The AI Edge: Sales Strategies for Unleashing the Power of AI to Save Time, Sell More, and Crush the Competition (Jeb Blount)

stakeholder, potential pitfall, competitor, and our own weaknesses were possible villains. The sessions, usually conducted with several of my peers, were painful and, at times, embarrassing. Murder boarding exposed blind spots, overconfidence, lack of vigilance, confirmation biases, weaknesses, and gaps in our knowledge. It was uncomfortable to be

One of the best sales managers I ever worked for played a game with every big deal in our pipeline. We'd get in a room and explore each potential scenario that could kill the deal. This wasn't a broad 30,000-foot conversation. We dove into the minutia and killed the deal (murder boarding). Nothing was sacred. Every

Cutting-edge AI-powered proposal generation platforms, including PandaDoc, Proposify, Beautiful.ai, and Qwilr, along with creative platforms like Canva and Prezi, automate the creation of visually appealing and customized proposals. Many of these platforms integrate with CRMs and use AI algorithms to generate proposal templates, suggest content bas

during discovery conversations and presentations to subtly and systematically eliminate your competitors as an alternative in the minds of your prospect's stakeholders.

Review the information you learned in Exercise 35.1 and develop questions and messaging to use

What is [competitor's] unique value proposition? How is it unique compared to other market offerings? Describe the strengths and weaknesses of [competitor]. Highlight significant shortcomings. Summarize common negative user or customer feedback for [competitor]. Explore current market conditions affecting [competitor]. Compare the strengths and wea

prospects are doing this type of research, you can bet your commission check that savvy competitors are going to use AI to find and exploit your company's weaknesses. Don't wait until you are pushed in a corner. Get to work now and analyze each of your competitors in relation to each other and your company. Here are some potential prompts to get yo

AI can also put this same information in an easy-to-digest table:

But because emotions drive buying decisions, it is crucial that you uncover and address individual stakeholder criteria, with questions like these: “Tell me what success means to you?” “Can you tell me about what's most important to you?” “What problems are you personally trying to solve?” “What worries you most about the current situation?” “Can y

Here is an example of how AI can help you develop root-cause analysis questions.