purchasing agreement. Fundamentally, we offered BT, and they con-
tracted for, a lock on our factory capacity for two years and a series
of as-yet-unknown product innovations in five different product
categories. In other words, they bought guaranteed industry capac-
ity and future innovation from us, all in the context of a long-term
partnership. This client became our biggest advocate in the indus-
try and helped us springboard our sales to other major telecommu-
nications companies.^3Use Comparative Benchmarks
The use of comparative and competitive benchmarks is an excel-
lent way to stimulate your client’s thinking and get him or her to
talk about possible needs. It can be powerful to say to a client,
“Your company spends 3 percent of revenue on research and devel-
opment, whereas the industry average is 4 percent—and you bring
out 20 percent fewer new products each year. What do you think
accounts for these differences?” You might get a number of
responses to this question, each with different implications for
needs. Your client may have chosen this strategy on purpose, for
example, or may in fact be disadvantaged due to weak internal
practices or processes. Being able to benchmark your client pre-
supposes that you’ve made a significant investment in understand-
ing his or her business—goals, strategy, organization, and industry
environment.
Talk to Company Observers
There are many sources of data and perspectives on a given com-
pany that you can tap as a way of identifying client needs. If the
company is publicly held, some stock analysts can be a fertile source
of information, and nowadays, many of their reports can be
obtained at no cost from your broker or banker. Other “experts”
can include suppliers, consultants who specialize in the industry,
and trade association executives.
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