By Nigel Hammond, Co-Founder, Foresight
QBR’s have gotten a lot of heat recently. It’s fair – they historically take a lot of time to prepare for and make very little impact on the overall relationship.
That said, the issue is not in the exercise itself but rather in how it is delivered – customers (ESPECIALLY Executive Decision Makers) have zero interest in being presented some cherry-picked stats that make your solution seem valuable and a few slides on roadmap initiatives they didn’t ask for.
What they do want, however, is to get the highest possible ROI from your solution. Following this, we below outline some simple mechanisms for reframing a QBR to focus on what your customer actually wants to talk about: how you can help them get more value out of your solution.
This is the first part in a series focused on helping you level up your QBR’s to make them actually matter.
We’ve linked a brief video outlining the points below and have included a few helpful resources at the bottom.
We hear leaders talk everyday about how their QBR process is broken: they know it doesn’t make a big difference, but what’s the alternative? Some common issues we hear:
- Reps don’t do QBR’s
- Execs don’t attend QBR’s
- Meetings not productive / don’t make an impact
The Solution
What we have seen effective is a combination of both a mindset shift – reps have to embrace what we call the “partner consultant” persona of an expert uniquely positioned to help guide a customer on their journey of value realization – and reframing the positioning of the actual meeting.
Mindset
- Don’t call it a QBR – what about their business are you actually reviewing? It’s a Value Review – an exercise focused on reviewing they value they are / are not realizing
- Be a partner consultant; customers want outcomes and YOU are in a unique position to help them achieve those outcomes
- Position the check-in as an opportunity to assess how well your customers priorities are being met and any opportunities to realize more value based on Best Practices that have been effective in similar companies
- Ahead of your meeting, engage key stakeholders and document their priorities and how well they view your solutions as supporting those priorities
- Center your meeting agenda around recommendations that help your customers realize more value from your solution based on what they have identified as key priorities and any reported unmet needs
The Outcomes
- Just in reframing the language in the email asking for a QBR, we have seen a 50%+ increase in QBR engagement from executive buyers – in one specific scenario, we worked with an AM who had spent over 6mo trying to get time with one of her customers without getting a single response. By positioning the Value Review – and how it benefitted them – they immediately got a meeting booked for the following week and had the entire firm attend (10 person Private Equity Fund)
- By pre-empting Value Reviews with a “measurement” – documenting priorities and experiences, we have seen as high as 33% of value reviews lead directly to upsell opportunities created
Resources / Implementing in Your Team
- Value Review Guide
- Sample Positioning Language
“Hi [Contact],
As part of our ongoing efforts to ensure [Customer] is realizing the same value from our solution that we see in similar firms, I’d like to go through a Value Review in the coming week or two.
This is an exercise we use to assess how things are going and identify any opportunities to better support your firm based on best practices we have seen successful elsewhere.
As part of this process, please can you take 5-10min to go through the below Value Assessment?
[This is where we link an assessment outlining the common business needs your solution supports]
This outlines the key business needs we typically support in a company like [Customer]. Based on your and other stakeholders feedback, I’ll put together a Value Realization Plan with specific recommendations to address any unmet needs based on best practices we have seen effective elsewhere.
Thanks and let me know any questions!”
