Getting Past the Gatekeeper in the Age of Covid
To sell effectively, sales reps have to connect with decision-makers – getting past the gatekeeper in the age of COVID presents its own set of issues. The presence of gatekeepers makes reaching decision-makers more challenging than ever. Gatekeepers can be personal assistants, secretaries, and receptionists.
Decision-makers are quite busy. And it’s the job of gatekeepers to limit any outsider’s access to their boss’s time, energy, and priorities. That’s why a salesperson who hopes to get access to a decision-maker’s calendar will have to prove their offerings’ worth to the gatekeeper too.
However, salespeople don’t have to unload their elevator pitch on gatekeepers just to prove the importance of their offerings. That’s because gatekeepers are schedulers or executive assistants who don’t have the authority to call the shots. Even worse, making your product or service a hard sell in front of the gatekeepers will make them think that you’re unable to react to a situation properly.
These challenges were common to the art of getting past the gatekeeper in a pre-COVID era. Aside from these challenges, a sales rep will have to meet a new challenge of getting past the gatekeeper in an age marked by social distancing and virtual meetings.
We’ve spoken about getting past the gatekeeper in the past, but in the past year circumstances have changed. In this blog, we’ll discuss some strategies that’ll help sales reps get past the gatekeeper and earn a spot with the decision-maker when they’re working from home.
Research matters the most
When you’re working from home, you have more time to think of innovative ways to start a conversation with gatekeepers. Besides having your goals and metrics, you should be creative enough to begin a conversation that can spark a relationship with the gatekeeper. A productive conversation with anyone, including gatekeepers, will require understanding. That’s why it’s essential to do your research before the call with gatekeepers. While gatekeepers may not have the power to make the buying decision, it’s important for you to impress them as much.
Knowing their business is integral to having meaningful conversations. Since today’s age is digital, it’s easier and faster to understand a business’s mission, history, and its current offerings. Besides, you can also go to the business’s LinkedIn page to get a rundown on its personnel. If you can spot any potential gatekeeper from LinkedIn, it’ll be a definite plus. That way, you can strike a meaningful conversation. You can also scan a business’s social media accounts to understand their challenges, audience, and current situation.
Communicate relevant value
You have to communicate value every time you call gatekeepers or prospects. These are table stakes for salespeople. When you’re in a virtual sales call with a gatekeeper, you have to communicate the value that’s relevant to their business. Most salespeople fail to circumvent the gatekeeper because they fail to communicate relevant value to the gatekeepers.
The relevant value may not always be something that’s valuable to you. You may think you have a valuable product because you know its features. However, you have to make stakeholders—and their gatekeepers—realize that your product or service brings an incredible level of value to customers. Make sure your call with the gatekeepers is all about them and their boss instead of your business or product.
Prepare well before the actual call
Winging your first call with gatekeepers, thinking that they’re just a means to an end, isn’t the right approach. Winging it is a sure sign of self-importance. When you plan on going on a call with gatekeepers unprepared, you’ll likely end up bull-rushing—which isn’t a positive sign for the conversation’s future.
It’s hard to get people on phone these days as everyone’s busy working from home and juggling multiple responsibilities. That’s why you should have a clear goal in mind whenever you make a call. You should know what exactly you’ll likely achieve from a specific call. However, preparation doesn’t mean reading from a script—that looks artificial. Rather, you should practice your opening line multiple times before the actual call begins.
Still not confident how you’ll bypass the gatekeeper in the age of COVID-19? If that’s the case, you should bring a team of experienced reps abroad. This team will go a long way in helping you get past the gatekeeper. When it comes to finding a dependable team of sales development reps or SDRs, it comes down to Acquirent.
Acquirent: Augment your sales team’s capabilities with experienced SDRs
Whether you own a Fortune 500 company or a start-up, we, at Acquirent, help you get past the gatekeeper with proven tactics. We have sales enablement tools, processes, and people to help our clients make sales even during COVID-19. Partner with us will help augment your sales force. Connect with our sales specialists and discover how we can help your business uncover new growth opportunities during the pandemic.