MEDDIC
Qualification is not a binary step of the sales process. Qualification is a mindset and a habit to apply all along the sales process, from the first call to closing. Qualifying is closing.
More than being just a slogan in a movie, “Always Be Closing” is a concept, a motivational phrase, a philosophy, according to which any good salesman must be in a constant state of closing sales. That type of sales is no longer tolerated among more educated buyers or in more strategic Enterprise type of sales.
Successful sellers are those who spend their time with prospects who will end up buying.
Sellers need to objectively and constantly assess their prospects in order to know if they can be qualified and if they will be closed before a given date.
- Why anything? Why would the prospect consider buying anything at all? This is about the “I” of MEDDIC as we’ll see later.
- Why us? Why would the customer award this contract to us? We will see later that this is related to several elements of MEDDIC such as the “M”, the “DC” and the “C” of MEDDIC.
- Why now? Why wouldn’t the customer delay the decision? We will see later that this relates to the “compelling event” as we cover the “E” and the “DP” of MEDDIC.
Introduction to MEDDIC/MEDDPICC
MEDDIC, or its longer variant MEDDPICC, is a recognized sales methodology that is widely used in technology and other enterprise sales context, especially when the sales cycle is rather long and complex.
The definition of MEDDIC is the acronym it represents, composed of six elements.
- METRICS: Measure the potential gain leading to the economic benefit of your solution vs. competition.
- ECONOMIC BUYER: Identify and meet the person who has the final word in releasing funds to make a purchase.
- DECISION PROCESS: Know and influence the process as defined by the client to make purchase decision.
- DECISION CRITERIA: Know and influence the criteria as defined by the client to make purchase decision.
- IDENTIFY PAIN: Identify and analyze the pains that require your solution to be relieved.
- CHAMPION: Identify, qualify, develop, and test your champion, the person who sells inside the account on your behalf.
MEDDIC has a few variants. MEDDICC, with two Cs in the acronym, adds “Competition”.
MEDDPICC emphasizes the paper process.
Anyone with experience in complex enterprise sales knows that interactions with the legal department or purchasing team could be a nightmare if they are under-estimated.
The fact is, you could have a stellar sales pitch and amazing sales skills, but if you don’t have the right judgment and assessment of the deal’s strengths and weaknesses, then you will not be able to properly direct your efforts.
It is important to know that MEDDIC is not a sales process; it is a qualification methodology, which can be used with any process that determines whether or not a customer is a qualified buyer that you should invest your time and effort into.
MEDDIC isn’t a process on its own, but rather it is a method that works well with any sales process that you may already be working with. So instead of replacing your current sales process, MEDDIC will integrate into it to make it more effective.
The following are some important characteristics of MEDDIC that make it so unique and effective. It is a short checklist:
- It is activity based
- It reveals gaps
- It is self-assessing
- It brings a common language to your team
Most processes have a similar format. They usually start with prospecting and discovering; at this point, the MEDDIC questions will be general. The next step in the sales process is usually the scoping and go-no-go. This is where the MEDDIC questions become more specific. And then the last phases usually highlight elements like Validation, Proposal, and Closing; this is where you will need to confirm your MEDDIC questions as you get close to signing the contract.
Metric
What is a Metric? This is the first component of the MEDDIC process, and it focuses on identifying and explaining why a buyer will consider your solution.
The main objective of a metric is to turn subjective gains into objective measurable gains.
What did the business achieve with the help of your solution? A metric helps to outline solutions in a measurable form that greatly helps in the decision-making process.
E: Everyday Language
T: Tells a Story
R: Result of an “After-State” Comparison
I: Impacts Economics
C: Champion Supported and/or Authored
It is presented as a measured gain, in every-day language understandable by anyone, that it tells a story, includes a before-after comparison, leads to an economic impact, and is supposedly supported by the champion.
Without a measurable sales pitch, you are missing out on an important tool for leveraging your sales.
There are two main sources for collecting metrics: your existing customers and your prospects.
The same exact product functionality can be a source of savings or as an engine to grow revenue. It can enable time saving or accelerate growth.
There are two primary types of economic impacts of a solution: the revenue and cost. But there is a lesser implemented impact also: mitigating risk.
Asking Open-Ended Discovery Questions. These are questions that have no right or wrong answer and cannot be answered with a yes or no. You need to let the customer define the experience for you.
T-H-E-D: This acronym stands for four types of popular questions.
“Tell me about…?”
“How do you…?”
“Explain to me…?”
“Describe for me …?”
Asking the right questions AT THE RIGHT TIME. Timing is essential.
When Prospecting: Be sure to keep it low key or a prospect might feel overwhelmed and intimidated.
During Demos: During or after a demo, a prospect is excited about killer apps or hot features that are your key differentiators, this is a great time to get metrics.
