7 Strategic Questions Regarding Your Prospecting Process
Mark Hunter
Sales kickoff speaker helping you turn prospects into profits, it all starts with prospecting with integrity.
Today I want to give you an excerpt from my new book, High-Profit Prospecting. Consider the below strategic questions as you look at your own prospecting process:
1. What about my prospecting process is compelling to the customer?
When I say "compelling," I am talking about the customer's willingness to engage and share with you what they truly want. Prospects won't do that unless they find you and your process compelling and full of potential to help them meet their needs.
2. Does my prospecting process result in the customer having false expectations about what I sell, and thus force me to spend time later in the selling process reshaping them?
Nothing can suck more profit out of a company than having customers demanding something they feel they deserve based on comments by a salesperson.
3. Is my prospecting process effective enough to help reduce the amount of time I spend negotiating with customers?
The better we prospect with regard to finding and validating great potential customers, the less negotiating we will have to do to close a sale.
4. Is my prospecting process focused more on sharing with the customer what I have to offer or is it more about uncovering information about the customer?
Prospecting processes that do not put learning about the customer first are only going to result in a high level of "no" answers from customers. There is no way you can be successful with your prospecting if you're chasing leads that don't have potential.
5. Is my prospecting process segmented enough to allow me to uncover customer needs faster from different types of prospects than if I used the same process for everyone?
Not all prospects are the same. They may have the same buying profile, but their communication needs may be polar opposites. The more you can tailor how you prospect, the greater the number of customers you will close.
6. How does the customer see me and how I can help them?
The number and different types of questions prospects ask you during the selling process is going to help you understand how they see you and what you sell.
7. How long does it take for a lead or prospect to have confidence in me?
Prospecting is all about building confidence. The sooner the customer has confidence in you, the more you'll be able to accurately uncover their needs.
For more on prospecting, be sure to check out my new book High-Profit Prospecting.
Copyright 2016, Mark Hunter "The Sales Hunter." Sales Motivation Blog. Mark Hunter is the author of High-Profit Selling: Win the Sale Without Compromising on Price and High-Profit Prospecting: Powerful Strategies to Find the Best Leads and Drive Breakthrough Sales Results.
Retired. Mind engaged. Adventuring. Camera in hand.
8 年Mark: as ever, thx for your thoughtful take on a tough challenge. For what it's worth, what we're seeing is the more a seller learns about a buyer's situation + challenges + goals in a conversation, the more they'll reap the rewards of better results earned more effortlessly. More buyers willing to engage in conversations [as the seller learns to conduct them in ways that create value for buyers]. On issues of compelling business concern [to the buyer, and on which the seller has capabilities to offer]. With confidence that the conversation's been so valuable it needs to continue [from both the buyer's and seller's perspectives]. - John
??Helping Ambulatory Improve Financial Performance, Gain Access to Top-Tier Talent & Lower Total Cost to Collect ?? | Senior Vice President of Sales - UnisLink ????? | Bestselling Author | Keynote Speaker
8 年Outstanding diagnostic Mark. Thanks for sharing!
Retired
8 年Mark a point I forgot to add. You referred to the prospecting progress as strategic. if you asked a 100 sales managers to describe their prospecting process how many would use the word strategic?. A point lost on the VP Ops above. I firmly agree with you
Retired
8 年Mark, I shiver when I still hear people talking about 'the more sales calls you make the more sales you will make'. I interrupted a VP Operations at a workshop who exclaimed precisely that and I had to step in and give him a red card (Jonathan please note). As it turned out that's all he has ever known. Finally as much as cold calling is maligned, rightly when it is just a punt in the dark, when the call directly addresses a buyers issue the whole tenure of the call changes .