The ideal outcome of mid or late middle game is to presell your solution and preempt the competition by having the customer award you a sole-source contract. In business development, as in chess, it doesn’t have to go to endgame—and sometimes doesn’t. Although not a common occurrence, securing the contract and thereby keeping the RFP off the street happens often enough that you should explore the possibility with each customer. If you can make it work, everyone wins except your competitors, and that’s the best tilt you can put on the playing field. At the very least, you want to have sold the customer on your solution even if the customer proceeds with formal purchasing. Sometimes, though some key people may already have made their decision, they have to go through the motions of formal purchasing. But whether they are going through the motions or proceeding with a good-faith effort to fairly assess all the bidders, your goal should be to convince them to select you before they formally release their bid request document or RFP. Our experience suggests that this is feasible more often than not if you have played middle game well.
In part you presell your solution by having crafted it with customers—by having worked with them so thoroughly in defining their needs and exploring alternatives that they have gained an extraordinary level of comfort with you, your people, and your products. In part you presell by taking the initiative and being more present, more helpful, and more engaged than your competitors have been, which demonstrates more commitment to customers—a commitment they are inclined to repay through the simple social mechanism of reciprocation. Of course, your solution must be excellent; it must solve their problems or meet their needs in ways that are technically and financially sound and competitive. But if all else is equal, your superior commitment to customers during mid–middle game will behaviorally differentiate you and position you for the win.
1. How selective are you in chasing opportunities? Do you channel your resources into the best opportunities or do you squander resources on opportunities you have no hope of winning or couldn’t execute profitably if you did win them?
2. When do you typically start pursuing opportunities with enough force and commitment to send a strong behavioral message? Look again at Figures 7-1 and 7-2. Which of these radar diagrams is most like you? If your picture is more like Figure 7-1, what could you do to engage new opportunities sooner and with more resources?
3. In this chapter, we contrast the sell and tell approach with a facilitative selling approach. Which of these approaches is more characteristic of your company? What behavioral message do you send while you are exploring the customer’s needs and developing the opportunity?
4. Do you have a formal process for assessing opportunities and determining which ones to pursue? Do you create pursuit strategies that include ways to differentiate yourself behaviorally during mid–middle game? If you don’t develop pursuit strategies now, what would it take to implement this practice in your company?
5. How much customer time share and mind share do you typically have during mid–middle game while the opportunity is developing? What could you do to increase them?
6. To what extent do you typically influence the solution? How often do you help customers draft the specifications or the RFP? If you are rarely invited to participate in these mid–middle game activities, what are you doing wrong? And what can you do to fix it?
7. Finally, how well do you position your teams during mid–middle game? How effectively do you presell your solution? Do you go into late middle games and endgames already positioned for the win? Or do you typically get started late in middle game and find yourself chasing your more proactive competitors? Most companies win or lose B2B competitive contracts in middle game. What could you do to improve your behavioral differentiation during this crucial part of the business development process?
*Centex Construction Company is a particularly interesting example. Former CEO Bob Moss insisted that pursuits be done as we have described here; consequently, the company was meeting its revenue goals one year ahead of schedule.
*Likewise, your strengths should correspond to the customer’s highest-priority requirements or concerns. When your strengths and your competitors’ weaknesses overlap the customer’s key requirements, you are operating in the “sweet spot.” When the converse is true, you are in the “sour spot.”