We started President’s Club by playing David Sandler’s classic, “Nancy and the Seagull.” How often do we paint “seagulls”; those features and benefits of our product and service that we think the prospect will want to buy from us? Often this backfires and leads us into unpaid consulting, proposals that waste our time, or worse a total disconnect from our prospect relationship. What’s the solution? A simple 3 step process if we will only follow, and not get side tracked from the “traps” our prospect lays out. First, what are the 3 steps?
- Find the problems
- Determine the reasons for the problems
- Learn the personal impact of these problems
What are the traps and why do salespeople get so easily entangled in them? The trap that salespeople fall prey to is premature presentation syndrome. That’s right, they hear a problem and salespeople can’t wait to offer solutions and fix the problem. Consequence: recipe for losing the sale or getting caught in a quote where the prospect makes you a commodity and buys the lowest price. Sound familiar? Worse, our entire educational system is built on answering questions, fixing problems and offering solutions. So how do we break this non- productive cycle?
Develop a new system and create new habits. How? We use what David Sandler provided in the pain funnel questions and the tactics triangle (Success Triangles).
- What are the top 3 problems, challenges, concerns my prospects face? Develop a great 30 second commercial around this using emotional words (get 30 second commercial template).
- Now start asking questions from the pain funnel:
- tell me more
- how long has that been a problem for you
- how is the problem impacting you and so on
- Use the tactics triangle (Dummy curve, Reversing, and Stripline) for further clarification.
People buy emotionally, not intellectually…….so if that’s the case (and every study says it is); then unless I understand their personal impact of the problem there’s no need for the prospect to buy.
As a professional salesperson, I must be committed to learn the personal impact of the prospects issues. Once I do, this creates a huge level of trust, and gives the prospect an out if those reasons are not compelling enough. If they are compelling then you’re helping them to understand the reason to buy. Now that’s a win –win! How can I now create this when I’m speaking with a prospect today?
Good selling,
Jim Dunn
Sandler Trainer
