You should try to sell in a manner that compliments what the different types of social styles prefer.  For example if you are a amiable perons that likes the small talk at the start of a sales call you are not going to get of on the right foot selling to a driver.  The driver is relatively in patient and this will be magnified with an amiable.

Selling to a Driver

• Cut the small talk
• Find out what’s driving them.  Is it social status, is it recognittion is it financial?
• Focus on that element then massage that aspect so they can see how it will benefit them.
• talk big picture and in concepts.
• Keep it short and sweet and you will instantly build rapport and have a lasting effect on this type of peronality

Selling to an Amiable

In many ways much the opposite to selling to a driver, the amiable person will like the following:

• Spending time to find out more about them
• Small talk such as how they are feeling, what kind of day they have had
• They like benefits of products that relate to social aspects such as if you were selling a product taht could make an amiable more money, you would create the proposition in the the context of them being able to take their family on holiday for example.
• They care what other people think and also what you think

The analytical person

• Since I am a cross bewteen an analytical and Driver I can tell you straight how to approach an this type of social style:
• If giving information in graphs and charts etc,  they will want to know teh detail behind the figures so be prepared to know how to explain any claim and figures that you may quote.
• They need time to absorb information so don’t puch too hard on a close, use phrases such as ‘have you had a chance to reflect on these figures?’
• By definition they uinlikely to make a decision on the spot espcially for a big purchase, they are the classic, I’ll think about it’ kind of people, so when they do , if you allow them some time then follow up you won’t be missing out on an opportunity.

The Expressive person

When dealing with this type of group they too sway a little toward sthe social side of things.

• Expressive people are often the loudest people out, they like to express preferences and emotions.
• Uaing energy and dynamic words works well
• Let them express their personality when talking to them

This is just a quick check list that will definitley help you build better rapport and understanding of how to approach and sell to different types of people.  It may also explain why you may not have had success in a consistent manner before.  Try these skills out for yourself and see the results you get.

I will go further into some NPO and also the insights colour model to also look at other tools for selling better.

Coming from such an intense pressured role in pharmaceutical sales we had numerous advanced sales training to make ever single interaction count. Since it was hard enough to actually get to see acustomer when we did we had one chance to make a first impression and also we normally only has less than 5 minutes to sell a prescription drug!

There are many selling models and therories you can use, they are all tools to dip into when you need to.  Social styles looks at 4  individual personalities:

1. Amiable
2. Driver
3. Expressive
4. Analytical

How to ‘Flex’ your style to build rapport and sell better.

The frst thing to do is be aware of your selling style.  You can usually figure it out; amiable people like to be freindly care about social networks and to some degree what people think, a driver is stereotypically someone who is very goal focused, wants it now, top line big picture and conceptual in thinking, often seen as arrogant with big ego’s.

The analytical person is more reflective, often takes time to soak up all he information before making an informed decsion, they like detail and facts, and will not make a rushed decsision.  If you see quite people in work , they are often analyzing the information.  An Expressive is exactly that, somewhat in your face, flamboyount and loud spoken with a degree of energy and sometimes seen as scatter brains jumping all over the place.

Finishing of my in call effectiveness series I want to talk about gaining true comitment in your calls.

The weakest points in any sales call and presentation is the agenda setting and pre call objective and of course the close, asking for the money!

Quite frankly too many people are too afraid of just asking for the business and they have spent all this time doing a great call only to be in such a state of rapport that they feel they cannot close.

Let’s look at it from the three P’s again:

Purpose – Strengthen your ability to ask for and recognize true commitment and how to respond appropriatley

Process - Asessment of your own field information, observe, create and discuss examples, role play with your team or line manager and practice getting true Joint commitment.

Pay Off – Increased level of confidence that the customer will move to action. Use a collection of powerful commitment questions and responses.

So let’s look at gaining true commitment

When we talk about Joint agreement we talk about what the customer is going to do to take action and give you a sale and also what you as a sales executive need to do to facilitate the sale..

The sales flow  would go something like this:

Summarize all relevant agreements throughout the call first then:

1. Ask the commitment question – ‘Will you’…

2. Evaluate the readiness to move to action  (negative ) – then Identify (Unclear) -then Clarify

(positive) – then Specify

3. Specify the commitment  ‘How will you’….

This is where closed questions are really good, it’s a simple yes no answer:

• ‘Will you’?
• ‘How about’?
• ‘Are you ready to’?

