The technical work in IT industry can be divided into four systems: pre-sale, research and development, implementation and maintenance. It should be said that the pre-sales position is the highest, and the salary of the lowest-grade pre-sales is higher than that of the top maintenance personnel. Of course, the senior personnel of R&D may be worse. They are generally the backbone of the company and master the core technology. There will be many personnel changes in the company, but these people are determined, have no pressure and enjoy the treatment of super employees. It should be said that the latter three are relatively pure technical work, while pre-sales are different. The title of pre-sales is generally consulting expert or technical consultant, which is a job between technology and market. At IBM, there are even sales tasks before sales. In most domestic companies, the pre-sales are often held by senior technicians (more than 6 years of work experience and more than 4 years of industry experience). The technical person in charge of the company generally also does pre-sales work, and larger companies will have special pre-sales consulting departments. From this, we can see why the pre-sales salary is high, because the general implementation and maintenance technicians are all people with less than 3 years.
The task of pre-sales is to provide consultation for customers. Specifically, there are two points. The first thing is to talk, that is, technical exchange, and the other thing is to start work, that is, to write a plan. Let's talk about technical exchange first. Technical communication is generally divided into two stages. The first stage is to talk about the plan, I said you listen. Generally, pre-sales personnel hold PPT to tell customers about the scheme. The second stage is to answer questions, you ask and I answer. After the scheme is completed, the customer asks questions and the company answers them. Generally speaking, technical exchanges can be divided into two types. The first kind is purely technical communication, sometimes there is no time limit, and large projects even talk for several days, usually one morning or afternoon, and half a day takes about two hours. At this time, the basic skills of pre-sales personnel are most tested; The other is to bid at the request of the customer's tender, which generally won't be very long, at most 1 hour (including question and answer time). At this time, it is mainly business, such as the company's qualifications and commitments, and technology will only pass by.
? In the marketing process of a project, the first communication is usually carried out first, and the company is shortlisted before entering the tender. Pure technical communication is mainly to communicate with customers' technical personnel, usually the person in charge of future projects. Technicians have no right to decide who to give the project to. Generally, they have veto power, but they just think which company can't. If the first technical exchange is rejected, the customer will inform you that you don't have to go to the next round, and you have no chance. Of course, at this time, the company may also try to bid, and the market needs to mobilize greater relations at this time. However, in this case, even winning the bid will be very difficult. Writing technical solutions is another job before sales. It should be said that the scheme requires vividness, clarity and attractiveness, while the technical scheme focuses on everything, making no mistakes and leaving no evidence for your opponent to attack you (in black and white, it is more conclusive than the mistakes in the scheme). Relatively speaking, writing is much easier than speaking. For a senior pre-seller, a molding technical scheme can be completed in just a few minutes. As far as experience is concerned, a brand-new system has 40% usability in the scheme, 60% reusability in the same technical field, and 90% duplication if the same system is aimed at different customers. It can also be seen that the copying of a world plan depends on how you copy it. Large companies have special pre-sales departments, among which the core personnel are the people who talk about the proposal, who can speak and write (after all, they don't write articles, and they don't need any literary talent), and of course there are other people who can be called pre-sales assistants, because in addition to the technical proposal, the bidding documents also have business parts, which are completed by the pre-sales assistants. Or there are some unimportant projects, and when the staff is not enough, the pre-sales assistant will write the technical plan according to the cat's drawing tiger, and then the pre-sales people don't even know what the plan is, but are only responsible for saying it.
? The writing of PPT is generally done by the person who talks about the scheme himself, because PPT is actually a summary of the content, and everyone has his own habits in how to say and how to deduce it. When the company's business is busy, pre-sale is like a star actor, flying all over the sky and running around. Everywhere I go, I take out my PPT. Similarly, I will talk to different people for 2 hours. In this case, it is sometimes difficult to keep the vividness and passion of the speech, especially when there is one in the morning and one in the afternoon. To put it bluntly, all companies attach great importance to pre-sales, but the role of pre-sales is not necessarily great. To put it bluntly, some pre-sales are the facade of the company. In the first cooperation project between the company and customers, the technical component only accounts for 65,438+00%, and the projects after the second project only account for 30% at most (so don't think that the company will stop working without a technician, but at most some things can't be done well. In fact, there is a market, and everything will return to normal soon. To start and get a project, there is much more work under the table than on the table.
