What Should a New Sales Engineer Do in their First Customer Meeting

I still remember my first customer meeting as a Sales Engineer. I’ve done customer meetings before as a Network Design Engineer, but I’d usually come in after the customer bought the equipment, and I consulted on how to build the network. This was different. We went there to sell something. My manager and the territory director who had never met this customer in the past took lead. They sat on either side of me on a circular conference table. The customer was facing me, not a smile in sight. I could feel that the customer is unhappy. I just didn’t know why.

As is customary when meeting new customers, I introduced myself and proceeded to not say a word the entire time we were there. I just listened. I listened to the customer explain what equipment he has. I didn’t know what he was talking about. I then listened to my manager explain that the customer’s equipment was End of Life and what they could be replaced with. I had no idea what my manager was talking about, and what End of Life was.

After a few years of experience, my first meeting with customers as a representative of a new company was very different. You see, I have the same customers as I did in the past, and I know them deeply. What I was not able to offer in product knowledge, I was able to offer in situational awareness. I was able to participate in asking questions, but not so much in solutioning. Luckily, I was there with colleagues who knew the product.

Why am I telling you all this? Well, in the youtube video above I explain the conversation I had with a friend. He recently joined a company as a Sales Engineer. He’s never been a Sales Engineer, and he asked me what he’s supposed to do in a customer meeting. The answer to this question depended on a multiple of factors:

1- What the SE knows about the customer he is meeting.

2- What the SE knows about the products and services that his company provided.

3- What the SE’s desired outcome of the meeting is? If that match his or her Account Manager’s desired outcome.

If the SE doesn’t know anything about any of that, then the SE is say nothing. Just listen, observe and learn.

If the SE knows the customer but not the services/products they offer, then the SE cannot really ask questions to build the customer vision, so either learn that first, or just say nothing, just listen and observe.

If the SE knows the customer and knows what problems their services/products solve, then the SE can be active as part of the discovery, but not the solutioning.

If the SE knows the service/products, but not the customer, the SE can either observe and learn or can actually participate and ask questions about the customer. Ideally, the SE would do some research ahead of time and chat with the Account Manager about the customer.

If the SE doesn’t know what the desired outcome is, then discuss it with the Account Manager before walking into the meeting.

This could be summarized in the image below: