Some inspiration from Mark Lack (link to shorten the gap.com) to help you close even more sales and serve more people with your products and services.
How do you get your prospects to “expand” their answers to bring out more emotion? You do that by asking “Expanded probing questions”. As you know prospects buy on emotion 100% of the time and justify it will logic.
Expanded Probing questions should begin with phrases like these: Walk me through … Tell me more … Can you share with me … Describe for me … Explain to me …
These questions show your prospects that you are there for them, you want to hear their pain. You not only want to hear their pain, but you want them to hear their pain right? You want them to relive the experience of the pain they associate from not having the problem resolved yet.
So what is the most intense emotion? It’s PAIN! Without pain, there is no sale. Without you pulling out pain from the prospect with powerful questions your potential customers will continue living that pain, doing what they always have done, maintaining the status quo. Unless you learn to uncover a prospect’s pain with great questions, you will continue to sell using traditional selling techniques, playing the numbers game, losing sales you could be making.
Examples of Probing Questions:
Can you walk me through your company’s decision-making process? Can you give me a specific example so I can understand this better? Can you go over with me the qualities you look for when choosing a company to work with? Walk me through the criteria you use to make a decision on something like this? Describe for me what you’re possibly looking for just to see if I could help you. Explain that to me in more detail just so I understand … And did that work? How did you feel about that? In what way though?
Solution awareness questions can help the prospect become open about your competitors who are also marketing to your clients. Once you learn more about how your competitors are and where your prospect is with each one, it will give you a competitive advantage in your sales process
Examples:
Could you share with me what you’re hoping to accomplish in the next 3mo/6mo/12mo? How does this compare with where you are right now?
Can you go over what qualities you are looking for in a vendor? How does that compare with what your CEO/boss/department heads look for in a vendor?
What differentiates your company from your competition? Why is that?
What is more important to your company cutting costs, or increasing sales and revenue? Why though?
Can you share with me your long-term goals and how they compare to where you are now? What’s prevented you from achieving them though?
What have you tried to do about this in the past? What worked? What didn’t?
How much do you think this has cost you? In what ways?
Have you given up trying to deal with this problem? Why is it important to deal with this now though?
Have you given up trying to solve this issue? Why though?
How long has this been going on in the organization?
How long has this been a problem?
What’s prevented you from solving this in the past? Why now though?
How much do you think it’s costing you in lost sales each year? How much do you think it’s costing you in lost revenue each year?
People don’t buy tools, no matter how many bells and whistles, they want results.
People don’t buy your fancy lifestyle, they want results.
If they can’t afford you, just give them the training on how to do it. You lose nothing, since they couldn’t afford you and would be a nightmare customer anyway.
And those who can afford you, gladly pay top dollar— without you ever needing to beat your own chest or explain what you do in detail.
Present yourself not as another expense- which clients seek to minimize- but as a profit increaser— which they want more of.
Show them how your product or service drives that intended result, step by step, so we can measure the investment and return.
Sell the sizzle, not the steak, say marketing gurus who know how to sell on emotion.
But I say just give them the steak and let happy customers do your marketing for you.
If it’s knowledge, distribute it for free via articles, webinars, social posts, and things that have zero marginal cost to you.
If it’s your time, especially one-on-one private consultations, charge dearly for it, since that’s very expensive— you can’t get that back or create an asset from it.
You’re a skilled doctor in what you do, not a used car salesman. So time to start acting the part.
From my buddy, Mark Lack, to help you sell better!
We all know how important sales are. Without sales, your business doesn’t grow, and without growth, your business dies. No matter what industry you’re in, you must account for sales and business development within your organization. Regardless of whether you have a large team or are an army of one, there are best practices and years of data you can draw from to be more efficient and successful. We’ve gathered 56 important sales statistics and grouped them into seven distinct categories to help you focus on what’s crucial to your business. Study these statistics, learn from them, and implement them in your own strategy to grow your business. To help you remember the most important statistics. Referral Statistics 1. Customers are 4x more likely to buy when referred by a friend. [Source: Neilsen] 2. One offline word of mouth impression drives sales ~5x more than one paid impression, and as much as 100x more for higher-consideration categories. [Source: WOMMA] 3. The lifetime value of referred customers is on average 16% higher than that of non-referred customers. [Source: Wharton School of Business] 4. More than 50% of buyers consult third party sources before consulting a company’s salesforce. [Source: Avande] 5. 73% of executives prefer to work with sales professionals referred by someone they know. [Source: IDC] 6. In a survey of 3,000 business people, over half of respondents indicated they got 70% or more of their customers via referrals. [Source: Ivan Misner] 7. Even after purchasing a product or service, 42% of buyers still reviewed a company on a third-party site. [Source: Avande] Cold Call Statistics 8. 44% of salespeople give up after one follow-up. [Source: Scripted] 9. 80% of sales require five follow-up phone calls after the meeting. [Source: The Marketing Donut] 10. It takes an average of eight cold call attempts to reach a prospect. [Source: Brevet] 11. It takes 18 or more dials to connect with a prospect over the phone and call-back rates are below 1%. [Source: TOPO] 12. Teleprospectors make between 100 and 500 calls for every lead they qualify. [Source: SiriusDecisions] 13. Sales reps can spend up to 40% of their time looking for somebody to call. [Source: Inside Sales] 14. 