Blog
4/1/1: 4 Random Thoughts from me, 1 tool to help Sales Engineers, 1 quote for motivation
4/1/1 The Big Differences and Similarities Between Sales Engineers and Family Doctors
- July 7, 2023
By Ramzi Marjaba
4/1/1 Weekly
4 Random Thoughts, 1 Tool, and 1 Quote
As Sales Engineers, are we supposed to know everything about everything? Many people say yes, and I wholeheartedly disagree. I tackled that question in the most recent podcast I did with Anthony Palmoze where we collected 3 audience questions and this was one of them.
I also tackle the idea of being mistreated as an SE in an Employer market.
Going back to the question above about knowing everything, the analogy that I can think about right now is the Family Doctor. So, let’s dig into that in the 4/1/1.
4 Random Thoughts From Me:
1– Sales Engineers are like family doctors… only a bit more useful! We know a bit about everything, but instead of sending a customer to a different specialist, we either become one for a short period of time, or we bring the specialist to the customer.
2- SEs don’t send their customers to a third party lab to do a diagnostic. We offer a diagnostic as a way to build a relationship for free with the expectation of only getting paid if we help solve a problem in the preferred way.
3- Good family doctors care deeply about their patients. They build relationships with them and will follow up after a health “dilemma”. Great Sales Engineers do the same.
4– Both SEs and Doctors have internal systems that sometimes feel like we need to overcome to help our customers/patients.
1 Tool:
I don’t mean this in any negative way, but the “tools” I’d recommend are teammates or specialists. Learn how to leverage them and be available to be leveraged by them when they need it.
1 Quote:
“Now I’m a scientific expert; that means I know nothing about absolutely everything.”
―Arthur C. Clarke, 2001: A Space Odyssey
Stay in the loop
Subscribe to get our latest content by email.