Project Description
5 ideas that will give you more success in scoring the meeting with the C-Suite.
5) Create a Custom Cartoon
Stu Heinecke, the author of “How to Get a Meeting With Anyone,” says he has seen ROI in the millions of percent on personalizing cartoons for his target accounts.
To borrow Heinecke’s technique, salespeople can commission a graphic designer or artist. Upwork, PeoplePerHour, and Guru are good sources for finding budget-friendly freelancers for these types of projects.
Wondering what to include in the cartoon?
“The trick is to steer the choice of cartoon based on the truth it reveals, and how that relates to the issue you want to address with the recipient,” Heinecke says.
For example, imagine a rep’s research showed the executive’s company just acquired a startup, and she’d like to offer her company’s IT integration services. She might send a cartoon of two employees discussing the complexities of unifying two technical systems.
If salespeople are mailing a physical cartoon, Heinecke suggests putting a message on the back of the cartoon “proposing a meeting and explaining why it’s worthy of the CEO’s consideration.”
Sending a digital one? Attach the cartoon to your email and write your note in the email body.
Because these strategies are time and labor-intensive, salespeople should reserve them for, especially valuable or hard-to-penetrate accounts. For example, if their average deal size is around $3,000, spending twice as long to close a $6,000 deal would make sense — but doing so for a $3,500 deal probably isn’t the best use of their energy or time.