7 Tips if You Sell an LMS

Make sure you know your LMS inside and out. If you sell a large enterprise LMS this requires some dedicated structured learning on your part.

This is one that sounds so obvious but it is a real gap in many sales professionals competencies. There are so many ways an enterprise level LMS can be implemented in an organisation and many times these are 'left field' of what the standard use case represents. The broader your knowledge in this area the more opportunities you will open up in the market. You must be able to link your LMS to an improvement in business productivity and performance linking from strategy to the individual.

Your first meeting should be a fact finding session with some basic business analysis. Your prospect knows as much as you do [likely], so now is the time to prove you are different from the others by demonstrating your acumen both in technology and organisational change. Your ability to ask great questions and listen to the response will elevate your stature in the eyes of the prospect.

You are now armed with some relevant information about your prospect and what problems they want to solve with an LMS. You now must configure your LMS to align with your business analysis and fact finding. If you have an enterprise level LMS there are plenty of configuration options. Do not use a 'vanilla' configuration for your prospects. You should not leave it to chance that they will understand how your LMS will address their needs based on a generic demonstration.

When you arrange your demonstration meeting, ask for a realistic chunk of time. If you are selling an enterprise LMS you will need at least 90 minutes and often more. If you are presenting to a group you will need time to address the various needs of members and answer questions. You are likely to be presenting on their turf so make sure you arrive early and are set up on time.

Your demonstration must be engaging. If you have experienced a dull software demo you know how bad it can be. LMS demonstrations should be engaging if you apply some creativity and get your audience involved. Your demo road map tracks to the information you gained in the first meeting and other communications with the prospect. Your LMS demo is showing them a new reality that is directly relevant to their organisation and their objectives. Use their employee names as users, include data that is sourced from them or reflects their environment. This is the work you need to put in to make your position as thought leader cemented into the minds of the attendees. Trust me, most of your competitors do not put in the time to make this happen.

In many cases the prospect will ask to have access to a sandbox of your LMS. Now that you have it set up for them there is no reason why you should hesitate. When asked, I like to set up the login access right in the meeting. Once they are in your sandbox you have an opportunity to collaborate in your 'turf' so use it for advantage without being a nuisance. You may wish to enroll prospects in some interesting sample courses, set up some discussions, add items to the wiki etc. You need to use the tools you have and those that are of interest to your prospect. I recommend introducing information about implementation and project management as this further demonstrates that you are an expert in this field and present low risk if they decide to engage your company.