SKILL
Who’s in Charge Here? LAINE CHROUST EHMANN
Finding a needle in a haystack (has anyone ever ac- tually looked for one there?) may be a breeze com- pared with identifying the decision maker within a big company that’s new on your beat.
Making your way in a new organiza- tion can be a real gauntlet of false starts and missed opportunities. While the people you need to reach and influence may be sitting in the huge corner office with the letters “VIP” on the door, they could just as easily be riding a forklift down at the loading dock or number-crunching over in the accounting suite. Locating the real decision makers in any business takes a combination of tenacity, know-how, and down-home charm. Read on to get the inside scoop on getting, well, the inside skinny. Do your research first. Before you even pick up the phone or sit down at the computer to email a contact, start
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your homework, suggests George Gwaltney, a group sales director for enterprise accounts. “The first thing I do is try to understand where that company is going – to try to inter- nalize what’s happening inside that organization,” says Gwaltney. Start with public-domain information. Hit the press releases, financial reports, and news pieces to start painting a picture of the company, its industry and competitors, and its business goals and objectives. Serena O’Hara, senior consultant with a large sales consulting firm, echoes Gwaltney’s recommendations. She suggests using information aggregator
Hoovers.com for additional data.
When you do your research, look beyond a basic company and staff overview. Dig deeper and see what executives are saying about the com- pany and where it’s heading relative to its competitors and end customers. What are they stating as their primary goals? And do their actions and initia- tives match their words? “You can then get a very good sense of what they’re saying and how they’re talking about their company, if this has sub- stance,” Gwaltney says. Create a list. Based on the informa- tion you gather in Step 1, create a list of possible contacts for the compa- nies you’re trying to break into. “The list is the linchpin of a successful cam- paign,” says O’Hara. Start with the people with the same title as current customers. “If ‘VP of marketing’ com- prises 80 percent of your titles, then, chances are, that’s who you need to reach,” says O’Hara. You’ll be left with some blank spots – either because you’re break- ing into a new market, because there isn’t a “typical” customer, or because you’re starting from scratch. In this case, O’Hara suggests filling the
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