When you pitch your product or service to a potential customer, you want to persuade them to buy from you. But you also want to educate them about the value and benefits of what you offer. How do you balance education and sales in a pitch? Here are some tips to help you craft a pitch that informs and converts.
Before you start your pitch, you need to know who you are talking to. What are their pain points, goals, challenges, and preferences? How much do they already know about your product or service, and what gaps do you need to fill? By understanding your audience, you can tailor your pitch to their needs and interests, and avoid wasting time on irrelevant or redundant information.
This is where it starts! The main things you should know beforehand are: 1. Your own product or service really well 2. Your customer's likely pain points (these may be company-specific, industry-specific or they may be issues experienced by the wider sector or just business in general) 3. The likely solutions your offering can provide that will help solve their pain. It certainly helps if you are selling to broadly the same demographic each time as you will learn the things that matter the most to them.
Listen to your customer, understand their concerns and issues, then present solutions to their problem. There is no pitch only possible solutions to the problem. If we provide solutions (that have education and benefits) then the end effect is selling the product. It's that simple.
Educating a potential customer is very important. Relationship is the key. Find the pain points of the customer over a conversation, link those to the solutions in your product. Personally after this I never had to persuade a customer to "buy" my product. The sales just happened. Be a Solution Manager rather than a Sales Manager. However a word of caution don't try to "fit" your products with their needs try to "align" it. After sale be on this journey with your customer.
If you're in sales, anytime you talk to prospects, you're pitching. They will have their guard up, and the better you know your ICP, the more effectively you'll be at bringing that guard down. Knowing your audience starts with knowing if they have a problem you can solve. If they don't have a problem, you shouldn't be talking to them, but if they do, your goal is to show, not tell.
A good sales pitch is one that educates the prospect about the benefits of your product or service while also selling them on the value of it. - Start by understanding your prospect's needs. What are they looking for in a product or service? What are their pain points? - Be clear and concise. Your prospect doesn't have time to listen to a long, rambling pitch. - Use stories and examples. Stories and examples can help you illustrate the benefits of your product or service in a way that is more engaging and memorable. - Be confident. Your belief in your product or service will be contagious. - Ask questions. Don't just give a monologue - Be prepared to answer objections. No matter how good your pitch is, there will be objections.
One of the best ways to educate and sell in a pitch is to use stories and examples. Stories and examples can illustrate how your product or service solves a problem, creates value, or improves a situation for your customers. They can also make your pitch more engaging, memorable, and relatable. Use stories and examples that are relevant, specific, and credible, and that show the results and benefits of your offer.
People love stories! As children we learned the simple structure of: Once upon a time (beginning) Then something happened (middle) They all lived happily ever after (end) You can use this simple structure to illustrate how you have helped others (especially SIMILAR others) to solve their pain/help them achieve their goals. It can be a short anecdote, a more in-depth conversation, or a formal case study. A good starting point can be: "XYZ company I worked with were in a similar position. Let me explain what happened ....." and off you go!
Often, the most interesting and attention grabbing people are the ones with stories. As old as time, mankind has used them to share knowledge and experiences. Try to incorporate some of your most relevant achievements and successes in a story about a person/business, just like your audience. Make it relatable. But remember to try and keep them short and simple - some people just need you to get to the point!
Have different stories available at all times. Each sales situation might need its own story. So, make sure that your success stories can cover a wide range of customer types, challenges, and even geographic locations (if applicable).
Stories and real-world examples can be powerful educational tools. Share success stories, case studies, or testimonials that demonstrate how your offering has helped others overcome similar challenges.
Using stories and examples to educate your audience about your product or service's value, making it relatable and persuasive.
Another way to balance education and sales in a pitch is to ask questions and listen to your prospects. Questions can help you uncover their needs, objections, motivations, and feedback. They can also help you gauge their level of interest, understanding, and readiness to buy. By listening to your prospects, you can adjust your pitch accordingly, and provide more information, clarification, or reassurance as needed.
It can help to know which questions to ask and when. You should encourage learners to use 3 different types of questions: 1. Open 2. Closed 3. Probing Open questions encourage people to speak, to open up and to reveal information. An open question tends to start with these words: Who What Why When Where How Closed Questions can be useful to clarify information, to stop someone talking too much and yes, to actually close! They tend to have one word answers - like 'yes' or 'no'. They start with verbs, for example: Will you Are you Is it Finally probing questions dig deep - so when you do great for uncovering pain points. Technically they are not questions, but an acronym TED. Tell me Explain to me Describe to me
If you're not asking questions, you're telling the prospect you don't care about them. Pitching without being invested in your prospect's success is a sure way to go nowhere. A great question you can ask is: "Can you walk me through your current process?" This allows you to see their workflow and address the problems very specifically.
Asking open-ended questions and active listening form the foundation of a successful (sales) meeting. Remember, the one asking questions leads the conversation. Active listening not only shows respect to your prospect but also deepens your understanding of their needs, enabling you to ask relevant questions and keep the conversation engaging. Simon Sinek offers valuable advice: ‘Be a better listener by being the last one to speak your opinion in a meeting.’ This skill accomplishes two crucial things: 1. It makes everyone feel heard and valued, fostering a sense of contribution. 2. You benefit from hearing others’ thoughts before expressing your own.
It's about looking at things from the other person's point of view. Not what can Bo sell you, but what do you you need? As Janet said, open ended questions are powerful, and people tend to like to talk about themselves. A helpful phrase I use in asking questions is Tell Me More. Then listen intently.
Asking questions and actively listening to your audience's needs, tailoring your approach to provide relevant information and solutions. Use stories and examples to illustrate how your offering addresses their specific challenges.
