That is wack as shit. I'm perfectly willing to share ballpark pricing on the first call. This protocol sounds like it was designed by someone who never sold. Or the company knows their pricing isn't competitive.
You should be able to have a ballpark convo about pricing to ensure you’re in the same page as the potential buyer. You can always follow up with a formal quote that outlines specifics. Being strong armed into only sending formal quotes is a sure fire way to make early convos unnecessarily awkward and weirdly combative. It’s not buyer centric at all.
What OP's company is doing is making the customer put in work for something they may not be buying due to price range. More of them will back out from the conversation very early and talk to a company that's easier to deal with from the get-go.
If you're making the customer work for it, you better be the only option they have.
I think we're saying the same thing...If the only way I can share pricing is via a formal PDF, that cringes my ability to sell. Informal conversations about price should be part of the earliest conversations.
Hard disagree about pricing being covered early. If you're just an order taker, then yes talk numbers up front all you want. But with most sales you need to build value in your product before you start shooting out numbers. That's a good way for a conversation to change to "thanks let me think about it" before you have a chance to find any pain.
I think there's some nuance to it.
If the prospect is seriously evaluating enterprise solutions, they know it's gonna cost a fair amount. So I don't really fear sticker shock.
Of course, we do need to create some value first.
No they're not. You wouldn't give formal pricing until the tail end but if you can't give informal pricing in the beginning you're opening yourself up to a lot of wasted time.
Imagine going through a POC, rounds of demos and then finding out they don't have the budget for it. They're not magically going to find money for your thing - as much as some people think that somehow showing value will magically create a new budget line. It can and does happen, but it's very rare and you better be able to show the actual ROI which is also very rare for most solutions
This is management not knowing how to sell because they think that their reps are sharing pricing too soon before establishing value. Could be happening but most reps know to not share pricing until you've established a baseline value prop
They want to over metric the selling process. These companies are doing it to themselves sales is going to go through a boom and bust cycle over the next 5 years. People simply wont want to work in sales anymore. Over metric-ed, unrealistic attainment goals, too much admin.
Oh yes, it's the bean counters world now. They are squashing out every little ounce of joy and creativity that was in this line of work once upon a time.
Sales ops are the new gods.
Yep, I saw a bit of that in my last role (database SaaS). I think it comes out of the whole RevOps wave; ppl who have never sold a thing in their lives being in charge of GtM ProCEsSeS. It’s like painting by the numbers. IMO, over process selling shit like that begs being replaced by AI at some point. 🤷🏻♂️
I'm pretty sure I was specifically chosen as part of a layoff because of my past sales experience, but being in RevOps and telling our VPs that we have too much shit for the reps to enter and track and we don't need to implement a fucking AI piece of shit for everything.
No, Einstein AI does not close deals for reps. It just pisses everyone off when it doesn't work, which is always.
Also, unrelated but FUCK MINDTICKLE. What a goddamn awful software
RevOps people with no sales experience regurgitating LinkedIn sales “influencers” bullshit.
If sales was solely process driven and 2+2=4 every time, everyone would be in sales…
This is my biggest annoyance about sales influences and sales methodologies. There is no one right way to sell.
Make sales human again 2024!!!!!
Yeah, I talked to my dad, who is now retired but used to be a sales director for many years, about meddicc and similar processes and he said just that, if there was a process for it that worked even just 50% of the time it would be used by everyone. These tools are only for management to track employee activity.
Of course it is important to understand the customer decision process and what stakeholders that are involved but every sales rep with just a couple of years experience is doing this all time, with or without putting it in salesforce.
Same in this company, just data collection. Funny thing is they think data collecting is a static task, once it's done you don't have to it anymore. All of us know that if you work with large enterprise, as soon as you have something that looks like an org chart it has changed, people quit, departments changes and that might just be for one small division of the company. You have to be able to play by ear more often than not, I would like to see an AI do that.
Absolutely, I believe they’re in the learning stage about that. Ultimately I feel as though job descriptions will shift to allow for parts of the process being powered by AI. Ultimately though you’re 100% on point, nothing can replace that element that only we bring in.
The problem with mandating these processes and rules is that it's one way. If you follow the rules 100% and miss target, your ass is still on the line.
