Qualifying a prospect is a tough job, mainly in a country where people are swamped with requests from suppliers pushing to get their products on potential customers' desk. Of course, the qualification process depends on the product/service offering but we would like to give you two first pieces of advice:

• Americans are very positive and enthusiastic about new things. But it may not be enough to consider that your contact will buy your product. Be sure to understand right away WHY the prospective customer would buy. The real question is: Where is the pain and do I provide a credible relief? What is going to happen if my contact does not acquire what I offer? Can they achieve successfully their current project without my help or my product? You may make huge improvements on reliability of your forecasts by asking your sales team these questions.
• People asking for the evaluation are not always employees. They are often consultants and may be looking for improving their knowledge of products/services available in the market. A large number of technical people in the U.S. are now working for themselves as consultants at customers' sites. There is nothing wrong in having the evaluation done by a consultant, but you need to be sure there is a project underway in the company. The best way is to ask the name of the project or application that will be used along with your product and find out who is its "owner" (manager with decision power). You may also ask your contact if he/she is an employee or a consultant. There is no problem requesting this information.