68 Getting to your prospect’s pain – the questions to ask

What is your prospect’s pain?

People buy to fulfil outcomes and to solve problems with solutions. People who are in the market for certain products and services often have a problem that they need an answer to. Your prospect’s ‘pain’ will be the real reason they are in the marketplace looking for a solution. The pain a prospect has will not usually be the first thing that they tell you when they meet. You will need to uncover it with questions and then show them how you are able to make the pain go away with your product or service.

Why is it important to find it?

The real painful issue behind your prospect’s desire to find a solution will be the light that will ignite their desire to buy. If you can find it you will be in a stronger position when describing your solution. You are more likely to motivate a person to buy from you when they see that you understand what they really want and why they want it.

Your challenge

Your challenge will be to ask the right questions and build enough trust and rapport between you and your potential customer so that they feel comfortable enough to tell you what you need to know. You will need to get their permission to probe. You will also need to listen, summarising for clarification at key intervals.

Questions to ask which find the pain

• What do you need to find out about x or y?
• What is most important that you find out about this x?
• Why is that most important to you?
• When choosing x or: y what matters most?
• What are your priorities?
• What problems have you been experiencing that has led to a desire to explore x?
• What led you to decide to look for an x solution?
• What has motivated your need to find a solution for x?
• What has been most challenging for you?
• How do you hope we can help you?
• What do you feel that you really need to achieve x?
• What are your timescales?

FIND THE PAIN – SPECIAL RESPONSE CHECKLIST

• What are some of the problems people have that motivate a desire to buy your product or service?
• What kind of pain drives their decisions?
• What kind of questions would uncover this pain?

How to use this information

The first part of any sales appointment should be all about the prospect. You will need to have a good set of questions that enables you to both uncover their pain, find out what they need, what their priorities and timescales are.

Once you have summarised your complete and full understanding of their position you will be in the best place to position your solution. Use this section to help you to create a targeted set of consultation questions.

69 Tailoring your sales proposition and positioning the benefits

What is a sales proposition?

A sales proposition is your presentation of a solution. A solution that potentially solves the problems and needs you have established during the exploratory part of your sales conversation. Your sales proposition may take the form of a presentation, proposal, dialogue or all three. The method you choose to use to communicate your sales proposition will depend on what is most appropriate.

What is meant by positioning the benefits?

Positioning the benefits is all about making a connection or link between what is important to your prospect and what you are able to fulfil. Positioning the benefits is about telling or showing exactly what your solution will do for your prospect. Benefits bring the solution alive and sell the value.

Why is it important?

Tailoring your sales proposition and positioning the benefits is how you ensure that your prospect lives the full potential value of your solution. It is so much better than just running through the generic facts. Your prospect will be interested in their needs, their problems and their solution. They will want to feel special. Tailoring your proposition and using their language to do that is a very powerful way of ensuring that you hit all the right buttons. The greater the fit, the greater the chance you will have of getting a positive reaction.

Your challenge

To tailor your sales proposition and position the benefits effectively you will need to be very clear about what the benefits of your solution are in the first place. Listening and asking the right questions will have been a vital part of the process. Without having the correct information about your prospect’s needs, problems and values it will be impossible to tailor your proposition. You will also need to be flexible and able to communicate what you do for people in different ways. You will not be able to rely on a standard sales pitch. Each presentation you make might be slightly different from the one before.

How to tailor your sales proposition for each individual client

• Summarise your prospect’s present problems and desired outcomes.
• Use their language.
• Make sure that you have their full agreement on their issues.
• Take each separate need or group of needs and connect with a description of a solution for them. Tell them exactly what you can do to help them to achieve what matters most.
• Project into the future by relating the solution you are suggesting to the bigger picture.
• Share relevant examples of how you have helped organisations to solve similar problems and achieve a good result. Make sure that you choose examples that the prospect will relate to.
• Make your recommendations confidently.

CAN YOU IMPROVE YOUR SALES PROPOSITIONS? – SPECIAL RESPONSE CHECKLIST

• How do you tend to make your sales propositions?
• How well do they work?
• Do you tailor your sales propositions?
• Are you communicating more about what your prospect will get than what you do?
• What can you do to improve your sales propositions?

How to use this information

After you have communicated your sales proposition you will want to get to a point when your prospect says ‘Yes I want to do business with you’. If you can reach this point conceptually after a verbal presentation, your final stage will be a proposal and the price. If you have been able to gauge budgets and price expectations during your initial conversations it will make it a lot easier to position the price in your ultimate proposal.

70 Designing a winning proposal

What is a proposal?

A proposal is your summation of exactly what your client will get for their money. You will usually only prepare a proposal after you have gained conceptual agreement to work with the client. This may follow an initial appointment during which you will have explored what the client’s problems, needs and priorities are. You may also have explored the budgets they would be comfortable working within. Your proposal can be delivered in either electronic, hard copy presentation or both. Even better, you can deliver in person giving you another chance to get in front of them. Your style of delivery will very much depend on the individual client’s expectations and the nature and value of the work you are proposing.

