I stopped taking vendor demos by making vendors qualify themselves.
I was getting 6 to 7 cold emails a day asking for “15 minutes.”
So I made a form.
Before anyone could book time with IT, they had to answer 27 questions about pricing, SSO, data retention, implementation time, support SLAs, and whether they had ever been breached.
Most vendors disappeared after Question 8.
The ones who finished usually attached enough information that I didn’t need a demo anymore.
Then Procurement found the form.
They loved it.
They added 19 questions.
Security added 34.
Legal added 11.
Now every software vendor has to complete 91 questions before talking to anyone.
Sales vendors complain constantly.
Procurement calls it streamlined intake.
I haven’t watched someone share a Gartner slide in 4 months.
This might be my best work.