Redgate Software was founded in 1999 and, in the 20 years since, has grown from offering a handful of tools to providing a full suite of database development solutions which enable businesses to include the database in DevOps practices.
Many solutions like SQL Compare and SQL Prompt are regarded as the industry standard and they are now used by over 800,000 people in every type of organisation around the world, from small and medium-sized businesses to 91% of companies in the Fortune 100. This has been achieved by investing heavily in making the software intuitive to use even though it solves complex customer problems – something Redgate calls ingeniously simple.
While Redgate has focused mainly on the Microsoft platform, it also offers solutions for Oracle and MySQL. Its acquisition of Flyway, the cross-platform database migration tool, in July 2019 has given it the additional ability to extend the advantages of database DevOps to every database.
The brief…
As part of the company’s growth plans, Redgate wanted to engage with more large organisations in the Fortune 100 and FSTE 100. These higher value customers are seen as a priority for many sales teams; with recent research from McKinsey finding that many organisations aim for 40% of projected revenue to come from just 1% of customers. After all, closing just a couple of these opportunities can dramatically and positively impact your CAC to CLTV ratio (the customer acquisition cost measured against the customer lifetime value), hit or exceed your overall team target and bring in revenue that propels your company to a higher growth trajectory.
But with greater rewards come greater risks. These customers can be extremely complicated and failing to make the sale to them affects revenue (and the lost opportunity of sales resources consumed by the prospect). Care must also be taken to avoid making deals on the wrong terms or promises that create severe post-sale issues.
The challenge…
With advanced technology solutions that are feature-rich, sales engagements naturally focus heavily on proving the functionality, leaving little time to define the business value the solutions deliver. Both buyers and sellers quite rightly start a sales engagement with an emphasis on the technical fit of the solution. Customer stakeholders, however, look for evidence of the value that the solution will deliver to their organisation. If the value is not defined, budgetary approval can be reduced or removed altogether in favour of another project that does have a clear value.
How then can a technology salesforce maintain technical expertise but in parallel define business value? Equally, given the length of time that very large customers can take to make a buying decision, it is imperative that sales campaigns are targeted at those potential customers who really do have a compelling need to buy.
The solution…
A programme of workshops for the salesforce using live customer and prospect examples to learn, model and deliver by:
1. Identifying the specific characteristics of a “perfect” potential high-value customer
2. Defining a customer’s operational and business issues that Redgate solutions can solve
3. Building into the existing Redgate sales process a new step that involves working with the customer collaboratively to agree a business case describing the specific financial and strategic value of the Redgate solution to the customer. The business case also generates urgency, helping accurate forecasting of high value customer business.
4. Learning how to “expand” an initial “land” new customer into a long term, repeat and high value customer.
As part of its consultative approach, RBL worked with the Redgate Sales Leadership to define and create a highly tailored programme for their solutions, prospective customer organisations and buying personas.
The result…
Since the beginning of the programme the number of high value deals, both won and, in the pipeline, has risen significantly. Pipeline diversity was a key.
Using the business case has also de-positioned competitors.
In addition, the team is using the targeting criteria built during the programme to ensure they focus on organisations with the potential to make a high value buying decision, improving salesforce productivity and having a positive impact on the CAC (Customer Acquisition Cost) and CLTV (Customer Lifetime Value) ratio.
What the client says…
“If you’re a fast growing Software vendor wanting to have a repeatable approach to win high value customers, then RBL Associates can deliver that service. RBLA’s unique approach to building the business case with a measurable customer value means you can address the concerns of every stakeholder in the decision-making process.”
Christian Curdy, EMEA Sales Manager, Redgate Software