While educating your prospects about your product or service, you also want to focus on the value and benefits they will get from buying from you. Value and benefits are what make your offer attractive, compelling, and differentiated from your competitors. They are also what motivate your prospects to take action and buy. To focus on value and benefits, use clear and concise language, emphasize the outcomes and results, and link them to your prospects' goals and pain points.
The value proposition is the foundation of your pitch. Often, we have more than one, and that's why the question and listen portion of this article is so important. If you don't ask the right questions, you won't know what your prospects need from you.
You might want to have some reports ready in advance for this. For example, do some case studies on the applications of your product or service and summarize the results in meaningful, simple graphs that you can show your audience during your pitch.
Offer additional educational content, such as guides, whitepapers, or videos, that delve deeper into the problem and its solutions. This reinforces your expertise and commitment to helping the customer and quantify the value your product or service brings. Explain how it can save the customer time, money, or resources, and how the benefits outweigh the cost.
Once you’ve grasped your prospect’s needs, you can tailor your product or service pitch to a personal level, greatly increasing your chances of success. The most effective approach involves articulating the Feature, Advantage, and Benefit of your offering, aligning them with your prospect’s highest-priority needs: 1. Present the ‘feature’ (your product) 2. Highlight the ‘advantage’ 3. Explain how it directly ‘benefits’ THEM
Closers provide value throughout the sales process, including after the sales has been made. The most effective way I’ve found to provide value for a prospective client is to make the data make sense for their use case. Make your value prop make sense for their use case. This involves going deep. Your value prop as a bullet on its own isn’t enough. Everybody is trying to save somebody money. Everybody is automating. In practice, what makes your solution the right choice for a specific prospect? Answer that every time.
One of the most powerful ways to balance education and sales in a pitch is to provide social proof. Social proof is the evidence that other people have used and liked your product or service, and that it has worked for them. Social proof can take the form of testimonials, reviews, ratings, case studies, referrals, or endorsements. Social proof can boost your credibility, trustworthiness, and authority, and persuade your prospects to follow the actions of others.
Social proof is king. It's why G2 badges, testimonials, and logo hunting are part of most GTM strategies. Bringing the right case study that speaks to your prospect helps identify a clear path forward.
Social proof is the most effective, when your audience feels they belong to the social group that is endorsing your product or service. So, collect social proof from different types of customers to keep the sample population diversified.
Share customer testimonials, case studies, or success stories to build credibility and demonstrate how others have benefited from your product or service.
In today's world this is the most important tool at your disposal. Happy clients who take the time to write a positive online review, send referrals your way or endorse your company in any way are an absolutely an essential part in any business being successful.
When?it?comes?to?social?proof,?don't?fudge?it. Even if you don't currently have any user experiences, always keep in mind that you are your product or service's very first client. Over time, you will gather feedback and rankings from other users who it has served. So, tell your story!
Finally, you want to end your pitch with a clear call to action. A call to action is the specific step or action you want your prospects to take after hearing your pitch. It could be to sign up for a free trial, schedule a demo, request a quote, or buy now. A clear call to action can help you move your prospects along the sales funnel, and increase your conversion rate. To have a clear call to action, use direct and urgent language, highlight the benefits of taking action, and make it easy and convenient for your prospects to do so.
A clear call to action should rarely be, "Go buy our product". It should be focused on helping your prospects learn more. Use the 80-20 rule with your calls to action. 80% of the time you should be pointing your prospects to a resource to learn more and 20% of the time it can be directed at sales.
Any Call to Action should consist of 3 basic elements: clear communication, an action, and a sense of urgency. Your CTA should motivate your prospect to take an action on the offer that is being presented. It is an essential element and one of the most important steps to close a sale. Without a clear CTA, your customer may not know the next steps to purchase the product. The 2 types of Call to Actions are Direct and Transitional CTAs. Direct CTAs are clear and straightforward. Transitional CTAs seem less scary and are less direct. Do not be afraid of using CTAs throughout your pitch and never forget to give your prospect those next steps!
When making a call to action, be careful that it should not give the impression that YOU need the prospects to take action. Rather, it should convey a feeling that it's THEM who will lose something if they don't act urgently.
My call to action is to express my desire to collaborate with the prospect. It should be clear to both parties whether a business partnership is the right choice. I always ensure that not only the client but also myself are fully committed to the project, as equal commitment is vital for a successful collaboration. If there’s mutual synergy, I communicate the next steps to kickstart our collaboration.
The most common reason I see SDRs losing prospects is bottomless emails. You send some materials, a deck, whatever to your prospect, and the never ending follow up email chain begins. Action items. Every meeting has action items. Next steps for all parties to execute before reconvening at a specific time. My best practice — I send a quick email summary after every meeting detailing the action items for each party. Now, if I’m not getting a response, I have specific, unfulfilled action items to point to. And sometimes they just ghost you ?? ! Welcome to sales!
The best salespeople don't look at education as something separate from selling. They educate their buyers to help them feel confident and comfortable with their buying decisions! If you provide valuable education the selling will happen naturally.
I set 4 sets of objectives for each pitch by answering the following questions: What do I want the audience to Feel, Think, Know, Do, after the pitch. This helps balancing the pitch between persuasion and educating.
In sales we usually tend to forget to listen as we are so focused about the pitch and brining our unique selling points across in the time we have. The best conversations I had that have led to successful business relationships were those when we answered and solved good questions from customers as well as supplier side and then concluded them together with a solution that fits.
Sales skills, just like any other skill, can get honed over time. So, ask for feedback and reflect on your previous experiences to improve your methodology continuously.
Education is a part of the sales process. These days, your buyers have research readily available but it does not make them an expert in your product, process, and services. Be wary of using jargon no matter how well informed your buyers sound. Make sure you can differentiate your communication approach so that it is clear and understandable.