As you may remember from my previous post “The Sales Acceleration M&A Trap: Why Your Reps Aren’t Selling the New Thing.” The decisions you make post close are pivotal for the success of your sales teams. Remember, your reps are paid on a 50/50 commission structure, and half their salary is waiting on closed business. They are under intense pressure to hit quota on the products they know.

The solution isn’t a long-winded company meeting about synergy. You have to create an incentive program that immediately captures their attention. Since they are already focused on their annual quota, you might as well lean into their commission-driven nature to get the new product activity you want.

The Two Hurdles to Overcome

1. “What’s in it for me (right now)?” We’ve covered this: a compelling incentive program.
2. “This is going to be hard.” Your AEs may believe they are starting from a place of zero knowledge about the new product. You must make this transition as easy and highly digestible as possible.

One of the simplest, most effective ways to achieve this is a Lead Pass Program - a structured, incentivized process for Main Co.’s sales team to transfer client opportunities/leads to the acquired company post-closing.

The Lead Pass program is designed to smooth out the disruption that hits the acquired company by using your acquiring AEs for a light-lift, high-impact action.

• Align to Familiar Stages: Don’t reinvent the wheel. The incentive program and lead pass must be aligned with the sales stages your AEs know like the back of their hand.
• The Light Lift: Have your acquiring AEs work only in Stage 1: Opportunity Qualification. The AE simply needs to qualify the lead at the same sophistication level they are used to for any of their deals.
• The Seamless Handoff: Once qualified and matched to the Ideal Customer Profile, you need to execute this systematically. For the first year, resist the urge to immediately merge CRM systems—it’s a massive distraction from winning market share. Instead, have your acquiring AE qualify the lead and create the opportunity, then work through a systematic process to pass that lead from system A (Acquiring) to system B (Acquired). The acquired company can then execute on these warm opportunities within the system they are comfortable with, moving quickly and driving revenue.

This requires sales strategy and integration teams to be in lockstep, but by focusing the acquiring AE on simple qualification and a strong incentive, you get the motion you need, you accelerate the acquired business, and you pay your AEs for their time.

Ready to stop the friction and accelerate your post-acquisition sales? Contact Acquire2Win today, and let’s design a high-conversion Lead Pass Program that gets your AEs incentivized and your new revenue flowing in less than 100 days.

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