Economic Buyer
The economic buyer is rarely the actual buyer in the procurement department. One exception that comes to my mind is when the customer wants to buy procurement software. The economic buyer is, in fact, the person with the authority to decide whether to purchase.
They usually have certain characteristics such as:
- They have discretionary use of funds
- They have veto power
- They are in charge of the ‘bottom-line’
How do you find the EB? Ideally, you ask your champion for this valuable information.
You want to ask: Who is the person who’ll make the final economic decision for this purchase?
You need to confirm and double check that the EB is the EB by asking them when meeting them: “Who else will need to review this purchase decision other than you?”
They tell you that there is no one single EB, that the final decision is made by the board of directors or an executive committee. Believing in that is like believing that the EB can be the procurement director; it’s naive. As is evident, every individual, based on their position in the company, has a different way of thinking.
The Individual Contributors want to know HOW.
The Middle Management wants to know WHAT.
The Economic Buyer or the Top Management wants to know WHY.
Metrics serve a strong purpose in each of the sections of an organization. Hence, you need to focus on different metrics for different stakeholders.
We want to meet with the EB, at least twice.
Once the decision process is explained to us by the EB, which usually includes the validation process (often in the form of a POC), we want to do some conditional closing. You or your champion need to meet with the Economic Buyer BEFORE you engage in other costly efforts. One of the key goals of the first meeting with the EB is to get our “return-ticket”. That is the agreement to meet again after the client has done their due diligence.
Decision Criteria
The third important consideration is the Decision Criteria. This is the ‘shopping list’ of a business.
To make your solution relevant and ahead of your competition, you need to focus on the important factors that a prospect will consider during their decision-making process.
- As a seller, you need to understand the specific characteristics or qualifications that they are looking for when deciding on a vendor. Understanding these requirements will help you to better represent yourself.
- A business will most definitely have a predetermined price range for their solution before they go out shopping.
- Your product or service needs to tick all the boxes on this list to be a suitable solution.
This is by far the most important aspect of the Decision Criteria since it directly addresses an organization’s ‘pain’ or requirement for seeking a solution.
As a salesperson, it is your role to influence them and bend their expression of needs to your solution.
The Value Triangle is a subset of the customer’s Decision Criteria that we, as a vendor, satisfy and that our competition does not.
- First, we have the customer’s expression of needs.
- Then we have our own solution’s characteristic, features, and benefits.
- Now, of course, we are not alone on the market; we have competition.
When we look at the competition together with our solution and the customer’s expression of Decision Criteria, we notice that there are seven different zones.
- The PARITY zone is composed of a series of needs or Decision Criteria, which are expressed by the customer that both us and the competition satisfy.
- Next is the MARKET TRENDS zone. These are capabilities or characteristics that we offer as a vendor, as well as our competitor, but the customer is not asking for them.
- USELESS features are those that the competitor is bragging about that the customer is not interested in and that we don’t offer either.
- Our UNIQUE DIFFERENTIATORS represent a zone where we have some key strategic capabilities that the competition doesn’t have but the customer is not asking for (yet).
- At the top of these triangles resides CUSTOM NEEDS. Those are capabilities or Decision Criteria that the customer is expressing but neither us nor our competitor can satisfy.
- The DANGER zone, which is exactly the inverse of the VALUE but for the competitor, is where the customer is asking for some capabilities or criteria that we cannot satisfy but our competition can.
How to act in zones:
- PARITY & MARKET TRENDS Don’t waste time on these two zones, other than presenting your solution to make sure that the customer understands the parity on the criteria in this category and that they don’t wrongly underscore your solution there.
- USELESS Unless the competitor manages to change them and bring them into the customer’s expression of needs, you don’t need to waste time on them.
- UNIQUE DIFFERENTIATORS You need to expand and enlarge the value of these features and show the client how they have helped other customers achieve metrics. Ask yourself the question: Why isn’t this customer asking for these features? Unless you have a very valid response to this question, you can help your customer revise the Decision Criteria to include your unique differentiators in their expression of needs.
- VALUE This zone should capture the most of your efforts and attention.
- DANGER In opposition to the VALUE zone, you need to be conscious that the competitor, if smart and aggressive, is also focusing and leveraging the DANGER zone on par with your efforts in the VALUE zone.
- CUSTOM NEEDS There is no general rule for this zone.
The idea was that if a large strategic account is asking for something we don’t have, and our competitor does not have it either, then it will become a VALUE feature if we develop it as an off-the-shelf feature in a future release.
Decision & Paper Process
The Decision Process is mainly the internal process of a prospect for signing up on a solution. It is the step-by-step procedure that they usually follow to make a decision.
