Getting a meeting with an executive or a buyer of a corporate organisation can be challenging but once you have secured the meeting, the next step is to keep them engaged long enough that they agree to the next steps. In the ‘Critical Corporate Conversations’ module of our framework, we share conversational strategies that convert into cash but I want to share with you 10 common mistakes most of us make. 

How many have you made?

1. You are ill-prepared and have not done sufficient research on the executive or the organization.
2. The client examples you have used do not resonate with what they are looking for and are too generic.
3. You feel like a small fish in a big pond and hide behind your numerous Powerpoint slides
4. You talk too much and the client talks too little. 
5. You ask questions that are tedious because they are too general and do not implicitly incorporate knowledge of the client’s strategy, organization, and industry.
6. You do not adapt, align and steer the conversation to the executive’s agenda of business critical priorities and goals.
7. You take too long to get to the point. Your nerves causes you to ramble
8. You tell (describe statistics about your company, talk about methodologies, etc.) instead of show (share short client examples, best practices, etc.).
9. You lack self-confidence, which gets communicated through the words you use, your body language, and your overall attitude.
10. You focus on your own methodologies rather than exploring the client’s issues.