Example of Echoing
Customer: Our computer system never works properly.
Salesperson: What makes you think your computer system never works properly? (A good question, but it is a little light on originality.)
Example of Rephrasing
Customer: Our computer system never works properly.
Salesperson: What makes you think your computer system is less than adequate?
Beyond Fluff
How do you know a measurable answer from an immeasurable one? Measurable answers let you and customers quantify their stated goals; immeasurable answers do not. The way for you to receive measurable answers is to motivate customers to progress through their three-tier response levels.
These levels consist of vague, clearer, and measurable. Customers’ responses usually stop at vague because your questions stop there. Hope springs eternal—and like most salespeople, you want to sell something—so you look for any glimmer of hope. Typically, if a salesperson feels a customer’s initial vague responses might provide opportunities for sales, he or she stops seeking more details. In essence, salespeople mistakenly encourage customers to stop at vague responses, except on matters of funding, deadlines, and decision-making details.
Salespeople tend to equate the absence of a concrete no response to the presence of a vague yes. They do not want to jeopardize these opportunities by finding out more specifics that might not be favorable to a successful sale. They use the strategy of “If I do not bring it up, maybe they will not bring it up.” Typically, they do not find out about an unattainable goal or filter until the umpteenth call, after everyone has wasted time and money.
Remind yourself of the golden rule of soaring sales and booming productivity: Sales opportunities are not created equally. Measurable answers help you choose the opportunities where your unique strengths or strongest features connect to the customers’ goals. While vague and clearer answers provide you with some successes, measurable answers provide you with many successes.
Customers will provide measurable answers if the right questions are asked, but they do not usually volunteer them. All you need to do is ask the right questions, gather those measurable goals and filters, weigh their impact on providing value-packed solutions, and reap the rewards.
Note Let customers know that your questioning follows a predictable pattern. It always focuses on making the cost-benefit analysis of their purchasing considerations (goals and filters) measurable in dollars. No moving targets, unmanaged expectations, or uninformed decisions when everyone uses objective rather than subjective information.
The vague-clearer-measurable questioning follows this three-tier pattern:
To first find out a filter or goal, you ask some version of “What does that involve?” as in “What are your plans?”
To make the customers’ vague responses clearer, you ask some version of “How does that affect you?”
Then, to make the customers’ clearer responses measurable, you ask some version of “How much does that cost and save?” or “What are those details?”
The two case studies in Chapter 6 explore this questioning process in detail as it pertains to filters.
Equally powerful, you can eliminate competition when you make customers’ responses measurable, as the following example illustrates.
Example
Watch how the salesperson’s three questions keep helping the customer to think in measurable terms—and eliminate competition at the same time.
Salesperson: What is your top priority (goal)?
Vague Customer Response: I want to improve operations. (Obviously, many products and competitors can help customers to improve operations. What do you think she has in mind? No one knows until she accepts or rejects his products)
Salesperson: What does that involve? (Salesperson seeks more details and encourages the customer to provide them by working off her last response.)
Clearer Customer Response: I want to improve operations by reducing administrative tasks. (Now, fewer products and competitors can achieve this objective. Yet, what products to offer is still anyone’s guess.)
Salesperson: What dollar savings are you shooting for? (Salesperson seeks financial details and requests the customer to share more details.)
Measurable Customer Response: We spend $1,800,000 on administrative tasks annually. They want to reduce them by 10 percent. (Now, very few products or competitors can save $180,000 on administrative costs to improve operations. If you choose your market segments carefully, only you can connect a unique strength to a confirmed measurable benefit of a goal.)
Note In market segments where you have no unique strengths, if your product can achieve customers’ goals, so can some of your competitors’ products. The significant advantage you gain through this questioning process is that you are making their goals measurable while competitors are not. Customers view you as their business and industry (market segment) expert. You help customers enhance how they buy when you arm them with facts that empower them to make well-thought-out decisions. Your sales approach becomes your competitive advantage in these product-neutral situations. You can win the sale by connecting your features to the customer’s measurable benefits better than competitors can.
The Power of the Four Types of Questions
Your most powerful selling tools involve four types of questions: dialoguing, qualifying, clarifying, and verifying. The last three make customers’ responses progress from vague to clearer to measurable. You end up exactly where you and your customers need to be—with measurable goals and filters.
Dialoguing
You use dialoguing to break the ice and make everyone feel comfortable without falling in the water. “How do you like this cold weather?” Dialoguing creates comfort levels or rapport between you and customers. These exchanges do not include discussions about goals, filters, products, and services. Use dialoguing to establish common ground. You also know by now not to be the four thousandth salesperson to ask about the picture of a sailboat hanging on a customer’s wall.
The use of open-ended questions encourages unguarded conversation and humor. It also gives a sense of each other’s mannerisms and personalities. This verbal insight assists you in determining what sort of formality, pace, and levity to use in the sales calls. If customers only laugh when you say good-bye, you might reconsider how well you read their comments.
Do not merely listen for clues to their styles; look for them, too. Even without a degree in psychology, you might notice certain visual clues. Customers stealing glances at their watches might suggest either impatience or self-importance. Answering telephones as they motion you to stay where you are, and then talking for twenty minutes might suggest two things; okay three if you count rudeness. They either consider themselves very important or you not very important. Your focus on their goals and filters will make them feel important—and let them know you are important to their efforts in achieving them.
Listen for verbal clues, too. “I have a hectic schedule” leaves nothing for the imagination. So does the all-time favorite, “What’s on your mind?” These subtle hints also reflect their degree of patience, sense of self-importance, and level of attentiveness. Be ready to shift from dialoguing to qualifying at a moment’s notice. Dialoguing consists of open-ended questions. These, as mentioned before in the How’s Zat? section, start with who, what, why, when, where, and how. Avoid seeking yes-or-no answers when trying to drum up conversation. A word of caution: Do not forget how a “no” answer can be a conversation-killer.
Qualifying
Qualifying is the first questioning process you learn how to use. You probably define the word qualifying as what you do on the first call to find out whether you can sell customers something. Qualifying can mean nearly anything. Is it finding out their level of pain? Is it uncovering their sense of urgency? Is it reinforcing how well they like you? Is it discovering they have money? You know better.
You know qualifying means not wasting anyone’s time. Therefore, qualifying starts with helping customers to gather information about their goals, filters, measurable benefits, and systems of evaluations. You first qualify customers on their ability to achieve their goals, not buy your products. Qualifying questions are open-ended. As expected, your first line of questioning most often results in vague responses. Qualifying questions, like dialoguing questions, never seek yes or no answers. The reward for saving those yes or no questions until the end is worth it.
Example
Customer: We want to improve our productivity.
Salesperson: What will that involve? (This qualifying question seeks details on what the goal of improving productivity means.)
Okay, be honest. Were you not tempted to say, “We can help you improve productivity with _______________ (fill in the product or feature)?”
Clarifying
While qualifying points you in the right direction, clarifying helps you make sure you are on the right track. Typically, you use this questioning process on the second in-person sales call when you realize there are still a lot of unknowns left over from the first call. When you follow your qualifying questions with clarifying questions, you save time and reduce wasted efforts. Customers’ measurable answers help them and you decide whether it makes sense for a third sales call.
Your clarifying questions turn vague responses into measurable responses. They become more measurable in terms of time or money. Clarified answers define customers’ goals and filters and how they measure value. Your clarifying questions also are open-ended and do not seek yes or no answers. Clarifying means never having to say you are sorry for unfulfilled goals, wasted time, or money.