Tweet

How do I get my sales people to create some urgency with the client?

Guest post by: Wayne Berry

Article Overview: If what you have will benefit your prospect enormously and they don’t go ahead now, who will lose? The prospect will, and of course so will you, but if you genuinely believe that what you have is right for your prospect you will be letting them down by not asking for the order then and there.

How do I get my sales people to create some urgency with the client?



I am often asked this question by Sales Managers.

Their sales people are selling an excellent product or service. They make a professional sales presentation where they explain all of the features and benefits of their offering, but more often than not, their prospects are not buying. There is no sense of urgency.

Instead they politely tell the sales person that they are impressed, and if they ever need what the sales person is offering, they will be in touch.

I call this playing “show and tell” and so many sales people fall into this trap.

Now I call it a trap, because when a sales person finally gets in front of a prospect, probably after working hard to get the appointment, the prospect will often say, “So show me what you have to offer”. If they are not careful the sales person will be “sucked” into doing exactly this.

The true sales professional however will go into what I like to call the “diagnosis mode”, and ask the prospect if they would mind answering a few questions before they tell them about what they have to offer.

Now it’s nothing new to ask questions to determine a prospect’s needs and whether what you have is a good fit for them or not. Most sales people understand this. However most don’t understand that their prospects have both logical needs and emotional needs.

When the meeting starts, it’s likely that the prospect is feeling indifferent or maybe even skeptical about what the sales person has to offer. The average sales person wants to take them directly from indifference to excited by making an enthusiastic presentation. Sure it can work, but the true sales professional understands there is a better way to create a sense of urgency, by asking questions that take their prospect from indifferent to disturbed, before they offer the solution which will take them to excited and create that sense of urgency to escape the pain and move into gain right away.

Questions that disturb

Here are some of the questions we teach sales people to use to disturb their prospects before offering the solution. I’ll like you to notice that this is not a list of random questions. The order in which they are asked is vital. We begin with broad questions and then become more specific. So here they are.

1. Mr Prospect what would you say is the major challenge you face today with respect to……. (now we guide them towards an area where we know we can offer them a solution. eg. “maintaining or increasing your market share?” Or maybe it’s “protecting your data?’ etc. We now wait for an answer and then ask…

2. How do you mean? (This is designed to draw out an expansive answer.)

3. Could you give me an example please?

4. When was the last time that happened?

5. What happened exactly?

6. Why did that happen?

7. Conservatively what would you say that cost you and your company over the last 6 months? or 1 year etc. (This may also now help you to financially justify what you offer.)

8. How much?!!! Are you serious? $ right off your bottom line?

9. What does your manager / partner / accountant etc say to you about that?

10. How does that make you feel?

11. What are the consequences if you don’t solve that problem of…….. (specify the problem)

12. By solving this problem of ………how will that help you?

13. How do you mean?

14. Why is that important to you?

15. How will that help you?

16. As a result of solving the problem of ……… and achieving ……… what will that mean to you personally?

Do you think your prospect might now be thinking “How can you help me?”

Some will even say this out loud. There is now a sense of urgency to relieve the pain and move into the “gain”.

Notice also that the answers to question 12 to 16 have your prospect

talking about the benefits of what you are now about to show them. They are selling themselves!

By the way, this sense of urgency should also be shared by the sales person. After all, if what you have to offer will benefit your prospect enormously and they don’t go ahead now, who will lose? The prospect will, and of course so will you, but if you genuinely believe that what you have is right for your prospect you will be letting them down by not asking for the order then and there.

So a sense of urgency can be created by the true professional sales person.

Related Articles
  Urgent Decisions - Sales and Marketing Training
  Five Lessons Learned from the 8 Figure Sale
  Four Square Organizer
  Direct Sales Strategies: Why "Buy Today" Discounts Don't Make People Buy Today, But "Buy Soon" Discounts Do
  How to Prioritize
  Invest in your Future; Practice Prospecting
  A Sales Success Strategy
  LEADS, LEADS, LEADS
  Anatomy Of A Buying Decision
  Sales Management, Prospecting, and a Sense of Urgency©
  The Sales Number Game Continues
  Boredom: The Gateway to Creativity
  Get Inside Your Web Site Visitor's Head
  Should Special Effects Determine If You Have the Right Salespeople?
  Increase Sales by Focusing on Qualified Prospects Who Turn into Loyal Customers
  Is Your Timing Keeping You From Being Successful In Your Business? Part 3
  Urgency
  How to Increase Sales and Reduce Costs by Using These Simple Sales Coaching Tips
  How to Increase Sales and Reduce Costs Using These Simple Sales Coaching Tips
  Email Marketing Made Easy #15 - Writing Effective, Sales-Generating Emails

Article Tags: ascii, bidi, br, cambria, div, family auto, fareast, font definitions, footer, hansi, mso, number position, orphan, panose, paper source, pitch, signature, style definitions, times new roman



