For MSP Sales to Be ‘Pitch Perfect’, You Need to Know When It’s Appropriate to Pitch

MSP sales pitches should not be foisted on every potential customer who walks through your MSP’s doors. The sales pitch should be well considered and presented with information attuned to your target. 

Pitching to everybody is firing shotgun rounds in the dark. You might hit something, but you’ll probably just waste ammunition. Following, tips will be explored to help you determine the best time to pitch:  

Learn to Know Where Prospects Are First  

MSP sales aren’t precognitive. In order to know where clients are coming from, you must collect data on them. This takes time, you’ll need to ask questions. Sometimes prospects are more qualified, sometimes they’re less qualified–something you will find out by getting to know them. 

Lead Qualification Maximizes Outreach Effectiveness 

As you get to know prospects, certain features of their present circumstances will doubtless jump out at you. Some of these will be things that exclude you from being a viable option. Sometimes, lead qualification reveals an ideal prospect just waiting to be wooed by your technology. Establish lead qualification measures utilizing the best data you have available, as well as that provided through SEO agencies specializing in MSP outreach solutions. 

Sometimes Pain Points Develop Independent of Need 

A prospect can have tech pain points that don’t qualify them for your services. There are no monochrome lead features which automatically pre-qualify them for a legitimate pitch. Sometimes, prospects just need help with something and came to you incidentally. If you can help them at that point, they may come to you later for a sale. But if you pitch them, they’ll think you’re less human and only profit-oriented. Such qualities discourage conversion. 

Pitching at the Right Time 

An MSP sales strategy that prequalifies leads will take a conscientious approach. Such an approach is more likely to initiate conversion than unilaterally pitching to anyone that interfaces with your operation. 

MSP sales strategies won’t be successful no matter how in-depth or well-informed if they overstress outreach teams. Like horses in battle or ships on the sea, there are times when they must rest. Horses need sleep and food, naval ships need time in-harbor for repair and fuel. Meanwhile, MSP professionals selling your IT services need to be managed such that they aren’t being stretched too thin. This will increase their effectiveness and your operational sustainability over time. Several strategies to help induce such outcomes include: 

Cut the Fat from Selling Protocols 

MSP sales should be informed by a strategic approach that excises anything unnecessary. If you’ve got some call flow with a bunch of counter-intuitive asks and promotions, get rid of it. Unless you’re some international conglomerate whose name is synonymous with IT service, you’re shooting yourself in the foot. 

You want the shortest distance between the client’s initial interest and their conversion. Figure out what is fundamentally necessary, and cut everything else out. You want metrics to make the proper choices here, working with SEO agencies which specialize in MSPs can give you a real edge through helping you identify and utilize relevant data. 

Messages Calibrated for Specific Targets 

The more specific your aim, the more precise your outreach ballistics will be. A shotgun fires a hundred BBs at a nearby target, but it’s bad for the livestock sprinting in the distance. Sometimes marketing tactics at a convention are different than those on the web. Use data to design any outreach, digital, physical, or through snail mail such that it is most likely to resonate with target clientele.  

Establishing Lead-Ranking Infrastructure 

Don’t send your sellers down blind alleys. Tier outreach protocols such that better leads get priority, and you’ll keep salespeople more energized as they acquire conversions. 

Stronger Sellers 

MSP sales techniques that trim the fat, calibrate outreach, and rank leads will give sellers a better chance at success. Consider existing protocols and optimize as it’s appropriate.  

MSP sales are going to be more successful if you plan them out beforehand— almost anything will be. Like so much in life, such forethought is easier to conceive than it is to enact. 

Following are a few tips to help you most successfully plan out interactions with prospects, ideally leading to an increase in your conversion metrics: 

Establish an Effective Value Proposition 

MSP sales techniques should be built around a value proposition which objectively provides the majority of prospects in your target market with tangible value. 

