Deltek Utilizes Win-Loss Insights for Competitive Intelligence
Deltek, led by August Jackson, leverages a comprehensive win-loss analysis program that tracks over 300 competitors to gain competitive intelligence by identifying industry trends, improving sales strategies through internal war games, and sharing synthesized insights across product, sales, and marketing teams to enhance business outcomes and address buyer concerns.
Deltek Utilizes Win-Loss Insights for Competitive Intelligence
August Jackson, Vice President of Market Intelligence & Competitive Strategy at Deltek, discusses how capturing and sharing win-loss insights has become a competitive game-changer for the company. Deltek leverages win-loss analysis to better understand competitors, identify industry trends, and conduct internal war games with their sales team.
Introduction to Win-Loss at Deltek
August Jackson oversees a competitive intelligence program that tracks over 300 competitors across various industries and geographies. Deltek sells software and solutions to project-focused organizations worldwide, and the competitive landscape varies greatly by market. The win-loss program is a key part of their competitive intelligence efforts.
Early Experiences and ROI
August's first exposure to win-loss interviews was in the early 2000s at a telecommunications company. Even with basic methods, the ROI was clear: insights from these interviews guided investments that improved business outcomes. By identifying missing functionality and closing those gaps, the company was able to turn lost opportunities into revenue.
Impact on Strategy and Focus
Deltek uses internal compete data from their CRM to identify trends in lost opportunities. By focusing on prospects who considered Deltek but didn't move forward, and combining this with targeted win-loss interviews and internal war games, Deltek identified immediate opportunities to improve their sales process and address buyer concerns.
Sharing Insights Across the Organization
A dedicated team member at Deltek consumes and synthesizes insights from win-loss interviews for various stakeholders. These insights are shared with product, sales, product marketing, and sales enablement teams. The process includes connecting win-loss findings with ongoing business initiatives, validating strategies, and suggesting tactical changes based on the voice of the prospect.
Navigating Market Shifts
Win-loss insights have helped Deltek adapt to significant macroeconomic changes, such as shifts in interest rates and inflation. These insights enable Deltek to understand how such changes affect prospects and to adjust their approach to mitigate negative impacts.
War Games and Sales Enablement
Deltek uses feedback from Clozd to run internal war games, simulating sales scenarios to test and improve their processes. Sales teams compete in these exercises, sometimes role-playing as prospects, to identify strengths and areas for improvement. The findings from these simulations inform the next cycle of win-loss interviews and drive organizational alignment around sales enablement and product marketing.
Securing Leadership Buy-In
Securing buy-in from senior leadership, especially in sales, is crucial for a successful win-loss program. Data and insights from Clozd helped overcome initial reluctance by demonstrating high ROI and the long-term value of winning early-stage customers.
Product Roadmap and User Experience
Feedback on user interface (UI) and user experience (UX) is often vague, but Clozd's interviews provided Deltek with specific, actionable insights. This level of detail was not available through other feedback channels and has been instrumental in shaping Deltek's product roadmap.
Competitive Intelligence and Market Perception
Win-loss interviews provide valuable intelligence on competitor roadmaps and messaging, often revealing information not publicly available. This helps Deltek identify both functional and perceptual gaps, allowing them to address real or perceived shortcomings in the market.
Advice for New Win-Loss Programs
August emphasizes the importance of securing buy-in from senior sales leadership. Without it, running a win-loss program is much more challenging. At Deltek, leadership quickly recognized the value of win-loss insights, which facilitated program success.
Overcoming Sales Team Concerns
A common concern among sales leaders is that win-loss programs are evaluative. August stresses the importance of framing win-loss as a tool for systemic improvement, not individual evaluation. Win-loss turns anecdotal feedback into actionable data, helping sales teams close gaps and improve performance.
The Future: AI and Competitive Intelligence
August predicts that artificial intelligence will significantly transform win-loss and competitive intelligence by streamlining information processing. The challenge will shift from gathering insights to effectively applying them in decision-making processes.
August concludes by expressing his passion for competitive intelligence and its impact on strategic business decisions.
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