It’s commonplace in many industries to conduct business reviews with clients on a quarterly basis – thus, the acronym for Quarterly Business Review: QBR. Here’s how these are commonly done.
The sales person runs reports and puts together a one-inch thick book of every client data point imaginable. Then, he creates a powerpoint presentation with these data points shown on the big screen in the QBR.
As the sales manager, do you ever look across the table at your client during these? They’re doing bird dips… You know, falling asleep!
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The meeting ends and everyone high-fives, but a great opportunity to demonstrate value has been wasted. Today’s business executives expect more from you… that is if you expect to be seen as a partner. They don’t just want data. They want you to synthesise the data. They expect you to analyse it and come to the meeting asking questions about trends and anomalies.
Use these meetings to show that you are paying attention to their business, not just running data reports. Think of it this way… If they could read the book and get the same information without being in the meeting, what value are you really providing?
