Selling could be very easy if you know how to apply the right skills, right timing and the right strategy. It’s hard to imagine how important selling is unless your source of income depends on it. When it comes to selling, people always say “I don’t know how to do sales”, “it’s not for me”, “I’m not born to be a good salesperson” and they keep describing how hard the selling is. In fact, salespeople aren’t only selling something but they are more than that. Great salespeople are made, not born, there is no short cut for anyone to achieve success with knowing how to sell. Think of the last time you convinced your parents to buy something for you, whether you believe or not, you are selling something.
There are so many ways and techniques when it comes to closing and selling.
Here I’m going to share you the secrets how to do sales to anyone and anytime!
First thing you have to understand…
How do you convert something that’s a raw material? How do you sell any product? How do you sell a service where everyone is selling? The very first thing to consider is to understand that the decision is based on emotions. People buy based on emotion then only come with logic. Think about the anything you want to buy in your life, it could be a car, property, vacation, watches and it could be anything you want. Ask yourself why you want to buy at the first place? Why do you want to own it? Why and why?
If you have a deeper understanding of the buying, you will find that it’s all about emotion. Think about it, sometimes you buy the item is just because of greed, save money (solutions) or it may just generosity that it might help others. Those reasons are mostly related to emotional reasons. When you are selling something, are you just describing how important is your products based on the features and benefits? Or you are pushing the emotional buttons?
Emotions are playing a very important part in decision making. However, if you could apply the tips as below, that can surely help you a lot in overall success.
Do Research!
Time is precious, if you are expecting your client to give you time and know about what you are selling, you have to invest your time learning about them first. Everything is much easier today with social media to know better about what the customers like, love, hobbies and care about. It doesn’t take long time for pre-call as little as 15 minutes per prospect. You can research the details before meeting them with;
- Blogs
- Company page
- WeChat Official Account
Building rapport with clients
It doesn’t matter what position you hold, where you are, what industry you’re in – knowing how to build rapport can bring you pretty far with opportunities. When you know how to build the rapport with someone, he or she will want to help you. Always remember this, people only love to do business with the one they know, like and trust.
Some people might argue that this is inborn skills but I would say rapport can be developed naturally and can be improved from time to time just like any other skill.
Imagine if you are walking into a retail store, the promoter wouldn’t immediately say “Hello, would you like to buy this nice television?”. Usually will greet you with “Welcome” and start to ask “How are you today?” and “How may I help you?”. You might be feeling comfortable and start to comment what are the things you are looking for. They will build up the rapport and making you comfortable with the environment and the staff.
Similarly, when you are dealing with your prospect you have never meet or spoken before, it’s important to learn about them. If you notice your prospect love fishing, you may study more on the hobby and open asking about fishing related matters and make them love to share and talk to you.
The end target is to get to know your prospect before you launch into what you have and what attracts them, why they should need it, and why you are the best choice compared to others. Remember to talk to your prospect as a friend instead of speaking to them like a salesperson.
Know your buyer
The secret of “selling anything to anyone” does not really mean really selling anything to just anyone without knowing your buyers. Regardless of what industry you are, knowing and familiarising with the characteristics of your targeted buyers would bring you higher success rate to make the deals. We called this an ideal buyer profile and its considered like a secret weapon!
By matching the specific type of the so-called “anyone” who is just right for your service or product, you will save a lot of time on getting the poor-fit leads. You could actually have more time to convert the prospects to customers.
Provide value before you sell anything
Most people spend time in explaining very hard about how good and the effectiveness of the products but they forget about the value selling. Customers usually buy your value or service before the products. Selling with value and solution to the customers are much easier. Pay more attention on explaining and expressing how it can solve customer’s problem. This is because when you focus on value, the price will become less important. However, if you don’t focus more on the value, the only thing you can talk about is price and face the price war.
Position yourself as a professional advisor who can able to help and provide solution rather than a salesperson thirsty to sell. You will find much easier to make any deal when you finally get to connecting clients problem with your solution or in another word: A good helper
Quality questions and listen
Quality questions and listen
We are not perfect, no matter how good your research on your prospect, there will be some imperfections on the knowledge and that might not solve the problems. Thus, it’s very crucial to ask good questions throughout your conversation with prospects.
Below are the open-ended questions to build rapport, build and to strengthen the connection and trust with the clients.
What’s going on in your business these days? How have things changed?
What are your plans for this weekend?
It was a great session to know a short version of you in a meeting, but since we’re going to have dinner, I’d love to know a longer version. How did you come up with this company?
It’s good to have a list of the prepared questions as a starter and you just take it as a reference. This is because there is nothing fixed in a conversation and usually it will be unexpected. People love talking about themselves, their experience, hobby and your genuine interest will help to warm you up.
Once you have started your question, silent and just listen to them. You got to really listen what the buyer is going to say and that is the great moment to receive the information from them. When they have finished their thought, link back the message back to them and verify again with them if you understood them correctly. You will be an active listener. The more we listen, the more we know about our clients and it would easier for us to provide the best solution. The prospect would feel good to talk to you and they will be more likely to listen to you when you have something to say.
