Pre-sales consultant 

Pre-sales department

Can you introduce yourself in a few words?

I’m Rabah Ammouche ,and I work as pre-sales consultant at everteam for 4 and a half years.

 What does your job of presales consultant involve? 

I am in charge of promoting our software solutions in the field of document management.We work in close collaboration with the sales and marketing teams.

The main mission of a pre-sales consultant is to act primarily as a support team during the entire sales cycle of our software and solutions.

Throughout the sales process, we may be asked to:

• For presentations/demonstrations of our solutions during prospecting meetings
• When responding to tender documents:
  • Analysis of needs and issues
  • Drafting of the offer detailing and describing the proposed solutions as well as their added value.
• During the defense
  • Present /Synthesize the proposed solution
  • Present the value of the proposed offer and its adequacy to the issues
  • Prepare demonstration models
  • Prepare / Write presentation materials

In addition to these main missions, we may be required to participate in various marketing events (trade shows, conferences, webinars) or training sessions.

This requires a number of skills or qualities that can be summarized as follows:

• Availability
• Listening and synthesis skills
• Curiosity
• Expertise on the solutions and software offered in the context of software publishing. But more generally, the pre-sales consultant must have a good knowledge and mastery of the solutions offered by his company.
• Good knowledge of our customers’ business issues and challenges in order to propose an effective solution to meet these challenges
• Depending on the sector of activity, one may have to develop a strong expertise on a particular subject or, on the contrary, have a rather broad and general knowledge in order to be able to tackle various subjects
• Autonomy and teamwork. This may seem contradictory but in reality, autonomy does not mean working alone, on the contrary, the consultant must provide a great deal of personal work for the constitution of a response but must also know how to solicit and coordinate the various people likely to intervene in the response cycle.
• Writing and oral skills

What is your background?

I have a technical training of engineer in software development and networks. I started in the active life as a software engineer in charge of developing computer applications.

Very quickly, I was in contact with our customers which allowed me to evolve towards project management functions before becoming a pre-sales consultant.

These past experiences have greatly helped me in my current missions by combining both technical knowledge on IT solutions and knowledge of customers’ business issues.

Why work for a software company?

First of all because I have always loved the software world as a user as each of us can be or as a developer. At a software company, we have the opportunity to be as close as possible to the design, development and use of the software by our customers.

For those who are passionate about new technologies and innovation and curious about how it all works, software publishing is a very broad and rewarding field from that point of view.

In what areas does your job of presales consultant and your skills have an impact on the life and/or development of the company?

Our jobs can indeed have an impact on the predefined roadmap. Indeed, we are in direct contact with the needs of the market or of our customers via the various presentations, customer meetings or responses to calls for tender.

We can therefore identify and pass on to our product teams certain interesting and high value-added features for our customers.

As we are in some ways the first users of our solutions, we can effectively be a force of proposal, particularly in terms of ergonomics or the ease of use of our solutions.

 Can you share with us any successes or moments that made you happy during your missions? Or maybe some obstacles?

Yes. The biggest success is of course the signing of a new project.

Indeed, this is the reward for a significant investment during the entire sales cycle. And above all, the feeling of having understood our customers’ issues and having been able to propose the right solution.

But beyond the signature, the greatest satisfaction remains that of the client. To have the recognition and thanks of a client is, in my opinion, a precious element, a sign of seriousness and trust.

 What advice would you give to a young person, for example, who would like to do this job? or to a person in retraining?

This may seem obvious, but the first question to ask yourself is: Why this job? What attracts you? What, on the contrary, does not appeal to you?

We have seen previously that the job of pre-sales consultant requires a wide range of qualities and knowledge combining both technical skills and interpersonal skills in order to argue and convince that your solution is the “best”.

Then, depending on the company, the sector of activity and the solutions proposed, the pre-sales job can be very different from one company to another.

It is not certain that there are diplomas on the subject. It is often f internal evolution.