Providing what is Valuable to the Customer and Gaining Commitment to Action

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Providing what is Valuable to the
CustomerandGaining Commitment to Action

• with Duane Weaver

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OUTLINE

• Providing Value
• Productive questioning
• Assessing productivity
• Donts
• Focus forward
• Consultative questioning
• Gaining Commitment
• Closing the Sale the ultimate?

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Providing what is valuable to the customer

• You can direct a customers attention by the
  way you ask them a particular questiononly by
  establishing what that value is will you be able
  to see whether you can in fact provide that value
  which in turn will make it easier for the
  customer to buy from you.
• Martin Colleran, 2003, SOLD! How to make it
  easy for people to buy from you, p. 26.

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Productive Questions

• Moves customer towards being ready to buy
• Focus on pains
• Focus on needs
• Focus on best solutions
• Moves ability to sell forward
• Identifies key pains
• Identifies key stakeholders
• Addresses related benefits for only what is
  needed

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Assessing Productivity of Questions

• Please get into groups of four and discuss a
  familiar sales situation that one of you has
  recently been in (come up with one type of
  question for each quadrant of the following grid
  that may have been asked or could have been
  asked)
• Friendly
• Unproductive
• Directive
• Productive

PRODUCTIVE
DIRECTIVE
Directs Business Outcome
UNPRODUCTIVE
FRIENDLY
Builds Relationship
Martin Colleran, 2003, SOLD! How to make it
easy for people to buy from you, p. 32.
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Some Questioning Donts

• Make the customer
• defend themselves
• focus on what would stop them from buying
• focus on competitors product
• Anything that causes the customer to stop moving
  forward (red light, foot on brake, lack of hill)

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FOCUS ON FORWARD MOTION

• Direct the discussion and focus your attention
  and the customers attention on
• the potential to do business

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Productive Questioning whilst building
relationships

• Consultative Questioning Cycle
• Give a piece of info
• Ask a question
• Demonstrate understanding
• Listen

Martin Colleran, 2003, SOLD! How to make it
easy for people to buy from you, p. 64.
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GAINING COMMITMENT to action

• CLOSING A SALE APPEARS PARAMOUNT
• 1 request for assistance by sales managers,
  sales directors, and sales teams
• Most often talked about and demanded by sales
  management
• Is it?
• We think that too much attention is placed on a
  topic that in essence is simple and
  straightforward. Think about it. If you havent
  got the customer in a state where they are ready
  to buy your product, its a symptom of what
  happened before, not what technique you use next
  to attempt to close the sale. You can ask as many
  closing questions as you like. It aint gonna
  make a ha penny worth of difference.
• Martin Colleran, 2003, SOLD! How to make it
  easy for people to buy from you, p. 64.

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Closing commitment to action

• Gaining satisfied customers that make long-term
  commitments to use your products, services, or
  ideas, as well as your store and service over and
  over again
• Satisfaction
• Long term relationship
• Repeat business and/or referrals
• Focus on ways to help a customer make a longer
  term commitment (be a brand)

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Commitment to Action

• Involves
• Ownership (customer owns commitment)
• Action (commitments requiring an action by the
  customer are more likely to be acted upon)
• Public (a genuine commitment is one made in
  public, the more people that know about something
  the more likely it will progress)
• The most likely commitment to a purchase is one
  that provides to the customer what you have
  established as valuable to them.
• Martin Colleran, 2003, SOLD! How to make it
  easy for people to buy from you, p. 75.

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Identifying Commitment

• Listen to the following ten examples of customer
  commitment and
• Identify if whether you feel it is a useful
  customer commitment by writing down
• YES
• MAYBE
• NO
• Write
• Asks info
• Customer commits to keep in mind
• Phones colleague
• Further appointment
• Takes card and agrees to call within 1 week
• Take customer out by request
• Pass card to their manager with intro
• Follow-up email re what is agreed
• Follow-up email re what is agreed

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Upcoming Project

• Start reading Value Added Selling Chapters
  1,2,4 and the downloadable old Chp. 4 IDENTIFY
  YOUR VALUE ADDED.
• Next seminar we will begin to build figures 4.1
  and 4.2 for your teams
• Teams of 8-9
• Project will involve selling
• Two members from team will serve as observers on
  other teams
• Each team member will provide
• a brief one page report on the personal
  experience
• as well as the sales managers report and
• a peer review report.
• These will added into your grade for the
  project (all three are due March 1st right after
  reading week).
• Observers will assess team success
• Each team will provide a peer assessment for
  their team(see above)
• Proceeds will go to a registered charity or
  scholarship fund chosen by the class
• ANY QUESTIONS?

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THANK YOU

• Your teams should now be formed. Please make sure
  your list has been submitted to me before you
  leave today(8 to 9) per team as well as
• Who the SALES MANAGER is?
• HAVE A GREAT DAY!