Pre-sales Workshop

Contents

1 Presales Process Overview

2 Roles & Responsibilities

3 Writing a Winning Proposal

4 Post-RFP stage

5 A Generic Framework
 What is presales
A set of activities normally carried out
before a customer is acquired

A typical sales cycles

 Suspect
 Prospect/Opportunity
 Lead

Presales involvement in these phases

differs from situation to situation
 What is Presales

 Happens along with a sales

person before a sale closes

 It is sales support

 It is also about being a technical

and business consultant
A Typical Sales Process

Product Knowledge
Prospecting
Approach
Needs Assessment
Customer Presentation
Sales Close
Follow-up
Presales Involvement

Product Knowledge
Prospecting
Approach
Needs Assessment
Customer Presentation
Sales Close
Follow-up
 What is not presales

 Searching for new

suspects, prospects or leads
 Qualifying prospects
 Deciding and planning to approach
prospects
 Negotiating with customer in closing
a deal
 What is not presales

 Developing relationship with

customers
 Calling for a meeting with the
customer
 Deciding the price of a deal
 Collecting feedback from the
customer
 Presales in IT
 Companies looking for vendors to
implement software solutions call for
proposals
 Support for Sales in closing a deal
 Many times a technical and business
consultant for the potential customer
 Crucial link between Sales, Customer
and Delivery
 Needs a blend of technical, business
and soft skills
 Presales in IT
Needs to work having the ‘big picture’
in mind – winning the deal for the
company as well as customer delight
Presales role could be specific to
account, territory, technologies and
partners
 Plays an important role in making
proposals for RFPs and RFIs
 Why Presales
 Increasing complexity in customer’s
business requirements in terms of
variety in technology, number of
components or modules, security and
infrastructure needs
 Customer delight is more than
matching customer needs with a right
technical solution. Customers expect
vendors to partner with them in
meeting their evolving business
needs
 Why Presales
 Bidding process is a complex and a
very formal one, with strict adherence
to procedures and timelines
 Bidding process involves intelligent
negotiation on price, scope of
work, schedule and other contract
requirements
 Therefore is too important to be done
without committed and dedicated
professionals
 Without Presales
Making proposals may either end-up
with delivery heads or worse, with
sales
 Sales will not have the depth of
technical knowledge to provide a
solution
 Delivery heads may not have skills to
match customer’s business needs
with the right technical solution
 Both the teams could be short on
bandwidth to take full responsibility
Place of Presales

Sales

Customer
Presales

Services
 Presales in career growth
A great opportunity to know up close
the market and the business of
software, and what ‘sells’
Opportunity to get a systemic view of
many things that makes up an
organization and it’s business
Opportunity to get to know different
cross-sections of customer and
technology solutions
 Presales in career growth
People with a technical background
can add lot of value by bringing in
their experience and thereby benefit
from it
Working in presales can also be seen
as a choice for shifting to
management career path
Opportunity to learn a variety of skills
including client liaison, managing
cross-functional
teams, leadership, consulting skills
 Presales in career growth
In larger organizations, presales
gives a very good opportunity to
network with all the right people

Since presales is demanding on both

technical and business knowledge
and management skills, it’s the right
place for a challenging job
 Presales is different
Any specific sales engagement is
temporary
therefore the corresponding sales-
presales engagement is also
temporary
The same is true for the other
cascading engagements between
presales and others down the line
The engagement on an average lasts
for about a month – from the start of
the RFP to the end of the RFP
 Place of presale
 Where does a presale person belong
to
 Practices
 Center of Excellence or Technologies
 Accounts
 Territory
 Partners
 Sales
 Sometimes from the project itself
 Common Attitude and Perceptions
I am on bench. So they picked me up
to do this job…
This is mainly a ‘cut-copy-paste’ job.
Why do they need me ?
In any case, winning depends entirely
on the sales team and the top
management…
After all, I am a technical person… I
don’t know or want to be a sales
person
 I don’t see the results immediately, it
usually takes months before I hear…
 Common Attitude and Perceptions
We are non-billable resources.
Obviously we don’t get enough
resources to do the job
I am not trained for this job…
There’s just not enough and right
information around to write this
proposal…
There’s hardly enough time to do this
work… Why can’t they inform me
much ahead ?
How do I grow in my career in this
path ?
 Common Problems
Presales work is not assigned the
right resources
Not enough training is given
Presales work needs many temporary
resources and therefore gets less
commitment
People who are on bench are
assigned
Proposal can have too many technical
components and therefore may need
involvement of many people
 Common Problems
May face ownership problems
Demanding on technical, business and
soft skills all at once
Every RFP response ‘suffers’ from
extreme time constraints
Presales Process
 Winning a Deal

•Market Analysis

Market
•Strategic Planning
Opening •Account Planning
Game •Branding

•Account Management

Client
•Relationship Management
Middle •Opportunity Management
Game •Pursuit Management

•Proposal Management

Deal
•Presentation
End •Negotiation
Game
 Presales Stages

Pre-RFP RFP Proposal Post-RFP

• RFP Issue
• Finalise reqmts
• Pre-Bid
• Shortlist
Conference
vendors • Customer
• Clarifications
• Finalise • Prepare Visits
on RFP
Evaluation Proposal • Demo of
• Modifications
Criteria according to Capabilities
to RFP
• Finalise Budget RFP guidelines • Presentation
• Identify
• Customer • Evaluation
resources to
presentation by
work on RFP
vendor
 Presales Stages
Roles
 Customer
 Sales person
 Presales person
 Finance
 Solution Architect
 Domain Expert
 Technical Consultant
 Account Manager
 Presales Stages
Pre-RFP RFP Proposal Post-RFP
• Finalise reqmts • Issue RFP • Receive proposal • Request for site visit
• Shortlist vendors • Arrange pre-bid and/or demo
Customer

• Finalise Evaluation conference • Evaluate and finalize

Criteria • Provide vendor
• Finalise Budget clarifications

• Make customer • Receive RFP • Assist presales with • Arrange for

presentation • Seek clarification on inputs from customer Customer visit
showcasing services, RFP and about customer • Arrange for demo
Sales

products and • Get commitment • Add commercials to and presentation

strengths from internal the proposal
resources
• Keep mgmt
informed
Presales

• Provide inputs as • Receive RFP • prepare proposal by • Assist sales in

needed • Identify resources working with cross- customer visit, demo
to work on RFP functional teams or and presentation
• Form cross- by taking inputs from
functional team them
• Seek clarifications

• Provide inputs as • Provide inputs as • Provide inputs as • Provide inputs as

Delivery

needed (case studies, needed (questions to needed (technical needed (inputs for
testimonials) customers on solutions, relevant demo)
business needs, case studies, etc)
technical specs, etc)
www.themegallery.com
 Information Flow
• Provide infn on
products, service
Customer
s
• present success
stories
• seek to
understand
• seek further infn business and
on customer •Business Reqmts
technical reqmts
• Technical
to form a solution
Reqmts
• seek to Delivery
• Constraints
• Evaluation • understand
Criteria solution provided
Sales • RFP
• Clarifications

• questions on
RFP
• questions on
• RFP • questions on
customer
• Infn on business and
• status update
customer technical reqmts
constraints, prefe • questions on
rences, priorities • Response to RFP customer
constraints,
• Competitor infn Pre Evaluation
• RFP Clarifications sales assumptions,
•Criteria
customer
problems, etc
 Discussion
Use the IFD to discuss about
 The gaps in information flow
 The inefficiencies
 What kind of information loss happens
 Identify areas of potential risks
 The choice of medium and its suitability
 Session 1 -Summary

What did we learn

Questions