In-Person Visit Processes

For large sales opportunities, AEs sometimes travel in-person for meetings. Travel, while not common at FareHarbor, is encouraged when it’s clear that an in-person demo / meeting will return the investment of travel – meaning the projected booking fees in year 1 should be significantly higher than the cost of the trip (e.g. $2,000 trip to close a prospect who is projected to bring in $30,000 and absolutely needs an in-person touchpoint). Travel for in-person meetings requires approval from your manager and Regional Sales Directors.

If you would like to travel to:

• Visit a client for an in-person demo
• Take part in a city takeover
• Visit another office for training
• Take part in a FareHarbor meetup
• Travel as an onboarder for a go-live

Please consider the following criteria when requesting travel approval for in-person meetings from Sales Management.

These are questions to keep in mind as you go through the sales process. There is no strict application process. The questions below can be addressed in a conversation with a manager or in a more formal, written fashion. Each situation is unique and treated case-by-case.

• What are the projected booking fees?
• Will this only close with an in-person?
• Have they seen a demo recently?
  • How was the demo received?
• Have they explicitly said they would like an in-person visit?
  • Can you provide this in-writing or via call recording?
  • What was said to make you think this warrants an in-person meeting? Be specific as possible.
• Is this company talking to any other reservation companies?
  • Are they currently on a competitor software?
  • Did they provide an in-person?
• What will the trip look like?
  • Prospective costs of flights, lodging and rental car (if needed).
  • Date and duration?
  • Are there other companies in the area you can visit?
  • Will the company go live while you are there?
    • If yes, what does the training schedule look like?
    • If not, what is the plan to go live?
• Do you need a member from FH Onboarding to go with you?
  • What types of technical troubleshooting do you foresee on-site?
  • Is there a large reservation transfer?
  • Do you have web access?
• Is there anything else you’d like to add?

More information for Sales Travel can be found in the other sections of this help page below.

Please visit the travel help page to submit a trip for approval.

All approvals will go through your manager first and then must be officially approved by Regional Sales Directors. Please provide at least 24 hours in-advance for requests. You will be notified if the request is approved or rejected.

The “Sales – In-Person Visit” custom field in Close records when an Account Executive provides a face-to-face demonstration to a potential client. This field was created to help measure outside sales success.

The custom field date format is YYYY-MM, reflecting the year and month the in-person demo occurred.

This is a multi-select field, so multiple dates can be selected if a lead is given multiple in-person demos over the lead history. It is important to not delete old in-person demo dates if a lead is demoed several times.

The AE’s Sales Manager is responsible for maintaining this field in Close. However, AEs will have access to edit this field if they need to.

An in-person demo only happens when a lead is demoed live and in-person. Meeting with the point of contact and discussing features does not count. The contact needs to be walked through the front- and back- end on a computer.

An in-person demo can happen anywhere. Giving a one-on-one demo during FH Meetups, conferences, drop-ins, scheduled, and unscheduled meetings can all qualify as in-person demos.

Giving a general demo to a group of multiple clients does not count as an in-person demo. However, giving an in-person presentation to many people in the same company will qualify as an in-person demo.

When?

After an in-person sales meeting or travel to a conference, you will be expected to speak in front of your office about your trip. The goal is to share knowledge about a specific industry, conference, location or company you visited. You will be expected to elaborate on any obstacles you overcame while on-site.

How long?

These presentations can be as long as you’d like. They can range from 5-30 minutes, depending on how much material you have to cover. If you want, you can create a PPT in advance. This is not required.

Content?

These do not need to be extremely formal presentations, but please do some thinking beforehand. The questions below are the key pieces to hit on during your talk:

• Where did you go? Show website, talk about sales process, go through the lead and explain who the key people are. Visuals are encouraged.

• Who did you meet with, and what obstacles did you face while you were there?

• Did you troubleshoot any specific functionality? Go as detailed as possible. If applicable, bring up the dashboard and explain it.

• What is 1 thing the office can take away from this (other than “meeting people in-person was valuable”)

• Are there follow-up actions involved for you and in the office? What are the next steps?

If applicable, please follow-up with a post in Slack about any relevant material you shared or displayed during the presentation.