Customers will ask you a question and you’ll proceed to talk about your
product. That is why you are not making more sales. It is your product
knowledge that keeps getting in the way. Not that you do not have
enough product knowledge trust me you have plenty. It is that you are
not listening to what your customer is truly asking you. You are taking
their questions or statements literally instead of trying to clarify what it is they are truly asking you.
Customers do not know what questions to ask. So instead they ask a
question that they are comfortable with hoping that you will find out what
they truly want. By getting to the heart of the matter and finding out why
they ask what they ask, you will unlock the key to the sale.
If you are able to focus your presentation on the customer and how the
customer will benefit from a product and your competition has focused
their presentation on product knowledge; you will win the sale every
time. Customers buy emotionally and they justify their purchase
logically. This means that you have to sell emotionally and validate their
decision with logic. It will never work the other way around.
When you focus on the emotional reason that the person is listening to
you today and speak in terms of how the product will benefit them, you
are giving the customer what they want; solutions!
Don’t get me wrong, product knowledge is necessary, but you are very
likely bringing it up too soon in your presentation. Your customer does
not care about you, your product, or your company. They only care
about themselves and fulfilling the need that they have today. Therefore
everything that you talk about should be in terms of them and how they
are going to benefit from your product. So put your product knowledge
aside for one second and focus on your customer’s needs.
The only way to find out the customer’s needs is with good questions. If
a customer immediately asks a specific technical question about your
product, then you need to ask yourself why they are asking that
question. Think about it for a minute. Most salespeople in your industry
will immediately go into a product puke session about nuts, bolts, and
widgets instead of asking the customer “why do you ask?” Remember,
they are not having a conversation with you today to buy nuts, bolts, and
widgets. They are having a conversation with you today for some other
reason and it is your job to find out what that reason is.
The next time you are getting ready to launch into a presentation about
why your product’s specs are better than the product specs down the
street; I challenge you to ask yourself, will this customer truly NOT
benefit from the other product?
For more information on engaging questions that you can use to get
your customer talking; send a blank email to
.
Tom Richard is the President of Tom Richard Marketing and specializes
in both marketing and sales education. Visit his website at