Good marketers only let pre-sales personnel do technical exchanges when all kinds of work are done almost the same. At this time, the role of pre-sale is to support the table, indicating that the company has the strength to do this project. Abuse of pre-sale is also a common phenomenon among poor marketers. Go to a customer and say that our company has a product. Then the customer happened to have this consideration, but didn't want to start doing it right away, so the marketing staff went to the company to do pre-sales, saying that I was very familiar with the leader of a customer, and they were going to a certain system soon, so they quickly sent someone to tell them. When it was really done, because the market's kung fu was not in place and the list could not be taken down, the market personnel said that the pre-sales explanation was not done well and took the pre-sales as a scapegoat. However, such marketers are poor marketers, not only can't do things, but also can't be human. As far as the company is concerned, the pre-sales position is very detached. Compared with the market that can't get the list, the company will pay more attention to pre-sales. After all, many pre-sales personnel are also technical veterans of the company. A marketer who can't get a list is worse than a dog in the eyes of the boss. Abuse of pre-sale, on the other hand, also shows the importance of the market. In this world of China, if the market is not well done, there has never been a case where a project can be won only by the clever mouth of the pre-sales staff. Of course, the market has never existed, but customers call the company to do a certain project, so there are still many things falling from the sky (we often tell some markets with large orders but no strength, don't you think this pie is too big, it will really kill people), but the next thing will test the market's ability. Then again, since the pre-sales work is just a facade, why should the company spend money to support such a group of strong people who just talk and don't do it?
This should start with the operation of the project. An IT project can be divided into three stages: pre-sales marketing, implementation in sales and after-sales maintenance. In the pre-sale stage, market personnel are the main ones. If you want to win the project, you must deal with the key personnel, that is, the speaker. These people will not even appear at the bidding site, but they are the final deciders. For this final decider, competitors may cross the ocean, not only to get the most critical person, but also to get the person who has the right to decide on the project, that is, the person who has the right to vote in the bidding. The relationship between superiors and subordinates must be clarified. It doesn't mean that if you know the Buddha in the temple, you don't have to worry about the arhat next to you. Everyone should cherish it. Of course, since it is a competition, we must do whatever it takes. Both companies will strive for their own relationship, and sometimes the situation is very unclear. It's time to go out before the sale. If the market has settled, then the purpose of technical exchange is to expand the scope of acceptance. Although the project is actually decided by one person, it must go through technical exchanges, invite people from relevant offices to listen to the plan, and finally solicit opinions from everyone. Although it is a process, since you agree, what is wrong with the project is collective responsibility, and it will not be said that it is the boss's fault alone. Here, we should remember that IT projects are a very special field. Broken roads, collapsed bridges and cracked buildings are all liability accidents. However, it is normal for an IT project to cost millions, and then the project is not put into use or even terminated halfway, which is rarely investigated.
This is beside the point, let's go on to say pre-sales. When the competition is fierce and the two sides are deadlocked, the role of pre-sale is reflected. After all, IT projects are used to assist work, so the rights of technicians are more important at this time. Both sides send sellers for technical exchange, and then the leaders will ask for your opinions. Generally speaking, the market is aimed at leaders, and the responsible technicians are relatively fair (after all, they are responsible for themselves and are not worth throwing themselves into the fire pit for money). At this time, his evaluation is even more important. In addition, if there is a problem with pre-sales technical communication, it will definitely be caught by the other company and become an important factor for the other party to say things. This shows the role of pre-sales. Again, pre-sale is the facade of the company, and we can do this by telling others that we are an IT company. Actually, it's that simple. Compared with marketers, pre-sales work is a simple job. Let's stop here. Next time, we will discuss the qualities we need before selling.