MAR3400 Ch8,9,10

consultative selling definition:

working with customers to try and understand why the need. “Selling slow” and making it personalized

Four Steps of Consultative Selling

Needs Discovery → Solution Development → Solution Presentation → Commitment to Action Plan

Needs Discovery:

most important step of consultative selling; you need to understand three or four things before you are ready to come back and present a product/solution to a customer)

process of Need Discovery step:

1. where is the customer today?

2. where will the customer be tomorrow?

3. headwinds; What’s keeping you stuck on the ‘today?’

4. are there any opportunities that you could take advantage of?

solution development definition:

the “fine tuning” our offering based on what we learned in step 1.

• tailor our services/products or customize some things that will help them make sure they get past these problems / grab these opportunities to take them to tomorrow.

  
  

solution presentation definition:

we are ready to come back to the customer and say “hey, we have something that can help you.”

Uncovering the need:

the customer hits us with an objection saying that they are not sure if they’re ready to move forward in our relationship, so we go back and work through their thought process

commitment to action plan:

When we come back and we make a bang up presentation where it's just perfectly aligned with what the customer is looking for, getting the customer to take action becomes pretty simple.

void model challenges:

• Customers rarely acknowledges company obstacles and problems

• Gap is worse than what the customer acknowledges

• Customer doesn’t realize that a better situation exists

• Sometimes it takes perspectives from many different members of the buying center to get the whole picture

why Needs Discovery is so important:

without the ability to uncover some very important things like where the customer is today, where they'd like to be tomorrow, we’re likely to just guess at the right kind of product we should recommend to the customer

SPINS Technique:

• Situation

• Problem

• Implication

• Needs payoff

• Summary/Solution questions

Situation Questions:

• General data-gathering questions

• Many situation-type questions can be answered through precall information gathering and planning

  • EX: what’s the project deadline, how many people are on your team

problem questions:

• Questions about specific difficulties, problems, or dissatisfactions

  • Make sure to ask customers why they think their issue is an issue, and what they think is causing it 

    • It's not just necessarily a problem, but it's also an opportunity that can help them get where they need to go.

implication questions:

• Help the prospect recognize the true ramifications of the problem

• Motivate the prospect to search for a solution to the problem

• Tell us how bad the problems are (How big is the gap?)

  • Think of the type of questions a doctor may ask you about a pain to understand the severity of your problem

implication questions are the most important because:

they measure how much the customer cares. If the customer doesn’t care about the problem, stop pursuing them

needs payoff questions:

• Questions about the usefulness of solving a problem. solution centered

• The point of these questions is to get the customer thinking about the future (I.e. Positive envisioning)

positive envisioning definition:

imagining a better future for yourself once you fix an issue you currently have

Summary and Solution Questions:

• Ensures that the customer is in agreement on the issues to be addressed and that they are willing to hear you out on your solution.

• Provides a smooth transition into product or service presentation

• Allows the customer to feel in control of the sales meeting

High performing salespeople will ask a good mix/variety of SPINS questions, but will have the bulk of the conversation be

Problem and Implication questions

Characteristics of a strong Presentation:

• Keeps the buyer’s attention

• Improves the buyer’s understanding

• Helps the buyer remember what was said

• Offers proof of the salesperson’s assertions/claims

• Creates a sense of value

Presentation Pyramid: What does the flow of a good product presentation or a solution presentation look like?

1. Review Issues

2. Present Solution

3. Summarize

4. Close

Use FAB when:

After presentation pyramid; we have to make sure that the customer understands the value of what we’re offering. Why should the customer care?

features:

• outlining the basic features and aspects of a product. 

  • A physical characteristic, that you can see, feel, touch or measure

    • EX: What is it? What do you sell? How are you going to solve a problem?

advantages:

• layout the obstacles and challenges of the process or solution. highlights what makes them different

  • EX: “Why is it important to do it this way?” “Why is this way better?”

benefits:

• what will happen when you choose our product. 

  • Must be personalized for best results, so asking implication questions is crucial

    • EX: “Why our product is better than someone else's." “When it works…” “If they close another path…”

    • “What does that mean to you (the buyer)?” “Of what value will that be to the buyer?”

types of benefits:

• Company Benefits:

  • Make or save money and time

  • Make a job easier or a product better and reduce stress

• Personal Benefits:

  • Recognition

    • EX: if you buy this product, you're going to get a lot more recognition and credit from your boss because they're going to be much happier with the productivity that happens in the company

  • Achievement

  • Security

  • Personal profit or pleasure

“People don’t buy drills, they buy holes”

I.e. they buy the outcome that they’re hoping to achieve with that drill

= People don’t buy features, they buy benefits

value definition:

the benefits the products a product or service provides minus the costs of acquiring, implementing and using the product or service

• V = B - C

What separates a great seller from an average one is:

the use of stories/storytelling

Six Steps to Telling a Good Story:

1. Why

2. Setting

3. Complication

4. Turning Point

5. Resolution

6. Questions

payoff story:

Tells the customer a story about the value that can be gained from implementing your solution.

• help us when the customer says, i don’t know if this is worth making a change or doing something different

the most common type of story:

payoff

process story:

Tells the customer a story about the details of HOW you and your company developed a solution for a similar customer. (I.e. helping the customer understand the process)

• Resolution: “Here are the details of HOW WE HELPED!”

the goal of process stories:

• illustrate the importance of a thorough solution development process, and establish credibility as a partner that’s easy to do business with.

  • They help us when the customer can see the benefits, but are still not sure if they know how to use the product in an effective way

foreshadowing story:

• Tells the Customer a story about a similar situation that another company failed to address. Gives a high-level overview of what can happen if the obstacle or challenge is not overcome

  • Turning point: continuing and/or not fixing the problem. “Never realized it was worth making some changes until I realized how severe the problem was”. this story keep you stuck at the turning point

We retain _% of what we hear, and _% of what we see and hear

20 ; 50

Memorable strengths, create comfort with the choice, and sense of differentiation all go into:

better positioning

How do we get people to remember the details?

• Call-outs and Chunking

• response checks

call-outs:

• are meant to change things up, change the pattern, etc

  • If we want something to really pop out, we should use a color that is not the same as the colors that we've been using throughout the rest of the presentation

chunking:

• when we take really important concepts and boil it down to really simple things. We try to come up with a device that helps people remember the details

  • EX: using acronyms, “Us vs Them”, only a few important numbers (50 and 20%: we are only 50 miles away and you will save 20% in inventory costs)

Response Checks:

• assessing reactions

• making adjustments