Grant Leboff: I think one of the things that's underestimated sometimes, in sales, is the importance of qualifying prospects. What's your advice in terms of a sales person doing that? How they should do it?
Nicola Cook: Don't be a salesperson, if you call it qualify - is my number one piece of advice, because for me it is THE most important skill. Everybody thinks that in sales you should be good at closing - actually closing happens easily if you properly qualify. Most of the reasons why sales don't move forward, or they stall, or you end up with hiccups further down the line is because you have not properly qualified a prospect. Qualification falls into two parts; the first one is, is to understand the emotional reasons why this person would want to buy and where they're at on their emotional journey. Then the second side of qualification is understanding their buying position. Have they got the authority, have they got the means, have they got the budget, are you working within the same timelines? All of that is all part of the qualification process as well.
I teach a technique called 'digging for the hot button', which is a full chapter in the book and there's five parts to that and we're not going to go through all of them, but if you can just remember that qualification has so many advantages. It adds momentum to the sale, because by just asking the questions to help you understand the emotional reasons why somebody would want to make a purchase, makes them more attached to the idea of making the purchase, then also makes them appreciate the loss and the sense of loss if they don't go ahead with that. Then on the flip side, it also helps you as the salesperson to understand where this person is at, in their buying journey. So that's how we add momentum to the sale.
The second reason is that it actually negates nearly all objections that could happen further on. It's quite normal that a sales process will take more than one touch point. And one of the reasons, again, why things don't progress is because we're presenting a solution at a point where we think the buyer is at, when they're at a completely different point in the journey - so we should never assume that. And we always want to close on whatever is the next step of the sale, not the end transaction. or we're wanting to do is to close them to the next stepping stone, to the next stepping stone, and take them through that process.
So if you ask for the wrong thing at the end of the interaction, it's because you didn't understand where they were at in their journey and you haven't qualified them in that part.
The final thing is, is that it actually tells you what you should be talking about. How can you know what offer or solution or product or benefits to be informing them about, to be relating to their needs, if you haven't taken the time to really understand what's important to them. So without all of those things, you are really just basically picking up a bucket and chucking a whole load of jelly at the wall and hoping that some of it's going to stick.
Grant Leboff: And in terms of qualification then, is it simply just a matter of asking good questions or is there a bit more to it than that?
Nicola Cook: There's a bit more to it than that. I teach a funnel process. You start at the top with some very open questions and then, depending on how that person responds, you can then lead them and lead them and lead them. So I'll give you two, for example: If I'm meeting somebody for the first time, who I don't know, I've obviously done my research, but I really want to get to know them. I normally start with a very simple, but open wide question about, tell me about your business? Or what currently is the biggest headache on your desk right now, is another one of my favourites. And then, depending on how they answer, one of the next follow up questions that I would ask is; and why is that so important? And then I'll maybe tailor that even more, I'll say, and why specifically is that so important right now? So you can see how you start to narrow it and how you start to create momentum.
And then maybe, once we've agreed and talked about what the important things are for them I'll ask another deeper question about loss and say, so what would it mean if we didn't achieve that together right now? And it's those kinds of funneling questions that will help you really narrow that.
Then the stuff about understanding their buying position is quite practical. It's being brave enough to say, what's your budget for this? What timeline are you working to? Are there any other internal processes, from your side, that I need to be aware of in order to become a supplier or to move things forward?
What would need to happen now in order to move things forward? Is another one of my leading questions. Does anybody else need to be involved in making this decision? All of those are really good deep qualification questions. I have a structure for it that it. It's called 'digging for the hot button', but it creates a funnel, so that by the time you get to the end of that, you both understand exactly where you are in this sales and client relationship and you move forward together in a very comfortable and easy way.
Grant Leboff: And do you have any techniques when you're going through that qualification, for opening the prospect up? I know one of the challenges, salespeople sometime say is that they will ask that generic opening question, 'what's the biggest challenge in your business right now or the biggest headache?' and get a very sorry monosyllabic answer, that they don't know where to go next!! The salesperson is trying to generate any sort of interest in conversation happening. So do you have any techniques where it's easier to open someone up at that wide top part?
Nicola Cook: What I do is, I teach people to work backwards. When you're thinking of what questions to ask, first of all, think about what is the benefit that you offer? So what's the, what's the benefit, what's the feature that relates to that benefit? Then, what would be the question or the answer that the client would need to give in order to lead into that benefit and that feature so, therefore, what's the question that you would need to ask?
So you have an armour, like a library of questions that you can then draw down on depending on that generic answer that they might give. So, I've asked that question where people say, 'What's the biggest headache on your desk right now? And they go, - oh, erm - supply chain.
That's not an area of expertise that I have or I offer any value in, but I want to get into their sales engine and how their sales function works. So my follow up question might be, and how is that affecting the motivation of your sales team? So I've got a leading question there that I get them talking about that subject because I know I've got a product and a solution and a benefit that's going to solve that side problem to the first one that they gave me.