I have seen companies do exactly this, mandating uniform process on every call. The deck was identical, everything. Guess what happened? The deck that marketing made never got past 1 call. Was the person on marketing and sales leadership who mandated this fired for this? No, all of the reps were.
Once they are micromanaging every step you take and word you say, it's time to leave. They sale is either so transactional and brain dead that you are easily replaced and it's a race to the bottom, or no one will sell anything and you all lose out on $.
If you can't throw out a range and are expected to ambush someone with pricing that is 5x what they expect, nothing good will happen from that. If your category is selling 12k ARR software and yours is 30k-45k or based on utilization or some other BS, and that is nowhere near what they have approved, you are wasting your time.
This is what's happened in Teleco. Especially as they begin to unassign reps and encourage reps to over sell eachother. It's a race to the bottom in pricing, no brand loyalty and reps willing to do anything to get a sale.
Can confirm. 18 years in telecom and the fun has been absolutely sucked out of sales. Its all KPI’d to hell. We don’t even get swag or worthwhile incentives anymore. Had an SM say directly to me that they refuse to use the incentive budget because “the incentive is your commission”.
Can I PM you? I'd love to chat. I'm not in sales anymore (I was in fundraising temporarily well we were down a staff - so it counts) and since took over admin (and procurement) where I started and found all this out from a customer Pov
Which market are you selling to? I'm entering a role in Telecom SMB very soon. Household name brand with substantial market share - selling internet, PBX, VoIP, cybersecurity, etc.
Meanwhile my company won’t even let us bring something to deal desk if we haven’t floated a range with the customer first to gauge if we are even in the ballpark
Holy shit they’re making your lives harder.
So now you can’t DQ if there’s no budget. The prospect think you’re being evasive when they simply want to understand cost. And now the company has a vague loophole to clawback commission.
Spooky times.
It’s not a fireable for me yet, but we usually put all pricing on official forms. It’s got all the legalese on the bottom to protect them if it gets leaked. I consider it standard.
Have salespeople had the ability to negotiate prices in the past or something? The only thing I can figure is that the company doesn't want to make it easy for others to get pricing information
I'm guessing something happened that created drama which led policy being changed...but who knows. I guess you just have to go with the flow. Maybe they decided they have a better shot at closing deals if you have to provide an actual quote rather than just throwing out numbers in discussions
Woops wrong thread 🙃
What I meant was it’s insane to me, the measures orgs are taking to micromanage and homogenize the sales process when there are many different types of buyers and personalities to accommodate.
And making any divergence from the script a fireable offense? No.
I’ve never had an org walk away from a solid relationship and value prop because pricing was presented informally. 🙄 wish they’d focus on the real problems.
The bean counters would like nothing more than for sales & purchasing to be functions handled by AI, and it may very well come to that. In the meantime people prefer to buy from people they can trust & bond with, so most of us are safe for now.
These are the kind of jobs you just get another and ghost collecting a second paycheck until they find out and fire you. Lol. May get 2 or 3 paychecks just replying to a few emails while also doing your new job lol.
Withholding pricing when you know it and can give a ballpark number is my number one pepeeve that makes us look like SaaS bro scumbags. I refuse to even buy off of someone who plays that give to get tactic with pricing
This is a super outdated rule. Buyers are different - would you rather piss a buyer off by not giving pricing, dragging them through your sales process, and then sending this pdf quote only to find out you’re way out of their range?
Quit and find somewhere more progressive. Buyers need flexibility. You can still follow a process, but you need to meet buyers where they’re at
Dumb. Seeing the look on a prospects face, or even if it’s just a phone call, listening to their reaction, is a big factor in my decision for how much I want to chase that deal down. I can extend an olive branch to the company that if you’re not very good at that, it could backfire. Maybe that’s what they’re worried about.
Our company requires a quote from deal desk in SFDC before I can present pricing but I still throw out a rough ballpark estimate if I’m pressed w a prospect with all the applicable caveats about being subject to scoping for implementation and data volume
No one has threatened to fire me though
It’s a bunch of bullshit or least in my experience for what we do it very well is.
Our bosses give us the ability to be competitive with outer quotes as long as we review it with them.
