The art of selling: IT budget approval made easier

One of the most persuasive techniques of selling is to actively listen to those you are selling to in an effort to better align on common goals before you make a pitch.

Let’s say you need more storage to keep up with incoming data. Just asking for storage because you relay that you are running out won’t likely win funding. But if you link the need for extra storage, and perhaps additional processing, with specific business needs, you can align organizational business issues with the information technology you seek in ways that everyone can see, exponentially increasing your chances of earning the investment.

These days artificial intelligence has the full attention of the C-suite and board. But to implement AI to better assess markets and competition for a company’s goods, for example, the AI will need access to a wide variety of data from within and outside the company to analyze customers, the market, and products. And at some point, all this data must be brought together in a centralized data repository so it can be probed and processed by AI algorithms.

In other words, the IT resources needed for this project are substantial. They might require new contracts with outside cloud vendors for data; new investments in external and internal security and data tracing products; data cleaning and preparation tools; expanded database software; significant enhancements to processors and networks; and both user and IT training.

You have to explain to other C-suite leaders and the board in plain English why all these resources are necessary to make a successful budget pitch — but you should avoid making this pitch until you know the key decision-makers in the company are already on board with it.

And in the case of our hypothetical AI project, the fact that it will examine company products, company sales, consumer habits, competitor products, and overall market conditions means that the allies you want for your budget pitch are likely to be the VP of marketing, VP of sales, the CEO and CFO, potentially the board, and perhaps even the VPs of engineering and manufacturing.