Your entire team has been working fiercely to score that sales win with a prized enterprise prospect. It could quite literally be a game changer for your company. You’ve been pursuing the deal for six months and have carefully made your way through the buyer network, crafted a client-focused solution and sunk in a liberal amount of energy, time and, of course, money. As so often happens, you get the call on Friday afternoon. With that verbal the verdict is in–it’s a won deal! After you express your thanks and agree to a final wrap-up and contract signing meeting the following Tuesday morning, the conversation with your soon-to-be new client is wrapped up. You set up a quick call with your team to share the good news, and feelings of relief, elation, anticipation and maybe even a little surprise flood through you.
Now’s the time. The time to show your professionalism and your poise. The time to hold off on that barroom celebration with the team. The time to refrain from email blasts and ecstatic announcements in posts on every social platform known to man. And the time to share that same guidance with your teammates. Of course, it’s certainly appropriate to savor the moment and to share some measured internal congratulations but there should be no popping of the corks. Not just yet.
Remember, it’s not a sales win until it’s in. The deal is not done until the deal is done. Viral declarations of victory, while immensely satisfying, could be counterproductive as well as unprofessional. Those types of global broadcasts go to everyone, including not only your friends but your competitors, some of whom may not yet have been informed of their loss. And they go to your executives, your clients and likely also by some of the buyers from your not-quite-yet account.
And while everything next Tuesday morning will likely go well, you just might be sitting across the table from some individuals you hadn’t met during the pursuit. And perhaps these representatives from the account’s contracts and/or legal teams know that you’ve gone wildly public, boasting of your win. And that could just cost you some leverage, some bargaining power at the table. Why? Because, remember, everyone knows about your big win. As such, negotiating an item or two might put you in a position where you feel compelled to give up a bit of margin here and there to make sure that everything gets wrapped up quickly and without conflict. You can be assured that it’ll definitely be in the back of your mind. While you’re wishing that you had only held off on those Friday broadcasts.
So, be professional and poised after a win. More than anything, just be smart. And act like you’ve been there before.
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