How to use "First Draft Proposals" to end every meeting with agreed next actions

Hello Subscriber,

We finished our email yesterday with a very significant suggestion:

At an early stage of a complex sale, your goal is not to win their business but to win their agreement to stay in the conversation.

And we introduced the idea of a “First Draft Proposal”.

Now, just to be clear, if what you’re selling is simple and easy to understand, what I’m about to outline is not appropriate for you. However, in almost every B2B market sector, the options available to customers are becoming more sophisticated. It’s increasingly likely that you can offer choices to your customers that were simply unavailable previously.

This is why, for most people in B2B sales roles, you’ll need more than one meeting with your potential customer to win some new business. It’s likely that you’ll need to meet with more stakeholders. A wider range of perspectives will need to be considered in your proposals.

And that’s why we should finish most of our initial meetings with new customers with the suggestion that we submit a “First Draft Proposal”.

What’s in a “First Draft Proposal”?