Active verbs can be used in a different context of the business outcome for example:

Expand, Try out, Continue, Start, Switch, these are all ways to get:

• New business
• More business
• Maintain business

Evaulate a customer’s readiness to move to take action

1.How does the customer react? – is it verbal or non verbal?

2.What does this mean? – Your confidence level

3.How will you react? Idenify – Clarify – Specify – DO NOT MAKE ASSUMPTIONS!

Verbal signs for commitment would include:

words such as ‘Yes I like it’, ‘Maybe’ , ‘I’ll bear it in mind’, ‘I’m already using it’ – hear if they are willing to take action they will usually as ask a question , make a suggestion or express a concern.

Addressing each commitment level

1. The neagtive situation

Use IDENIFY – You may have a potential major objection therefore refer back to what was discussed in the call and any partial agreements made.

Make sure you know what is the objection is it because there is: no need?, no hurry?, not convinced?  This is a test in actual fact if you are at this sitauation you did not get across the value proposition and you did not get partial agreement in the call earlier.

2. The Unclear situation

Use CLARIFY - Ask clarification questions:

• Rephrase your commitement question
• Check what information the customer is missing
• Help the customer to idenify the patients

The positive situation

Believe it or not this situation often has the weakest close and call to action.  Often sales executives don’t really push the business along and I have seen great calls go to waste if they get a response that they are already using it.  This is where specificity is king.  sometimes digging deeper will uncover; that in the mind of the customer their perception is that they may well use your product all the time, but when probing further they actually only use it a small amount.

So here’s what you do:

Use SPECIFY – Specify the commitment:  How will you…

• Ask and agree
• where you will use the product?
• How much of the product will you use?
• When will you buy the product?
• What do you need from me to get more use?

Use the ICE series to really look at how you sell and change up your patterns we need to re-evaluate our sales calls as we always get into bad habbits and easy comfort zones.  These tips and tricks will add simple yet effective changes to your presentations that you can apply in small steps and see the results.

I want to carry on my in call effectiveness series with personalising the message and gaining partial agreement

I call it the three P’s

Purpose – Engage the customer in a compelling value proposition, tailoring your message – Gainingh custmer agreement throughout

Process – Observe, create and discuss examples

Pay Off - New, better, different ways of personalising your approach, use a collection of relevant and powerful words to warrant a call to action at the end of your call

You need to select features and benefits of your product that you are selling which are aligned to the customers stated needs.  Gain partial agreements throught your call.

Tailoring our approach:

CHOOSE the right mesage – (What will you say) – (What will you show)

DELIVER -with conviction – (How will you say it)

ASK- for agreement (Gain partial agreement)

A benefit is only a benefit of the customer stated a clar need; that can be matched with a feature /advantage.

In earlier posts through the selling skills section of my blog I have talked about the face value reason people may give you upon questioning and the real reason that they buy.  You have to drill down with those more specific questions and start asking about the real needs of the customer.

We have several factors playing a part in the buying process:

1. Emotional
2. Rational/Logical
3. Political/cultural

In my fomer life as pharmaceutical sales executive, we had strong inputrs in all theree reasons, culture was dicated by old school medicine that resisted change and the political aspect was also being pushed by the local funding authorities which stepped out of the department of health and the government.

Finding out what’s the biggest or the most important factor in your sales call is the key to success in these situations.

Moving on from part two in my incall effectivenss series I want to to go further and talk about the power of pausing, paraphrasing in more detail, active listening and more skills that you can start using

Power of Pausing

Here’s a simple and easy way to add some authority and control to your call.

Stop and wait for 3-5 seconds after a question or response – What this does is it breaks up the call to really hone in on a really important point so much so that you can start to really emphasize the importance of what your talking about.  the second thing it does is it get you out of your comfort zone and more used to handling a prospect or customer where your call may not be flowing.  Use it now and then to change up the call and take control!

Paraphrasing

I’ve already talked about paraphrasing but let’s look at it a little more.

What paraphrasing essentially does is it takes the edge of any direct question you may want to ask once you have received the information from a previous question.  Simply put it shows an active listening component and softens the next question and almost in a way qualify’s you to take the information and probe further.

How to paraphrase

Simply restate in your own words (using their language) what the customer means:

I’ understand that it’….

‘What yout telling me is that’…..

