Answer Your Buyers’ Key Questions & Make Your Sales Messaging Great
Answer Your Buyers’ Key Questions & Make Your Sales Messaging Great
**Sales Messaging is the Key to Improving Sales and Marketing Effectiveness**
The key to creating great sales messaging is knowing your buyers’ primary buying questions for each of the products and services you offer.
Typical buying questions you’ll need to answer when creating sales messaging for prospects include:
• Why should I meet with you?
• Why should I change what I currently do and buy a product or service like this?
• Why should I buy your solution rather than a competitive alternative?
**Why Buying Questions Are Important**
If the goal of great sales messaging is to create rapport and gain traction through the sales process, then answering a buyer’s buying questions is the best way to create alignment with buyers. This is true for several reasons:
1. The human mind works through inquiry. We process information and solve problems by posing and answering questions. So when we direct our messaging to answer a buyer’s questions, especially their unstated, internal questions, we create instant rapport. That is, the messaging resonates with the buyer, because it answers the precise questions they are asking themselves.
2. Questions attract and focus the mind’s attention. When we hear or read a question, we automatically begin trying to answer that question. It’s an unconscious, reflexive response. By framing your sales messaging in the context of answering the buyer’s question, buyers will automatically be attracted to read and internalize your messaging.
3. Answering buyers’ questions helps us sales and marketing folks focus our communications and get to the point. Without questions to answer, messaging tends to veer off course, and lack the specificity necessary to effectively communicate with buyers.
**Different Buyer, Different Buying Questions**
The first step in determining what buying questions your company needs to answer in order to be more competitive, is to identify the types of buyers you need to attract and win. The most common buyer types include prospects, customers, channel partners, analysts and investors. The second step is to identify each buyer’s primary buying questions.
We’ve already reviewed a typical prospect’s buying questions. Now notice the differences among the questions for each buyer type:
Customer’s Buying Questions
• Why should I keep doing business with you?
• Why should I upgrade to your new product or service?
Channel Partner’s Buying Questions
• Why should I distribute a product or service like this?
• Why should I distribute your product rather than a competitive alternative?
Analyst’s Buying Question
• Why is your product or service a great idea?
Investor’s Buying Question
• Why is your company a great investment opportunity?
Consider how different the answers to the prospect’s questions are compared to answers for the channel partner, for example. The prospect’s questions are about the business case for buying the product from your company. The channel partner’s buying questions are about the business case for a joint venture with your company.
It should be clear now why knowing which buying questions your company needs to answer can lead to a dramatic improvement in the quality of your messaging, and thus to a dramatic improvement in your company’s competitiveness and its win rates.
**Great Sales Messaging is Buyer-Centric**
In order for your sales messaging to be truly effective, it must be buyer-centric. Your sales messaging must provide a compelling and persuasive answer to your buyer’s primary buying questions for each of the products and services that you offer.
This means that the presentation you use for prospects will be different from the one you use for channel partners, which in turn will be different from the ones you use for analysts, investors, etc. If your slide deck is essentially the same for each of your buyer types, what you have is mushy messaging, not great sales messaging. More importantly, you have a tremendous opportunity to improve your company’s sales and marketing effectiveness now, by implementing great sales messaging.
Answer Your Buyers Key Questions Make Your Sales Messaging Great - To learn more about this author, visit Michael Cannon's Website.
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Most sales and marketing executives and their teams don’t know their buyers’ key buying questions. That’s why survey data indicate that Sales considers over 50% of the collateral created by Marketing to be useless. And that’s why most marketing and sales people are consistently unable to articulate their value proposition.
**Sales Messaging is the Key to Improving Sales and Marketing Effectiveness**
The key to creating great sales messaging is knowing your buyers’ primary buying questions for each of the products and services you offer.
Typical buying questions you’ll need to answer when creating sales messaging for prospects include:
• Why should I meet with you?
• Why should I change what I currently do and buy a product or service like this?
• Why should I buy your solution rather than a competitive alternative?
**Why Buying Questions Are Important**
If the goal of great sales messaging is to create rapport and gain traction through the sales process, then answering a buyer’s buying questions is the best way to create alignment with buyers. This is true for several reasons:
1. The human mind works through inquiry. We process information and solve problems by posing and answering questions. So when we direct our messaging to answer a buyer’s questions, especially their unstated, internal questions, we create instant rapport. That is, the messaging resonates with the buyer, because it answers the precise questions they are asking themselves.
2. Questions attract and focus the mind’s attention. When we hear or read a question, we automatically begin trying to answer that question. It’s an unconscious, reflexive response. By framing your sales messaging in the context of answering the buyer’s question, buyers will automatically be attracted to read and internalize your messaging.
