Do You Have an Economic Buyer... or Just a Guess?

Every deal review I've ever run has the same moment. I ask, "Who's the Economic Buyer?" and someone points confidently at a name on the org chart. I ask my follow-up question, "How do you know?", and the room gets quiet.

That silence is expensive. It's the difference between a deal that closes on time and one that dies in legal review because the person who could say yes never actually said anything.

Economic Buyer is the "E" in MEDDIC, and it's one of the pieces people think they understand until they're asked to prove it. So today, let's prove it.

What an Economic Buyer Actually Is

The Economic Buyer is the person with final authority over the funds, the one person in the account who can kill your deal by saying no, and the one person whose "yes" means no one else's "no" matters.

That's it. Not the person who's the most senior. Not the friendliest person. Not the person who set up the most calls. The one who controls the money.

Here's the test I use in every deal review. Ask yourself:

• Have I personally spoken with this person, or am I only hearing about them secondhand?

• Do they understand the business impact in dollars, not just the technical benefit?

• Could they approve this purchase without asking someone else for permission?

• If my Champion disappeared tomorrow, could this person still get the deal done?

If you answered "I think so" to any of those, you don't have an Economic Buyer. You have a guess wearing an Economic Buyer's name tag.

The Decision Maker Isn't Always the Economic Buyer

Here's the mistake I see more than any other, and it's a subtle one: sellers treat "Decision Maker" and "Economic Buyer" as the same person. Most of the time, they overlap. But not always, and that gap is exactly where deals stall late.

A Decision Maker is whoever has the authority to say "yes, let's move forward with this vendor." That's an important person to have on your side. But that person can still answer to someone else- a CFO, a budget committee, a procurement head- who has to actually release the funds. You can win the Decision Maker's full support and still watch the deal die a level above them, because you never got confirmation from the person who controls the money.

Don't assume the two are the same person just because it's the more common case. Confirm it every time.

A Story: The VP Who Wasn't

I once worked a deal with an account executive who had a fantastic relationship with a VP of Operations: regular calls, quick email replies, genuine rapport. The AE was convinced she had her Economic Buyer locked down.

Three weeks before close, the VP said the magic words: "This looks great, let's move forward." The AE put it in her forecast. Her manager put it in the pipeline review. Everyone breathed easy.

Then the deal stalled. The VP stopped replying. When the AE finally got him on the phone, he said something that should be tattooed on every seller's forearm: "I need to run this by finance and the CFO before we can sign anything."

The VP had never been the Economic Buyer. He was a strong, engaged Champion, but he didn't own the budget, and he'd never once said he did. The AE had assumed it because he acted as he did.

She went back, asked better questions, and was introduced directly to the actual budget owner. It cost her three weeks and a very uncomfortable forecast conversation. It also taught her never to let enthusiasm stand in for authority again.

How to Actually Find Out

Stop asking "who approves this?", everyone will point to someone impressive-sounding and move on. Instead, ask questions that force specificity:

• "Walk me through what happens after we agree on price. Whose signature makes this real — and once that person is ready to sign, does anyone else still need to give final approval before it can happen?"

• "If this were $50,000 more than planned, who would you need to go talk to?"

• "Has your team purchased something like this before? Who signed off on it?"

Notice what these questions do, they don't ask your Champion to label someone. They ask your Champion to describe a process, and the person who controls that process reveals themselves. The first question in particular is doing double duty: it catches the case where your signer is just a Decision Maker, not the real Economic Buyer, by forcing your Champion to name whoever still has to sign off above them.

TAKE AWAY

An Economic Buyer isn't a title you assign to whoever seems senior enough. It's a role you have to verify, the same way you'd verify a Champion or a Metric. If you can't answer how you know someone is your Economic Buyer, you don't have one yet, you have your next action item.

Go back through your current pipeline this week. For every deal in forecast, ask yourself the four questions above. If any deal fails the test, that's not a red flag to ignore, that's the most important call you'll make this quarter.