Just about everything in life has a process:
> There's a process for getting registered for kindergarten.
> There's a process to get accepted into college.
> There's a process for changing the oil in your vehicle.
> There's a process for paying taxes.
> There's a process for having a baby.
Successful selling has a process, too. Think of the selling process as a GPS for your sales interaction. GPS will get you to where you want to go, as long as the unit knows your destination preference. A well-conceived selling process will also get you where you want to go with your prospect. Although there are always exceptions to rules, a step-wise progression consisting of doing the right things and the right times will yield big results in sales.
A PRIMER: THE SELLING PROCESS FOR SUCCESSFUL BUSINESS-TO-CONSUMER SELLING
1. Find your prospect.
If you work in a retail store or have leads provided to you, you don't have to find a prospect to sell to. But otherwise, one of the keys to selling success is to find individuals who are open to spending time with you discussing their needs for your products or services.
Door-to-door selling in a residential neighborhood is a process of finding someone who won't slam the door on your face and will answer your questions (at minimum) or indicate they have a need for your product (better yet!). Selling insurance or real estate or other products or services that aren't sold at retail or door-to-door (D2D) require strong prospecting skills (or a nice marketing budget) in order to have enough people to talk to about your product. Selling on the phone requires a phone list of viable prospects or current customers to upsell.
Once you have your prospect, it's time to find out more about them.
2.Investigate Needs and Desires
Purchases are not random acts. Consumers buy to fulfill needs. Clients are complex and marvelous beings, and the better we understand them and their needs, the better we can position our products and services, and our company, to fulfill those needs. This leads to the prospect or shopper to become a customer or a client.
The depth with which we understand the prospect's needs will help determine our success with our prospects. Merely a superficial understanding will yield less results than an understanding of depth and an appreciation of nuance and detail in the customer's thinking. Therefore, we ask questions to uncover needs, and we discuss those needs and desires to develop a rich and thorough understanding of them, even if we have limited time with our shopper/prospect.
Most sales training will tell you that identifying and understanding consumers' needs and desires is one of the keys to a successful sales career. But many salespeople don't spend enough time on this step of the selling process because they're so anxious to talk about their product or service, or show the shopper something. Ask good good sales questions. Then ask more questions. Investigate.
3. The Presentation
Now is the time for the focus to be on the product or service, the salesperson, or the salesperson's company. This is where we match up our product to the shopper/prospect's needs.
We explain the features of our product. "Features" are details and facts about the product, ideally with the individual consumers' needs in mind. A feature might be any of the following: It's available in 17 colors; you can get an extended warranty; It's available in large or small; It is manufactured in the USA; we custom design all our products for our customers; It's 1.1 carat; It has side airbags; etc.
We also present the benefits of the product or service. "Benefits" are what the features will do for the prospect/shopper. This is where value enters the mix.
A benefit could be any of the following: So you can match the color of the widget to the color of your decor; so you can be protected over the next three years should anything happen to your new computer, therefore saving you time and money and frustration; so you're helping to keep Americans working and not frustrated with products that are made overseas with less quality craftsmanship; so the item is the perfect size for your needs rather than having to buy a widget from stock sizes that might not be right for you; so your fiance will have a diamond that is over that important 1 carat threshold that so many engaged women hope for so your fiance will be thrilled; so your not only protected with the front airbags in a crash, but also protection to the side can help minimize head injury and even death during a crash.
4. Closing the Sale
Everything we've accomplished so far is like the plans for a wedding: the proposal, the shower, the selection of the wedding date, arranging for the participants in the ceremony, acquiring a location, buying the cake and flowers and scheduling the musicians, creating and mailing invitations, selecting the attire, purchasing the rings, preparing the vows, etc.
But closing the sale is like the wedding ceremony itself. It is what all the previous steps have led you. Without the wedding ceremony, all the wedding preparation is a waste of time. Without closing the sale, all the previous sales steps have also been a waste of time.
Closing the sale first consists of a trial close (or test close) that is designed to verify that you have been on the right track with your prospect/shopper. An example of a trial close question is "Are we on the right track?" Another is "Today you were hoping to find a brown widget that would let you do this and that. Do you think this brown widget would let you do this and that?" If the shopper/prospect says "yes," you've successfully completed the trial close. If the response is "no," you've got to return to the "identifying needs and desires" or "the presentation" step of the selling process.
There are many different methods for closing the sale, the simplest being a direct question: "Do you want to go ahead and purchase it?" A salesperson can give alternates: "Do you want to go with the Hitachi or the Sony?" or assume the purchase: "When do you want this delivered?"
Closing the sales is absent from many salesperson's repertoire in the B2C selling sector, and therefore their sales success is limited.
5. Handling Objections
An "objection" is a stated reason why the customer won't or can't purchase from you.
Many of the objections a salesperson hears from a prospect are automatic responses that are not valid. Consumers have developed these responses over many years of dealing with salespeople or seeing others (parents, for example) deal with salespeople. Many other objections are outright fabrications. The remaining objections are valid objections. It's the salesperson's job to find out into which of these categories the objection fits.
Once that determination is made, the salesperson's job is to navigate through these objections in an attempt to arrive at a closed sales transaction despite the objection. The salesperson does this by asking questions, providing new information or reviewing information already presented, investigating the objections, understanding the objections, exploring the objection with the prospect, and asking the prospect to buy again.
I've developed the 3A method for overcoming objections. It can be used as a template for a great many sales situations to help the salesperson successfully handle objections and move on to the sales transaction.
In our wedding analogy, think of the objection as an absent priest, pastor or rabbi from the wedding ceremony, or a lost wedding ring or a pipe organ that won't work. Handling these events are like handling objections.
6. Acquire referrals and testimonials.
While many business-to-consumer sellers skip this step, it can be helpful for many in the B2C sector. Happy customers are often willing to share the names of friends and family members who could use your products or services. Testimonials are positive statements of endorsement you can use in your selling process or in promoting yourself to others.
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Download the free sales eBook by Skip Anderson, "27 Can Do Steps to Sell More"
If you like this post (or don't) please leave a comment.Skip Anderson is the Founder and President of Selling to Consumers Sales Training.
He works with companies that sell to consumers in
all B2C sectors to increase sales by realizing the buying potential of every prospect.
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