I had some heart warming news yesterday when someone who had attended my last Lead Conversion Masterclass told me excitedly how he had used one of the simple soft selling questions he learnt on the course and lead to a much bigger and smoother sale. He couldn’t believe how simple and yet powerful the approach is. I could tell from his voice that he was feeling so much more confident with his ability to convert interest into a sale,
The question is nothing earth shattering to someone skilled in consultative selling – quite basic really as I am sure some people will be quick to say. Its not something I invented – I was taught it when mentored early in my own learning. Yet if you are an accidental sales person it may seem totally counter intuitive
When someone asks to buy something or asks about your product the intuitive thing is to sell it to them or to give them the information they want.
Next time this happens to you – stop yourself and ask the all important question ‘Why?’
Seems strange when someone comes along and says – can I have one of your products to respond with the question ‘Why?’ – Actually I ask ‘What is motivating you to want this? or what motivated you to email me?’ or something like that……but in effect you are asking Why?
By discovering the other person’s motivation to buy or enquire you will get the full picture. In the case of the guy who turned a £5 sale into £500 the person told him what he was looking to do and he made some honest recommendations which were accepted and there will probably be follow on work too.
The wonderful thing is that this person was struggling to convert interest into a sale let alone upsell!! It was not as big as one client that turned a £75 order into a £8,000 the day after learning about it…..but for this guy it was just as exciting to see it’s effect.
Of course when you ask ‘Why?’ you could find that you cannot help your prospect which may save you wasted time going through the whole sales process only to discover it later after you have invested loads of time in the sale.
It just goes to show you do not have to be pushy or manipulative in order to sell with confidence..
So next time someone asks you about your services remember to thank them for the enquiry and then ask them why they enquired!
Best wishes and happy selling!
Richard
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on Jul 1st, 2009 at 12:12 pm
I think lots of people take the easy way out and just ‘grab the sale’ rather than querying whether what the person wants to buy is actually what they need.
In lots of cases this is OK, the worst tht happens is that the client doesn’t spend any more money.
But in other cases it could be that the client has been competely mis-sold, and his/her expectations have not been managed (how can the salesperson manage expectations if they don’t ask the questions) and this can lead to bad feeling and a non-returning customer saying not very complimentary things about you.
It’s always best to try and find out whether what the client thinks they want to buy is actually the right thing for ther needs.
on Aug 27th, 2009 at 1:31 pm
I think that your advice is fantastic but it’s attracting the sales that I am finding difficult. I am not being contacted, there are no enquiries therefore these techniques cannot be adopted.