In the spirit of EkaLore's habit of taking into account how the world at large affects business people, we're looking at stock price and what it means in your sales cycle.
The valuations in equity stock markets have moved at serious rates recently. The Dow Jones Industrial average went from 19,173 on March 16, 2020, to 32,279 on May 9, 2022. That’s an increase of 68% from the bottom of the market. Does changing stock prices make any difference to selling to those public companies? What about companies that aren’t public?
Operational and manufacturing workers in large public enterprises frequently ignore the enterprise’ stock price even when blaringly loud in a facility. With many people working from home, even white-collar operational staff may not follow the stock price. Sales staff should keep in mind that managers and upper management do notice the stock price.
Managers care about the stock price even when their compensation isn’t directly tied to the price (for example, being only a bonus related value). Sales staff need to be concerned when a serious movement has happened to a prospect’s stock price. Acknowledging the change is a good communication with prospect staff. Understanding the change will help you sell better.
A steep drop in the stock price will affect your ability to discuss investment or initiatives at a prospect. The same way it will help sell a deal that depends on rapid cost savings or direct impacts on the bottom line in the next quarter or two.
A steep rise in the stock price will help you sell an ‘aspirational’ deal where the optimism of management is an essential. “Meeting the numbers” for stock prices makes managers less anxious about fuzzier ROI estimates.
Almost all information sources like ZoomInfo or Seamless.ai provide stock ticker information, but that doesn't mean it is used to plan day to day conversations.
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