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You Can't Sell if You Don't Get the Offer Right

Written by: Cheryl A. Clausen

Article Overview: “The offer”, you say, “that’s the easy part.” Is it? Or is the way you present the offer keeping you from selling more?

You Can't Sell if You Don't Get the Offer Right

“The offer”, you say, “that’s the easy part.” Is it? Or is the way you present the offer keeping you from selling more?

If you don’t get the offer right, and the way you say it right, you make it very difficult to sell anything to anyone. The problem is when you talk about the offer you tend to talk about features. Prospects don’t buy features.

Prospects buy to get something they want, to avoid something they don’t want, or to solve a problem. They don’t buy products or services or the features those products or services may have. Why?

Prospects don’t buy products, services, or their features because products and services and their features are meaningless to a prospect. Even when the prospect does immediately see the connection between a product or service, and why they buy they don’t see why they should buy from you. What they’re looking for is an outcome, result, or solution.

That means if you want a prospect to pay attention to you or have any interest in what you have to offer you have to be able to talk about it in a way they care about. Remember they care about an outcome, a result, or a solution. So you have to talk about your offer in those terms and those terms only.

When you talk about your offer in terms of outcomes, results, and solutions you’re talking about what the prospect wants to hear about. You’ve got the offer right. When you get the offer right you get the opportunity to get the next step right.

Prospects are actively searching for what they want, ways to avoid what they don’t want, and solutions to their problems. When you present your offer in those terms they immediately see your offer as one they need to pay attention to and learn more about. The next step is helping them understand why your offer is the offer they should choose over their other options.

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