Ask a Customer to do something - Testing them out
• Client Driven Strategy

When speaking to the customer we have been taught within the discipline of selling to focus on their business, their problems and their issues.

Encouraging the customer to put their thinking caps on, on our behalf and talk us through what is important to them and by so doing in sales terms ESTABLISHES THE NEEDS.

Doing this job as a salesperson effectively delivers to us what is VALUE in the customer’s eyes – once established we sell to those values and by so doing we diminish PRICE to a COST or better still to an INVESTMENT.

How well we facilitate the customer to think on our behalf can often be identified as the key element on whether a sale was lost or won.

‘Sales people don’t sell anything, they help others decide to buy’

So if the customer’s thinking process is so important to our success in selling, then perhaps it needs a little more attention.

Lets give it at least some attention:

TASK EXERCISE:

Please list on a piece of paper the sort of customer focused business questions you would ask at a meeting with the customer.

Then come back in your ‘Leave a Comment’ – text, listing some of the questions you might ask.

• What are you asking them to DO?

If before you present to the customer you have already had one or several meetings with them, you will have had the opportunity for them to formulate with you their expectations of the presentation.

In any event it is vital that they are clear why they are to attend your presentation and what you are to ask of them.

If you have managed PERCEPTIONS and used a CLIENT DRIVEN STRATEGY you probably by now will have a clear understanding as to who is your sponsor for the project you are impacting on, and to what level they are prepared to go to ensure you succeed on their behalf.

Make it clear to all the audience, that during and at the end of the presentation you will be asking them to take ownership of some actions that they will need to complete.

www.e-clientltd.com

Need the biggest ego have all the say?
From my experience of executive coaching, too often very valuable inputs are lost during
meetings because the largest and loudest egos take over.

Edward de Bono's SIX THINKING HATS methodologies enables everyone to contribute whilst at the same time for those egoistical tendencies to be expressed, but at the right time and in its place.

de Bono's methodology also 'licences' a focused business meeting to explore areas of discussion that the very make up, atmosphere, working environment stops us exploring.

All too often we are 'conditioned' to think in one mode, the results of which usually drags us inevitably into an adversarial stand-off.

It doesn't have to be that way.

www.e-clientltd.com

From my experience of executive coaching, too often very valuable inputs are lost during
meetings because the largest and loudest egos take over.

Edward de Bono's SIX THINKING HATS methodologies enables everyone to contribute whilst at the same time for those egoistical tendencies to be expressed, but at the right time and in its place.

de Bono's methodology also 'licences' a focused business meeting to explore areas of discussion that the very make up, atmosphere, working environment stops us exploring.

All too often we are 'conditioned' to think in one mode, the results of which usually drags us inevitably into an adversarial stand-off.

It doesn't have to be that way.

www.e-clientltd.com

• Client Driven Strategy

When speaking to the customer we have been taught within the discipline of selling to focus on their business, their problems and their issues.

Encouraging the customer to put their thinking caps on, on our behalf and talk us through what is important to them and by so doing in sales terms ESTABLISHES THE NEEDS.

Doing this job as a salesperson effectively delivers to us what is VALUE in the customer’s eyes – once established we sell to those values and by so doing we diminish PRICE to a COST or better still to an INVESTMENT.

How well we facilitate the customer to think on our behalf can often be identified as the key element on whether a sale was lost or won.

‘Sales people don’t sell anything, they help others decide to buy’

So if the customer’s thinking process is so important to our success in selling, then perhaps it needs a little more attention.

Lets give it at least some attention:

TASK EXERCISE:

Please list on a piece of paper the sort of customer focused business questions you would ask at a meeting with the customer.

Then come back in your ‘Leave a Comment’ – text, listing some of the questions you might ask.

• What are you asking them to DO?

If before you present to the customer you have already had one or several meetings with them, you will have had the opportunity for them to formulate with you their expectations of the presentation.

In any event it is vital that they are clear why they are to attend your presentation and what you are to ask of them.

If you have managed PERCEPTIONS and used a CLIENT DRIVEN STRATEGY you probably by now will have a clear understanding as to who is your sponsor for the project you are impacting on, and to what level they are prepared to go to ensure you succeed on their behalf.

Make it clear to all the audience, that during and at the end of the presentation you will be asking them to take ownership of some actions that they will need to complete.

www.e-clientltd.com

If the presentation you are about to give is the culmination of a sales campaign, then there is every likelihood that you know these people and their expectations.

But do you know them on the day of the presentation?

If the opportunity presents itself, get to the venue way ahead of your agenda time. Set-up way in advance to give you time to mingle.

Whether its coffee time or lunch, get in there and socialise once again who you are by just being there, purely by association being one of the team, so when you stand-up the gulf between you, the presentation environment and them has been softened.

Its an American thing. To say to a perfect stranger in downtown Minneapolis on farmer’s market day, ‘How are you’ - ain’t on, it pre-supposes a previous relationship, but to say ‘How are you today’ accepts that we must have had a previous shared experience
i.e. today means we are both around this day to be asking each other the question, ergo we both must have been around somewhere yesterday – its association by existing, and even that breaks down barriers.

By such pre-presentation socialising you will get a feel for how they are today.

So often, presenters are getting that last minute peek at their content and totally ignoring opportunities to look their audience in the face prior to the formal start, then standing up to be ‘rocked’ by the overwhelming attention of these alien human beings looking right back at you.