You get it.  People have to need what you’re selling or they won’t buy.  What you don’t get is how to move people from the need to action.

Consequently, you leave yourself open for missed opportunities.  Just imagine comfortably helping people to buy your stuff and doing it efficiently so you not only have money, but you have the time to enjoy the things money buys.  Seem impossible, well it’s not.

Common mistake #1.  You’re so excited about what you do you can’t even imagine a prospect not being interested, therefore, you charge ahead telling the prospect every reason why they simply have to buy and buy now.  Here’s the deal.  When the prospect is satisfied with what they’ve got now even though what you’re offering is hands-down better they won’t buy, end of story.  The harder you push to convince them to your way of thinking the more confirmed they are in their way of thinking.  The reason this happens is we have a need to be right even when we suspect we may be wrong.  Thus the harder you push the harder the prospect pushes back to support their previous decisions because they have to be right.

Common solution to mistake #1. Rather than challenging their decision sincerely congratulate them on that decision.  Ask questions about why they made that choice, what they like best about it, if there is anything that could make the option they chose even better, etc.  Never forget selling isn’t about telling it’s about asking.

Common mistake #2. You hear problem and you immediately jump to solution.  There are lots of little things that annoy you in life.  Perhaps your car makes an odd little sound as you drive down the road.  Yet that doesn’t mean you have any intentions of actually doing anything about that odd little noise it just bugs you.

Common solution to mistake #2.  Whenever a prospect shares a potential problem with you explore that problem and discover if there are others before you ever go down the path of sharing a solution.  There isn’t a need for a solution until the prospect tells you how important it is to have a solution, and what that solution would be worth to them.

Common mistake #3.  The prospect is hot to buy and hot to buy now, however, you lose them in the process of telling them about your solution.  After listening to you they aren’t so sure they should buy.  What they thought they wanted doesn’t seem like such a good idea now.

Common solution to mistake #3.  Going back to the solution for mistake #2 never forget that telling isn’t selling.  Telling opens the door to all kinds of missed opportunities because you aren’t necessarily talking about what the prospect wants to hear, you confuse the prospect, and the prospect doesn’t need to or want to hear the gory details of how you’re going to make the solution happen they just want to know it will happen.

This entry was posted on Tuesday, February 26th, 2008 at 7:03 pm and is filed under coaching. You can follow any responses to this entry through the RSS 2.0 feed. You can leave a response, or trackback from your own site.