Are you asking questions?

Photo courtesy of Morguefile user Alvimann

Photo courtesy of Morguefile user Alvimann

Most sales people don’t understand this simple concept: what‘s important to them may not be important to their prospect. How often during a sales call do you find salespeople spewing useless information to a prospect to show how knowledgeable they are about their product or service none of which is has any value to the prospect?

I remember being on a sales call with a new rep where the prospect was literally drawing circles on a notepad to pass time. The sales rep did nothing to uncover what was really important to the prospect by asking questions. The rep continued down the path of showing how much they knew about the product never asking if any of the features or benefits were important to the prospect. Do you think the rep made the sale?

Let’s put this into perspective. Think about the last time you were feeling ill and had to go to the doctor. I bet the doctor or nurse asked you about 15-20 questions while doing their exam. Why? To isolate the sickness and prescribe the proper medication. No doctor on the planet can take one look at a patient and determine the diagnosis without asking questions. The doctor needs to understand the root issue to cure it with medication. If doctors ask questions, why can’t salespeople? The moral of the story is that the doctor made a sale.

It does not matter what industry you are in asking questions is vital to making a sale. We can take that one step further and state that asking the right questions is vital to making a sale. As a salesperson, we must uncover a need or want for every prospect we engage. By asking questions we can isolate the needs of every single business, thus when presenting our products and services, it fulfills those needs and a sale is made.

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Guest bloggers for the TDS Business Blog.

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