Best Practice for Presenters

This topic helps you to follow Altify's recommended best practices to get the most out of Test & Improve.

Meeting Format

Altify's recommended Test & Improve format is shown on the Test & Improve entry page, and also in the right-hand panel's Process tab when you're actually in the Test & Improve. This format is equally applicable to every deal stage and deal size.

If you don't already have your own established Test & Improve format, we suggest that you initially follow the recommended format.

Then, after you've followed it a few times, you'll be in a good position to judge whether you need to tailor it to your own business needs.

The recommended Test & Improve duration is 90 minutes.

If you don't have that much time, stick with your proven Test & Improve process, but reduce the amount of time you spend on each stage.

Equally, if it makes sense to take extra time, do so.

Preparing for the Meeting

In advance of the meeting, it's a good idea to review the Altify opportunity plan and make sure it's up to date.

The best way to do this is to enter the Test & Improve in preview mode. This enables you to look at the plan in Test & Improve format without actually starting the meeting.

To do this, select Preview (as Presenter) on the Test & Improve entry page.

While in preview mode, it can be useful to check out the advice given in the right-hand panel's Checks tab.

If there will be more than one presenter, agree which plan areas each person should cover.

Each of these people should enter the Test & Improve as a Presenter.

The first presenter selects the Start (as Presenter) option, and each additional presenter selects Resume (as Presenter).

Who will serve as facilitator/coach? That person must select the Coach role in the right-hand panel. It's their responsibility to:
- Moderate the meeting, ensuring that the correct process is followed.
- Assign roles to the reviewers, and prompt each person to select that role in the right-hand panel. (Not all reviewers necessarily need to have an assigned role.)
- Keep an eye on time elapsed during the meeting to make sure everything gets covered in the time available.
As presenter, it's a good idea to use a conferencing application to share your view of the Test & Improve.

That way, in addition to having their own personal view of the plan in the Test & Improve tool, each person can see what you're currently looking at.

(On their own devices, each presenter and reviewer can navigate around within the tool without affecting anyone else.)

Presenting the Plan

When you're beginning your presentation, it's a good idea to hide the right-hand panel, so that no areas of the plan are obscured from your view.

(Each participant has their own individual control over the Test & Improve. So hiding the panel won't affect anyone else at the meeting.)

Avoid looking at the Feed while the presentation stage is in progress.
We find that it's best to present the opportunity plan tabs in this order:
- A general introduction to the opportunity, including where you are in the Sales Process, and what you know and don't know.
- On the Relationship Map, show who you know in the customer's organization, and which relationships you need to develop.
- On the Insight Map, explain the current extent of your understanding of the customer.
- Use the Assessment and Actions tabs to explain your current plans to win the deal.
We find that it's best to present the Account Manager plan tabs in this order:

Questions

Following your presentation, the reviewers can contribute their clarifying questions to the meeting's feed. This helps to ensure that everyone has a correct understanding of the plan.

Use the feed's FROM filter to filter the questions per reviewer. This enables you to address each person's questions in turn.
If you don't know the answer to a question, add an action to the plan to research it.
If some reviewers don't have an assigned role, prioritize the questions of those who do.
Each question has a Mark as Answered option. We recommend that you prompt participants to check this option when you have answered their question. Mark as Answered is displayed in the Feeds tab (as indicated in the example below) and on the Test & Improve's Summary page.

Potential Vulnerabilities

When the clarifying questions have been dealt with, the reviewers contribute any potential vulnerabilities they've spotted.

As with questions, use the feed's FROM filter to filter the vulnerabilities per person. This enables you to address each person's contributions in turn.
If some reviewers don't have an assigned role, prioritize the contributions of those who do.
If you're short on time during the meeting, it may be more efficient to combine the vulnerabilities and recommendations stages.

Recommendations

In this phase of the meeting, participants offer Recommendations to address the potential vulnerabilities they have identified.

As with questions and vulnerabilities, use the Feed's FROM filter to address the recommendations of each reviewer in turn.
If some reviewers don't have an assigned role, prioritize the contributions of those who do.
If you're short on time during the meeting, it may be more efficient to combine the vulnerabilities and recommendations stages.

After the Meeting

When the recommendations stage is complete, the meeting is done. The reviewers can leave the Test & Improve.

The feed is now populated with the participants' contributions. The Test & Improve's summary page collates all of these contributions into a format that makes it easy to deal with them.

Even though the meeting is complete, it's still possible for people to make additional contributions. This is useful when, for example, a person who couldn't attend the meeting wants to contribute, or a reviewer has additional thoughts after the meeting.

(Only users with Salesforce access to the opportunity plan can enter the Test & Improve.)

On the Summary page, make sure every good idea is turned into a PRIME action.

It can be useful to identify the top three recommendations, and create actions based on these.