By David Flint - Integro Learning

Last month I sold my car.

It was time for a change. My wife and I both get bored with cars quickly and this one had lasted for a record period of time. There was nothing wrong with it and we weren't terribly serious about selling it, but thought it would be a good idea if somebody was prepared to pay us what we thought was a fair price. So we put it in the local paper on a "run it till you sell it" deal and eventually last month it did!

Of course we now needed another car in a hurry and the next Saturday found us doing the rounds of a few of the local car yards.

We managed to visit three dealers and were approached by 5 salespeople. And guess what? They all wanted to sell us a car!

"Hi folks how are you doing today? Can I help you? What car are you looking for? Well this model is... and has.... "And then they were off. There was no stopping them. After a cursory qualifying question as to whether we were looking for a large or small car their interest in what we really wanted disappeared completely. All they were interested in was in extolling the virtues of one car or another, slipping in a few barbs about any other brand that we might mention, and then trying the traditional closing techniques if we seemed even remotely interested.

One young salesperson in particular blew his chance of making the easiest sale in his life. He didn't listen! He didn't recognise buying signals and didn't respond to our requests. He was absolutely focused on selling a particular car and just didn't realise that he could have sold us a different one if only...

There are five major decisions in the buying process and any sales presentation should be fashioned to match the sequence in which these decisions are made. In other words if the young salesman had listened to us more and confirmed our need with us, he would have been able to not only align himself with our buying decision process but he would also have made the sale!

Now with the reputation that car salesmen have you might not think that this is all that significant but let's look at it a little closer. How many times do we focus on what we have got to sell rather than what our prospect or client actually needs?

Not me! I hear you exclaim.

It is a very easy trap to fall into. We become so obsessed with the value of our own goods and services that we are convinced that this is just what is required by our prospect. It is important to remember that we can only determine "what to sell" if we have first learnt about our customer's position. Once we have determined the "what" we can then concentrate on the "how".

It is my experience that most sales training programs normally only concentrate on the "how". With many of them focusing solely on closing techniques. Obviously these are the courses that car salesmen attend. There is nothing more frustrating than have a salesperson apply closing techniques on you when they haven't bothered to establish your need, yet alone build some rapport with you in the first place!

If you don't differentiate yourself, your company and your product or service then there is only one thing that your customer will concentrate on... and that is price. You will end up forcing your prospect to regard your product or service as a commodity and when that happens they shop around.

Remember in any selling situation it is not what you say, but what you ask that will lead to success. By asking the best questions at the various stages of the sales process you will be able to establish rapport, find out what your prospect really needs, and determine whether your goods or services are a good fit. You can then proceed to "agree on the need". Then, and only then, is it time to sell your company and your product and finally ask for a commitment.

It is very easy to get side?tracked by a customer or prospect when they ask you to "tell me about your ... " Off we go giving them the verbal data dump and without stopping to consider whether this is what they actually want or need.

Anyway, back to the story. On the Sunday we visited two more car yards with exactly the same result. No one had convinced us that we wanted to spend our hard?earned with them. All very frustrating, because I wanted and needed, another car. All that the sales people had achieved was to make us realise that we needed more time to think about what car we wanted.

And that is what we did. After narrowing the choice down to a couple of contenders we drove them one after the other and decided on a car. It was then a matter of obtaining the best price that a dealer was willing to give us. Not one salesperson tried to differentiate themselves or their product or services. No one seemed to care about us, or what we were looking for. Not one dealer earned our respect or trust.

The whole process was reduced to obtaining the best price for an item that was reduced to commodity status.

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David Flint is the General Manager of the Integro Learning Company Pty Ltd. Integro specialise in learning and personality suystems and distribution.

Phone: +61 2 9453 4555
dflint@integro.com.au
www.integrolearning.com