If you’re in sales and new business development, you know that your job consists of three primary functions: selling (including presenting your solution to a prospective customer or client, then closing for a commitment), servicing the account once you’ve closed it and prospecting for new opportunities.
By far, the activity that many sellers find most distasteful – and will often go to great lengths to avoid – is prospecting for new business. You’re attempting to strike up a conversation and form a relationship with someone who doesn’t know anything about you, or your company, doesn’t have the time – or desire – to talk to you, probably has no interest in your product or service and, in the off chance they do, are likely doing business with another vendor or supplier.
Other than that, what’s so difficult?
Unfortunately, this leads to an awkward, uncomfortable and pressure-laden dynamic between you and your prospect. The result, for many sellers, is a condition we refer to as “call reluctance: a mindset in which a sales professional’s enthusiasm for prospecting is significantly diminished, sometimes to the point of avoiding the activity entirely.”
If you’ve ever experienced it, you’re not alone. Forty percent of sales professionals say that prospecting is the most difficult, and unpleasant, part of their job. In today’s business environment of virtual selling, email, social media, gatekeepers, voice mail, etc., it takes 18 attempts just to connect with a buyer and half of those won’t even qualify.
So, what’s the solution? Reduce, or eliminate, the pressure of the call by shifting the focus from you, your product or your service to the buyer. When your intention on a prospecting call is getting the prospect to engage with you, listen to what you have to say and respond favorably, you have become emotionally involved. When your focus is on you, not the prospect, you’re more concerned about protecting yourself from rejection than you are about listening to that stranger and developing them into a customer.
The goal with a potential customer is to have a no-pressure conversation, which is a diagnostic chat intended to discover whether additional conversation is warranted and desired. These conversations give you and the prospect the opportunity to decide whether you want to continue the conversation. That’s all.
A no-pressure conversation with a prospect has four parts:
• Pattern Interrupt
• 30-Second Commercial
• Pain Questions
• Call to Action
It might sound something like this:
(Pattern Interrupt)
“Mr./Ms. Prospect, this is Lucy Lafferty. Am I catching you at a bad time? I don’t imagine my name is familiar to you. Mr./Ms. Prospect, may I take 30 seconds to tell you the purpose of my call, then you can decide if we should continue the conversation?”
(30-Second Commercial)
“My company is MegaMultiMedia. We’re a print and broadcast media advertising firm and, typically, we work with independently owned businesses that have a large base of loyal repeat customers.
But they’re:
frustrated that their growth is plateauing due to an inability to attract new first-time buyers.
Or they’re:
• concerned that their historically good customers are buying but not as frequently.
Or they’re simply:
• wondering how to compete more effectively with the deep discounting and massive marketing campaigns of some of their competition.
“Our clients have been able to increase traffic of first-time buyers and improve order sizes without the need to increase their advertising budget.”
(Pain Questions)
“Not sure if any of these are concerns you might be having in your business. If so, is it worth a conversation? (If so…) Can you tell me more? Can you give me an example? How have these issues been affecting your business?”
(Call to Action)
“May I make a suggestion? Let’s take a look at your calendar and find some time over the next week, or two, where we can take a closer look at the challenges you’re experiencing and the work we’ve done with our other clients.”
Notice that this approach is more focused on the prospect, and potential problems they may be experiencing, rather than the typical “feature and benefit dump.” Initiating buyer-focused conversations shifts the emphasis from the product, or service, being offered to the needs and desires of the potential buyer. By adopting this strategy, sellers can better-initiate conversations, build stronger relationships, foster trust and, ultimately, increase their chances of closing a sale.
Jim Marshall is the founder of Sandler Training of Tampa Bay, which provides sales and management training and coaching to high-achieving companies and individuals. Contact him at 813.287.1500 or [email protected].