Give Them Something to Say Yes To

A pre-proposal meeting is a meeting where you share your ideas about the right solution with your prospective client without requiring that they make a commitment.

A pre-proposal meeting does a lot of things for you.
It allows you to share ideas with your prospective client without requiring that they commit to the ideas now. Because they are not committing to anything, it means that you are still in a stage where you are collaborating to make sure you get the proposal exactly right.

What Will They Say No To?

By providing your ideas and what a solution might look like without the commitment to make a decision to buy or not buy, you get to identify all of the things your prospective customer may say no to. The time to find out that there is something that they can’t accept or that won’t work for them is before you provide a final proposal that requires a yes or no answer. The feedback that you get allows you to make adjustments. The more stakeholders that review your pre-proposal with you, the more easily you can tailor the proposal to meet their exact needs.

You can have as many of these meetings as you need (without doing so just to avoid dealing with an ask!). There’s no reason to rush through the sales process and deliver a proposal without knowing with absolute certainty that that proposal is the right proposal. Providing your dream client with a proposal that isn’t right for them does nothing to benefit you, and it does nothing to benefit your dream client either.

Give Them Something To Say Yes To

Once you’ve made the adjustments and you know for certain it’s exactly what your dream client wants, you can provide the final proposal. You’ll know this proposal is right because you will have had your dream client develop the proposal with you over time. You’ll have the support of the stakeholders because you will have tailored it to meet their exact needs.

Once you’ve done this, you have something that your prospective client can say yes to.