qualifying Archives - Page 3 of 5

Your customer's budget creates a banana bunch of big qualification questions. Can they pay? How much should we ask for? What do we do when they come back with, "That's too much!"?

Unfortunately for salespeople, these are all the wrong questions.

This may be one of the most important ideas I've ever shared. I talk a bit about it in my video training and live calls, but not to this extent. Only with exclusive 1-on-1 clients who are working with me on an extended coaching program have I gone into this level of detail. So listen:

Budget is NOT about your customer's ability to pay!

Yes, that's what I said: how much money your prospect has in their wallet or bank account is not the issue here.

Your Customer's Budget: Not What You Thought It Was

One of those mental 'flips' is coming...

Ready?

Budget is more about YOU than anything else.

Your head trash.

Your limiting beliefs on what your product or service is worth.

Surprise!

Head trash telling you--subconsciously, remember--a certain dollar amount is "a lot of money"? Watch yourself get nervous when you start walking around numbers like that.

Begin noticing when you get nervous. That's the poker tell.

What You Should Be Asking Yourself About Your Customer's Budget

Let's get right into the question you should be asking yourself when it comes to your customer's budget:

Does this prospect have a problem big enough to make it worth my while to solve?

Roll this around for awhile.

Think of the implications.

I'll bet you've been playing it small with your customer's budget. "Well I'll just offer my product or service at a few hundred / a few thousand dollars, and we'll see what happens."

NO!

Can you see how, with this filter putting those blinders on you and blocking out any other opportunities, you're forcing yourself to see only those small opportunities that fit your expectations and head trash?

At the low end of the prospect spectrum, we have those who are nervous about trusting anyone, failing or on their way to failure, don't have any money and are disinclined to talk with other people. Low-end potential clients.

Is this who you've been subconsciously choosing to play the game of sales with? Without making a conscious choice about it? This is your customer's budget?

Consciously applied, Budget is about attracting those prospects who have a problem that's big enough to be worthy of your attention to solve.

Budget always comes down to your self-esteem. I can't say it more plainly than that. And as usual, I'm the only guy saying it, too. You've been looking in the wrong direction all this time. Your customer's budget isn't about them. It's about you.

Conceptually Applying Your Customer's Budget In the Real World

So how do you apply this in the real world?

Choose your income level. Pick your revenue target. Determine how many customers you need to hit that target.

Now spend some of your time--perhaps a lot of your time or maybe even most of your time--looking and filtering for prospects who have problems the size of which are attractive for you to solve.

It's not like this is extra work. After all, you're already doing it...for a much smaller payday.

For prospects on the other end of the spectrum than you're probably used to playing the sales game with, money is not a problem. They aren't scared to talk to someone who can help them. They don't have trust issues with implementatation. They don't question you're every move; they just let you get to work. Money...money to them is a resource, and if the problem is big enough for them they can get the money. Cash can almost always be gotten if the prospect wants the result badly enough. What I'm saying is, budget is almost never the real issue in selling. (So if it's not, then the problem is somewhere else, and that's what I've been telling you through this whole post. Look at that picture at the top: where do you believe that jeep comes from?!)

The money is available.

The choice is yours.

>> Jason Kanigan is a sales force developer. Sign up to learn the secrets of ethical, effective selling with SALES ON FIRE <<

Qualifying before you get there--before you begin the conversation with the prospect--is an easy but overlooked part of the sales process. Everyone wants to know, "What secret techniques do you use to get them to buy?" when you've got them on the phone or are sitting in front of them; however, you're really starting too late in the process if this is your focus. In fact, there are several key things we can do prior to prospecting. These will help ensure we're talking to people who truly need our help. They'll also smooth out some of the bumps in the sales road we likely would have otherwise encountered later.