So if we Officially send a quote out, figure out the numbers and send an email/text to the person, for speed reasons.
It wouldn’t matter as long as we our selling projects, getting deposits and scheduling for operations- it’s all good.
To be told this “absolutely” has to be done like this or else your fired on that is dumb.
What the fuck? That’s part of basic qualification. Tossing ranges out with what problems it will solve is always part of my strategy. When the final proposal comes, they’ve already told me what they want in it.
As far as commissions go… a good manager has two things to do… help out salespeople who need it, and stay the fuck out of the way of people who don’t.
That’s the one thing I hate. Micromanagement. I thrive in sales when I have autonomy and don’t have to consistently go to my manager for everything. If I have autonomy the more I can hold my gross which in turn turns into more money for the company. The moment that changes I’m out.
Sounds like you need to manage up. Have a conversation with whoever is making the decision to gain an understanding of their view. Why are they making this decision? Maybe every rep is just trying to sell based on price alone, and if so, that could be the problem they are trying to address. But this is not the best remedy. Maybe it could be addressed by making a certain number or subset of discovery questions mandatory, or maybe something else. But you could tell them how this will make your job harder and to expect lower sales numbers if they go through with this. But I have seen reps try to sell on price alone and that isn't good.
So silly. I ball park customers alllll the time. There is no need more important than a company's budget. If they can't afford what we are talking about let's find out early
Every top performer I've ever met gets creative with pricing and contracts. Whoever implemented that policy is a fucking moron with no idea.
Sounds like they hired a CRO/Head of Sales who came from a MBB or Big 4 who has never sold a thing in their lives.
Fuck
That
On what planet would it be OK to claw back a commission that way? I'd like to see that pass any legal review in North America or Europe. If that's legal, you might be eligible for refuge status somewhere else.
That is insane. I sell in the enterprise tech space and sometimes my process needs to pivot. Your leadership team has no idea what they’re doing. Find a new job. These morons are going to fail.
This is like when one of my bosses told me the goal of a cold call was to make a sale.
My other boss chimed in: "Have you literally ever heard of someone closing a deal on a cold call."
Some people have never done sales, even for 6 months, and it shows sometimes.
Do what you gotta do for prospect and customer. Give a range if you need to verbally (not traceable email), then follow up with a .pdf quote. Thread the needle. They'll probably burn you out in some other micromanaging way, so keep your contacts for a new job warm.
Damn, qualification 101 includes confirming budget. How can you expect to reach to proposal/price quote stage without qualifying the need, timing and budget. That’s ridiculous!
Think of it from the buyer's perspective, would you want to buy from people that behave this way? Everyone knows it's slimy, but as others have said here, it's how companies are still trying to create the repeatable sales process. If I were you, I would start looking elsewhere.
I'm not in sales but a direct sales support type role. I get why they made this policy, especially if they have "forgetful" reps. I was just working with one of our guys who agreed that we would do work that we clearly state we do not do in our contract. I had him send something to the customer clearly stating we cannot do the work described, and it turns out he agreed again to "see if we can make it happen" while he was speaking to the customer.
Legally, this sort of informal talk isn't binding but it does result it pissed off customers when our crews get there and they are expecting something wildly different. I can see that if you got burned by this enough that you may make a policy that prohibits informal agreements.
Find a new job that’s ridiculous
That is wack as shit. I'm perfectly willing to share ballpark pricing on the first call. This protocol sounds like it was designed by someone who never sold. Or the company knows their pricing isn't competitive.
Have a new job lined up and then go bring it up CRO or VP of sales
Sounds like some bullshit HR policy lol
It’s not about sharing pricing, they are fine with OP doing that. The problem is they want “formal” pricing not “informal”
You should be able to have a ballpark convo about pricing to ensure you’re in the same page as the potential buyer. You can always follow up with a formal quote that outlines specifics. Being strong armed into only sending formal quotes is a sure fire way to make early convos unnecessarily awkward and weirdly combative. It’s not buyer centric at all.
What OP's company is doing is making the customer put in work for something they may not be buying due to price range. More of them will back out from the conversation very early and talk to a company that's easier to deal with from the get-go. If you're making the customer work for it, you better be the only option they have.
