Behavior Hacking, Episode 2: Hacking a Buyer's Internal Capital

This interview has been edited for clarity and length.

Is Your Buyer Willing to Spend Their “Social Capital”?

Gray Hardell: 

So, Nate, I'm going to think about myself as a buyer. How, as a seller, can I determine how much they're willing to spend on that currency internally in order to actually solve this problem?

Nate Nasralla: 

Yeah, you can call it social capital, currency capital, as if it's a resource that they'll have to spend at every step to move the deal forward. 

Now, one of the things that I think a lot of people get wrong when they talk about like, "Oh, you got to test your champion. You got to see if they'll spend the money," is they do it in a way that really sets up a pretty invalid test because there's always a significant asymmetry of risk in a deal.

The Asymmetry of Risk in a Deal

Nate Nasralla: 

For the buyer, it's risky internally. They're going to live inside of that organization with the same people long after the deal is done. And so I might say something like, "Hey, Gray, can you introduce me to Mark? It's our very first meeting, right? Hey, can you set up a meeting with your executive?" What are you going to say? Like, I don't even know if this is, like, does this match what Mark's thinking about? Like, it's no, right? And so if I said, "Well, Gray's not a champion after that," you would be like, "Well, that's not really a valid test." Right? So you have to think about what is the right way to actually—I'm going to use a phrase that we can unpack later—add value, which is a little squishy, but add value back to the buyer while you are testing them.

Valid Testing by Adding Value

Nate Nasralla: 

So, for example, you are working through a deal where it's going to be new, like never been done before in the organization. You recently finished up a project with another customer. I say, "Hey, Gray, if I connect you with Heather, I think you guys might have a great conversation. Would you be up for that?" Yeah. I'm going to check in and be like, "Great, did you actually call Heather like you said you would? Did you follow through?" If not, I'm going to start to wonder, like, is this really top of mind? And I know that that was something valuable. I just made an introduction to a peer in your role who has recently executed the project that you're going to do. That is a valid test.

Building a Deep Pipeline

Gray Hardell: 

I think a lot of sellers fear not having deals to work. They keep their happy ears going, and they're afraid to ask those questions. What do you say to sellers in that situation?

Nate Nasralla: 

So part of it is, well, if you have a very shallow, dry pipeline, then that could be true. Like you need to go back and build some pipeline and you will move more into a feast, not a famine, like mindset, scarcity mindset. But the other idea is that if you look at where the difference between a really low, like call it 15 percent versus a higher 50 percent win rate is going to come from, it's not working more and more opportunities. 

It's going deep into the highest value, highest potential opportunities. Because if you're treating every deal the exact same, then you're starving the high potential deals of your time and your creativity and your thoughtfulness. And you're feeding that to where it's not going to drive any level of outcome. 

So if early on you can begin to decide, okay, where are we going to go really deep together? And I'm going to qualify out others. These, I'm going to, I know I'm going to win these because we're going to go deep together. That's part of the value. Even if you're like, man, I don't have an overflowing pipeline. All the more to dial up win rate by going deep on a few that are high potential.

The Importance of Coverage

Gray Hardell: 

Well, that's why the equation of coverage is so important, right? If you have a really low win rate, you're going to need a lot of coverage. But if you've got a high win rate, you don't need to have as much coverage.

Nate Nasralla: 

Yeah. That's right. And that's where if you start to think about pipeline in terms of a discounted or weighted approach to say, okay, well, I have some high-value late-stage deals that I'm going deep on, like, let's spend more time to make sure that these get across the line. Well, you can feel okay. Because you're not saying, "Ah, I just need to work toward a blind or raw top line coverage ratio, like always have 4x." No, it's like, let's look at where these deals actually are and the value of each individual deal and where you're at.

Understanding the Core Problem

Gray Hardell: 

One of my favorite things to do was to say, "What you said and what I heard could be two different things. So please tell me, did I articulate the problem the way that you perceive it? Or is there a nuance to it that I am missing?" 

Because usually you can get a layer deeper because most people at their core are only going to tell you the surface level, not the underlying motivations, because there's always emotions that are fueling the reason that this is a priority or a problem, right?

Nate Nasralla: 

Yeah, and I think a lot of people miss that. It's like one of my big things is no one ever is like, "Oh, man, this thing is causing me zero anxiety, so I think I'm going to go and fix it." No, it's because something is causing them anxiety. People are worried about losing their job. They're going to have to do a huge layoff or something monumental is going to happen that is causing them a tremendous amount of bad feelings. And they would like to not feel that way anymore. 

But if you keep it at that surface level and you actually don't understand the driving emotions or the reason that this is an executive priority or why this person has been trusted to solve this problem, then you're never actually going to be able to build a meaningful business case. Is that fair?

Writing Down the Problem

Nate Nasralla: 

Yes. And a couple of things that you just touched on are so important. One of the most powerful human experiences is to feel fully known and understood. And to your point, a lot of these problems are wrapped up in a lot of negative emotion that is easier to ignore. 

One, putting it down in writing helps people see it. And for those where you can outline this in a way where they're like, "Oh my gosh. Finally, somebody who gets it, and somebody who can express this even more effectively than I can, because I've been trying to get other people to pay attention to this, and it's gone by the wayside. We're still trying to figure out the same thing." Writing it down creates that catharsis, which is incredibly powerful.

To go back to your point on conversations versus content, when you're translating what you were talking about into written content, you're kicking into effect this reality that it feels far more permanent or real when it's written down. And so what you'll find is you'll get far sharper and more detailed feedback. When you're looking at something in writing together, it's a real thing. 

Cunningham's Law is the title of this, named after Ward Cunningham, the guy who created the first wiki, which became the technology behind Wikipedia. His point is that if you really want to understand the real answer, don't ask a question, write down the wrong answer. Watch and see how people come alive and they can't wait to correct you. And that's part of the value of doing this in written form. In this case, as it relates to a problem statement.