Use the Magic Words in Consultative Selling E. Michael Shays CMC At some point in a sales meeting with a client, a professional is expected to offer some course of action. If he or she has listened carefully, she will likely be completely aligned with the client. However it is also likely that the client hasn’t revealed some inner motivations that influence the decision to use a professional advisor. Offering a course of action becomes a gamble: If you read the client correctly you get client agreement. If you missed something the client said, or worse, did not say, you and your course of action face being dismissed.
The object is to bring the client in as a partici¬pant in the design of the solution, to get his fin¬gerprints on the course to be followed. You do this with these magic words:
1. “If we could [suggested professional approach], would that help?”
These words avoid locking the professional into an approach. The client’s response helps you understand what the client thinks is needed and in fact may help the client understand his own needs more clearly. If the suggested approach is not going to be helpful in the eyes of the client, there is now time and space to learn more about the need and to develop the appropriate solu¬tion, to negotiate an assignment, and to ob¬tain the client’s buy-in.
If the suggested approach is on target you are on your way to the next level of magic words. Since the best solution is a result of the professional and client working together to solve a problem, the best place to start this collaboration is with the next question:
2. “Let’s see how we might do that.”
This invites the client to work with you to structure an implementation of the approach that is satisfactory to the client and gets the client that much more involved in the sales process, which is a win-win outcome for both client and professional. The client is that much surer of getting what he needs, and you not only get a better understanding of the client’s expectations, but also brings the client closer to committing to a close.
The next question is just as important:
3. “Just what would be the benefits if we took this approach?”
The answer to this question will help you understand the value the client places on the solution under discussion and gets your client that much closer to agreeing to an engagement. The answer helps the client to understand the results she will have to reach. The answer also begins to give the professional a basis for a fair fee. This leads naturally to the next question:
4. “Let’s see if we can structure something that makes economic sense.”
At this point you may need to go off-line to develop a fee structure, but if you have sufficient experience in the environment and the approach agreed upon, this too could be developed collaboratively with the client. Since the best consulting is a collaborative effort between the professional and the client, a reasonable fee will be affected also by how much responsibility the client is willing to take for the implementation of the agreed approach.
It may be a stretch to call these four ques¬tions “magic words,” but they do help to guide the professional and client in a mutually satisfac¬tory collaborative effort to close the sale.
* * *
E. MICHAEL SHAYS CMC (ems@emsnetwork.com) is President of EMS Network, International, an association of senior consultants helping clients faced with conflict, transition, stagnation, and management dilemmas.
To learn more about this author, visit Michael Shays's Website.
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Michael Shays
(Visit Michael's Website)
Michael Shays is a senior management
consultant, public speaker, facilitator
and mediator. He has coached executives in
24 countries in six continents to resolve
conflict, manage transitions, and develop
breakthrough solutions to tough problems.
He has helped over 500 clients, including
AT&T, IBM, KPMG and, Hewlett-Packard, and
the CEOs of smaller companies.
After seven years with the operations
improvement firm, Bruce Payne &
Associates, he passed examination as a
Certified Management Consultant and was
recruited by Coopers & Lybrand as a direct
entry Partner. BDO Seidman recruited
Michael 14 years later to be the National
Director of Management Consulting and
Chairman of BDO’s International Management
Consulting Committee. He left BDO in 1990
to open his own firm, EMS Network
International, with strategic partners in
four continents. See www.emsnetwork
.com.
He is a Fellow of the Institute of
Management Consultants USA and a recipient
of their Lifetime Achievement Award. He
has served as Chairman of IMC USA, the
International Council of Management
Consulting Institutes, and the Journal of
Management Consulting. He an active member
of the Center for Breakthrough Thinking.
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