Sales Skills

How you sell to people is to ask them some good qualifying questions. For instance; Why did you pick up this book? What are you looking for in sales training? What techniques do you try that don’t work for you? When have you been frustrated when trying to make a sale? Those are discovery questions.

So what you need to do is to find what questions work well for what you are selling. How many times have you walked into a clothing store and the retail person has said, “Can I help you today?” That’s not a qualifying question; that’s an invitation for you to say, “No, I’m just looking, thanks” and shut off the whole process. How many times have you walked into a retail shop and the person has said to you, “Hi! Are you shopping for yourself, or are you looking for a gift for someone else today?”

Well, how do you get away from that one? You can’t just go, “Never mind. I’m just looking.” It’s not that easy. You’re now in a conversation. You have to say, “Well, my mother-in-law has a birthday coming up, and I have no idea what to buy for her, and I’d better buy her something because she did something really nice for me a couple of weeks ago.” Oh, my gosh! Now the sales person knows what you want and how to help you. That’s why you ask good discovery questions. There is no other way to know how to help your prospect talk himself into buying. So figure out what discovery questions work well for what you’re selling, and then learn to listen.

The best salespeople sell because they listen. If you listen, the prospects are going to tell you why they’re interested in what you have to offer, why they’re not interested in what you have to offer, and then you have someplace to go in your conversation. You have some way of knowing what the conversation is going to be.

So, ask your questions and listen. Hear what they’re saying. People will give you buying signs. A buying sign is something like, “Well, I was thinking about getting a Budweiser mug because I just love the Budweiser horse ads.” My gosh, there’s a buying sign for you. Take that person to the beer mug section of the store and sell him a Budweiser mug. Listen for buying signs.

Also listen for concerns that the person has. The person might say, “Well, I really would like a new suit, but, you know, I just don’t think I can get it this paycheck.” Well, okay, now you know that if you can find this person something on the sale rack that’s going to look like it didn’t come off the sale rack, he can get it on this paycheck and not the next paycheck. You get credit for a sale today. The customer gets to look good now for less money then he had hoped he’d spend. The store gets to clear out inventory and add revenue. Everyone wins! So listen to what the people are telling you.

During your discovery-question phase of your presentation, you also have the chance to raise some important considerations. While you’re listening to people talk, you’re able to think about their situation and raise considerations that they normally would not have thought about. For instance, if someone is shopping for a self-storage unit – they want to put Grandma’s antiques in storage — maybe they don’t know air-conditioned storage exists. Maybe they’re scared to death to put that antique in storage because they don’t want all of the joints to get out of whack. Well, you explain to them as the storage sales person that you have a climate-controlled unit where the temperature will not get above 80 degrees and the humidity stays under control. Now this person thinks, “Oh, thank goodness! There’s a solution for me.” So raise some important considerations for people. You know your business, they do not.

Your discovery questions will also allow you to qualify the prospect. Does the prospect qualify to buy this product? If you’re selling a car, okay, does this person have a driver’s license? Does he know how to drive? Does he have money to buy the car? Well, these are qualifications that you need to get past when you’re trying to sell to anyone. In your discovery-question phase, you can find out: Does this person have the means? Does this person have the authority? Is this sale going to happen if I can prove the value of the purchase and satisfy all of the concerns that might block the sale? So your discovery questions are very important to determine not only if you have a genuine prospect in front of you, but to also determine how this prospect will decide to buy.

Your discovery questions tell you where your prospect falls in your rule of thirds theory. Is this going to be a “gimme”? Is there no way a sale is going to happen any time soon? Is this a sale you are going to have to work for?

Now your discovery questions are also going to allow you to build agreement with that person, and that’s what selling is all about. No matter what you’re selling, there are certain issues you have to agree on before the whole deal can come together, and the discovery questions help you build agreement.

For instance, if I were selling puppy dogs and you came to me looking for a puppy dog, one of the questions I might ask you is, “Well, what breed do you like?” And if you don’t say the breed that I’m selling, oh, oh, we’ve got problems. These are the kinds of things that you have to build agreement on.

For instance, if you were renting a self-storage unit, when do you need that unit? If you don’t need it pretty soon, I’m not going to rent you one any time this month. If you don’t know where my self-storage location is, how to get there, if it’s not convenient for you to get to, we’re not going to rent you a storage unit. Do you know what size you need? Can I help you figure a size? Do we actually have a size that is going to meet your needs? If we can’t agree on these issues, I’m not going to rent you a storage unit. So no matter what you’re selling, there are certain topics and issues you have to agree on. Find out what those topics are, build some questions that will help you come to agreement on those topics, and go from there.

Okay, you’re buying clothes at a retail shop. You need a new dress for Saturday night. What color do you like? What color do you think you look good in? If we can’t agree on the color of your dress, I’m not selling you a dress. What sort of a hemline do you like? Do you like a poofy skirt? Do you like it so it twirls when you spin? Do you like it tight? If we can’t agree on these issues, I’m not selling you a dress. So find where you need to build agreement and come up with ways to do that.

Then, create urgency. How do you create urgency? Urgency means that the prospect you’re selling to wants to buy now. It doesn’t help you if that person buys later — although if you’re selling products and services, you will need customers later — but you need customers now. So what is it that’s going to help that person buy now rather than later, or not at all, or not from you?

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