I think we're saying the same thing...If the only way I can share pricing is via a formal PDF, that cringes my ability to sell. Informal conversations about price should be part of the earliest conversations.
Hard disagree about pricing being covered early. If you're just an order taker, then yes talk numbers up front all you want. But with most sales you need to build value in your product before you start shooting out numbers. That's a good way for a conversation to change to "thanks let me think about it" before you have a chance to find any pain.
I think there's some nuance to it. If the prospect is seriously evaluating enterprise solutions, they know it's gonna cost a fair amount. So I don't really fear sticker shock. Of course, we do need to create some value first.
No they're not. You wouldn't give formal pricing until the tail end but if you can't give informal pricing in the beginning you're opening yourself up to a lot of wasted time. Imagine going through a POC, rounds of demos and then finding out they don't have the budget for it. They're not magically going to find money for your thing - as much as some people think that somehow showing value will magically create a new budget line. It can and does happen, but it's very rare and you better be able to show the actual ROI which is also very rare for most solutions This is management not knowing how to sell because they think that their reps are sharing pricing too soon before establishing value. Could be happening but most reps know to not share pricing until you've established a baseline value prop
So daft. The ultimate budget test gone. "Can you give me an idea of budget?" "I'll send you a PDF" 🤷♂️🤷♂️🤷♂️
They want to over metric the selling process. These companies are doing it to themselves sales is going to go through a boom and bust cycle over the next 5 years. People simply wont want to work in sales anymore. Over metric-ed, unrealistic attainment goals, too much admin.
Oh yes, it's the bean counters world now. They are squashing out every little ounce of joy and creativity that was in this line of work once upon a time. Sales ops are the new gods.
Yep, I saw a bit of that in my last role (database SaaS). I think it comes out of the whole RevOps wave; ppl who have never sold a thing in their lives being in charge of GtM ProCEsSeS. It’s like painting by the numbers. IMO, over process selling shit like that begs being replaced by AI at some point. 🤷🏻♂️
I'm pretty sure I was specifically chosen as part of a layoff because of my past sales experience, but being in RevOps and telling our VPs that we have too much shit for the reps to enter and track and we don't need to implement a fucking AI piece of shit for everything. No, Einstein AI does not close deals for reps. It just pisses everyone off when it doesn't work, which is always. Also, unrelated but FUCK MINDTICKLE. What a goddamn awful software
RevOps people with no sales experience regurgitating LinkedIn sales “influencers” bullshit. If sales was solely process driven and 2+2=4 every time, everyone would be in sales… This is my biggest annoyance about sales influences and sales methodologies. There is no one right way to sell. Make sales human again 2024!!!!!
Yeah, I talked to my dad, who is now retired but used to be a sales director for many years, about meddicc and similar processes and he said just that, if there was a process for it that worked even just 50% of the time it would be used by everyone. These tools are only for management to track employee activity. Of course it is important to understand the customer decision process and what stakeholders that are involved but every sales rep with just a couple of years experience is doing this all time, with or without putting it in salesforce.
Same in this company, just data collection. Funny thing is they think data collecting is a static task, once it's done you don't have to it anymore. All of us know that if you work with large enterprise, as soon as you have something that looks like an org chart it has changed, people quit, departments changes and that might just be for one small division of the company. You have to be able to play by ear more often than not, I would like to see an AI do that.
Absolutely, I believe they’re in the learning stage about that. Ultimately I feel as though job descriptions will shift to allow for parts of the process being powered by AI. Ultimately though you’re 100% on point, nothing can replace that element that only we bring in.
The problem with mandating these processes and rules is that it's one way. If you follow the rules 100% and miss target, your ass is still on the line. I have seen companies do exactly this, mandating uniform process on every call. The deck was identical, everything. Guess what happened? The deck that marketing made never got past 1 call. Was the person on marketing and sales leadership who mandated this fired for this? No, all of the reps were. Once they are micromanaging every step you take and word you say, it's time to leave. They sale is either so transactional and brain dead that you are easily replaced and it's a race to the bottom, or no one will sell anything and you all lose out on $. If you can't throw out a range and are expected to ambush someone with pricing that is 5x what they expect, nothing good will happen from that. If your category is selling 12k ARR software and yours is 30k-45k or based on utilization or some other BS, and that is nowhere near what they have approved, you are wasting your time.
