One of my last employment stints was with a Marketing Consulting company. It was probably one of the worst experiences of my life – the story is so outrageous – no one would believe how it started and how it ended. The company ultimately failed – in fact, Magnus Marketing Group outlasted them. A fact I am truly proud of. And I thank them in my mind everyday for destroying me at that time so that I could – like the Pheonix – rise up out of the ashes and turn my talent to help some really good people build their businesses.

One thing I learned in the almost 3 years with the company was a practice they called “putting it to B.E.D.” A practice I tried very much to instill with my clients – some of whom followed it, many followed the “E.D.” part. The ones who did not – said I did not generate any revenue and stiffed me on my last invoice.

Putting it to B.E.D.

Brief: Before any sales event or meeting have a discussion about the prospect and what they are looking for, what is expected, why they are engaging. Sometimes the brief is a discussion or an email outlining what the meeting or demo is about. I always call my client and email them with an outline of the meeting – who, what, where, when and why. The better clients call me to discuss in more detail.

Execute: The demo, discovery call, or meeting occurs. I usually implore my clients to let me sit in on the discussion and moreso the demo where I listen to everything. I also take notes on what the prospect questioned any feedback they share. I also denote any issues my client encounters – they did not answer questions, came off rude or abrupt, failed to explain something….etc. Observational and opinion oriented, typically.

Debrief: Call my client or my client calls me or emails me with feedback about the sales event. We discuss the prospect….determine whether it was truly qualified (sometimes that is when I learn they lost the business on cost or the client did not have enough assets to justify the solution cost, etc. ), and share mutual feedback on performance.

If this is followed and the appropriate feedback is shared then there should be no surprises, such as when I called the search agency client after six months of hearing nothing and generating a meeting a month – to learn that nothing was closed and nothing had moved forward. That kind of surprise should NEVER occur during any kind of client engagement or employment. Additionally, if followed – fine tuning of target companies, people, and messaging should also occur which should feed into continued sustainable success.

Successful companies – successful salespeople will always – put it to B.E.D.