The Education of Millionaires - Michael Ellsberg [76]
The basic answer is quite simple and refreshing. Everything you thought sales was about, including the scripts, pressure, pitching, gimmicky “closing” techniques, sleazy guilt tripping, truth stretching—in other words, all the stuff that makes you want to run the other way when you hear the word “sales”—doesn’t actually work very well. Particularly not on “major sales” in which the buyer perceives the price point as significant, the sale happens over many conversations, and the buyer is likely going to have an ongoing business relationship with you or your firm after the sale.
What works then? It’s simple. While we normally think of salespeople as fast-talking slicksters, it turns out that the more the prospect talks—about their problems, their fears, their frustrations related to the needs your product or service addresses—the more likely they will want to do business with you. Which means, effective sales isn’t about spewing off a slick pitch. It’s about asking a lot of questions. The right questions. And then listening.
What are the right questions? Any question that gets the prospect deeply connected with their frustrations, fears, and desires around the problem that your product or service addresses.
Victor demonstrated his approach on Jena. I was astonished. He knew very little about Jena’s business, weight loss, yet simply by asking the right questions, he was able to sell her very effectively on her own services! In this improv dialogue, Victor spontaneously played the salesperson, and Jena played a hypothetical “prospect” in her business:VICTOR: So how much weight do you want to lose?
PROSPECT: About twenty pounds.
VICTOR: And why do you want to lose that weight?
PROSPECT: I want to feel good and attractive.
VICTOR: And why is feeling good and attractive important to you?
PROSPECT: I’d like to be in a relationship, and I just don’t feel confident around men. I walk into a room and I feel like I’m invisible, or like my body’s disgusting. I feel so out of control around food.
VICTOR: And if you did have more confidence in your life—walking into the room and not feeling self-conscious—how would that impact your life?
PROSPECT: Well, hopefully I’d get into a relationship and have more friends and be less lonely. And hopefully it would benefit my career too.
VICTOR: Let’s talk about the first one. Talk about being lonely. How does that feel right now? What is it like?
PROSPECT: It’s terrible. I go home and just eat cookies for company. It’s a vicious cycle because all I can think of is the cookies. After I eat the packet of cookies I feel sick and I don’t want to go out, even if my friends are calling me to go out.
VICTOR: What would happen if this problem didn’t get resolved ?
PROSPECT: I’d be alone, I’d be miserable, I’d have no kids.
VICTOR: And how would you feel about that?
PROSPECT: Terrible. I want to be a mother. I want to have a family. I want to fulfill that role.
VICTOR: And what you’re telling me is, the weight today is quite possibly getting in the way of your life, the unfolding path of your life. What is it worth to you to fix that problem and have the life you’ve always wanted?
PROSPECT: A lot.
VICTOR: On a scale of 1 to 10, with 1 being not important at all, and 10 being extremely important, immediately, where are you?
PROSPECT: 9.5.
As we went more into this sales demonstration, Victor commented to us: “You see, I haven’t ‘sold’ anything. All I’ve done is ask questions. But the questions go beyond the superficial. They go into the deepest levels of why they want this change in their life.
“The reason this method works is that people’s underlying motivations are very different. Two people could walk into your business wanting to lose twenty pounds, but for very different reasons, at either the conscious level or the unconscious level. If you say, ‘I can help you lose twenty pounds,’ without going into why they want it,