Converting a Sales Lead into a Sales Opportunity Using BANT Criteria

Before you start the relationship building process with prospects, you need to identify which of your prospects are hot and which ones are not. Using BANT (Budget, Authority, Need and Time) criteria, you can better qualify what leads you should go after. Originally developed by IBM, BANT criteria can help you determine if there’s a budget, who holds the authority regarding the purchasing decision, their business needs, and the timeframe for the implementation. A sales rep needs to fill in three of those four criteria in order for a lead to be a sales opportunity. If sales reps can do this, they won’t be potentially wasting time with a lead that might have a need but no budget, or one that has a budget but the timing isn’t right.

Determining if a prospect has room for your solution in their budget is a critical step to closing a sale. The budget qualifying process usually falls into three categories: the prospect has available room in their budget; the decision maker doesn’t have room, but will find the money; it’s not currently budgeted, but may be next year. The budget is usually the most difficult part of BANT to discover, but it’s also the most integral part to the BANT equation. In order for sales reps to accurately develop their sales forecast, they must uncover the prospects that have money budgeted for their solution. It’s even more important now because of how companies’ budgets have been dramatically reduced, coupled with their capital spending plans. Fortunately for IT sales reps, there appears to be good news on the horizon. Comments from EMC’s CEO and CFO and data from CIO.com survey identifies that companies will start increasing their budgets and spending for IT infrastructures in 2010.

Sales intelligence resources can also assist you in determining the components of a prospect’s budget; what their capital spending plans are (time) and uncover their current business drivers (need). Sales steps should start the relationship building process by asking questions to better understand their problems and opportunities. By doing this, they can make a bridge to the budget discussion without forcefully asking if they have money to spend. You don’t want to be kicking tires with a prospect that has a need, but doesn’t have a budget. Identifying who owns the budget and if they currently have money for your solution will accelerate your sales cycle. If authority, need and time all meet the necessary criteria, getting your solution budgeted should be the priority for the decision-maker. Identifying the budget can be difficult, but once done, you’ll have discovered what prospects are hot, and you will be in a better position to forecast your sales.

Sales Forecasting Template

SalesQuest has created a FREE Sales Forecasting Template and Worksheet that will help you qualify your leads better and keep your sales pipeline full.

Download the FREE Sales Forecasting Template and Worksheet

- Mark Kilens
mark . kilens@salesquest.com
978.749.9999 ext. 118