Partner community’s sales approach
• overview of demand generation processes specifically designed to uncover customer pain
• different levels of buyer need
• a flexible process to effectively sell solutions
• prospecting
  • research and planning
  • calling on prospects to obtain meetings
  • getting qualified prospects to call you
• prospect meetings/sales calls
  • necessary preparation
  • structure of a sales call
  • assisting prospects to form a buying vision
• different types of buyers and their key drivers
• gaining buyer commitment
• handling buyer concerns
• selling in partnership with Microsoft.

Key topics covered during Day 2 include:

• revision and practice - key concepts from Day 1
• dealing with opportunities previously identified by competitors
  • developing a strategy to “hijack” and win the opportunity
  • modifying the opportunity to suit your unique capabilities
• developing plans to “win the deal”
• developing a tender response strategy
• obtaining and documenting buyer commitment
  • the “Roadmap to the Deal”
• offering proof
  • writing stories of Evidence
• justifying value – writing a business case