You are at your most efficient when...

This is a 4 minute read. I suggest particular attention to the idea of learning the buyer's journey and inquiry. This is the most challenging aspect of sales for the vast majority of sales people; and separates the sales professionals. The depth of your inquiry in all regards of the sales cycle is imperative to the efficiency of process and customer satisfaction. 

HERE'S THE DEAL: Sales is not one size fits all, and it isn't about your organization. It's about customers and their journey to solve a problem/fulfill a need. Even within organizations, at different times you will need to understand there are going to be differing value propositions; often not predicated on increase revenue/decrease cost. They are not here for you to prosper, you are here for them to prosper. However, they define that. You have a product you are working to position the buyer to say,"I need this."

THE IMMUTABLE FACTS:

KNOWLEDGE OF CUSTOMER IS "IT": Your key to success is the acquisition of information that enables you to understand how to align with the prospect/customer/client and then induce the win-win. Every engagement should be viewed as an opportunity to move along a path of greater understanding along the multiple lines of a buyer's journey. The path is usually multi-faceted if you are in more complex sales.

THE JOURNEY MUST BE LEARNED: As a sales professional (using consultative, transactional, solution, provocative/missionary selling - each when needed) it is in your best interest to know their journeys in detail. Where they are in the journey, do they have a map/directions-what is it, who else is traveling with them and why, how they think they should best arrive at their destination, have they traveled this journey before and failed - why, what do they want out of the journey, why they want to go, when they want to go and how fast are they wanting to get to their destination, why - what they fear might stop them from getting there. What do they envision when they get to their destination? And many more. This learning is perpetual and incontrovertibly essential to your success.

MULTIPLE HATS: This means you should be prepared to wear multiple hats and know which one to wear throughout the journey, and is most relevant to the buyer's mindset, and their compatriots, at any one time; and aligning your product with their needs and creating the seductive environment that they come to the conclusions, in timely fashion, you are guiding them towards for the win-win.

IF YOUR GO TO IS DATA DUMP: If you are used to showing and telling, feature.advantage.benefit, spilling your candy in the lobby, or puking your knowledge out on them you are lucking into sales you do have, and you are stretching out sales cycles such that you impact your capacity to produce more sales more quickly. When you do this you have handed everything they may need to know, and things they don't want to know, to them. Why do they need to come back to you anymore, other than if THEY identify YOU as the best solution? You are not walking with them on their journey as the guide/consultant you are now standing on the side of the road hoping they will pick you up like a forlorn hitchhiker.

GET UNCOMFORTABLE: Therefore you need to get uncomfortable. You are on their journey and there will be uncertainty. The best way to mitigate this for you and them is applying your knowledge as the guide to their destination. How? By having established trust, credibility, and rapport upfront with alignment via questions and then by continually understanding their journey with more questions. You have to accept this is THEIR journey. You have to be willing to make space for that. And in so doing you become more inquisitive bc you know you can't guide them to an aligned win-win destination without perpetual and, at times, seemingly overbearing inquiry. You can't fully help them if you don't. You realize you must and listen a lot. Or rather hear them and help them connect the dots to your product.

CONNECT - THE INQUISITIVE IS THE BEST CONVERSATIONALIST IN THE ROOM: You contemplate and you expand your vision and understanding of the buyer and their journey. You can then do the same for them. They will welcome your insight. They will create their own insight via your knowledge and your questioning process. They will draw the conclusions and find the answers you know to be true because you have opened them up to be emotionally receptive to your perspective. It is now their perspective. You have empowered them to draw the conclusion you were always guiding them toward with your PROCESS. Conversation flowed while you did very little talking.

WIN-WIN: By following this PROCESS you open the buyer(s) to new ways of seeing their future because you enabled them to come to the realization for themselves. You are their guide and their consultant. They look to you to guide them to their destination. Win-win.