3. Answering buyers’ questions helps us sales and marketing folks focus our communications and get to the point. Without questions to answer, messaging tends to veer off course, and lack the specificity necessary to effectively communicate with buyers.
**Different Buyer, Different Buying Questions**
The first step in determining what buying questions your company needs to answer in order to be more competitive, is to identify the types of buyers you need to attract and win. The most common buyer types include prospects, customers, channel partners, analysts and investors. The second step is to identify each buyer’s primary buying questions.
We’ve already reviewed a typical prospect’s buying questions. Now notice the differences among the questions for each buyer type:
Customer’s Buying Questions
• Why should I keep doing business with you?
• Why should I upgrade to your new product or service?
Channel Partner’s Buying Questions
• Why should I distribute a product or service like this?
• Why should I distribute your product rather than a competitive alternative?
Analyst’s Buying Question
• Why is your product or service a great idea?
Investor’s Buying Question
• Why is your company a great investment opportunity?
Consider how different the answers to the prospect’s questions are compared to answers for the channel partner, for example. The prospect’s questions are about the business case for buying the product from your company. The channel partner’s buying questions are about the business case for a joint venture with your company.
It should be clear now why knowing which buying questions your company needs to answer can lead to a dramatic improvement in the quality of your messaging, and thus to a dramatic improvement in your company’s competitiveness and its win rates.
**Great Sales Messaging is Buyer-Centric**
In order for your sales messaging to be truly effective, it must be buyer-centric. Your sales messaging must provide a compelling and persuasive answer to your buyer’s primary buying questions for each of the products and services that you offer.
This means that the presentation you use for prospects will be different from the one you use for channel partners, which in turn will be different from the ones you use for analysts, investors, etc. If your slide deck is essentially the same for each of your buyer types, what you have is mushy messaging, not great sales messaging. More importantly, you have a tremendous opportunity to improve your company’s sales and marketing effectiveness now, by implementing great sales messaging.
Answer Your Buyers Key Questions Make Your Sales Messaging Great - To learn more about this author, visit Michael Cannon's Website.
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Dave KurlanDave Kurlan is the founder and CEO of Objective Management Group, Inc., the industry leader in sales assessments and sales force evaluations, and the CEO of David Kurlan & Associates, Inc., a consulting firm specializing in sales force development. Dave has been a top rated speaker at Inc. Magazine's Conference on Growing the Company, the Sales & Marketing Management Conference and the Gazelles Sales & Marketing Summit. He has been featured on radio and TV, including World Business Review with General Norman Schwarzkopf, in Inc. Magazine, Selling Power Magazine, Sales & Marketing Management Magazine and Incentive Magazine. He is the author of Mindless Selling and Baseline Selling – How to Become a Sales Superstar by Using What You Already Know about the Game of Baseball. He created and wrote STAR, a proprietary recruiting process for hiring great salespeople, and he writes Understanding the Sales Force, a popular business Blog and is a contributing author to The Death of 20th Century Selling and 101 Great Ways to Improve Your Life, Volume 2. - Visit Dave Kurlan's Website |
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David AchesonDavid Acheson is the founder of DCJA Consultancy. DCJA Consultancy is a management consultancy business specialising in B2B sales consultancy. They offer bespoke and packaged sales consultancy including Sales Optimisation Review, Interim Sales Management, Sales & Marketing Review, 1:1 Sales & Management Staff Analysis, Management Training, Solution Sales Training, Creation of New Pay Plan, KPI's, run Customer Feedback Campaigns, assist with Recruitment, Coaching, Appraisals and set up Strategic Marketing Campaigns. David spent his early career in accountancy and then moved into sales in 1982, working in Office Equipment, IT, Advertising, Training, Outsourcing and Consultancy. He has held many Senior Positions in SMBs and Global Organisations including Head of Sales Operations & Head of Business Development. His knowledge, skills and great experience of the Sales Industry has led to David making keynote speeches and running educational sessions to key businesses through organisations including The Chamber of Commerce and Business Link. - Visit David Acheson's Website |
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Linda RichardsonLinda Richardson is the Founder and Executive Chairwoman of Richardson, a global sales training and performance improvement company. As a recognized leader in the industry, she has won the coveted Stevie Award for Lifetime Achievement in Sales Excellence and she was identified by Training Industry, Inc. as one of the “Top 20 Most Influential Training Professionals.” Ms. Richardson is credited with the movement to Consultative Selling and is the author of ten books on selling and sales management, including Sales Coaching — Making the Great Leap from Sales Manager to Sales Coach, and Stop Telling, Start Selling. She teaches sales and management at the Wharton Graduate School of the University of Pennsylvania and the Wharton Executive Development Center. Linda is a frequent speaker at industry and client conferences, has been published extensively in industry and training journals, and has been featured in numerous publications, including The Wall Street Journal, Forbes, Nation’s Business, Selling Power, Success, and The Conference Board Magazine. Learn more about Richardson's sales training and performance improvement solutions at http://www.richardson.com web - Visit Linda Richardson's Website |