75% of 1,000 executives polled were prompted to attend an event or take an appointment as a result of a cold call or email. [Source: DiscoverOrg] 15. The optimal voicemail message is between 8 and 14 seconds. [Source: The Sales Hunter] 16. The best days to call are Wednesdays and Thursdays from 6:45 to 9:00 a.m. and 4:00 to 6:00 p.m. [Source: RingLead] 17. The worst times to call are Mondays at 6:00 am and on Friday afternoons. [Source: RingLead] 18. 92% of all customer interactions happen over the phone. [Source: Brevet] 19. The average Sales Development representative makes 46 calls a day. [Source: The Bridge Group] Sales Email Statistics 20. The best times to email prospects are between 8 a.m. to 10 a.m. and 3:00 p.m. to 4:00 p.m. [Source: GetResponse] 21. Personalized emails improve click-through rates by 14% and conversion rates by 10%. [Source: Aberdeen Group] 22. People who buy products marketed through email spend 138% more than people that do not receive email offers. [Source: Convince and Convert] 23. 40% of emails are opened on mobile first, and the average mobile screen can only fit four to seven words max in the subject line. [Source: ContactMonkey] 24. 33% of email recipients open emails based on the subject line alone. [Source: Convince and Convert] 25. 70% of email readers open emails from a brand or company in search of a deal, discount, or coupon. [Source: Campaign Monitor] 26. Subject lines with three words or more have an average email open rate less than 15%. [Source: ContactMonkey] 27. 57% of email recipients consider a message to be spam if it isn’t relevant to their needs, even when they know the vendor well. [Source: Scripted] 28. 69% of email recipients report email as Spam based solely on the subject line. [Source: Convince and Convert] 29. Almost 40% of all messages are sent between 6:00 a.m. and 12:00 p.m. [Source: GetResponse] 30. Only 23% of sales emails are opened. [Source: TOPO] 31. 44% of email recipients made at least one purchase last year based on a promotional email. [Source: Convince and Convert] 32. Adding the word “New” to your subject line can increase open rates by 23%. [Source: Adestra] 33. 23.63% of all email opens occur within the first hour of delivery. [Source: GetResponse] 34. 17% of Americans create a new email address every six months. [Source: Convince and Convert] Lead Nurturing Statistics 35. CRM system adoption increases sales by up to 29%. [Source: Salesforce] 36. Nurtured leads make 47% larger purchases than non-nurtured leads. [Source: The Annuitas Group] 37. 95% of buyers chose a vendor that provided content to navigate each stage of the buying process. [Source: Demand Gen Report] 38. Companies that excel at lead nurturing generate 50% more sales-ready leads, and do so at a 33% lower cost. [Source: Marketo] 39. 67% of the buyer’s journey is done digitally. [Source: SiriusDecisions] 40. Businesses that use marketing automation to nurture prospects see a 451% increase in qualified leads. [Source: Annuitas] 41. Seven out of ten executives believe that technology will replace human interaction with customers in the next decade. [Source: Avande] Social Selling Statistics 42. 43% of consumers are more likely to buy a new product when learning about it from friends on social media. [Source: Nielsen] 43. 81% of American’s online purchasing decisions are influenced by their friends’ social media posts, versus 78% who are influenced by the posts of the brands they follow. {Source: Market Force] 44. You are 4.2x more likely to get an appointment if you have a personal connection with a buyer. [Source: Sales Benchmark Index] 45. 55% of B2B buyers search for information on social media. [Source: Blender] 46. 32% of buyers post a review on social media. [Source: Avande] Sales Timing Statistics 47. Research shows that 35% to 50% of sales go to the vendor that responds first. [Source: InsideSales.com] 48. There is a 10x drop in lead qualification when you wait longer than 5 minutes to respond, and a 400% decrease when you respond within 10 minutes versus 5 minutes. [Source: Harvard Business Review] 49. The best days to qualify leads are Wednesdays and Thursdays, with a 49% increase on Thursdays compared to Tuesdays. [Source: Harvard Business Review] 50. In a study of 2,241 US companies, only 37% responded within an hour, 53% within a day, 24% after 24 hours, and 23% never responded at all. [Source: Harvard Business Review] 51. 80% of prospects new to their position who are spending $1M+ on new initiatives do so in their first 90 days. [ Source: Craig Elias] Sales Challenges Statistics 52. 79% of all marketing leads are never converted to sales. [Source: SalesForce] 53. Only 5% of salespeople said leads they receive from marketing were very high quality. [Source: HubSpot] 54. 22% of salespeople don’t know what a CRM is. [Source: Hubspot] 55. 65% of customers are lost because of indifference, not because of mistakes. [Source: Blender] 56. 82% of B2B decision-makers think sales reps are unprepared. [Source: Blender]
After years of experience working with clients all over the world, it was when I met a billionaire friend that made me realise something most people miss…
A billionaire friend told me not to charge by the hour or the month.
Yes, I know this is weird because it’s what most do.
But the truth is if you want to stand out as an agency or consultant, measure and charge by business results.
The business results will be a reward in its own right growing your authority, but this shift can be the difference between succeeding and not.
So many marketing agencies over promise and under deliver. There is a big difference in saying you can do something and actually doing what you say.
So to talk about business results, whether or not you can deliver, is what drives sales. The only way to drive sales is to drive leads.
Demonstrate you have a detailed process you follow and emphatically state you don’t do what’s not in a process.
Don’t say you do everything and serve everyone, big or small.
Don’t say you’re affordable and serve small business.
Even if you’re desperate for business, if you get cheap and cut corners, you’ll shoot yourself in the foot by attracting nightmare clients that even pros wouldn’t be able to make happy.
The more you say what you don’t do, the more confidence your clients have in what you say you do well.
Relationships with clients when you first start out are fragile things, but when you have the self-respect to admit things you can not do it displays your dignity towards your client. It’s crucial that you and your business/agency don’t seem too good to be true.
When you start with their financial goals and tie your effort to them, you shift from an expense to a profit centre.
Then it doesn’t matter what your fees are.
Your goal is not to reduce your fees, but increase their profit— probably from your efforts.
