There is an old adage in sales that I’m sure everybody here knows “We all have 2 ears and 1 mouth for a reason, in sales you should listen twice as much as you talk.”
How many people actually follow this excellent advice? I know from the people that have been trying to sell to me over the last few weeks, very few and it can be infuriating. Sales is essentially very easy – understand what the need is, match what you are selling to the need and convince your prospect that you represent the best company to fulfil their need. Yes I know there is a lot more going on around the sale, but that is the basic premise.
For some reason, most telemarketers seem to forget these basic principles. An analogy I often use on training courses is that of buying a car. I’m a single man with no children and looking for a 2 seated convertible sports car that handles well and is powerful. The best salesman in the world would not be able to get me to buy a diesel Range Rover, but if he doesn’t listen to what I am looking for, we are both going to waste a lot of time.
However if early on in the conversation he asks me pertinent questions and listens to my answers, he could tell me about the Porsche Boxster he is selling and then all he needs to do is convince me I want to buy the car from him.
This is a very simplistic analogy, but is exactly the same as B2B telemarketing. I was looking at buying advertising space for a client of ours recently and happened to receive a phone call from a relevant magazine. This telemarketer asked me why I bought advertising space, I told him we were looking to raise awareness of a new product so relevant readership and audited circulation were essential. Instead of meeting my requirements he told me of great offers he has available so close to deadline and how much cheaper than the competition he was. Neither of which were relevant to me at my stage of the decision making process.
Hardly surprising he finished the call without a sale and my impression of the magazine was tarnished.
This telemarketer certainly isn’t alone. So many are guilty of having a set script or list of questions to ask, not listening to the answers and only selling the benefits that their sales manager has told them are the benefits. Everybody has different motivation for buying a product or service, your skill should be identifying and meeting these. If you do you will find you are a lot more successful.