Visma case study
Giving Sales Engineers the Work-Life Balance to Adding Capacity to Presales Teams by Eliminating Demo Lag Time
Company Size
500
Presales Team
5
AE:SC Ratio
7:1
Avg Sales Cycle
3 Months
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The results at a glance
to 0 Days Demo lag time reduction
hours per week Presales capacity increased by
Unqualified demos reduced
The Challenge
Too Many Unqualified Demos Creating a Presales Bottleneck
Visma | Raet understood that buying their solution was a complex process for their buyers. They also knew their buyers wanted to see the product early in their journey, which required their presales team to execute a lot of demos. Their desire to help customers see their product soon became a
bottleneck though, as prospects had to wait for solutions consultant availability to see the product, which took three weeks or more from their initial conversations with sales reps. Visma | Raet’s solutions consultants felt this burden weigh on them as they tried to keep up with the several demands on their time while trying to meet the demand for demos. Their frustrations began to rise as they realized that many of the demos bogging down their calendars were repetitive intro demos for prospects ranging from those who were either improperly prepared, or totally unqualified for a live call.
As tensions between sales and solutions consultants rose, Visma | Raet sought a solution to help their buyers see their product by scaling their SC team’s abilities to deliver intro and FAQ demos.
The Solution
Qualifying Prospects for Live Calls Using Demo Automation
Visma | Raet implemented Consensus as a means to alleviate their presales bottleneck by giving buyers instant access to demos. Sales reps sent demos upon request to pre qualify prospects for live calls. This Demo Qualified Lead (DQL) strategy shielded the solutions consulting team from spending time on repetitive intro demos and helped sales understand the interest and urgency shown by customer buying groups. Once the demo was watched, sales would engage the solutions consultants for live demonstrations in which prospects could ask specific questions about Visma | Raet that connected to their personal business problems.
The Results
Eliminated Demo Lag Time
Unqualified Demos Disappeared
Empowering sales reps to send demos on demand brought another positive impact to the solutions consulting team by shielding them from demos that had little chance of progressing. Before Consensus, the team estimated that 50% of the demos they executed were underqualified or totally unqualified because a prospect lacked authority, was the wrong persona, or had no urgency to progress the deal forward. After implementing Consensus, they saw that rate reduced to 5%. Leveraging demo automation allowed Visma | Raet’s teams to see who was truly interested in their solution and therefore ready to speak with solutions consultants. In fact the reduction in unqualified demos and the prioritization of DQLs gave Visma | Raet’s presales team more than 20 hours back in their work week to focus on impacting the buyer’s journey with customized content, in depth discussions, and solution scoping that normally took place weeks later.
Improved Cooperation Between Presales and Sales
As with any new tool, there was reticence to adopt Consensus among other groups. The sales team hesitated at first, but soon became comfortable with sending demos to prospects and now do it proactively to understand how prospects are viewing their solution and who else gets involved in the buying process. The ability to discover new stakeholders sooner, see how buyers prioritize content, and even close deals without engaging presales for live calls became a boon to rep empowerment and improved the communication and collaboration between the teams. Because they no longer had to wait weeks to get a live demo, sales felt enabled with the right demos to share with champions and buying groups alike at any point in the sales cycle. On the flip side, solutions consultants now felt like their calendars were filled with meaningful customer engagements instead of repetitive intro demos that showed little promise of turning into revenue down the road. Tensions eased between teams and working relationships improved with newfound focus, alignment, and eagerness to meet buyer needs.