‘Could we say that’……..

Use their language if they say ‘I see’ or ‘I hear’ what your saying re use their language, it’s again building rapport by mirroring their language

So What I’,m hearing is…..

Hearing vs Listening

When you just hear things:

• Things just happen
• Your simply receivig words
• It’s very pasive
• There’s liitle energy needed

The result is that you have not been engaged yourself, so how can you engage your customer when you have not listened!

Now what I call listening:

• It’s a concious choice
• Requires concentration
• You Process meanings from words, body language and sound
• Leeds to learning

To help with active listening skills the following prompts will help you:

Non verbal listening skills such as:

• Pausing
• Keeping eye contact
• Taking notes
• Smiling
• Nodding

Verbal listening skills

• Say ‘Yes’, ‘ok’, ‘I see’
• Ask clarification questions
• paraphrase
• respond to body language

Look and respond to changes in body language

Signs of interest:

• Customer leans forward to  look at your sales materials or moves closer to you
• Seeks eye contact
• Looks up
• Smiles
• Takes notes
• Will actually mirror you at different stages of the call!

When a customer is not nterested this may be present:

Leans backwards

Looks away from the sales executive

Crosses arms

Clock watches

We have looked at questioning and active listening skills, as you can see there are many things you can conciously do to make sure that you get full enagagement in your sales call.  I think the hardest habbits to break are that of just passively hearing. If you start doing the above listening skills you will start making  more sense of the information that is being received by your ears and your brain!

is easily distracted with things on their desk

In my last post we looked at ICA, which stands for Identify, Clarify, Agree and commit, this little sales tool gives you the right structure to ask the right questions and to take part in active listeing by clarifying and paraphrasing the anser back to the customer.

Lets’ look at narrowing down the technique:

1. Start with an open broad question

2. As a more specific question

3. Drill doen a level to another more specific question

4. Even more specific questions- (uncovering layers to the real customer needs)

5. Validate your understanding – use specific information gathered throughout the call

Paraphrase back to avoid interrrogation!

Probing

Sometimes the first answer may not be the real reason behind the line of questioing.  that why above we keep going further by asking more specific questions.  This is known as probing.

Simple example:

1. What’s important to you?

2. What else?

3. What else?

4. Which of these is most important to you?

5. Why? (remember when asking why always paraphrase)

As part of my ICE series I want to look at productive questioning and active listening.  Quite frankly you need to practice, practice and practice.  This combined skill takes a while to perfect as sales reps especially with technical sales you often when new try to think about what you need to saya and spend more time thinking in your head instead of asking the right questions and actively listening, I have been there!

Firstly you need to havethe confidence to know that you have all the information you need and it only needs to asccess when you are given a stimulus throgh a question or a response to your question.

Follow these easy steps to get in the right frame of mind:

Ask For information – Listen to learn

Ask for agreement – Listen to obtain Information

Ask for commitment - Listen to understand

You should only be asking questions that progress the relationship and the business
These are what I call killer questions and filler questions.  Good sales people never use filler questions.  Killer questions often get you right to the meat and bones of the customers needs within 3 questions. I have discussed about different types of people i.e drivers, amiables etc, in other posts.   Well drivers hate filler questions, and amiables may well like them but there is a time and a place, you should set yourself goals to try and get to the customers needs within a maximum of 4 questions.  That means you have the right agenda and have engaged the customer.

K.I.S.S – keep it simple stupid

Just think – why are you asking the question and what are you going to do with the answer, if you know that you will stop asking filler questions.

Use a mix of open ended qiestions with closed ended ones

Open questions mean that the receiver must give an answer that elaborates and explaines.  Closed ended questions can only give yes/no replies, therefore can lead you doen a road block.  If you use them to do a yes set or gain an agreement after you have opened them up, they can be very effective.  But if you go in and ask, how, what, why, where, when, 20 questions later you have really not been effective in a sales call and this is where customers start shutting down- though lack of engagment.

Rule of thumb!

The receiver i.e customer should be doing the majority of the talking I would say as much as 80% – by definition the customer is engaged if this is going on.

Im going to leave you with a acronym to help you until my next post:

I – Identify (a need, view, concern)

C – Clarify (Further explore, more specific information, validate your understanding)

A- Agree (Get confirmation, partial agreements)

C- Commit (move to action)

It’s self explanatory but it’s a cool little tool to structure your sales flow so that you use productive questions and aloo active listening.

