3 Takeaways From Our Win/Loss Webinar With Egencia’s Jayde Phillips

For the first installment of our new Win/Loss Wednesdays series, we had the pleasure of chatting with Jayde Phillips, who manages market and competitive intelligence at Egencia, an American Express Global Business Travel company.

By the end of the conversation — which covered CRM hygiene, interview tactics, data analysis, and more — Jayde had given the audience several takeaways. Here are our 3 favorites:

1. Set a clear, measurable goal for your win/loss program
2. Skip the incentives (for both your buyers and your sellers)
3. Aim for 6 30-minute interviews per quarter

1. Set a clear, measurable goal for your win/loss program

The goal of your win/loss program determines everything you do: the stakeholders you involve, the CRM fields you create, the buyers you interview, the questions you ask them, etc.

So it’s critical that you set a clear, measurable goal — like one of these:

• Increase our win rates against our top 3 competitors
• Double our market share in the EMEA region
• Achieve 100% net dollar retention in our enterprise customer segment

With a goal similar to those examples, you will work efficiently and produce actionable insights.

On the flip side, you should NOT set broad goals like these:

• Win more deals
• Optimize the product roadmap
• Improve customer satisfaction

With a goal similar to those examples, you will waste time and produce low-value insights.

2. Skip the incentives (for both your buyers and your sellers)

A common misconception is that your buyers won’t agree to interviews unless you offer them incentives (e.g., gift cards).

Jayde begs to differ. She’s never offered incentives, and yet she’s been consistently interviewing buyers on a quarterly basis for years.

Her advice? Position the interview as an opportunity for the buyer to make their voice heard and influence your company’s strategy. For many people, that’s just as enticing as a gift card.

Another common misconception is that your sellers won’t maintain good CRM hygiene unless you offer them incentives.

Again, Jayde begs to differ. She recommends sending them a message: It is in your best interest to maintain good CRM hygiene. The better your hygiene, the better your chances of hitting quota.

Ideally, you’re not actually the one who sends that message; it’s more likely to resonate when it comes from a well-respected seller or sales leader.

3. Aim for 6 30-minute interviews per quarter

Depending on the number of deals your sales team works each quarter, 6 interviews may be too many or not enough — but it’s a good starting point. Once you have a few quarters under your belt, you’ll know whether you need to adjust.

Unfortunately, there’s no magic number of interview requests that will convert into 6 interviews. Jayde suggests reaching out to as many as 100 buyers — but, again, you may find over time that you need to adjust that number.

For each 30-minute interview (45 minutes is OK if absolutely necessary), Jayde recommends the following:

• Record and transcribe it (free tools like Otter are helpful)
• Ask 6-8 questions
• Stick to open-ended, qualitative questions — don’t ask anything that can be answered with “yes,” “no,” or a number

Don’t ask this: “Did you enjoy the sales experience?”

Ask this instead: “Can you talk to me about the sales experience?”

Learn how to get senior leaders to buy into your win/loss program

In another installment of Win/Loss Wednesday, we talked about getting executive buy-in with Scott Frost (formerly Stripe, Adobe, New Relic). Click here to read the recap and watch the recording!