During a recent Strategic Customer Care session, one participant, we'll call him Rick, had a demo scheduled with a client. The standard "show up and throw up" they typically did early in the sales cycle.
Trying to shorten the buying cycle, I 'dummied up' and asked naively, "Why does the customer want to buy? What are they trying to accomplish?" Rick couldn't tell me. I asked if he thought the salespeople on the account knew. He said no. I gave him an assignment: he had to find out "Why," "Why now," and "What's it worth." Otherwise, no demo. In other words, no compelling reason to buy...no demo.
So Rick took a risk, and asked the client why he was looking for a solution like theirs. He asked what their goals were, what kind of outcomes they expected, and what would happen if those outcomes were achieved in the demo. He asked, and found out, their timeline for implementation of the new product. And finally he asked, ‘what happens if you don’t buy a new product?’ and uncovered a number of problems that would ensue if they didn’t move forward. To his surprise, the prospect happily answered all Rick’s questions and the result was they moved into the demo with clear expectations and goals already in place.
Rick’s questions shortened the buying cycle and it closed hours after the demo ended. The untapped power of the ‘other sales team’ – customer service providers, technical staff, IT consultants, and others within the company that interact with prospects and customers – is huge. Do your people know the questions to ask to get a sale on track?
