7 golden rules to winning the sale

... and its not about the document

First contact• Its 4.20pm on Friday - you are

just leaving the office for a family weekend away. You get an email for the CFO of Mercantile Holdings (MH). They are looking for new advisers. A 20-page detailed PDF is attached. Responses are requested in 21 days time - you relax a little.

• You are offered a choice of 4 dates to meet the MH finance team for an initial briefing. You notice they all seem to fall during your firm's annual retreat...

• How do you react?

1. Act like you really want the business!

From the first callRespond instantly. Their deadlines / availability is all!

ResearchAssemble the best possible team

More details• You read the PDF & make the call.

MH is a €50m turnover hi-tech manufacturing company. They are headquartered in your town, with manufacturing plants in Thailand and Poland. They have private equity investors and are looking for a potential trade sale or IPO in 3 to 5 years. The CFO is ex-PWC. Existing audit and tax advisers are KPMG, where the Audit Committee chair was a partner some years ago.

• They have been a target of your firm for a while. You quoted for some employee share scheme work a while back, but they gave it to EY (you do not know why).

• What are your thoughts?

2. Sometimes it's a "Thanks, but no

thanks"Is there a realistic intention to instruct?

What are the past buying patterns?What is the background and preferences of the decision

makers?Who else in on the list?

The plot thickens....• Its basically an audit and tax

compliance brief. You find out that its only PWC, BDO and yourself on the tender list. You start to feel that MH is serious in talking to you. The CFO says he was happy with KPMG ("no surprises") but the Audit Committee "want to see what's out there". Each firm will get a tender information package, a 1 hour meeting with the finance team and a phone call with the audit committee chair. Tender documents are due in 21 days, and there will be a 90 minute presentation and Q&A session for firms, if invited.

• From the back of your mind, you are just trying to remember.. didn't someone in the office mention MH recently, and didn't somebody join from KPMG not too long back....?

3. Know all the players

Who is really deciding, why and how? Who do we already know?Getting the inside track

Research (again)

More is revealed• It turns out your firms knows at

least 3 people with good MH connections... Calls are made. Coffee is drunk... Research is carried out.

• It seems as if the CFO is close to KPMG. The Audit Committee wants to see some fresh challenge but the CFO is reluctant saying that the PE backers will view changing poorly, especially to non-Big 4. KPMG's costs are an issue, especially in Thailand and Poland. Also, they got a tax structure wrong in the latter country which is still not fully resolved. You also hear that MH is planning a €10m fund raising to invest in a new technology, which might in part be by acquisition.

4. What are our value propositions? What were the problems with previous advisers?

Beyond the brief.. what are their particular needs?Test and check - do they like our team, our

propositions?And, er.... more research

A little luck...?• Your tax manager comes into your office

in an animated state. She has just returned from a local international tax group meeting, and there was a presentation from the visiting Thai Chamber of Commerce. They covered some potential tax and grant incentives available for hi-tec manufacturing investments in 2015. You've had similar experience for another client. Its definitely interesting, but not exactly within the MH brief....

• You also see in the industry press that BDO Poland has just sold out to Deloitte.

• You are attending a reception at a law firm that evening, and you see the Audit Committee chair is on the guest list.

5. Respect the rules - but push the limits

Use every means to get in front of the prospectDon't try to negotiate the deadlines!

Respect the competition, but lay a few mines

Disaster strikes• Its going well. You got in front of the MH tax

director (the only firm that did) and had a great meeting on Thailand. You have developed strong service propositions for Thailand and Poland, offered the CFO regular free meetings to keep him totally in the loop. You also developed a fixed price agreed-procedures DD package for M&A. You had some good rapport with the Audit Committee chair, and agreed a new contact protocol. And you are pretty sure your soundings on price have been well received.

• The document is due on Friday by 5pm. On Wednesday your key manager calls in sick. Worse still, a corrupted disk looses the latest version of document. You are not sure you can now make the deadline. One option is to produce a cut-down version covering the key points. Another is to call the CFO, explain what has happened, and ask if first thing Monday will be ok...... Its tight for a presentation on Tuesday, but should be possible and you can rehearse in the taxi on they way over....

6. You won't win it with the document, but you

can easily loose If it isn't your best work, then don't do it

Prepare, rehearse & rehearse the final pitch. Then rehearse some more.

Check your pricingPractice for the questions you hope don't come up

And the results is....• Your best possible shot at success.

• You decided it was sensible to pitch, understood the decision process and buying criteria, identified influencers and decision makers, researched thoroughly, crafted and tested value propositions, changed the manager because of sickness, used external designers and worked through the night to get to good document in on time. And you rehearsed your pitch presentation with independent coaching....

• Win or loose, you inspired your team, impressed the prospect, learned and grew.

7. Win or loose.... De-brief & learn

You won! Learn why & hit the ground running...or Know how to win next time,

plus, you never know when the winner will mess it up!