What Business Development REALLY Means, According to Brent Atkins

Mo asks Brent Atkins: What is your personal definition of business development?

• When training his team, he tells them to “build your brand.” The way they go about building relationships and adding value will be different from Brent’s, and they need to lean into that.
• When Brent worked on the carrier side of the business, his first goal when developing new business relationships was becoming a trusted individual in that person’s network. Brent always strived to have the credibility to say when he wasn’t a good fit for someone, and by being willing to do that, when his solution was the right fit, he had that person’s attention and trust.
• Progyny has a great solution, but it’s not the right fit for every organization right away. When that is the case, Brent digs into other areas of the business they want to improve on and offers material on how they impact those areas to see if that makes sense. Once they do those steps, the prospect often comes back with Brent in the #1 position in their mind.
• We’ve all experienced a situation where we felt like we had a great connection but it resulted in silence. Brent tells the story of when that happened to him and how by letting them know that he didn’t have their attention right now, but he would like to reconnect in the future when they're ready, and how that got him an immediate response.
• To child trust, connect with the prospect at their level. Ask them questions and give them the space to answer. When you are dealing with someone on an individual basis, they might tell you something real about themselves, and if you can remember that it shows that you think they’re important and want to connect in a thoughtful way.
• The people that develop the deepest relationships are the ones that are interested in the other person. Finding things in common is one of the highest correlations to likeability.

Mentioned in this Episode:

GrowBIGPlaybook.com

brent.atkins@progyny.com

Brent Atkins on LinkedIn