Maxime Leclerc: Secrets of Effective Sales Negotiation

In this second interview, Maxime Leclerc from Scalability reveals his advanced negotiation techniques and advice for building a high-performance technology stack. An expert look at methods that make the difference in modern sales.

His Ultimate Negotiation Technique: Mutual Transparency

"It's negotiating by sharing all your constraints and understanding the person's constraints and wanting to win with the person." Maxime advocates a collaborative rather than adversarial approach.

His philosophy? "There's no negotiation without concession, without counterpart, counterpart, concession, concession, counterpart." This golden rule structures all his negotiations.

His tactical advice:

• "Put multiple people in the loop, I'd say that's essential"
• "Don't negotiate with an operational person, with someone who's not a decision-maker"
• "Accept making concessions because you can always make efforts to get a logo, get a longer commitment"

The Art of Smart Follow-Up

For follow-ups, Maxime has developed a structured method: "Already, don't follow up too much, set a next step before needing to follow up."

His process:

1. "Me, normally, I don't leave a meeting without a next step"
2. "I don't set next steps just to set next steps"
3. "It's important to build the most relevant next steps"
4. "At some point, you have to be patient and deprioritize the deal if you're losing too much time"

Facing Competition: Confidence and Preparation

"Me, I like my competitors, that's where I win most often." This confidence is based on meticulous preparation:

His anti-competition method:

• "You have battle cards, you know why you're better, you know where they're better"
• "Most important is the discovery you do upstream"
• "Understand the decision criteria of the person in front of you, the decision process, the timeline"
• "Play with all these elements to animate the deal properly"

His secret tip: "Maybe suggest to a client who worked with your competitor and now works with you, that they can testify to the difference and it doesn't come from a salesperson's mouth."

The French Problem: Closing Obsession at Discovery's Expense

"Salespeople, for me, they need to progress on discovery." Maxime points to a systemic problem: "All the problems I've encountered [...] generally, whether it's all the sales directors who talk about closing, closing, closing, the problem comes directly from discovery."

His analysis goes further: "If I go even upstream of discovery, it comes from your targeting." The solution? "You have to talk to the right people, you have to have good persona criteria, ICP, good client cases."

His Worst Memory: Difficult Beginnings

"I think it's when I started, I called restaurateurs, I was in Lyon, I called restaurateurs in Corsica by phone, my name is Maxime Leclerc, my mother is from Corsica but you can't see it in my last name."

This difficult experience: "It wasn't obvious to start on that target, I still hung on but so it wasn't pleasant, I had a manager who spoke behind me to tell me what I should say."

Tool Stack: His Expert Recommendations

For sales leaders with budget:
"If you're a sales lead and you have a good TAM at Scalability, I'd say, it brings together several tools, several processes, techs who work for you and new features permanently."

For others, his essential stack:

1. Data enrichment: "It's having a tool already to find phones. Today, you have cascade enrichment tools, you have Full Enrich, you can do your cascade yourself if you want to have fun."
2. CRM: "After, it's having a good CRM, Salesforce, HubSpot, I recommend, for me they're my two favorites."
3. Time management: "Having a calendar, keeping it updated and having a routine on that. The calendar isn't a tool, but for me, actually, your time is as precious as your clients' time, so you have to respect it."
4. Automation: "Automations on time-consuming tasks, AI to save time and a phone."

Maxime Leclerc offers us a complete vision of modern sales: from win-win negotiation to the crucial importance of discovery, through an optimized technology stack. His advice, nourished by experience and fine market analysis, constitutes a valuable guide for all ambitious salespeople.