And that brings up a key topic—especially in technology companies: the relationship between Sales and Presales. They are two different perspectives, both necessary and complementary. Sales is usually more focused on opening doors, understanding the business, and moving the opportunity forward; Presales focuses on technical quality, validating feasibility, and giving solidity to what is being proposed. The problem is not the differences themselves. The problem appears when each side acts according to its own logic, but without a shared methodology.
Because when there is no clear sales process, friction starts. Presales gets involved too late, without context. Or it gets involved too early, before there is a properly qualified opportunity. Sometimes a demo is shown before the real problem is understood. Or expectations are set that later need to be corrected. It is not always about bad intentions; often it is simply a lack of agreements.
And even though it may feel internal, the customer notices. They notice when there is coordination and when there isn’t. They can tell whether they are in front of a team that thinks together or a set of people taking turns speaking without a clear direction. In consultative selling, that matters a lot, because trust is not built only with a good pitch. It is also built with coherence.
That’s why, more than “getting along,” what Sales and Presales need is to work from a common foundation. And that foundation is a clear sales process, a shared methodology, and defined criteria that indicate when each area should step in. It cannot be left to gut feeling in the moment or the rush of a meeting. There must be simple but firm agreements: what minimum information must exist before involving Presales, what each stage is trying to achieve, what role each person plays in the customer conversation, and how the next step is decided.
This matters to me especially because, over time, I have also come to understand something broader: it’s not only about Sales and Presales. It’s about the commercial ecosystem. Sales, Presales, and everyone who at some point is customer-facing are part of the same team. Sometimes it’s Operations, sometimes Customer Success, sometimes a specialist, sometimes someone from delivery. If each person shows up without shared criteria, the customer experiences fragmentation. If everyone operates within the same commercial logic, the customer feels order, consistency, and professionalism.
And that makes an enormous difference.
There are authors such as Art Fromm—whom I know and value—who focus precisely on integrating Sales and Presales. And I think that is spot on, because customers don’t buy departments. They live an experience. When that experience is well coordinated, it shows. When it isn’t, that shows too.
In the end, consultative selling is not sustained by individual talent alone. It is sustained by method, process, and teamwork. And when that happens, it doesn’t just improve the relationship between Sales and Presales. It improves the quality of conversations, the use of time, customer trust—and ultimately, results.
