Selling to build curiosity and urgency

When selling a product, we want to create urgency. One way to do that is to be very unassuming and make statements that create a sense of insecurity when thinking about life without your product.

You want to create an itch. That is, you want to induce curiosity. It is important to plan out what your are going to say when doing a sales presentation. You can rehearse your initial sales approaches and presentations and then, once you've done a few, you can begin to as, in situations where you aren't successful in closing, you can think particularly about what you could have said to get a different reaction.

Customers react, good salespeople respond.

Take away closing and price conditioning

In the insulation industry, there is an interesting closing technique that works well. This technique can be applied to many different types of sales.

It's called price conditioning. You can use it as a way to get prospects thinking about buying and you can use it to help keep your pricing high.

When making a presentation on a product where the price is not tagged, you can use statements and phrasing that induce prospects to ask "How much?"

You can say things like "This product is very, very expensive!" or "Even though the price is very, high on this product, it is well worth it!".

When asked about price, you can then respond with a joking phrase such as "Don't worry, it is less than ($100,000) so it's definitely affordable. (and then laugh and say that you are just kidding)

Now they are thinking about what the price could be and they might try to justify how it may be expensive.

The thorn in the side close

When it comes to selling, you want to hit an emotional button.

A great close for hitting those buttons is the thorn in the side close.

It goes like this:

"Chances are, Miss Jones, the last time you saw something like this, you said you wanted to wait and get it next time, but if you think about it, this is the next time and if you don't get one now, when are you gonna get one?"

This close appeals to the urgency and fear that if the client puts you off, he or she may never actually get a chance to own the product or service you sell. Remember, many times, people want what you got, they just don't want to admit it.

Door to door sales at its best

The fact is door to door sales people are still in existence.

Some people have a hard time believing that door to door sales still survives as a viable marketing method.

One of the biggest door to door sales organizations is Kirby vacuum cleaners. A Kirby vacuum salesman will tel you, there's nothing quite like door to door vacuum sales.

Most sales people will agree that the biggest challenge is finding a lead.

Look at it from a Kirby salesman perspective when you have to go out into residential neighborhood areas and scope out prospects for an expensive vacuum cleaner.

The vacuum may cost in the range of $1500-2000 or more depending on what market it's sold in.

There are several steps to making a Kirby vacuum sale

First you have to find a prospect. This can be done one of several ways. The most common ways being to knock a prospects door or to set an appointment ahead of time.

The simplest and most readily available method is door to door. Since you have complete control over when and where you demonstrate your Kirby vacuum equipment.

You are typically gonna have to to demo your equipment for anywhere from 20 minutes to 2 hours or more. Usually a demonstration takes about 1 hour to 90 minutes.

New sales people are encouraged to use what is called a "factory demo".

A factory demo is pretty generic and it includes a thorough demonstration of each aspect of the vacuum cleaner using traditional "sales clinchers" and closes.

In this generic demo sequence, the salesperson goes through a bit a detail.

Since dealers have found more recently that an "upright demo" is a quicker way of qualifying the prospect as a potential buyer. In this demo version, the salesperson immediately sets the vacuum up in its upright position.

By doing this, the salesperson is immediately able to hone in on the shock factor of the dirt that is in the carpet. This is usually much more sufficient than using attachments in the beginning, since most people have busy schedules, they do little more than sweep the floor with their vacuum anyways.

The attachments are more detailed and therefore may appeal more to the detailed person who are few and far between.

Now this is a lesson for all types of sales people. Appeal to the most common hot buttons first to establish rapport the quickest.

For example, when we go to the car lot as a prospect, what do we want to hear and see?

It's simple, we want to hear logic, we want to see style....results...potency.

We want to hear all the logical reasons that are buying the product so that we can justify it to our better halves and loved ones.

We want to see all the emotional reason so that we can justify it to ourselves. We want to see that the care truly has more get up and go on the road. We want to feel the leather seats and we want to see the look on Bobs face when he sees us driving a new Hummer.

On the other hand, we want to be able to go home and justify it to the people who trust us, so that we maintain their respect.

We want to be able to say that this new Hummer has more towing capacity which you need since you live in a mountainous area and you do plan to buy a boat one day.

We want to think that by owning such and such brand, we will have the prestige we need to be successful in business.

We want to think we got that last "gold" one which means we are more and more unique.

This is some ridiculous logic maybe, but it is the kind of logic people use to buy things.

Remember: Show emotion, talk logic

Face to face direct sales

Direct selling - FACE TO FACE SALES

With face to face selling, the important thing to remember is that you have complete control. Remember not take anything from anyone. Always keep conversations moving in your direction. Remember, it's probably a lot harder for them to turn down your offer than you think.

