Since my area of emphasis is sales prospecting – or finding new, currently interested customers for business, I want to focus here on the elements of a sales presentation occurring at the first steps of the sales cycle. The better qualified your prospect is, the easier it will be for you to make a sale. Qualification includes details about buying preferences, affordability and understanding your customer’s wants and needs. However, the most important initial qualification element is current interest.
Create sales literature and a sales presentation that is first focused on identifying current interest.
Current interest can be discovered through “qualitative questioning.”
- How happy are you with your current vendor?
- How’s that working?
- Is everything ok?
- Are you pleased?
Questions about timing are also key:
- When do you look into that again?
- What time of year do you consider this?
- When was the last time you reviewed this subject?
- How long has it been since you have looked into this?
If interest is directed toward a future date, make a note – and follow up as needed.
Sales Literature
Make literature or sales material (whether mail, fax, permission email, web material, etc.) proactive at all times. This means, even in a newsletter or information piece, always provide a section that asks about current interest and include a reply prompt of some kind (i.e. Learn how to create proactive sales letters with, “The One Pager Manual.”). Depending on what you sell, you may wish to be either more or less detailed about what you ask for in reply.
- The more detail you request in a reply, the fewer responses you will generally receive – however the responses you receive will tend to be better qualified.
- You must strike a balance in terms of the amount of information you request. Don’t scare off an interested prospect by requesting too much.
- Remember too that a prospect’s comfort level will grow over time.
- Once you have exchanged interactions a few times, the prospect may be more comfortable in providing you more details about his or her situation.
A sales presentation that begins with a deliberate focus on establishing current interest is a good start. Learn how to produce a high volume of interested customers, then every other step in the sales process will become easier. If a prospect is currently interested, you won’t need to be so glitzy or persuasive in your sales presentation in order to make the sale. Be professional, be competitive, deliver on time and at the promised price – and seek out prospects with genuine current interest.
