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Sales-Meeting-Minute

Are you asking the right questions?

Have you ever had this happen to you?

You are in the middle of your second or third good discussion with a prospect and everything seems to be going great. The prospect seems engaged and happy to work with you. 

Then prospect poses an innocent sounding question, "So, how big is your company?"

Without hesitation, you answer that question. You recite, more or less verbatim, the standard reply you were trained to recite when people ask you about the size of your company. The answer laid out for you in your orientation workshops, promotion materials, and brochures: 500 employees, one headquarters location, three regional offices, and six assembly facilities in three states. 

The prospect nods and the conversation continues.

Although there are plenty of smiles, pleasantries, and earnest promises to be in touch as you wrap up your meeting, the oddest thing takes place once you leave the building... All forward motion stops. 

The prospect no longer returns your calls. Your emails receive ambiguous replies and weeks pass by. You're off the prospect's radar screen. You find that no one else in the company seems willing to acknowledge your attempts to reach out. It's like the prospect has ordered everyone in the enterprise to deny your company's existence.

What happened?!? You answered all the prospect's questions!

David Sandler advises that you should only answer your prospects' questions if doing so can help you... or at least it can't hurt you.

Since prospects tend to "smokescreen" their questions - meaning that they tend to ask questions whose true purposes aren't likely to be clear to you at first - you must make sure, first and foremost, that you're answering the real question.

Guess what? When that prospect so innocently asked, "How big is your company?" the real question was: "Will you be able to handle an 11-state distribution schedule?"

As it happens, you can handle an 11-state distribution schedule. But the answer your company taught you to repeat only mentions three states. And that was enough (non)information for this prospect to tune you out... without telling you why. 

In most cases, and especially in the early going, you have to assume that every question you hear from a prospect is a smokescreen question. 

So the question, "How soon can you get shipment to us?" may mean, "Can you get shipment to us by 10:30 Thursday morning?" The question, "How strict are you with quantity discounts?" may mean, "Can I take advantage of the quantity discount and arrange for a 14-day split-shipment?"

If you make a habit of answering the first question you hear, you'll never understand the real question!

You must discover why the prospect asked you the question you just heard. You must identify the underlying intent. 

Intent: The importance and true relevance of the question to the topic of discussion.

If you don't know the intent you cannot respond intelligently. 

How do you identify the intent? By Reversing. 

Reversing is the strategy of responding to your prospect's questions and statements with a question. It puts the verbal ball back in the prospect's court. 

Reversing prevents you from attempting to mind-read. It adds clarity and completeness to the prospect's smokescreen questions and statements. It helps you uncover the underlying intent of those questions and statements. 

Some reversing questions include:

  • Why do you ask?
  • Why is that important?
  • What are you hoping I'll tell you?
  • Why did you bring that up just now?
  • What are you really asking?
  • What are you really saying?

Reversing must be done with caution. Firing back with questions in response to the prospect's questions may sound harsh. So in most cases, you will want to precede your questions with softening statements. 

  • That's a good question. And you're asking me that because...?
  • I'm glad you asked me that. What are you hoping I'll tell you?
  • Many people ask me that. And that's important to you because...?
  • That's an interesting question. Why do you ask? (What brought that up?)
  • Good point. And you brought that up now because...?
  • I appreciate you sharing that. I can't help wondering, what are you really saying?

Often it takes three or more reverses to get the prospect's real question. 

In this case, if you had asked effective Reversing questions, you could have gotten to the prospect's true question and confirmed that an 11-state roll-out was no problem. 

And you would still be in the game. 

 

Copyright 2015 Sandler Training and Insight Sales Consulting Inc. All rights reserved.

John Glennon is the owner of Insight Sales Consulting Inc, the authorized Sandler Training Licensee for the Interior of British Columbia. He can be reached at [email protected], toll free at 1-866-645-2047 or visit www.glennon.sandler.com

This article is written by or on behalf of an outsourced columnist and does not necessarily reflect the views of Castanet.



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About the Author

John Glennon is an authorized licensee of Sandler TrainingSM in the Interior of British Columbia.

John is an accomplished sales person and manager with over 17 years sales and sales management experience. Beginning in sales in 1990 as a sales representative, he progressed to territory manager, sales manager, division manager and national sales and marketing manager roles throughout his career.

In 1997, John became a student of the Sandler Selling System. This introduction changed his sales career and over time propelled John and his career to new heights.

Successful in accelerating growth through strategic leadership, John knows firsthand the value of a sales training approach that follows a learning philosophy of ongoing reinforcement. He is experienced in driving the behaviours, attitudes and techniques required of an effective sales team.

Sandler Training is offered on a regular basis from their Kelowna, BC training center and through innovative distance learning programs to the rest of the BC Interior.

www.glennon.sandler.com




[email protected]
1-866-645-2047



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The views expressed are strictly those of the author and not necessarily those of Castanet. Castanet does not warrant the contents.

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