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Notes from the opening.
Perspectives, playbooks and field notes on opening markets and earning meetings, written by the people who do the work for the people who buy it.
What a qualified meeting actually means
Most pipeline programmes promise qualified meetings and never define the word. Here is the four-part test we work to, what it rules out, and why it has to be agreed before the first message goes out.
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The first ninety days in a new market
A new country, a new vertical or a new line of business: the opening quarter follows the same pattern. What to decide, what to build, when to start the conversations and when to judge them.
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An account list is a point of view
A list of target companies is treated as data. It is actually a strategy: every record encodes a decision somebody made about who matters. Three questions to ask of any list before you work it.
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How to brief a closer
The meeting is booked. The brief decides whether it was worth booking. The one-page format we send before every qualified meeting, section by section, and what we ask for in return.
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Events are a pipeline channel, not a party
Most event budgets buy presence. Treated as a channel, with a target list, a before and an after, an event is one of the few places where the first conversation and the second can happen in the same week.
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Selling IT services when the buyer has already decided
Enterprise IT services buyers arrive at the first call with a shortlist, a budget and an opinion. Field notes on what still moves them, and what no longer does.
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Selling to both sides of a platform
Marketplaces and platforms have two customers, and the pipeline for each behaves differently. Field notes on sequencing supply and demand, and on the partnership deals that sit between them.
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Research that salespeople actually read
Most sales research is written to be thorough and ends up unread. The format we use for account and buyer research, built around the one question a seller actually has: where is the way in?
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Why feet on the ground still matter in a remote-first world
Video calls made the first conversation cheap. They did not make the trusted one cheap. Where in-market presence still decides enterprise deals, and how to use it without opening an office.
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A short history of the cold open
From the switchboard to the sequence tool, every generation of sales technology has made the first message cheaper and the first reply rarer. What the chess opening teaches about making the first move count.
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Regulated buyers: opening financial services and healthcare
Banks, insurers, asset managers, hospital groups and payers buy under rules that most outreach ignores. Field notes on the compliance stakeholder, proof before the call, and the channels that still work.
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The weekly report: what we send clients and why
One page, every week, on every engagement. The six sections of our weekly report, what each one is for, and the metrics we deliberately leave out.
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New pieces, in full, the week they are published.
Your move.
Tell us the market you want opened and what is in the way. A senior member of the team will come back to you with a point of view on the first three moves.