Having been grounded in sales for 25 years in IT, I can recommend that many steps in the sales process need to be discussed and agreed internally and with the business customer to arrive at an agreed and signed contract.
Following this sales process through the so-called ‘Sales Closing Plan’ outlines all the necessary milestones that need to be agreed upon from a resource perspective, internally from a vendor perspective, as well as from a business customer resource perspective. This sales closing plan will allow you to set the right expectations up front during contract negotiation milestones during an enterprise sales process.
Talk to your business client about the closing plan and have your client sign/close the sales closing plan on timelines and milestones. If each milestone is completed, please confirm this in an email to your customer so that all expectations and potential roadblocks remain transparent and visible to you as a vendor and business customer.
1. Identify Power Sponsors:
Which customer contacts have the power to approve or veto a major contract deal?
Who are the business owners?
2. Identify the customer acquisition process:
Submit No Disclosure for approval.
Perform due diligence and Client assessment.
Is a supplier employee selection process required?
What are the standard customer terms and conditions?
What are the expected legal challenges? Intellectual Property, Warranty…?
what are the payment conditions?
What is the VAT number?
What are the details of the shipping address?
What are the billing address details?
Find out about spending cost limit guidelines.
What is the commercial identification code?
Will the payment be in dollars/euros…?
What are the finance contact details?
What legal resources are required from the supplier, internally, externally?
3. Approval process:
Who should approve from the IT department?
Who must give the approval of the commercial department?
Is there a budget available? If not when?
Is Board approval required to close the deal? I do, when is the next Board meeting?
Which person on the Board supports the business case?
Do we need a reference visit and who will take care of the client?
What reference do we nominate for the site visit or phone interview?
Agree on travel arrangements for the reference visit.
4. Feedback First round of legal discussions/proposals:
Is it necessary to update the commercials/T&C of the proposal to get a deal?
If yes, what supplier and customer resources are required?
Do we need internal senior management approval for this?
Is the client requesting any legal adjustments that need further legal review by the provider?
5. Send new proposal/T&C’s contracts:
Agree date for presentation of final proposal to the client.
Does the client verbally accept the new proposal/T&C?
6. Contracts:
When will the clients sign/close the contracts?
When can the signed contracts be collected from the client?
Reconfirm the resource assignment.
Start of project or delivery.