Now that value can be in terms of increased revenue over time, decreased processing hassle, or better public image— in short, it can be from a number of diverse angles. The key to a successful value proposition is one which emphasizes that which you can do better than the competition.  

Understand Who Makes the Calls from the Start 

With a clear value proposition, your next step is to avoid pitching unnecessarily. You want your proposition to go to the person who has the authority to induct your services. 

You don’t want to give a proposition to a secretary to abbreviate for her boss; her shorthand likely won’t communicate the value you intend. Know who makes the decisions and how, and angle your value proposition accordingly.  

Banish Desperation; Advise, Understand, and Challenge Prospects Instead 

Don’t be desperate. Desperation equates to inexperience in the eyes of many clients. You’re a trusted adviser— think of yourself this way. Your role is to challenge prospects and understand them from within and without well enough to know what will challenge them, and whether such challenges will yield value. 

MSP sales strategies that aren’t desperate, but advise, challenge, and understand clients, are apt to be more effective. Additionally, ensure you’ve got an airtight value proposition and that you present that proposition to the right person among your prospect’s ranks. 

MSP sales have enough of an uphill battle without poor internal practices. Following are three things MSPs often do which reduce their effectiveness in terms of sales and how to avoid them:

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Your MSP sales strategy needs to cut off all the fat. There are a lot of things which may be unnecessary, and there are likely actions you’ve neglected to take that you should. A good way to ensure you’re always at your best is to design outreach operations with built-in productivity strategies. Consider this threefold approach:

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Your MSP sales aren’t going to see a spike because you think they should. You’re not going to hit goals simply because you’ve got the infrastructure for them. A website is a good step in the right direction, but such a thing doesn’t guarantee sales in and of itself. You’ve got to optimize it for visibility and refine a means by which continuing traffic may be recouped. Following are tips to help you effectively manage your sales strategy:

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The truth is, ineffective lead generation in MSP sales may develop from a number of factors beyond your control. That said, there is just as much ineffectiveness which surfeits existing outreach strategies and is totally within your power to correct. Following are three common areas where tech companies commonly drop the ball: 

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There are common mistakes made in sales which can be avoided. Experience helps tenured sellers stay away from these mistakes, but as a new MSP, they’re easy to fall into. The following three tips address MSP sales strategies worth employing for increased conversion: 

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Your MSP sales need to have an economy of production in terms of content. It is essential that you get the maximum productive value out of each piece of content your organization produces. You don’t just want to post it once on your blog and call it good.

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MSP sales will come up against issues that are hard to overcome and beyond your control. However, there are certain attitudes, habits, and strategies of your sellers which you can control and statistically increase your rate of conversion over time. 

The following are several things clients dislike that you should teach your sellers to carefully avoid: 

Cookie-Cutter Emails  

MSP sales strategies need to incorporate emails that are personalized based on prospect importance as well as category. You don’t want to send out a bunch of form emails that seem like— and in reality, are— spam. Look at your current outbound email marketing campaign and develop messages which resonate, but don’t replicate. 

Bad Follow-Ups from The Same Channel 

While it’s been observed that contacting leads a minimum of five times has a statistical track-record of effectiveness, if you do it in the same way through the exact same channel, that’s downright irritating. Call them. Send an email. Contact them via SMS on social media. Arrange a meeting at a conference. Send a care package. Contact prospects at least five times, but don’t do it the same way. Be unique, be creative, and do not be annoying.  

Treating Clients Like Friends Rather Than Partners 

Your clients know you’re not their friend and they’re not yours. If you’re always acting all “buddy-buddy”, that’s got a synthetic sleaze to it that isn’t likely to do you any favors in the long run. Instead, treat clients with deft professionalism. You call the shots in your domain and allow them to call the shots in theirs. Let them introduce you to management, don’t be demanding. Play it as professional as possible. Converted clients are partners, so treat them accordingly. 

MSP sales which strives to please clients and avoid all irritating activity is more likely to be successful in such endeavors. Consider your existing strategies and excise any of them which are obtrusive or annoying.