Earning the Right to Close
Do you earn the right to close? We find that probably 75 percent of salespeople and other business developers do not. They may think they do because they show up, ask a few questions, and make presentations as if to say, “I’m here. Isn’t that enough?”
Showing up is indeed essential. But it’s not enough. Even though Woody Allen did say, “Eighty percent of success in life is showing up,” he left us hanging. What about the other 20 percent? The part that says you can’t score if you don’t shoot?
We believe that consultative selling can be defined as creating value during the sales process. That creating value gives you the right to close because you’ve earned it. The question for every salesperson then is, how do you create value?
Ultimately, doing this successfully requires both a custom sales process, which can be created, and a high level of skill, which can be taught. Many business developers assume they can do these two things on their own without training. In our experience only about 20 percent can–they’re the naturals. But the others either don’t realize what is required, incorrectly assume they already are doing it, or just don’t know how to go about it. In other words, they don’t know what they don’t know.
But you can create value even in the small things –in business-to-business lead generation, for example–especially if you’re using the telephone. Simply asking a prospect about a problem might sound the alarm about an issue he wasn’t aware he had or remind him of an issue he’d been meaning to take care of. He might not use your services or buy your product but you will have delivered value. In the future he might well recall that you’re not just “selling something” but are also delivering value during the sales process.
We have identified 17 different ways that sales people can create value for their prospects and customers. One of these, for example, is in fact helping prospects understand the problems they are experiencing that they don’t even know they have.
If you’d like to know more about creating value , please get in touch at 847-446-0008, and we’ll send you our list of “17 Ways to Create Value.” We’ve helped thousands of salespeople, executives, and other business developers learn how to create customized value and earn the right to close.
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