Question From Blog Reader:
I’m assuming that you mean: “how do I start the process so that I can control it all the way through?” That’s a better question. In this post, I give you several components of how to handle the very first call.
We really waste a lot of energy sometimes, don’t we? In a profession that relies on our mind to do the heavy lifting, we certainly fail to think about things in the right way. One example of that is “who we see as the enemy. Read more
We’ve all had that great prospect–the one that invites you in to his office, tells you all about the issues he has, expresses hope that you can help him, pays you what you ask, and faxes in the PO. Wouldn’t it be great if they were all like that. We’ll call that the IDEAL PROSPECT.
I want you to think back to that prospect (it’s irrelevant whether it was last week or last decade). Because as of today, that becomes your standard to which all other prospects are held.
The reason is simple: Most sales professionals have very weak standards when it comes to prospects. We let ’em get away with lying to us, we let them skate the important answers, and we keep calling them back, chasing them like we were pirahnas. In selling, the way I see it, that’s mechanically wrong.
It’s wrong because the person with the solution is the one that should be in control. (That would be you.) And if the prospect isn’t behaving correctly, it’s either bcause he really isn’t a prospect at all. Or, it’s because you haven’t helped him become a good prospect.
So if you find yourself doing the chasing (instead of them chasing you), then you have to raise your standards. And the way you do that is to remember that IDEAL PROSPECT.
What do you do if you’re in front of a prospect who is not behaving correctly? Call him on it.
Say: “Mr. Johnson, usually at this point in the conversation, we’re talking about your problems and we’re discussing solutions. But in this process, all we’re talking about is how great your company is doing without a service like mine. So, it appears that we’re at the end of our dialogue, unless I’m missing something.”
Remember, you are not manipulating him–or trying to make him say something you want him to say. You are simply calling the game on him, and letting him know that he’s not a prospect because he’s not acting like one. And then you proceed to tell him exactly how most prospects act at this time.
This keeps you strong and in control by raising the standard of how ALL of your prospects should act. If they don’t act that way, move on.
I had a call yesterday from a client who was struggling to get first appointments. I asked him to role play what the phone conversation sounded like…and it was obvious what was happening.
Even though he was saying the right words (“Not sure I can help”, “I’d like to inqure to see if we can be of any value”) there was an *undertone* of desperation. The prospect has a sixth sense that picks up on that. So my coaching advice was simple: rather than work on the words you say–work on the thoughts you think.
He was relieved when we finished the call. His new attitude was one of “discernment and skepticism.” He said he was going to enter each phone call with a discerning attitude–being a little stodgy with his time, not chasing people to see him, and acting from a place of curiosity–rather than certainty.
Attitude changes your words and the tone with which you say the words. And that’s what leads to more appointments.
Malcolm Fleschner (www.sellingpower.com) just wrote a nice piece in the latest issue. He quoted us extensively in it. Thought you’d get a kick out of reading it. Who Loves Ya’ Baby?
One of the issues he brings up is the idea of “calling the game.” When someone is lying to you, you must call it out–or else it’s you who is out of integrity. I don’t talk about that much in Same Game New Rules, but it’s a fact. Every time you have a feeling (that you’re being misled by your customer) and you fail to call him on it, you lose self-esteem.
Now, there are ways to call it and ways NOT to call it. I prefer the very soft, simple approach we might call,”Broaching The Subject.” You say, “John, a couple of things don’t jibe with me. Can I bring it up then you react to it?”
I like that approach because there is no pressure. You aren’t accusing him/her of lying. You make it an “I” message. “It’s just me not having understood something.”
By “broaching the subject”, you send a signal that you are listening intently to what he’s saying. And that you take this whole thing seriously. When you’re getting misled, you have to call it–and not worry about the approval (or lack thereof).
Hope that helps with the courage to take a stand and demand the truth.
Come to think of it…we just did a podcast on the topic of truth as well.
Question: What did your parents teach you when it comes to talking about money with others?
Answer: “Don’t talk about money with others. Don’t ask them how much they make. Don’t ask them how much they paid for their house. Don’t ask them how much money they save. Just don’t talk about money.”
Now flash forward to your current role as sales professional. Suddenly your parent’s insistence that money is a taboo, private matter is suddenly getting in the way of you closing deals. You don’t like talking about the money. You avoid it and hope they don’t ask. You put pricing on the last page of the proposal. You don’t talk about it at all before sending them your quote and they fall out of their chair when they get your pricing.
So what’s going on here? Unfortunately many sales professionals suffer from ATTAM: Aversion to talk about money. If you’re one of them, you’re likely losing deals and opportunities because of it. So what to do about it:
Here are a few ideas:
1-Accept It: It’s the way you’re wired. You’ll need to face the fact that you don’t like discussing money before you can fix it.
2-Share Your Uncomfortableness With Your Prospect: Just be real and tell your prospects how you feel. “We need to talk about the money and I find that’s not always a comfortable subject.”
3-Make Yourself Talk About It: Make it mandatory to talk about the money before you leave the call. If you leave without it, call ‘em back and tell them you need to meet again. Don’t ever send pricing without talking about it first.
4-Relax: Money’s just money. It has no REAL value. It’s nothing more than a piece of paper or a computer screen with numbers. We humans are the one’s who put the emotion into it.
The best sales professionals put the Moose on the Table when it comes to talking money. It has to happen. Just realize that it may be counterintuitive to how you’re hard-wired. The good thing is, you can always change your thinking. And when you do, watch the money in your life grow exponentially.
In our last newsletter, we hinted that soon we have our newsletters enabled with multimedia. Well we are at Caskey, as an Easter treat for our loyal readers are giving you a preview of our video-blog. What is a video blog, well like a blog a video blog is a individual discussing a certain subject, usually in form of a brief essay. A video blog is like that but instead of using either text or html we are using web video to discuss a certain topic.
The subject of our first video blog, is a brief introduction to the concept of “THE FUNDAMENTAL SHIFT” , a term we use extensively in our sales training. This short video is presented by Bill Caskey. We hope you enjoy it.
Click here to download FlashPlayer
This video blog is best seen on a broadband connection
"But Bill, you say I need to be detached–but I don't want to appear uninterested!?"
Well of course you don't. I don't want you to be uninterested either. It's just that I want the prospect to feel the pressure to admit their problems to you, prior to you feeling pressure to solve them.
Here is a brief interview that Bryan Neale and I did with Mike Donahue (Newgrange Consulting). It's about 6 minutes long.
I got the proposal via email a week after the sales person and I had talked at length. It was well designed. It was well laid out. And it came with a fabulous letter introducing it. (I presume all from some template that a higly paid consultant had devised).
BUT…..
It didn’t hit the mark because the solution he proposed was a random effort to solve my problem–which, of course, got me thinking (everything gets me thinking).
His solution was random and not intentional. The reason is that it had no direct link to my expressed pain. He never connected the dots for me. Therefore when I looked at the solution he was recommending…and the price…it didn’t “hit the spot.”
What he should have done: He should have crafted a proposal that went down item-by-item through the problems I had and the compelling reasons for changing. Beside each of those, he should have crafted a well-written sentence explaining the benefits of his solution in solving those problems. Then his solution would have become intentional. It would have intended to solve the problem, rather than intended to make the sale.
The paradox? He would have gotten the sale instead of a “let me think this over.”
Be intentional–not random.
