Who likes a high pressure sales pitch? Or how about someone who is really TRYING TOO HARD to convince you to buy something? Neither one sounds appealing.
I always remember this one time when I was at a dealership looking to buy a vehicle, and this sales guy kept trying to sell me the ugliest crossover SUV you ever saw (I’ll leave the brand out because it’s not important, plus one of you may be driving that thing around).
Anyway… Didn’t matter how many times I said “no”, I’m looking for a completely different model, this guy just kept forging ahead. It was really weird to honest with you. It was like being stuck in an episode of the Twilight Zone.
Now I’m guessing that the dealership was pushing hard on the sales crew to sell these toilets, and were offering a bonus of some kind to the sales team to get them off their lot. This was a case where the salesman was putting HIS INTERESTS ahead of mine. Not a good set-up for the buyer (me), so I finally left and went to another dealership. Couldn’t take it anymore.
Well to make a long story short, your potential customers are “just like you”. They don’t want this type situation. Now I’m not suggesting any of you are out there performing high pressure sales tactics or anything like what this crazy salesperson was doing to me, but I just wanted to highlight the fact that people “love to buy, but don’t want to be sold”.
They want to decide for themselves, but they need someone to “guide them along the way”. They don’t want a “salesperson” to be that person. The sales team are not looking out for anyone but themselves. What they need is a “consultant”.
And guess who needs to become that “consultant” that they desperately desire? YOU DO. So instead of being a “salesperson” you must morph yourself into a “consultant” focused on solving your client’s problems. Your prospects will respond to your “expert advice” by becoming loyal (and extremely profitable) customers.
This means you need to do the following. Ask yourself these two simple questions:
- Where exactly is the prospects PAIN?
- WHY did they call me?
When you meet with the potential customer what you are really doing is performing an interview to unlock the answers to the two questions above. The goal of your bid is to clearly define how you will solve the answers to the two questions above. Then once you get your bid together at a later date, make a point of saying this when you hand it over to them… “This is my RECOMENDATION for solving your problem”.
Avoid phrases like here is “my proposal” or even worse “my presentation” because that just sounds like a salesperson talking. And that is NOT HOW YOU WANT TO COME ACROSS! Remember… “people love to buy but they don’t want to be sold”. So transform into a “consultant” now. When you do your potential customers will turn into real ones at a much faster clip.