Why is it important?

It is important to make a good job of your proposal as even though your potential client has agreed conceptually, the deal will have not been finalised. Your prospective client may use the proposal to make their final decision. They may want to compare your proposal with others. Your proposal will show them how well you have listened and understood their position and requirements. It represents you, your organisation and resells the potential value of the solution before the final commitment is made to your proposal.

Your challenge

Your challenge may be that you have a lot of very time-consuming proposals to prepare. If, as a result, your proposal is late and lacking in any way, you risk giving your prospect a negative message about your reliability or ability to meet the required standards the job requires. Your proposal and everything that goes with it is a reflection of you and what your business promises. It can make or break the final outcome.

Never do a proposal on speculation. It will waste your time and you won’t have enough information to make a good job of it.

The structure of a winning proposal

It is a good idea to create a basic proposal template that covers the key sections important to your proposal. You can add in the individual customer’s detail as required. This will make it a lot easier and quicker to do. There may be elements of your proposal that end up as standard. Your proposal will need to provide enough detail for your client to make their decision. It will also need to look attractive and be easy to read and interpret. Section headings that include the word ‘Your’ will make it appear very personal.

The key elements of a winning proposal will include

• Introduction – Refer to your last meeting along with an overview of what to expect in this proposal.
• Your situation – This is your situation summary of what you established was important at your recent meeting. Use their language, priorities and timescales.
• Your objectives – Bullet point exactly what they have told you.
• Your solution – The solution you suggest broken down so that the client can see all the key elements clearly. You may include in this section some standard descriptions of elements of your service, product and methodology you propose.
• Value – Make sure that the ultimate value of each element of the solution is communicated. What is in it for them is most important. They are buying results, not processes. It may be appropriate to refer to financial savings or other tangible results they will benefit.
• Your price – An outline of your charges and any price assumptions. If you have price guarantee this is the time to include it.
• Your plan – This could include suggested targets and timescales. A calendar of actions is a useful way of projecting forward, assuming the project will go ahead.
• Your next step – This is where you suggest the follow up you have agreed.
• Sign off – a positive statement about working together in the future.

Success tips

• Make sure that you fully understand your client’s situation before you do your proposal.
• Don’t make it too long: two or three pages is enough.
• Keep the language you use straightforward and clear.
• If you can, provide your client with a choice of options.
• If you outline your methodology keep this broad; too much detail and you give all your secrets away.
• Always follow up yourself – don’t leave it longer than a week.

HOW GOOD ARE YOUR PROPOSALS – SPECIAL RESPONSE CHECKLIST

• Take time out to have a good look at the standard of yourown proposals.
• How long, on average, do they take you to complete?
• Do you get them out on time?
• How many of them turn into new business? How many don’t?
• How well do they reflect the image you want to portray to your customers?
• How could you use the structure provided?
• Do you make sure that your proposals appear tailormade and personal?
• How could you improve your proposal design?

How to use this information

Create a simple system for creating winning proposals and getting them done on time.

71 Following up and following through

What is follow up?

Follow up is carried out by telephone or email after an initial contact has been made with a prospective customer. You may need to follow up the following.

• Leads generated at networking events or conferences.
• Leads or contacts made at talks.
• Sales letters or direct mail.
• Sales proposals.
• Offers on your products and services made to your best customers.
• Research or testing of new ideas.

Why is follow up important?

Following up sales letters or direct mail can increase the response you get between 20% and 50%. Follow up in general is vital.

Follow up both acts as a reminder and shows that you are interested. Most people will thank you for following up. Another term for follow up is nurturing. By following up you are nurturing your prospective customers.

Your challenge

Think about how long it typically takes to finally get a piece of business in your industry. Consider whether or not you would have got it if you hadn’t been disciplined with your nurturing. Your challenge will be to get into the routine of doing your follow up. This will involve setting up a system and keeping the focus.

How to follow up successfully

• If your follow up is by telephone always ask if it is convenient to talk.
• Remind of the last contact.
• Explain the purpose of your call.
• Always have full details of your last contact in front of you.
• Get the details right.
• Use their name.
• Connect with the rapport you had the last time you met or spoke. Find some common ground from the start.
• Be disciplined and carry on until you have a conclusion.
• Don’t pester – calling and leaving messages every day is not good practice.
• It is better not to ask for the person to call you back. That way you are in control of when you try again. You may leave a message that you called and find out the best time to call back to catch the person in.
• Keep an up-to-date customer management system.

HOW GOOD IS YOUR FOLLOW UP? – SPECIAL RESPONSE CHECKLIST

• How do you handle the follow up of your sales proposals?
• How do you handle the follow up of the contacts you make?
• And sales leads – how many ‘Nos’ do you get before you give up?
• How much business could you be missing out on by not following up?
• What about following up sales letters or direct mail, have you ever tried it?
• How could you improve your follow up and follow through?
• What impact could this potentially have on your business?

How to use this information

If you can see the value of follow up and want to test out the impact it could have on your business, set yourself some goals and targets.