If you’ve been in a Sales Engineering (SE) role long enough, you’ve probably heard someone on your team mention MEDDPICC, often during deal reviews, pipeline forecasting, or when things start to go sideways. While this framework is traditionally owned by Account Executives (AEs), the most impactful Sales Engineers understand that MEDDPICC isn’t just a sales tool, it’s a team sport.
What is MEDDPICC?
For the uninitiated, MEDDPICC is a qualification framework that helps B2B sales teams assess, manage, and forecast complex deals. It stands for:
- Metrics
- Economic Buyer
- Decision Criteria
- Decision Process
- Paper Process
- Identify Pain
- Champion
- Competition
Each element represents a piece of the deal puzzle. And while AEs might drive the overall strategy, Sales Engineers are uniquely positioned to fill in key gaps, especially when it comes to understanding the customer’s pain, influencing the decision process, and beating the competition.
Why MEDDPICC Matters to Sales Engineers
Let’s be honest: SEs are often the most trusted people in the room. Prospects confide in us. They ask real questions. They drop hints they wouldn’t say to a quota-carrying rep. That trust is a goldmine, but only if you know what to do with it.
Here’s how each piece of MEDDPICC intersects with the SE role:
1. Metrics: Translate Features into Business Value
Don’t stop at “we can do that.” A great SE ties features to business impact. Help quantify the “so what.” If the prospect cares about reducing churn or improving onboarding speed, put numbers on it. This isn’t fluff, it’s fuel for ROI discussions.
🧠 SE Tip: Ask, “What does success look like in measurable terms?” Then reinforce those metrics during demos, workshops, and follow-ups.
2. Economic Buyer: Get Technical Buy-In First
You may not own the economic relationship, but you can influence it. Often, you’ll meet the economic buyer in executive demos or technical validation calls. Be crisp, clear, and focus on outcomes.
🧠 SE Tip: Learn how to explain technical value in non-technical language. Practice executive summaries.
3. Decision Criteria: Influence the Checklist
SEs have the inside track to shape the customer’s decision criteria during early technical conversations. If you’re passive here, the RFP will reflect your competitor’s strengths, not yours.
🧠 SE Tip: Ask early, “How will you evaluate this?” and help guide them toward your differentiators.
4. Decision Process & Paper Process: Help Navigate
SEs are often brought in to run pilots, build POCs, or map integration timelines. These moments are perfect opportunities to ask about procurement, security reviews, or internal sign-off processes.
🧠 SE Tip: Be curious about “what happens next.” Get ahead of legal or technical blockers before they stall your deal.
5. Identify Pain: Get to the Root
Your discovery calls and demos are treasure hunts for pain. Not surface-level “we want to automate,” but the real cost of inaction. When you uncover pain, you give your AE ammunition for urgency and budget justification.
🧠 SE Tip: Dig deep. Ask, “What happens if you don’t fix this?” and “Who’s losing sleep over this problem?”
6. Champion: Enable Your Internal Ally
Your technical champion is often your biggest fan, but also your biggest risk if you don’t enable them. Arm them with decks, one-pagers, ROI calculators, whatever they need to sell you internally.
🧠 SE Tip: Treat your champion like a co-seller. Build trust, educate them, and check in often.
7. Competition: Know the Battlefield
SEs often get direct exposure to how a prospect is evaluating competitors. Ask what else they’re looking at. Attend competitive demos if you can. And never badmouth, just outclass.
🧠 SE Tip: Learn to demo against competitors subtly. Highlight your strengths where they fall short, without naming names.
Wrapping Up
Sales Engineers aren’t just technical translators, they’re deal-makers. If you want to move from demo jockey to strategic partner, adopting the MEDDPICC mindset is key. You don’t have to “own” every letter, but you should be actively supporting most of them.
📌 Start with one or two letters you can impact today. Then build your influence over time. Deals will get clearer. Your value will be felt. And best of all, you’ll win more.
Want to train your SE team on applying MEDDPICC in real deal scenarios?
Let’s talk: ignacio.vandroogenbroeck.net/workshops