Mastering Technical Sales: The Sales Engineer's Ha

Sometime around 250 BCE, Archimedes invented the screw pump (Archimedes Screw), a “ship-shaking” claw (the Claw of Archimedes), and a heat ray proposed for the defense of Syracuse (really!). It is likely that the first presales people appeared about the same time, tasked to explain what these machines did, how they achieved the results, and the value associated with their use. In addition to executing the technical sales of these devices, it is also likely that these presales ancients instructed buyers in their setup, operation, and ongoing support – and celebrated the successes enjoyed by users, collecting some of the world’s earliest reference stories. Presales has been around for a long time. I’ve learned that the presales function is a critical point of leverage for revenue-generating teams. For example, the ability to improve the ratio of sales:presales, without sacrificing quality, can yield rather astounding top-line revenue increases. Our job is to be as effective as possible. Traditionally presales has been a “cottage industry”. Individual organizations defined the role in accord with their experiences, often operating without any ability (or interest) in comparing the function and activities in other companies. Presales tools were often absent entirely or hand-hewn from Microsoft Office or Google Docs products. Skills training opportunities for presales were limited – and training budgets even more so. Know-how and best practices were similarly siloed. Learnings developed within one organization diffused slowly to adjacent companies in a space and even slower for firms in unrelated markets. Simultaneous invention took place repeatedly and correspondingly wastefully. In the 1990s, we began to see industrialization of the sales function, with the appearance of sales methodologies and associated training, along with bespoke tools for sales operations and sales enablement. Presales teams were “invited along for the ride”, but these new skills and product options were misaligned and insufficient. Now, 30 years later (wow), we are enjoying a presales renaissance, with increasing availability of tools, skills training, and communities specifically designed for presales – along with corresponding resources of know-how and best practices. This fourth edition of Mastering Technical Sales is one of the key levers now available to move the world of presales forward and upward. Similarly, while there are hundreds (or thousands) of course offerings for software sales, marketing, and development disciplines, there are currently only a handful that embrace the presales function. That’s another example of why this fourth edition of Mastering Technical is so important and valuable – it is the textbook for presales. Sales processes (and buying processes) are often diagrammed as a funnel, with leads entering at the top of the funnel and closed business exiting at the bottom. Many Chief Revenue Officers and heads of sales believe that the key to increasing revenues is to increase the number of opportunities at the top of the funnel – through marketing, outbound calling, and related activities. Presales is all about the middle of the funnel – how we can progress and accelerate the opportunities with good product “fit” while removing those with poor fit as early as possible. Vision generation, discovery, solutioning, value analyses, presentations, demonstrations, POCs (Proof of Concept), POVs (Proof of Value), Guided Workshops, and RFP (Request for Proposal) responses are some of the activities in the middle of the funnel – each of which affords the possibility of acceleration of the good and early discard of the poor. A clear understanding of why these tasks are required, what needs to be done, and how to best execute is the essence of successful presales practices. Mastering Technical Sales provides fundamental guidance for those new to presales, an opportunity to accelerate growth for the developing practitioner, and sets the stage for those seeking front-line management positions. THE Book for Presales! - Peter E. Cohan, Author of Great Demo! and Doing Discovery

Excellent book. 100% recommended it.

Presales Pros: Nearly every profession has that one resource that everyone in the role has at their fingertips: For Doctors, it's the Physicians Desk Reference For Telecommunications pros it is Newton's Telecom Dictionary For Architects, it's The Architecture Reference and Specification Book And for PreSales Pros it's John Care's new fourth edition of Mastering Technical Sales. This book is that go-to to help you diagnose a professional challenge, sharpen your skills, and generally become a more effective PreSales Pro. Starting with "What is a Sales Engineer?" this book carries you though all of the skills that you need to develop to build an impactful career. I especially like that at the end of each chapter, John gives you specific Skill Building tasks to grow your talents targeted to the new SE, the experienced SE, and in some chapters the SE manager. So whether you are just starting your PreSales career or you are a seasoned professional that just needs to sharpen the saw, this is a must-own.

I tried so hard to go through this book, but I couldn’t. It’s so dry, and sometimes not cohesive. You finish the section and you wonder what the point was.