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Using the right sales qualification method can help you optimize your sales process and streamline the process of turning all those potential customers into prospects. But to get them across that finish line, your sales teams need to make sure they're talking to the right person so that they can prioritize the right people.
In this blog post, we walk you through what MEDDPICC is, why it's important and what you should consider when reviewing your MEDDPICC sales process.
What is MEDDPICC?
MEDDPICC is a sales methodology designed for complex and enterprise sales that first appeared in the 1990s.
It's popular with sales teams who have to navigate a complex B2B sales cycle that require a more structured approach with a goal to help improve conversion rates as leads go through a sales funnel.
There's also a MEDDIC sales qualification process which does not look at paper process or competition. This is the original framework used to qualify prospects based on a selling principle by Neil Rackham.
Understanding MEDDPICC's key components
MEDDPICC is an acronym that stands for metrics, economic buyer, decision criteria, decision process, identify pain and champion. Below is a closer look at each stage of the framework.
- Metrics: This looks at the economic benefit of your solution for your lead. Why does your potential customer want to buy your product?
- Economic buyer: This looks at the person who has authority to make key economic decisions at the prospect company.
- Decision criteria: This looks at what's influencing and driving the decision and could range from anything including ease of use, cost and ROI.
- Decision process: This looks at how decisions are made at the prospect company.
- Paper process: This looks at the process and paperwork needed to onboard the prospect.
- Identify pain: This looks at trigger events and financial consequences of the problem they're facing.
- Champion: This looks at who's selling on your behalf
- Competition: This looks at competition of the prospect company and why they're competing.
Collectively, this framework will help you gain a better understanding of your customers to help improve your lead qualification process, build closer relationships with them and close deals effectively.
The MEDDIC sales process vs MEDDPICC process
While MEDDIC focuses on Metrics, Economic Buyer, Decision Criteria, Decision Process, and the user, Champion, and Coach, MEDDPICC expands upon this framework by adding components such as identifying pain points and understanding competition.
Benefits of MEDDPICC
The MEDDPICC methodology can act as a check list for your sales leaders of an enterprise sales process to refer to in order to fill in any missing gaps in a complex sales process. Below are a few benefits a successful sales strategy can reap by using the MEDDPICC framework.
1. Improve qualification process
By thoroughly assessing each aspect of the prospect's buying process, sales teams can improve the way they qualify opportunities and focus their efforts on deals with the highest likelihood of success.
2. Know your customer better
MEDDPICC encourages sales professionals to delve deeper into the prospect's business, leading to a better understanding of their needs and pain points.
3. Increase win rates
With a deeper understanding of the prospect's buying process and challenges, sales teams can tailor their sales approach and sales pitch to effectively address customer needs, resulting in higher win rates.
4. Build stronger customer relationships
With more information at hand that can be accessed by both marketing and sales teams, you can nurture stronger business relationships with customers and use demos to address any pain points to help them in their purchasing decisions more effectively.
5. Improve forecast accuracy
The metrics that MEDDPICC take into account can help sales organizations and teams to make more informed decisions based on solid data. This way, you can make sure you're keeping an eye on the right key performance indicators and identify risks early in the sales process.
Best practices of MEDDPICC
Implementing the MEDDPICC framework effectively requires a few best practices to consider, including the following:
- A collaborative approach: Your sales teams and other business functions such as marketing need to collaborate closely. Use what you've learnt in conversations with prospects to create sales enablement material with the content team.
- Active listening: During interactions with the prospect, make the most of the time to understand each of their pain points and key factors of their decision making process. If there are any drawbacks or hesitations, figure out what features you can ask the product team to prioritize and go back to potential customers with a timeframe of when that product update might be. This might help with their purchase decision.
- Personalization: You may find that each potential customer has different pain points. Make sure that all your touch points are tailored to their needs.
- Train and up skill your team: MEDDPICC is a complex sales qualification methodology to practice so make sure your sales team, including sales reps and sales manager have a strong understanding of what's needed at each stage.
By incorporating the above best practices into your MEDDPICC strategy, sales managers can help increase the effectiveness of a sales rep navigating a complex B2B sales cycle and find more prospects who are a good fit.
What to consider if you're implementing MEDDPICC for the first time
If your organization is new to MEDDPICC, there are a few things you need to consider as a sales leader in order too ensure its successful adoption. Including:
- Buy-In from leadership: Getting buy-in from sales leadership and stakeholders within the organization to ensure support for implementing MEDDPICC is vital. Leadership endorsement is critical for driving adoption and reinforcing the importance of following the methodology.
- Your tech stack: Does your sales team have access to the right tools to implement MEDDPICC effectively? Things such as a CRM can make a difference in your sales methodologies, especially if you want to promote a collaborative environment across your team. You need one that can help them create contact lists, automate email sequences and provide AI support to personalize multiple touch points. Like folk does.
- Create MEDDPICC templates: Have a step by step guide on hand that your team can refer to so that they're clear on what questions to ask at each stage so they can capture the right information.
- A strong feedback loop: Encourage open communication and feedback loops between sales teams and other departments, such as marketing, product development, and customer success. This way you can make sure your MEDDPICC strategy can fit specific needs of each department and facilitate collaboration.
Other alternative sales methodologies for startups and SMBs
Is the MEDDPICC methodology right for your sales team? If you've got a complex sales cycle that has multiple decision makers and road blocks, or often face low conversion rates and an inaccurate forecast as well as lack of repeat business, it might be. But if that's not the case, there are a few other sales models often used by startups and SMBs.
Spin selling
Coined by Neil Rackham, SPIN Selling focuses on asking Situation, Problem, Implication, and Need-Payoff questions to uncover customer needs and pain points. This sales methodology can be used alongside other sales frameworks and places an emphasis on building value as trusted advisors to win larger deals.
Challenger sale
Developed by Matthew Dixon and Brent Adamson, the challenger sale emphasizes the importance of challenging a potential customers' thinking and providing insights that drive change. In this case, being the challenger is positive as you'll be taking ownership of a sales conversation based on the in-depth understanding you have of your potential customer's pain points and struggles. Then use this to drive them towards making a key decision.
Social selling
This is a customer-centric approach that focuses on understanding customer needs, aligning solutions to address those needs, and demonstrating value throughout the sales process. It emphasizes the importance of consultative selling and positioning the company as a trusted advisor to the customer.
Context selling
This is a personalized touch point approach that addresses the overwhelm that customers face and the need to be different to capture their attention. There are simple techniques that you can use including personalizing emails and building a relationship with your lead on social media platforms such as LinkedIn. We've got more on how to generate new opportunities with context-based business development here.
Conclusion
The MEDDPICC and MEDDIC sales methodology is a useful sales approach if you want to enhance your sales process. But it might not be suitable for all teams. Choosing the right sales strategy for you and your team requires a deep understanding of the pain points your team often faces and close collaboration between your marketing and customer success teams. Once you've got the right methodology in place and you're looking for a CRM that can help you nurture business relationships, make sure you try folk. It can support cross-team collaboration and has AI features that will help you personalize those multiple touch points.
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