People want to see value and if you've got a sales background, you already know that you need to build value in the customers mind appropriate to what you are selling. For some people that may be a monetary value and for others in may be a sentimental value. In fact, the more expensive what you are selling actually is, the more it appeals to the sentimental values of a customer.

When we go out to buy a car for example, if you were buying a bottom of the line, basic model car, you'd likely be concerned with the actual and practical uses and applications of that car, whether you want something economical or that has a lot of space for a large family etc.

On the other hand if you are going to shop for a brand new Mercedes or other luxury brand, you are probably not thinking about gas mileage, space or any such matter.

More likely, you can't wait to see the look on peoples faces when they see you in this obviously expensive brand of vehicle.

Thus when selling pricey models of automobiles, expensive lines of clothing or an expensive vacuum cleaner for that matter, you want to make the customer feel like their choice in your product or service is going to boost their status.

For example, even just at a hand car wash in a high end business community for example. When people you may work with and know see that you don't just have a clean car all the time, but they actually see your new car on display on the side of the road at the local car wash and they think "Wow, Bob can and does spend the money required to get his car detailed by hand each week! What a cool guy!"

Do you think that the appeal of the car wash is in the price and quality of the cleaning? Probably not so much as it is convenient and popular amongst his peers. This added convenience makes him feel like he's got more time to do "other things" and now he's got life easy and his friends and co workers can see it. This is part of his image at this point.

That's just a car wash and you can probably guess how Bob dresses and what kind of car he drives. He dresses to impress and he drives a Hummer. Not because it saves him on gas or because he's always towing military gear but rather because it makes him feel more in control. More independent. Stronger.

This is the mindset of the customer when you are talking high price. On the other hand when you are at the bottom end of the price spectrum, you probably want to appeal to practical benefits, such as motor life or trunk size or mileage.

BOTTOM LINE: If you want to make more money, appeal to emotion, justify with logic. This is how your customers buy.

WHEN ASKING FOR THE MONEY IN ANY SITUATION...There are several key things you can do to make it easier and more effective. The close of a sale is early, often and late. You already know this, but what are some ways we can actually apply these early closes without alienating our customers?

GET COMMITMENTS THROUGHOUT PRESENTATION - Find out what holds your customer from buying. Ask them, if your product or service meets that condition, is this something that they would like to have. For example good things to say when asking for commitments include:

"So what do you think John, if the product was able to perform like this all the time and it was affordable, do you think you'd get one?"

or during a close, if the prospect puts you off and procrastinates, you can ask them what would hold them back. Typical answers include either one of 3 basic objections. They want to think about it, they have a spouse or partner to discuss with or they simply can't afford it.

PREPARE YOUR CUSTOMER FOR A HIGH PRICE - Before actually introducing pricing or exact pricing to a customer, find a hot button, something that the customer seems impressed with about your product. Telling them everything about the product except the price.

Make statements that induce price asking. When they do ask "So how much is it?", use an inflated figure, say if you're selling a real nice leather sofa living room set, in a showroom, you could state that they can get the whole living room set for say less than $10,000.

Even though the set may actually sell for only $3500...you use that inflated figure as a sticker shock desensitizer. In most scenarios, you'll probably want to state this ridiculous price laughingly, in other cases, you may want to use it in an "Honest mistake" approach when you do get them down to the table. Be sure to use a price that is not so high that they don't think it's a possibility.

You want your prospect to almost wonder, even though you seemed to be kidding. They will likely think "OK he's joking about that price, but maybe the real price isn't that much lower." In fact, your prospect may think that you are joking but the price is still going to be at least half that amount. In the case of the sofa, that would still be $5000.

Finally when you do get to the actual price and you are able to say your whole set is only $3,500, your customer may be quite relieved and much more vulnerable and apt to buy at that price. The idea is to actually build the value in the mind of the customer. Some customers, simply are not aware of what your product cost. If you can show them some clear benefit to your product, they will ask you how much it is.

Direct sales

PS When thinking about the overwhelming task of starting a successful business, just think about the Baalbek stones, the largest cut stones on the planet.

It is said that in ancient times (5000+ years ago) some unidentified civilization moved THE three largest cut and worked stones on the planet to the building site which is about 2 miles away from the quarry they were cut out of.

These three stones are estimated at 800-1000+ tons and are placed in such a manner that they would be difficult if not impossible to perform with todays known technologies.

There is one, larger stone left in the quarry, which was for some unknown reason left incomplete. It is believed that whoever left the stone there probably saw a flaw in the stone and abandoned it.

Ancient Maronite Christians would say that they were built by giants. This may be hard to swallow. But it may be worth a thought to bare in mind that the Romans and Egyptians both had extreme challenges in moving stones just a third of the weight of the super colossal stones in Baalbek.