Suspects and Prospects

Bill Warner Thursday, January 10, 2008

Successful sales people really know the difference between suspects and prospects. What makes them successful isn’t so much that they are smarter or more dynamic than others, but it is that they don’t waste their time on chasing potential customers that really won’t lead to a closed sale. Knowing the difference between suspects and prospects makes the difference between making your sales objectives and having to look for another job.

At a CED Fast Track meeting I saw Richard Dean give a short tutorial on the art of selling. He stressed the importance of really knowing what a real prospect is before you spend any time on the sales process. His major point was, “if the answer is going to be no, find out quickly.”

What all this means is that good marketing and sales people spend time qualifying a potential customer. Without proper qualification, a potential customer is simply a suspect. That is, you do not know if they are in a position to be able to buy what you are selling.

Starting the sales process on a suspect will lead to a lot of wasted time on potential customers who will eventually say no. With proper qualification, you turn the suspect into a prospect who you know is in a position to buy. Spending time only on prospects will significantly improve your sales productivity by not wasting time on suspects.

Qualification of Suspects

In order to turn a suspect into a prospect, you need to ask some questions and get some clear answers about their readiness to buy:

  • First determine if the suspect is buying what you’re selling, and why. You must determine if the suspect really has the problem that your product or service solves. This amounts to asking a series of questions about the suspect’s business and having them describe the problem as they see it. Your job is to match their description with your solution. If there is a match, you are on the right track. Next you need to determine how pressing the problem is. Find out why they need to solve the problem and how it is impacting them. The more objective the answer, the more the suspect will be interested in buying. If you get a superficial qualitative answer, then you might not really have a real prospect. The suspect may indeed have the problem you solve, but is not really ready to spend money on solving it. The suspect may have other priorities for spending budget dollars at this point. You need to ask if the suspect is ready to buy a solution to the problem now. With a positive response to these questions, you need to find out more before you are sure you have a prospect.
  • You need to be sure that you are working with the decision-maker. You simply need to ask if the person you are talking to will be the one to decide to buy your product or service. If not, you need to find out who it is and get an introduction to that person. Often you will be faced with working with a representative of the decision maker, but you should not proceed with the sales process until you know and have met the actual decision maker. The decision maker may delegate the job of making a recommendation on a purchase to the person you have already met, but you will be proceeding with the knowledge that the decision maker is aware and supports the sales process.
  • Find out if there is money in the current budget for the purchase of a solution. Even though the suspect may have a pressing problem, a budget may not be in place. If you find that the decision maker is faced with going forward to find incremental budget money, you are not working with a prospect. It is probably best to come back at a later time once a budget has been put in place.
  • Does the suspect have the authority to spend the budget? Just because a budget is in place does not mean that a decision has been made to actually spend the money. Find out if the amount of money that will be needed to purchase your product or service fits within the limits of approval of the suspect. Also determine what additional authority is needed to approve the purpose, if any. If the suspect really doesn’t have the authority, you are really not working with the decision maker.
  • Next you need to determine who is going to actually sign the check for the purchase. Sometimes it will be the decision maker. Sometimes it will be much more complicated. You may be faced with a situation where the decision maker has to get additional approvals within the company. This takes the form of purchasing departments, budget committees and executive signature authority. Although the decision maker may have a budget and a spending limit, it is not unusual that other people need to sign off on the purchase. You simply need to ask what the process is to get final approval for the expenditure. Then, decide if the decision maker really does have enough clout in the company to cause the payment to be made once the decision is made.
  • Now, you need to find out what the purchase decision process is. Many companies have a rigorous decision process involving justification analysis and determining the advantages of the purchase along with the return on the investment. You need to find out what the decision making process steps are and how long they will take, all the way from now until the check is signed. If you find that this process is way out of the ordinary compared to other prospects, you might decide to forego this suspect because the sales process will be too long. Either way, you will have a template of what it will take to close the sale and how to drive the decision making process.
  • Knowing the criteria for making the decision is critical. Ask the suspect how he or she will decide on the purchase. If they are able to clearly state in objective terms what the decision points are, you are working with a prospect. If you get subjective and rambling answers, you are working with a suspect and should move to your next opportunity. They obviously have not thought about it enough to be clear about how they will decide on a purchase.
  • Know who the key influencers are. More often than not, other people are going to be looking at your sales proposal and giving advice to the decision maker. You need to know who they are and what perspective they bring to the decision process. You will have to spend time with them to make sure they understand your product or service so they can give meaningful input to the decision maker.

Qualified Prospects

Suspects that successfully answer your qualification questions without hesitation and with clear and objective reasons are going to be your prospects. Spend the sales time on them and decide if and when you will ever go back and talk to the suspects who didn’t qualify.

After all, the objective is to sell, not educate or spend time dragging a suspect to a point of qualification. They should get there themselves.

Filed Under: Business Operations, Sales Tips & Strategies



Bill Warner is the Managing Partner of Paladin and Associates, a business consulting firm in the Research Triangle Park area of central North Carolina, and is the Chairman of the Triangle Accredited Capital Forum, an angel investor network with over one hundred members throughout the southeast.

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