Match your prospects to the right level
It’s great to have a salesperson bring their talent and unique personality to selling process. But at the same time, paying the equivalent attention to your prospect’s personality is even more important. Our personal attributes and characteristics have a huge impact on how to like to be sold.
Here’s a brief breakdown on the 4 main personality of the buyers and how to sell them
Assertive
They are goal-oriented and decisive. Usually they look into the results rather than the personal relationships. They might not response to your festival wish or even send you holiday cards, but it can deliver the end results and commitments, the business relationship will be very strong. People with assertive personality types are also want information fast so that can make decision and move on.
How to sell them?
Professionalism is always the first thing they are looking at. Always make sure you’re well prepared for the meeting and if you don’t know the answer, you have to be sincere and let them know you will follow up instead of trying to give the inaccurate answer.
Assertive people love efficiency, don’t waste their time on repeating the things. They want the clear information.
Be direct to the point, emphasize how your service or product can solve their business’ problems. Assertive people will appreciate if you can demonstrate how the solution from you can be useful in their organization.
Provide more testimonials, tell more about the ROI with the clear figure rather than how much loved the service or product.
Assertive people are not a great listener, keep your information simple, direct to the point.
Amiable
Amiable people appreciate the personal relationship and the trust with their business partners. They love new challenges and creativity. On the other side, they probably don’t do research before meeting with you and you have the advantage to guide them through the purchasing process.
They don’t make decision fast. They take time to establish the rapport with the people they are dealing with. You would expect a longer sales process than usual and follow-ups are needed.
How to sell them?
You need to help them visualize the end results that could achieve what they want from your products or services.
It takes longer time in building up the rapport as they want to feel safe in the business relationship with your company before they get comfortable doing business with you.
Testimonial and examples are needed for the similar successful clients who have used your products and services. Tell the real story why did the client ABC come to you? Why they still continue to use the products? What are the features attractive them most?
Take the role as a professional advisor to guide them through the decision making process.
Give them the guarantees from company such as the purchase is refundable if they are not satisfy or they can cancel anytime to claim their anxieties and make them comfortable to buy.
Expressive
They very similar with amiable people, personal relationships are very important to them.
They are very concerned with other’s well-being especially the people around them such as employees and customers. The expressive people would want to know how their decision affect to people around them. Bear in mind that they have the powerful personalities to convince others.
Expressive people are creative, outgoing and spontaneous. They appreciate mutual respect, loyalty and friendship.
Don’t make any empty commitment or promise to expressive people or you will just end the relationship.
How to sell them?
Case studies, expressive people want to be reassured that you are really taking care of them. The best way is to show the real stories of how your service could help or impact to your customers.
Emphasize on the ongoing relationship with your customers. If your company offers the exceptional promotion for long-term partnership, this is the show time!
Expressive people don’t really look at facts and figures. They would prefer to look at how their decision affects their business on a human level.
Analytic
These people love data, facts and figures.
They will look the history of the business and get straight to the facts. Be prepared to the detailed questions and don’t be surprised they would study and know about you.
They stick to their deadlines and take time to make decision. These type of people are more logical and cautious than any other personality type. Once they make the decision, they will stick to it.
How to sell them?
Never ever rush the analytic people, they need longer selling process as they need to do research and know more about the facts and figures before making any decision.
Provide more detailed information as possible instead of just saying “Our products have helped many people to lose weight”, you should say “Our products have help many people to lose weight averagely 10 Kg within 3 months”.
Once you can identify the category of your prospects, tailor your presentation and messaging to nail what’s best suit to them.
People buy with emotions
It very rare to see a pure rational decision, in fact, I would say no such thing. Emotion makes decision, our emotions colour the way we process the information and eventually make the final decision. As a professional salesperson, you should learn to speak out the prospect’s emotions as well as their rational mind.
The general emotions such as
Greed: If I make a decision now, I will grab what I want!
Fear: If I don’t make decision now, I will lose it!
Altruism: If I make a decision now, others will be benefited!
Envy: If I don’t make a decision now, my competitor will have it!
Pride: If I make a decision now, I will become better!
Shame: If I don’t take action now, I will regret!
After all, you got to understand people buy because of emotion and they justify with logic. Don’t push your products, services, features and benefits. Think about what are the emotional hot buttons that you can do.
Always think out of the box, people don’t buy the drill, they just want a hole in the wall. You need to figure out how to solve the problem and once you can solve it nicely, you are at the right track. The amount of money you make is directly proportional to how deep you know the marketplace’s pain.
Remember, people don’t just buy products and services, they prefer to buy stories. There are hundreds and hundreds of similar products and choices out there, how do you stand out in this situation? Think about how to add a story to a watch, what’s the difference between a normal $50 watch and a $5000 Rolex watch? They both are tell the same time but if you add in the limited edition Rolex watch and the stories, the price would be very much different. It’s 100 times more valuable. So think about it, how to add a story to your products or services. Always remember, facts tell but the stories sell.
It’s important to be professional in sales, but it’s even more important to personable. Prospects have own life and things they are passionate with. Build the rapport with your prospects and drift to the personal once in a while and it doesn’t need to be all the time business, make them as your close friends.
That’s how we think selling should be done. Now we want to hear from you. What would you add to this guide? Share your thoughts in the comments.
