You should never ask the buyers the impact of their problems. Your job as a seller and as a Gap Seller is to find the value or the Gap for your client or prospect. As humans, we naturally want to get to the end result as quick as possible. That’s simply just not effective in selling. That’s your job.
Why should we never ask the buyers the impact of their problems?
Part of being a Gap Seller is your ability to make the connections between the current state root causes and technical problems and the future state outcomes. Your buyers aren’t Gap Sellers. They don’t know where you are trying to go or what equation you are trying to complete. Asking them what the impacts of their problems are is going to seem out of touch. “Why are you asking me?” If you go to a mechanic for an oil change, you can be damn sure the mechanic isn’t going to ask “what’s the impact of you not getting your oil changed today?” That would be ridiculous, they know the impacts far better than most of us.
You’re in the same position. Don’t ask the buyers the impact, use your Gap Selling skills, and calculate the impact for them.
- Loss of Credibility
We’ve talked about credibility a lot recently, because it’s important. As sellers, we need to show each and every buyer that we have done our research and we know their business and their environment. People are busy. If you have a problem are you more likely to take a meeting with someone who understands the lingo or the problem area and can make accurate and helpful recommendations or the person who takes up the entire first conversation trying to get on the same page?
You should know prior to the call what some of the potential impacts of their problems would be. If you don’t, go back to your PIC, and go back to your research. You need to be an expert before you jump on a call. Asking the buyer to run through the potential impacts makes you look uninformed, uninterested, and quite frankly, it makes it look like you don’t respect their time. If you lose their credibility early, good luck regaining it.
Don’t ask the buyers the impact of their problems. Go find it. Ask questions. Be freaking curious.
Key Learning Moments:
7:28 – Never ever ask the impact of the problem
15:21 – Don’t ask self diagnosing questions!
17:48 – Stay in the current state during discovery
19:14 – Make sure you find ALL the root causes
22:03 – Make sure to tie your found root causes to where the buyer wants to go
30:11 – Know your business and know the numbers for your client
31:51 – Summarize your findings from the discovery and then juxtapose it to the future goals
If you or your organization want to start asking sales questions that get your buyers to say yes, click here to schedule a call with our sales team.
0 Comments