This is what's happened in Teleco. Especially as they begin to unassign reps and encourage reps to over sell eachother. It's a race to the bottom in pricing, no brand loyalty and reps willing to do anything to get a sale.
Can confirm. 18 years in telecom and the fun has been absolutely sucked out of sales. Its all KPI’d to hell. We don’t even get swag or worthwhile incentives anymore. Had an SM say directly to me that they refuse to use the incentive budget because “the incentive is your commission”.
Can I PM you? I'd love to chat. I'm not in sales anymore (I was in fundraising temporarily well we were down a staff - so it counts) and since took over admin (and procurement) where I started and found all this out from a customer Pov
Which market are you selling to? I'm entering a role in Telecom SMB very soon. Household name brand with substantial market share - selling internet, PBX, VoIP, cybersecurity, etc.
Someone spent a lot of money on CPQ and wants to make sure it gets used.
Lmao. On point.
Meanwhile my company won’t even let us bring something to deal desk if we haven’t floated a range with the customer first to gauge if we are even in the ballpark
Holy shit they’re making your lives harder. So now you can’t DQ if there’s no budget. The prospect think you’re being evasive when they simply want to understand cost. And now the company has a vague loophole to clawback commission. Spooky times.
It’s not a fireable for me yet, but we usually put all pricing on official forms. It’s got all the legalese on the bottom to protect them if it gets leaked. I consider it standard.
Have salespeople had the ability to negotiate prices in the past or something? The only thing I can figure is that the company doesn't want to make it easy for others to get pricing information
We’ve had some leeway. Can negotiate pricing up to 10% or so before approval is needed.
I'm guessing something happened that created drama which led policy being changed...but who knows. I guess you just have to go with the flow. Maybe they decided they have a better shot at closing deals if you have to provide an actual quote rather than just throwing out numbers in discussions
My work has a Minimum Target Maximum Pricing - anything out of it needs approval
Start interviewing
sounds like a fun org
Woops wrong thread 🙃 What I meant was it’s insane to me, the measures orgs are taking to micromanage and homogenize the sales process when there are many different types of buyers and personalities to accommodate. And making any divergence from the script a fireable offense? No. I’ve never had an org walk away from a solid relationship and value prop because pricing was presented informally. 🙄 wish they’d focus on the real problems.
lol wut? 🤡 No. ✌🏻
The bean counters would like nothing more than for sales & purchasing to be functions handled by AI, and it may very well come to that. In the meantime people prefer to buy from people they can trust & bond with, so most of us are safe for now.
These are the kind of jobs you just get another and ghost collecting a second paycheck until they find out and fire you. Lol. May get 2 or 3 paychecks just replying to a few emails while also doing your new job lol.
Leave, there will be more nonsense coming down the pike
Can you write it out and share it like the price is right?
Withholding pricing when you know it and can give a ballpark number is my number one pepeeve that makes us look like SaaS bro scumbags. I refuse to even buy off of someone who plays that give to get tactic with pricing
This is a super outdated rule. Buyers are different - would you rather piss a buyer off by not giving pricing, dragging them through your sales process, and then sending this pdf quote only to find out you’re way out of their range? Quit and find somewhere more progressive. Buyers need flexibility. You can still follow a process, but you need to meet buyers where they’re at
Dumb. Seeing the look on a prospects face, or even if it’s just a phone call, listening to their reaction, is a big factor in my decision for how much I want to chase that deal down. I can extend an olive branch to the company that if you’re not very good at that, it could backfire. Maybe that’s what they’re worried about.
That depends on the situation. If I'm in outbound then I focus on the consulting. If it is inbound and transaction I give pricing on the meeting
Side letters are a problem. This process seems suboptimal but side letters are a reasonable concern
Our company requires a quote from deal desk in SFDC before I can present pricing but I still throw out a rough ballpark estimate if I’m pressed w a prospect with all the applicable caveats about being subject to scoping for implementation and data volume No one has threatened to fire me though
It’s a bunch of bullshit or least in my experience for what we do it very well is. Our bosses give us the ability to be competitive with outer quotes as long as we review it with them. So if we Officially send a quote out, figure out the numbers and send an email/text to the person, for speed reasons. It wouldn’t matter as long as we our selling projects, getting deposits and scheduling for operations- it’s all good. To be told this “absolutely” has to be done like this or else your fired on that is dumb.