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George LudwigGeorge Ludwig is a recognized authority on sales strategy and peak performance psychology. An international speaker, trainer, and corporate consultant, he helps clients like Johnson & Johnson, Abbott Laboratories, Northwestern Mutual, CIGNA, and numerous others improve sales force effectiveness and performance. Though it's George's strategies and processes that help corporations increase productivity and performance, it's his tremendous energy and dynamism that spark the transformation. Again and again, clients remark on his amazing ability to unleash human capacity and inspire men and women to break out of their comfort zones. The result is a whole new type of salesperson. His customized presentations teach achievers to make stunning advances in their lives. From helping salespeople realize cherished dreams to helping corporations exponentially accelerate revenue streams, George Ludwig leaves audiences and individuals empowered, emboldened, and clamoring for more. George is the best-selling author of Power Selling: Seven Strategies for Cracking the Sales Code and Wise Moves: 60 Quick Tips to Improve Your Position in Life & Business. - Visit George Ludwig's Website |
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Leanne Hoagland-SmithAre your sales where you want them to be? Will you be one of the few who achieves sales or business success or one of the many who have failed to change? Are you tired of being told you are like everyone else? Then you may find my first book on sales of interest. Be the Red Jacket in the Sea of Gray Suits, The Keys to Unlocking Sales available at Amazon or at http://www.processspecialist.com/red-jacket.htm. This book is a reflection of my no-nonsense approach to improving sales to overall business results. If you are truly committed to making sustainable changes, then I can help you secure a positive return on your investment because I focus on executable solutions not telling you the problems you already know you have. From training to corporate (group) coaching to executive one on one coaching, my approach is to assess, create awareness, build a goal driven action plan and then execute. The bottom line question is "Not do you or your employees know it, but do you or they want to do it?" Please call for a free strategy session at 219.759.5601. - Visit Leanne Hoagland-Smith's Website |
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John BrennanJohn Brennan Ed.D. Dr. Brennan is President of Interpersonal Development, LLC, a training and development firm. Interpersonal Development has provided sales training and coaching to more than 3,000 sales reps from over 100 companies. A native of Australia, Dr. Brennan received his doctorate from the University of Rochester. His dissertation researched the effectiveness of Behavioral Modeling Technology in training people in interpersonal skills. While he has spent most of his career designing or delivering training, he was also a Vice-President of Sales of a training and development franchise with operations in 25 markets. Dr. Brennan has designed and delivered sales training in North America, Asia, Europe, Australia and the Middle East. He has been a guest speaker at numerous national and regional professional conferences. When Microsoft wanted Best Practices articles on sales for their web site, they called Dr. Brennan. The results are at http://office.microsoft.com/en-us/FX011387391033.aspx His firm’s clients have included Volvo, The Prudential, Merrill Lynch, Eastman Kodak, Gannett, Equifax Europe, the Economist Group and countless small businesses. - Visit John Brennan's Website |
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Kim CastleWith nearly two decades in the advertising and design business, with clients like Domino's Pizza, General Motors, Direct TV, Pedigree, Wolfgang Puck, Higher Octave Music, Hollywood Celebrity Products, Disney, and Paramount, as well as thousands of entrepreneurs around the world define, structure, communicate, and position their business for greater profits, BrandU(R) co-creators Kim Castle and W. Vito Montone discovered that entrepreneurs could experience the same power that big brands command for a fraction of the cost with the world's only process-based results-drive Integral approach to business creation. BrandU(R) is helping entrepreneurs grow with the power of extreme clarity from idea...to brand...to market(TM) and helping one million entrepreneurs become successful and whole so that they can make a difference in the world. Are you one of them? If you want to experience clarity all the way to the bank(TM), get started now at http://www.brandu.com. - Visit Kim Castle's Website |
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Anne BarrAnne Barr has over 26 years experience in sales and marketing, six years as a franchisee. She has assisted over 367 business owners and purchasers to achieve their goals in career change, transition and exit strategy. She holds the designation of Certified Franchise Executive from the International Franchise Association, Certified Business Intermediary from the International Business Brokers Association and Board Certified Broker from the Texas Association of Business Brokers. Anne is active in professional organizations, networking groups and volunteers for non-profit entities. As owner/operator of four successful businesses, Anne has proven people skills and enjoys helping clients find the right "fit" in business ownership. Visit www.FranchiseOpportunitySpecialist.com for more information about me and my company. - Visit Anne Barr's Website |
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