What is the BANT framework?

Having a solid pipeline of potential customers is salespeople's holy grail. Many salespeople find it discouraging when they put in time and effort into pursuing a deal only to have it deemed unsuitable for their pipeline. Several decades ago, IBM's top salespeople developed a system called BANT for gauging a lead's potential for conversion. Only leads that satisfy at least three of the following four conditions should be considered a qualified-lead:

• Budget - Does the prospect have money available to make a purchase?

• Authority - Does the people I’m in contact with have the authority to make a purchase?

• Need - Does the prospect have a need for my solution?

• Time frame - Does the prospect want to move forward immediately or at a later time?

There are a lot of variants of the BANT developed by salespeople. For example, some variants include MEDDIC (Metrics, Economic buyer, Decision criteria, Decision process, Identify pain, and Champion), ANUM (Authority, Need, Urgency and Money), and CHAMP (Challenge, Authority, Money and Prioritization). The goal of all these frameworks is the same, and no variant is absolutely superior over another. Personally, I’d like to use BANT because it was first introduced to me and became easy for me to remember. 

BANT's strength lies in the fact that it provides salespeople with a uniform scorecard, as well as a framework within which to ask qualifying questions and collect relevant data. Since many prospects will already be familiar with the concept and understand why you are asking, you need not worry about scaring away serious buyers with these inquiries. What you are looking for is commitment from your prospects. That's why these questions come up after you and a prospective client have connected and are discussing the possibility of working together. 

How to effectively use the BANT framework?

The BANT acronym begins with "Budget," but in practice, it is more common practice for salespeople to start by verifying a need before discussing pricing. It seems out of place to inquire about the prospect's budget and authority before confirming that you have a solution to their issue. 

Need:

In a previous blog post, we talked about how to ask effective discovery questions. Examine the situation carefully to see if the need is strong enough to overcome the buyer's resistance and result in a sale. One can learn about the priorities of those involved in the decision-making process by assessing their level of need. 

If a client calls you after receiving your outreach or initiates contact, you should find out what prompted them to do so. It's safe to assume that they won't join a call merely to chat about the weather. During the discovery call, you should learn about the customer's current situation and the criteria they use to judge the success of a product or service implementation. Finding the customer's needs is the starting point of a sale.

Timeframe:

Once you confirm the needs, it’s then natural to bring up questions about timeframes. If a purchaser is serious about making a purchase, they will have a set timeline in mind for doing so. Prospects who express uncertainty about the timeline may still be in the planning phase and thus not be as committed as you'd like.

You could, for instance, inquire as to whether or not their requirement is an immediate one, or whether other concerns take precedence. If the timing is not immediate, do they have a roadmap or a monthly decision meeting coming up? Are there specific dates they have decided internally? Ideally, you should come out of the meeting with a clear time and date for a follow-up action.

Budget:

Asking about the budget is often the most difficult of the BANT questions because it’s uncomfortable for many salespeople to ask about money. Eventually, you have to do so if you want to make a sale. For the purpose of building a high-quality pipeline, we don’t recommend you leave the budget question till the end. In fact, from the prospect’s perspective, answering the budget question is not easy either. In many cases, the buyer can simply respond with a request for proposal. If you're a sales professional who values your time, you won't immediately respond with something like, "I'll get you a proposal by the end of the week." Instead, you'll want to check in with the buyer to see if they're interested in the opportunity before devoting any additional effort on a proposal which may just end in the bottom of their inbox. 

There are multiple ways to gather more information to decide whether you’d like to invest time in a proposal. For example, you can first agree that you are open to suggesting a proposal, but you want to make sure what you propose is reasonable for their budget. There is a good chance that the prospects will say they don’t have a budget yet. That’s when you can confirm whether the prospect is just shopping around or is serious, but just at a relatively early stage of the purchasing journey. 

Remember that asking the BANT questions is to make sure you qualify some good deals before investing too much time in every single one. So, if sharing some ballpark figures can help you confirm the buyer’s budget situation, go for it. Do not be afraid to delay a proposal until you are sure the ballpark numbers are acceptable to the prospects. It normally requires some internal discussion within your prospect’s organization to get an okay. Therefore, make sure you know the client has the budget, and then invest the time to create a detailed proposal.

Authority:

In another blog post, we talked about how to map out the internal stakeholder of your buyer. In today’s businesses, it’s uncommon that decisions are made by just one person. Asking a prospect directly for the name of the person who makes purchasing decisions won't get you the information you need. However, it’s completely reasonable to show curiosity about the decision making process in your prospect’s company. If the prospect is unable or unwilling to share their decision making process, they are probably not ready to make a purchase or do not trust your company yet. 

The authority typically resides with the prospects' internal stakeholders, such as their managers, peers, board members, coworkers from different departments, etc. During the discovery phase, you must determine each internal customer's desired outcome. Understanding what motivates and concerns your potential client's internal customers will allow you to diffuse the situation and advance the sale.

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