Debrief after each Sales Call

As an Sales engineer, you often get caught up in the action of demonstrating the product, that you don't notice how everyone in the room reacts to what you say - or if you are on a webex how it looks on everybody else's screen.  One thing you should not be afraid of is getting criticism on your presentation skills. After all it is the only way to get better is to eradicate mistakes or things that confuse people, and explaining other things better for everyone.

At Mastering Technical Sales: Sales Call Debriefs I read this great tip on how to seek this information in a constructive way. It is called the T3-B3-N3 system. All you do is ask somebody from the meeting (typically someone on your side of the meeting) to tell you:

  • 3 things you did well - what did they think worked well
  • 3 things you did poorly - where can you improve
  • 3 things that you didn't do that they'd like to see
The eyes of a non-technical Sales person or overlay expert can be very good at seeing what you may have left out, how certain people in the audience react or even what looks really cool about the product. As an SE, you might be excited about features or components that aren't as important to the customer.

Part of building a great demo presentation is engaging people well, showing them what they want to see and also not showing things that don't help you sell the product. A Demo is less about teaching how the product works or how to use it, but more about showing the solution to the business problem and giving confidence that you are offering the best solution.  Any advice on how to do this is gold dust.