Sales trainers will tell you that in order to succeed you must assume that every sales pitch will end in a closed sale. It’s also referred to as ‘positive thinking’. But there are dangers associated with this – how many times have you assumed what the prospective customer wants without discovering their real needs?
The 3 Rules
- Ask Questions
- Listen without guessing
- Check you’ve got it right
Ask Questions
I have 3 young children and spend most of my time being bombarded by questions from them; “How does that work?”, “What is that person doing?”, “WHY?”. If you have children yourself you’ll notice how they don’t have the ‘inbuilt assumptions’ that us adults have. They ask lots of questions to get THE FACTS. The more questions you ask the less you assume. Another important benefit of good questioning or ‘fact finding’ is that it also allows you to expose any assumptions the other person may have (yes, its not just you!).
Listen without guessing
Listening is not waiting for your turn to talk. To truly ‘listen’ you need to completely disassociate yourself from what the person is saying and focus solely on them. The most difficult part of this is not reacting to what they are saying and simply making mental notes (or written notes) of what they are REALLY saying.
Check you’ve got it right
Once you’ve got the facts go back over them with the person you’re selling to. You can do this either by verbally reiterating what you’ve recorded, sending the person an email with the key points or physically looking at evidence of what they are describing.
By following these 3 rules will have solid evidence that you can then find sales solutions to. I’d love to hear any other tips you have to stop the ‘dreaded assumptions.’
By Steve West
Marketing & Business Development Manager
