Parnets Digital Advertisements Bangalore

Understanding your client’s “true why”

All too often, we think that all a client wants is a website, or a logo, or a marketing campaign. So we sell features, or we talk about how great we are at design or coding or marketing.

According to Scott, this surface level method of selling results in lower close-rates because clients view what you have to offer as a commodity.

He says that the most important thing to learn when talking to a prospect is their “true why”. In other words, what will that website or marketing campaign do for them on a deep, personal and emotional level.

For example,

if you’re selling to a small business owner, their ‘true why’ might be that they want to make enough money to live a comfortable lifestyle and spend more time with their family.
If it’s the owner of a large enterprise, their goal might be to sell their company for millions and create a legacy for their name.
Or if they are a middle manager at a big company, their primary interest could be covering their ass so they look good to their boss.

Having a persona you sell to is incredibly important, since the same kinds of clients likely have a very similar ‘true why’.

The point is, when you have those first conversations, you want to break down their walls so you can learn what drives them on a deeper, more personal level. What are his/her deep fears, frustrations and needs?

When you articulate how your service is going to contribute to their higher vision, clients are more compelled to say yes to what you have to offer.

Once Scott changed his approach to sales and created a repeatable system, he went from spending 12-18 hours per lead with a 20% close-rate to spending only 4 hours per lead with an 80% close-rate. The system works.

Qualifying leads

To minimize, even eliminate the amount of bad leads that come in through your door, it’s important to have a solid qualification process. You should have a series of questions that you ask new leads to understand where they are in the buying process.

In most cases when people buy something, they go through a series of steps.

I need something done
I’m going to research what’s out there
I found what I want and now I’m ready to buy

Often leads don’t turn into business because we’re selling them too early in their buying cycle, so learning where they are in the buying cycle will ensure you’re not wasting time on proposals when they’re still in the research phase.

Nurturing leads

What if they aren’t at the purchase stage yet?

Don’t write a proposal. Instead educate them in a way that costs you very little time. Add them to your mailing list so they get automated emails with information that addresses their problem. Connect with them on social media and send out links to blog articles. In other words; use content marketing to your advantage to nurture them so they are primed to do business with you once they reach the buying phase.

Don’t make the mistake of getting caught up in endless meeting requests. Clients will often want to get a coffee or have lunch to talk about their upcoming project, but this drives up your cost of sale and doesn’t necessarily get you closer to a signed contract.

Instead, when a client asks you for a coffee or lunch, ask for a call instead and keep it to 15 minutes. Always end every conversation with an action. Don’t leave it too general like “hey let’s chat again in a few weeks”. Instead pick a specific day and time for the next step, like “I’m going to research your questions and I’ll call you next Wednesday at 10 am to show you how I’m going to achieve what we talked about”.

The next step should be a proposal, and if you’ve done your work up front to get to the proposal stage, you’ll only be sending proposals to qualified prospects who are at the buying stage and primed for what you have to offer.

Closing the business

What’s next after the proposal is done? Some people just email it to their client and wait for them to review it. Scott books a phone call with the client and emails the proposal 5 minutes before the call.

Then over the phone he walks through the proposal. Instead of talking about feature X, Y and Z, he instead starts with their “true why” and discusses how he’ll solve their deepest frustrations, alleviate their fear and help them achieve their dreams.

Once he’s done presenting, he asks them if he’s addressed their needs with this solution. If they say yes, then he talks price and tells them what they’ll need to invest to make it happen.

A lot of small business owners get uncomfortable discussing money, but it’s important to remember:

Every client has money, they just choose where to spend it and where to scrimp. You need to bump yourself up on their priority list and convince them to spend it on you.
If you’ve addressed their deepest needs instead of surface level features, they’ll be more inclined to spend it on you.
They shouldn’t be surprised at the price once you’re down this far in the sales funnel. You should have already given them a ballpark early on to weed out clients with unreasonably low budgets.

It’s ok if a client takes a deep breath when they see the price. You want to make sure you’re maximizing their budget and not leaving money on the table. On the other hand, if they just can’t afford to pay for the solution up-front, give them the option to spread the payments out over six months.

If you follow these suggestions, you’ll find sales becomes much more streamlined and predictable. What are some ways you are systemizing your sales process? I’d love to hear your thoughts in the comments below.

Welcome back to another 5-minute marketing tactic.

This one focuses on understanding the logical progression of ideas your client has to go through before they commit to buying.

Do you know where they are in that progression? What you should say at this exact point of their "journey" to keep them moving forward?

This is something many businesses get wrong at various points.

For instance, I've already mentioned how you need to show your client that you understand their problem. But that alone won't convince them to buy. You also have to show them that you have the solution. But...*that* alone won't convince them to buy either! Because they need to know how much it will cost before they can make a decision.

As a general rule, all marketing material should follow this fundamental thought sequence:

Problem --> Solution --> Price

If you get this out of order -- talk about the wrong thing at the wrong time -- or if you just forget to talk about one of these at all, you generally find your sales tanking off.

And of course, fixing the problem can produce big lifts in sales quite easily.

So it's worth checking if any of your marketing material is talking about, say, price before the solution. Or the solution before the problem. (For instance, if you have a webpage that talks about the problem, does it lead very clearly to another page that talks about the solution and the price...?)

One place I've noticed this thought sequence is often neglected is in proposals.

We use the problem > solution > price model fairly naturally on websites (mostly), but for some reason in proposals we forget. But doing so *greatly* increases your chances of it being accepted -- because it is structured to reflect the logical sequence of ideas your prospect has to go through to make a proper buying decision.

This means it naturally persuades -- your proposal goes from being a technical document, to a persuasive one.

Parnets Digital Advertisements Bangalore

Sunday, 12 April 2015