Winning a B2B SaaS deal is hard, but it’s just the start: Implementing it is harder. How to handle what comes after the sale.
It’s hard to win a deal. In B2B SaaS, it involves getting through lengthy RFP processes and contract negotiations.
It’s even harder to implement a deal. Even if you sell Software-as-a-Service, it isn’t as easy as just turning on the software and sending the invoice. In the case of Yonder, a B2B SaaS company, implementing a deal starts with a process we call onboarding. This involves configuration of the software, transfer of the content, and training of the key users.
Easy, right?
Sometimes it is, sometimes it isn’t. The larger and more complex the customer organization, the more laborious the onboarding.
Let’s look at some real-life examples.
1. Configuration Hell
Large organizations need configurable software products, as they often have a huge number of organizational entities, complex approval requirements, and so on. Offering a fully configurable product is one part of a compelling solution, but helping the customer to configure it properly is another. Very often, large organizations suffer from overdetermination and they try to map this to a software configuration. Doomed to fail.
Even as a SaaS provider, you can help your customers by finding a common ground between meeting their complex requirements and the possibilities offered by your product. Quite often, sharing how other customers solved similar challenges is much appreciated by new customers. Because it reduces the time to configure a software product and the probability of apparent bugs due to complex configuration.
2. Misunderstood Features
No matter how honest and detailed you were during the RFP processes, it’s close to impossible for a customer to understand all your features in all detail before deciding to buy from you. Very often, people involved in the sales process are different people than will be involved during the implementation phase. That opens up a whole lot of room for misunderstandings, disappointment, and even conflict.
Even as a SaaS provider, you shouldn’t just rely on instant chat messages and support tickets in such situations. Jump on a flight, go and see your customer to sort things out. And if it’s urgent, pick up the phone.
To pick up the phone, it helps if you know the person on the other end of the line personally. So I would suggest you jump on a flight for the kick-off of the onboarding process. In this way, you can meet the people, help them stay out of configuration hell, and clear out any misunderstandings about features. Plus, should the shit ever hit the fan despite a great kick-off workshop, you can pick up the phone and they likely remember who you are.
3. The People Factor
Large organizations are often political, and large organizations attract the odd egomaniac here and there. No matter how unpolitical and un-egocentric you are, you will also meet such people. They will unnecessarily complicate your work, and there is not much you can do about it.
Grit your teeth, do a good job, and stay yourself. We have experienced such situations on several occasions. It was always nerve-racking and painful, but you know what? In many cases, the egomaniacs disappeared after some time, and things became smooth again.
If you stay yourself and do your job, you’ll last longer than the egomaniacs.
Conclusion
If you want to make your customers happy, you’ll have to navigate through many tricky situations. And even after many years in this business, I am astonished over and over again when I meet yet another new tricky situation I haven’t seen yet.
Sometimes, life is ugly. But it’s worth it.
