“One of the best ways to persuade others, is with your ears.” – Dean Rusk, United States Secretary of State from 1961 to 1969.
The quote above says it best. Listening is the most obvious and neglected tool in any selling activity. Yet your ears are the key to your success in sales.
It shouldn’t need to be said that once you’ve come this far you must listen to what the prospect has to say. But it’s an all-too-common mistake to ask a question and then pay absolutely no regard to the answer while we’re thinking of what to say next. The motor-mouth salesman simply uses the gap as a chance to catch his breath and then resume his filibuster.
If you’re doing all the talking, you will only discover what you already knows. He will not discover any of the difficulties, problems, concerns, etc., of the prospect. If the prospect does have an objection, the salesman will never find it out until it is too late, as he never had a chance to let the salesman in on it.
So, when you ask that question, sit back, inhale nice and slow and really actively listen to what your prospect is telling you. Then, when it’s your turn to talk again, address what the prospect has told you as completely as necessary. But don’t overdo it! If he asks you what time it is for example, don’t feel you have to explain how to build a watch. Give him what he needs, not more, not less. Align your answer to what information he needs to feel comfortable, not to how much you may know about the subject.
As an additional note, your listening should not be confined to the times the prospect is talking. You should be “listening” while you speak, as well, as the prospect communicates through his body language, his facial expression, his eye contact or lack thereof, and many other subtle ways. He’s trying to tell you something, and if you are not “listening” with your ears, eyes, and other sense perceptions, you will miss it. And he will know that you are actually interested only in the sonorous inflections of your own voice, or your attention is really only on the money you will walk away with.
The big punch line here is that the whole enterprise becomes ridiculously, laughably easy if you simply break it down to its basics.
You establish active, live communication by whatever effective means at your disposal, but always based fundamentally upon an interest in the prospect and how you can help him achieve his goals.
You impart live information, (not just data), that he can understand and use by any communication channel available, and orient your product or service to his needs and wants.
You now communicate further while listening to his opinions and ideas, all the while continuing to build more agreement, confidence and trust based on mutual interest and understanding.
Continue to communicate and demonstrate how his interests will be served by utilizing your services and how that will benefit him directly until the “light-bulb” goes on in his mind on why it would be to his distinct advantage to do business with you.
Always strive to simplify. Insecurity creates complexity. And complexity creates insecurity. Direct, open communication is best. Precise, clear communication comes from confidence in your product and service, and certainty that you can deliver what you promise. Keep it certain; keep it direct; keep it simple; keep it human.
There is nothing to fear from being direct and uncomplicated in your communication. Add to that, “persuading the prospect with your ears,” and you have eliminated the most common reasons for salesman failure. The prospect is probably telling you over and over in subtle and not so subtle ways what he really needs and wants from you and your company. Show him how he can get those things from you and he’ll actually help you close him. You practically can’t stop him at that point.
Think about that for a second . . .
He’s telling you how he can be sold…if you’ll only observe and listen and remain interested. In this manner, you’re building the bridge of agreement essential to establishing a bedrock of confidence and trust without which any long-term relationship would be impossible.
Only when you violate the basics as given above do you consistently have to resort to unusual solutions and effort to get them to do business with you. Anyone can always make something more complicated than it needs to be to produce a specific result.
It is the wise man that can reduce the activity to it’s simply basic fundamentals and find a way to apply them consistently and flawlessly. Of course, that is all we expect of you as a professional in sales!
Jack Welch, General Electric chairman, said it this way when interviewed by the Harvard Business Review:
“You can’t believe how hard it is for people to be simple, how much they fear being simple. They worry that if they’re simple, people will think they’re simple-minded. In reality, of course, it’s just the reverse. Clear, tough-minded people are the most simple.”
It is worth learning, I assure you, and it’s not really difficult – just don’t sweat at it too hard.
It’s not all that complicated . . . really!
daniel w. jacobs
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