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Does A Hard Sell Work?

Written by: John Brennan

Article Overview: As many of you know I have a strong bias towards a consultative approach to selling. I share the values and competencies required for successful consultative selling, and despise those of the “hard sell”. I’ve also assumed that the consultative approach gets better results, that people resist a hard sell, and that a hard sell is not at all effective with large ticket sales. But I recently came across a sales organization that questioned these assumptions.

Does A Hard Sell Work?

I’ll call the firm ABC Consulting. This firm provides general business consulting to small businesses – primarily “mom and pop”s. In ten years they have experienced rapid growth, in the neighborhood of 50% and more each year. Annual revenues are well over $100 million and they have thousands of employees. Their telephone sales reps cold call to set up appointments, the sales reps close the customer on a business analysis, and the business analysts close on the high-margin consulting services. Their closing ratios are impressive. The phone reps, the outside reps and the business analysts make one call, then move onto the next. The company does no advertising. The pace is fast and urgent. Get an appointment Monday, close Tuesday, do the analysis Thursday, close on consulting services Friday, deliver the services beginning Monday. It is a 100% cash business; customers pay at the end of each day.
If it sounds like a well-oiled machine, well, it is. It gets the results it is looking for, namely growth and profit. I have to concede that it works, but its values and methods make my skin crawl, and I have to wonder about the damage it does to its employees, its customers and to the image of the sales profession.
Here’s how consultative selling and the hard sell compare on values and methods.
Feature Consultative Sell Hard Sell
Values Integrity
Respect for the customer
Authentic communication
Sincerity
Expediency
Arrogance
Manipulation
Deception
Competencies Listening
Probing for needs
Creative problem-solving
Trust-building
Assertiveness
Persistent
Fast-talking
Probing for weaknesses
Creative trickery
Control
Bullying, nagging, aggression
Pushy
Orientation Customer needs
The customer is educated to make an informed buying decision
Product promises
The customer is beaten into submission
Driven by Service to others
Greed
Strategy Find customer-partners
Under promise, over deliver
Lengthy sales cycle Target the vulnerable
Over promise, under deliver
One call sale
Tactics Build credibility and mutual respect, understand customer needs and goals, find mutually beneficial solutions, gain agreement to action plans.
Impress the customer, play on fears or greed, thrust the product on the customer, make him take it, get the money, move onto the next prospect.
Measures of success
Multiple: including customer loyalty, profit, community respect, employee satisfaction
Just one; profit

Conclusion
My very unscientific study concludes that the hard sell approach works, but at a price too high for me. The consultative approach is a better fit for me and for my clients. Maybe growth won’t be as rapid, or margins as high, but I’ll sleep well at night and hold my head high as a consultative sales training consultant.

Related Articles
  Heart of Marketing by Judith Sherven and Jim Sniechowski
  Like it or not – Success is about being able to sell YOU
  Sell Yourself First
  Using Your Heart and Soul in Business
  Up Sell you way to a Better Turnover

Article Tags: consultative approach, consultative selling, hard sell



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