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    The ROI of Executive Insight

    November 19, 2014

    Companies spend millions of dollars every year traveling to meet with customers, entertaining customers and staging educational events for customers. 

    Yet companies make almost no investment in figuring out who these customers are and what they should be talking about once they finally get in the same room with them.

    Consider what an investment in executive intelligence--allowing you to know your customers before you meet with them--can yield. These are real stories and quotes from our customers, who have made an investment in executive insight:

    • Getting the meeting in the first place:We were targeting an executive who reports directly to the CEO. The team crafted a message that referenced some of the information in his Boardroom Insiders profile. He got back to us in 10 minutes and we got the meeting. Personal relevance works.” - Enterprise Sales Manager
    • Higher levels of executive engagement: "I met with the customer and cited several things from his profile during our conversation. The meeting was scheduled for 30 minutes but the customer kept us 1 hour and 20 minutes. The insight really helped us estabish credibility fast, which is what you need when meeting the CEO of a company." - Strategic Account Managerdescribe the image
    • Uncovering net new opportunities: "We thought we knew everything there was to know about this customer but the insight in the profiles made us aware of a $200 million opportunity we did not even know about. Now we're able to be in the running for this deal." - Global Account Director
    • Closing bigger deals, faster: "The profile content was fantastic and saved us a ton of research time.  The information helped us quickly connect the dots between the customer's business objectives and our solutions, and we closed a sizable deal much faster than we anticipated." - Enterprise Account Manager 

    Time and time again, we have seen that doing your homework pays off. The best salespeople know this, and research their customers on their own time. One top rep told us that she has a regular Sunday night "date" with her iPad and a glass of wine, typically spending about three hours on customer research. That adds up to 12 hours a month.

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    We got curious about what an average rep's time is worth and did a simple analysis (see above). The numbers speak for themselves--and what we're showing is cost savings--not even factoring in new or accelerated deals.

    Want to learn more? View some of our executive profiles now.

    Executive Profiles by Boardroom Insiders

     

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    Sharon Gillenwater

    About the Author

    Sharon Gillenwater

    Sharon Gillenwater is the founder and editor-in-chief of Boardroom Insiders, which maintains an extensive database of the most in-depth executive profiles on the market, from Fortune 500 companies to independent non-profits, to help sales and marketing professionals build deeper relationships and close more deals with clients. Gillenwater is a long-time marketing consultant with expertise in marketing strategy, account-based marketing, and CXO engagement programs.