Playbooks.

How to use this

Stage 1 — Prospect

• Do: book the intro/discovery call; open with “anything change on your end since we last spoke?” / “anything you want to walk away with today?”
• Capture: Employees, Countries, HRIS on the record.
• Exit criterion: confirmed ICP fit + a real documented pain → advance to Qualified. If under the bar → Lost (Too small) or On Ice.

Stage 2 — Qualified

• Do: run full discovery; identify deal shape (program vs bulk/event); get the annual-spend number.
• Capture: Goals, Challenges, Decision maker, Spend/employee.
• Exit criterion: mapped need ↔ capability + a named buying group → Develop.

Stage 3 — Develop

• Do: demo (often a 2nd demo for another stakeholder); offer the sandbox before signing; multi-thread to finance / HRIS owner / economic buyer.
• Artifact: same-day recap email with summary + pricing + catalog link, every time.
• Exit criterion: buyer is testing in sandbox and pricing is requested → Proposal.

Stage 4 — Proposal

• Do: put pricing on the table off discovery (use the commit ladder); proactively offer the draft agreement (“should I send over our draft agreement?”) via PandaDoc, in the contact's name first.
• Lever: sign-by-end-of-month discount tied to their internal leadership meeting.
• Exit criterion: signature from CEO / partner / VP → Won.

Closed — Won / Lost

• Won: introduce the dedicated CSM on a handoff call; kick off onboarding (~4–6 calls over two months). See Sales vs CS.
• Lost: always tag a close-lost reason (Competition / Price / Went cold / Not the right time / Too small). See why we lose.

On Ice — the revisit play

• Use for good-fit, wrong-time deals — not as a graveyard.
• Set a concrete revisit trigger (budget year, January launch, headcount crossing 100, vendor renewal date).
• Re-open with “curious if anything has changed on your end since we last spoke.”