Qualifying Before You Get There: How To

Trainer Jack Daly has some great recommendations to get a powerful headstart on your prospecting and qualifying processes. The first thing I want you to notice is his system of creating a five column list of potential customers. Who are these potential customers? A straightforward way of figuring out who you should be focusing on speaking with was covered in my last entry.

Column #1: List your potential key accounts down the left side.

Column #2: Account status, and prospecting activity to it over the past 90 days (this is arbitrary, in my opinion: it could be 30, 60 or 90 days as you please).

Column #3: Hurdles blocking you from winning the sale. Then analyze how you can overcome these.

Column #4: Timeline of events for achieving the win.

Column #5: Assignment of action steps to individuals to hit the timeline targets.

Now I will share with you that while the process of making this little spreadsheet and qualifying before you get there is not difficult, very few people actually do it. But don't you believe you'd have a much better chance of closing a sale if you had a roadmap to getting there and a deadline for doing so?

Edison said There is no expedient to which a man will not go to avoid the labor of thinking. How many of us are guilty of this?

Mapping Out the Road Trip: Qualifying Before You Get There

So we can leave our prospecting and qualifying activities in the dark, or we can think and clear them up. What position would you rather be in?

Daly's next suggestion is to apply the same process to key accounts you already have. How can you get an increasing flow of business through these existing clients?

Again, we are taking out the guesswork. If we don't know something, we now are aware of what question we need answered...before we ever speak to the prospect.

Qualifying before you get there is accomplished by determining in advance which questions you need answered. Sounds simple, but hardly anybody does it. Imagine how much time this would save you. Instead of fumbling around in the dark with disjointed questions, trying to latch onto some pain point or other, you go straight for the jugular.

Either they're In, or they're Out. Either they have this key problem or they don't. Either they have an opportunity to work together that's in alignment with your goals and methods or they don't. Ultra fast. Razor sharp. Crystal clear.

You can be qualifying before you get there. Or you can continue to prospect and then qualify, in a slow, stumbling manner. Your choice.

>> Was this helpful for you? Share or Comment to let us and someone else interested in sales know! And you can join us on Facebook for other tips and discussions by 'Liking' us with the button on the right. <<

Part of Selling 101 is effective questioning. Salespeople believe because they have a brain and a mouth, they must have good questioning skills. Unfortunately, this is frequently not true. When we look back at the Sales Board's study results, we find that 86% of salespeople ask the wrong questions.

What questions are salespeople asking? What should they be asking about instead?

Sales expert Mark Hunter provides his answer in this video:

Selling 101 - Effective Questioning

So Mark highlights three types of questioning by salespeople:

1. Lousy - asks questions customer knows answer to, but salesperson does not

2. Average - asks questions customer doesn't know answer to, but salesperson does

3. Great - asks questions customer doesn't know answer to, and salesperson doesn't either.

What does the Great questioning approach result in? "Let's go find the answer together." I can tell you from experience this is very powerful. The chances for a profitable long term relationship, uncovering new needs, and strategic profitability are all results of taking the risk. But if you're confident in your abilities and fulfillment, there really isn't any risk, is there.

At first the Great questioning approach seems a bit scary. You are really going out into the open, the unknown. This does not seem to be Selling 101! But that's why it's so effective: you and your prospect will not find new, bigger and more powerful solutions inside your comfort zone. When your questioning leads a prospect to discovering for themselves that they have a huge problem overlooked until now which you can fix, you take a big step towards being seen as a trusted advisor.

Many sales scripts are organized around positioning and driving a prospect to a conclusion. That is Average selling, however, because it only does one thing. Either you get the result you planned for, or you don't. That result is inside the box. It's "We do this", and that's it. For those who say they "know" Selling 101 - What have you been leaving on the table?

>> Jason Kanigan is a sales force developer and business development expert. Was this post useful to you? We provide these sales tips for Free, so please Share, Like or Comment! You can also Follow this blog with the big red button in the bottom left. Thanks! <<

qualifying

Your Customer’s Budget: Qualifying 101