Related Forum Posts
Find Me Customers and Get 25% of New Client's Bill - I run Egg Marketing & Public Relations, a marketing and public relations firm. I am looking to grow my business through a viral affiliate marketing campaign, and I need your help. If you know someone (or can find someone) who needs marketing assistance for their business, I'd love to take them on as a client. My firm can: *create marketing plans and strategy *write web and marketing copy *write and distribute press releases *create enewsletter and email campaigns For every new client you bring me, I will give you 25% of their billable hours. For example, my average monthly consultation fee is $1000. That's $250 per month for the life of the client relationship just for a referral! I can provide you information and resources to help you. If you're interested, contact me at smpayton@eggmarketingpr.com and let me know where you're based and how you would go about spreading the word to get new clients for Egg.
Re: Burn all your bridges inorder to succeed?? - [quote="Tami Szabo":3rpvrmbh]I hear what you are saying, Kevin. In other words, sometimes "creating the need" is exactly what gets us moving! I think it can work when you know you are ready and you BELIEVE you can. However, I believe it's not the only route. One way is to "create a need" without having to burn the bridge. If you are working full time, you can make "small needs" which cause you to grow at the pace you want to. For example, if someone is struggling to write a book, they might arrange a spread out series of speaking engagements on the topic of the book. The time commitment requires them to get writing the speech for each date. Then they can simply translate the speech to the book. So, how can you create a "small need" in your current entrepreneurial endeavour? This is when a Coach comes in handy as you clarify what you want and create an accountability plan to help you stay true to what you want. That's why so many business people and corporations pay for Coaching. The return on investment can be quite remarkable! Have fun thinking of ideas! Tami[/quote:3rpvrmbh] Hi Tami, I think it really depends on the individual. Some people are very self motivated, while others are lazy and need to create a sense of urgency to get themselves moving toward their goal. For instance, I was just watching a television interview on a mixed martial arts fighter who admitted to being lazy and burned all of his bridges in order to succeed. He sold all of his possessions, got in his car and left his family and friends behind to pursue his dream until he eventually made it into the UFC (Ultimate Fighting Championships). When you have literally nothing to go home to, it can drive a person to do great things. At times, burning all of your bridges is what it takes since "bonds" between you and others can actually be a distraction.
Dealing with Sales Reps - I've dealt with a wide variety of sales reps over the years and the vast majority take time to get back in touch. Its not usually a situation that a retailer calls for some information and they get an answer that day. In addition, most of the sales reps I had also deal with a couple of hundred other accounts. That's a lot of people to kep straight and to answer all their questions in a timely manner. This was really an issue in roofing because we were usually offering the newest products and at that point the rep had limited info, little or no sales material and usually no samples. This made the rep look bad and we had to explain to the homeowner that we were working to get what they needed, but there were about 5-8 links in the chain of information that all had to do their job. In these cases, I was being truthful when I told the customer or client that I was working on it and the sales rep was working on it. It just takes time to make things happen - usually longer than the consumer wants to realize or understand. Shri
Re: What Franchisors Want From Franchisees - In my experience one of the things franchisors look for is the professionalism of a candidate. I have run across quite a few times where I had a candidate looking a certain franchise and the other person that was looking at the same territory made their decision first and my client was left without a territory. That being said, my client did make their decision, it was just a day too late, but we didn't know that at the time, so the franchisor went to the drawing board and without overloading the market figured out a way to create 2 territories by moving the 1 territory over and establishing another one. Both franchisees were happy and the franchisor got a 2fer. Talking with the franchisor afterward they told me one of the main reasons they did that was because of the responsiveness of my candidate. They say this was very professional and it wasn't just the $$ that made them create the additional territory, although I am sure that played a part, but they really worked with all of the existing franchise owners and the new one and my candidate to get this done.
Where I want WSI to be in Dec 31 2007 - Here are my goals for end of 2007 Employees - SEO specialist - admin assistant - sales rep - designer/data entry - copy writer (may be outsourced) Target market (client base) manufacturers 10-50 million in revenue looking for integrated marketing solution ranging from 10k - 30k Systems - crm fully utilized - project management smooth process - sales and marketing to continuously generate leads SALES (My big Goal to focus on ) Last years sales revenue was $220K This year we want to hit $500K - approx 40k per month


Share this article with your friends. Fund someone's dream.

Leave a comment below or share on the left and you'll help support entrepreneurs in Africa through our partnership with Kiva. Over $50,000 raised and counting - Please keep sharing! Learn more.

Newsletter

Get advice & tips from famous business
owners, new articles by entrepreneur
experts, my latest website updates, &
special sneak peaks at what's to come!

Name:
Email:

Popular Articles

The Value of Small Businesses

Time management for DIY PR

Four Secrets to Earning Income as an Author

Suggestions

Email us your ideas on how to make our
website more valuable! Thank you Sharon
from Toronto Salsa Lessons / Classes for
your suggestions to make the newsletter
look like the website and profile younger
entrepreneurs like Jennifer Lopez.