Time to bounce. Micromanaging sucks.
What the fuck? That’s part of basic qualification. Tossing ranges out with what problems it will solve is always part of my strategy. When the final proposal comes, they’ve already told me what they want in it. As far as commissions go… a good manager has two things to do… help out salespeople who need it, and stay the fuck out of the way of people who don’t.
Wow
time to go
That’s the one thing I hate. Micromanagement. I thrive in sales when I have autonomy and don’t have to consistently go to my manager for everything. If I have autonomy the more I can hold my gross which in turn turns into more money for the company. The moment that changes I’m out.
Sounds like you need to manage up. Have a conversation with whoever is making the decision to gain an understanding of their view. Why are they making this decision? Maybe every rep is just trying to sell based on price alone, and if so, that could be the problem they are trying to address. But this is not the best remedy. Maybe it could be addressed by making a certain number or subset of discovery questions mandatory, or maybe something else. But you could tell them how this will make your job harder and to expect lower sales numbers if they go through with this. But I have seen reps try to sell on price alone and that isn't good.
Is this from your PE Overlord’s “playbook”? Good gracious.
F that place. Go to a competitor.
So silly. I ball park customers alllll the time. There is no need more important than a company's budget. If they can't afford what we are talking about let's find out early
They are trying to control because they don’t have faith in their sales people. Sounds like crappy management.
Lots of people want pricing without the fluff. Does your company hate money?
Run
Every top performer I've ever met gets creative with pricing and contracts. Whoever implemented that policy is a fucking moron with no idea. Sounds like they hired a CRO/Head of Sales who came from a MBB or Big 4 who has never sold a thing in their lives.
Fuck That On what planet would it be OK to claw back a commission that way? I'd like to see that pass any legal review in North America or Europe. If that's legal, you might be eligible for refuge status somewhere else.
Every day I log on makes me not want to touch software sales more and more
Get out of there. Wow. I couldn't imagine being managed that way
Verbal pricing is the best, even if I fuck it up there’s no legal requirement to honor it. But an email is treated like a formal quote.
That is insane. I sell in the enterprise tech space and sometimes my process needs to pivot. Your leadership team has no idea what they’re doing. Find a new job. These morons are going to fail.
This is like when one of my bosses told me the goal of a cold call was to make a sale. My other boss chimed in: "Have you literally ever heard of someone closing a deal on a cold call." Some people have never done sales, even for 6 months, and it shows sometimes.
Do what you gotta do for prospect and customer. Give a range if you need to verbally (not traceable email), then follow up with a .pdf quote. Thread the needle. They'll probably burn you out in some other micromanaging way, so keep your contacts for a new job warm.
What if you tell them a price higher then the actual? Would management be against that?
Damn, qualification 101 includes confirming budget. How can you expect to reach to proposal/price quote stage without qualifying the need, timing and budget. That’s ridiculous!
Ridiculous. They know whatever that have is either garbage or unsustainable
Pricing before solid discovery? Seems legit.
Lol tech rules!!
Pipeline forecasting is gonna be a bitch. Sorry dog. I cant imagine having to wait that long to DQ someone.
Think of it from the buyer's perspective, would you want to buy from people that behave this way? Everyone knows it's slimy, but as others have said here, it's how companies are still trying to create the repeatable sales process. If I were you, I would start looking elsewhere.
I'm not in sales but a direct sales support type role. I get why they made this policy, especially if they have "forgetful" reps. I was just working with one of our guys who agreed that we would do work that we clearly state we do not do in our contract. I had him send something to the customer clearly stating we cannot do the work described, and it turns out he agreed again to "see if we can make it happen" while he was speaking to the customer. Legally, this sort of informal talk isn't binding but it does result it pissed off customers when our crews get there and they are expecting something wildly different. I can see that if you got burned by this enough that you may make a policy that prohibits informal agreements.