There are usually two components to the Decision Process: the validation and the approval. Validation focuses on the technical and functional aspects, while approval focuses on the financial, administrative, legal, and commercial aspects.
If you simply focus on accepting all the client’s requirements without requesting any action from the client, you create a bad habit that will continue onwards without any constructive outcomes.
One key concept that allows you to understand the timeline of an opportunity is the Compelling Event. It is a deadline resulting from a business pressure, as perceived by the Economic Buyer, for making the purchasing/contracting decision.
The Compelling Event is the Economic Buyer’s answer to the “Why Now?” question.
Unlike what some sellers think, your “end of quarter” or “end of the year” deadlines are not Compelling Events.
Identify Pain
Pain is the core problem that you are trying to resolve for a prospect, and it is driving their interactions with you.
Pain could be of two different kinds. It could be a business problem within the account: for instance, the cost of operation is higher than the yield. These are business pains. The pain could also be related to a lack of capabilities. When a pain addresses both the capabilities and business, it becomes crucial!
You need to be very careful about the words that you use to create a better and more fruitful flow of communication with your prospect. Avoid using the word ‘pain’ obviously. Instead, put them into a positive perspective and use questions like “what are you trying to improve?” or “how are you trying to add more value to your business?”
- What are the consequences if the pain is left unaddressed? This key question helps to analyze and understand the scope and the importance of the pain.
- You need to understand the desired result that a client is envisioning. What exactly is it that a prospect expects the outcome to be?
- Another important factor for addressing pain is urgency.
Please note that the key element for identifying pain is to address needs and not wants. You need to conduct your due diligence to identify the root causes of the pain and how it is impacting the business.
The EB usually has a perfect understanding of the why of the pain, the consequence of non-decision, and the expected outcome.
It is when the customer starts sharing their problems with you that you start building confidence.
Champion
The champion is someone that will drive customers to take action in your favor. It is the person that you have the best relationship with inside the account.
One of the key characteristics of the champion is that they have access to the Economic Buyer, the person with the decision power. The champion needs to have good credibility within the company. The champion needs to be your friend. This is oftentimes overlooked. But in my opinion, this is one of the most crucial aspects of creating a good relationship with a champion. They need to have something to win from this decision/project. All champions need to have a reason to want your solutions.
This is another common misconception: coaches are mistaken for champions. A champion is your internal sales rep. A champion is a person standing up for your solution!
On the other hand, a coach is a guide. A coach may or may not have the power of decision and doesn’t necessarily want or need your solutions. Also, a coach most likely doesn’t have anything to gain from supporting you.
The fact is you NEED a champion to sell. No sales happen without a champion. A champion will also become your go-to person to test your strategy during the sales campaign. A champion helps open doors. A champion will be your go – to person every time you have a problem in the account. Champions are built over-time.
The ROI Pitch
Return on Investment is a very important aspect of the sales process; your prospect needs to know the value that they are getting with your solution. This is why Metrics is a key element of MEDDIC.
Metrics without ROI is as useless as knowledge without action.
You need to show how metrics translate into dollars. You need to have a process that will transform your METRICS, almost automatically, into monetary SAVINGS or GAINS. I prefer talking about the PAYBACK PERIOD instead of RETURN ON INVESTMENT. You sell when you move the conversation from COST to VALUE.
The following are just some of the many benefits that this quick ROI approach or Payback Period can have on your sales process.
- It helps create urgency.
- It allows you to avoid the conversation around pricing.
- It gives confidence to your non-financial people, and it typically pumps up your champion to take you to the EB.
- It helps you speak at the same frequency as the Economic Buyer.
Say No To Qualify and to Close
Saying no is very important in every business journey. It is a tool and accessory that is strategically and effectively used by the most successful salespeople.
There are two main areas where it is important to be able to say no: during the qualification phase and during the closing phase.
In the Decision Criteria, saying no helps us to assess those criteria, and it also helps us to focus on the essential elements.
We also say no in the Decision Process, as it is a great way to remove unnecessary activities.
You want to get closer to the “trusted advisor” role, which is achieved by creating credibility, done by saying no at appropriate times.
Your NO should be said nicely.
BANT vs MEDDIC
Budget should not be a sales criterion of qualification
Why? Because of Metrics, the M of MEDDIC. If you have Metrics, or if you can obtain and document them, then since you know how to transform it into ROI and take it to the EB, you don’t need any budget prior to your work.
The beauty of MEDDIC is that it transforms the urgency of sales into urgency from the prospect to buy in order to save costs or to increase revenue. The success of MEDDIC proves that neither the budget nor the timing should be in your qualification criteria. MEDDIC proves that there is a lot more to Sales Qualification than just the NEED (which is the “I” of MEDDIC or Identify Pain) and the AUTHORITY (which is the E of MEDDIC or the Economic Buyer).