Next post I will expaand on questioning and listening further

The most important part of you sales call is the first 30-60 secs.  Granted that the first impression rule works in as little as 10 secs.  But here is where you must clarify the customers needs and engage the customer in a compelling value proposition.

Why is it so critical ?

The start of the call is like your journey on a map, it’s the best example I can think of, if you go into a sales call bling without a purpose and without an objective, just like heading for a long drive your going to get lost and make a real mess of things!  think about these reasons:

• Sets the appropraite tone for the call
• Creates a positive climate
• Helps to focus the discussion
• Motivates the customer to be active
• Encourages the customer to listen and react
• Differentiates you from the others

In sales the one thing I always used to try and do was to differentaite myself from other sales executives.  Customers see sales reps and managers all the time, so why would they listen to you?  Asking the right questions and being a resource and gong the extra mile is what sets you apart, I always thought of myself as an expert in my field so that instantly made me look different through the behaviours and expectations I put out in each call.

Using the different openings for different customers!

Just like the color selling skills posts I have talked about we are all different! So people use different means for communication.   If you havn’t sepnt any time thinking about this here’s some tips;

There are 4 sensory inputs that we can use to our advantage:

1. Verbal – Listen to people if they are strong auditory people they will use words and communication over visual aids and feelings – be aware and tune into good listening skills, reciprocate the words they use to build rapport.

2. Emotional – You know the gut feeling, well these people base their decisions on it, and so should we! I would say our gut feelings are around99% accurate and in women I would go as far as 99.9% Use emotion to sel it to them, talk about how great it would ‘feel’ or how would they ‘feel‘ about this product etc.

3. Visual -  I myself respond well to people showing me something rather than being told or seeing it in writing.  Practical demonstrations for visual people is dynamite, again look for clues such as the words they use, if they say I see what your saying all the time, that’s a good clue.  If your in their office or home look for pictures and lots of visual stimuli as that will give you an idea as well.

4. Rational – Ahh the logical and rational side of our brain, how often do you think we buy wth rational though?  You would think its highbut its much less of the time, that’s because we are not 64-bit processors we are social animals and we like emotions.  So when you get a logical person such as the analyitcal blue people (see my color model posts) you need to play upto that and deliver the rational sell.

So think about your sales environment and how you can use the 4 sensory inputes to wrap around yuyr product or sales call and really sell it to them!

The final color we need to look at and how we can better interact with this type of personality:

Green people will come across as:

• Relaxed
• Amiable
• Patient
• Emotionally focused
• Relationship focused
• Informal
• Slower paced
• Democratic
• Understanding
• Say yes, mean no! – I’ll expand
• Agreeable

The green person is the person that cares what you think!  I have sold in pharmaceutical industry for over 6 years
and when you get a green customer and you ask them for the business, they would always say yes because they are hard wired to agree with you!  It takes a good sales person to really dig down and close a deal and know they have with a green person.

Here are some tips of what to do to get you there:

• Be friendly and show a genuine interest in them
• Chat before business – ideal for small talk are the greens!
• Be alert for non verbal signs of concern
• Be in formal and non threatening
• Uncover their needs with open questions
• Develop trust

A quick note we saw that blue people don’t really care or like testimonial because they want to analyze the info and make an informed decisions themselves, where as greens are a really hot with testimonials as they are so motivated by other peoples opinions (social proof) – Using endorsements of drivers and other contemporaries is ideal here
they often think about others directly when making decisions!

With greens do not:

• Be pushy
• Put them on the spot
• Dominate the discussion
• Rush things
• Make wild claims or demands
• Decide for them
• Be abrupt
• Be insincere

You can see that some of these traits are similar to the blues but for different reason, the blues want to reflect and make their own mid up, so if you push them they will get annoyed, where as the greens are so touchy feely they too will feel violated if you push them out of their natural comfort zone.

There you have it a quick whistle stop tour looking at how you can improve you interpersonal skills
with using the color model also known as insights and flexing your behavior to accommodate the
traits that different colored people show.

Give it a try even on your friends and family and you will see great results!

Since I have my blue days I know what I’m like!  I think I got my red driving personality from playing high level sports
and being in a competitive environment for over 25 years.

My blue side is the studious side of things where having studied all the sciences at college and a degree in pharmaceutical
and medicinal chemistry developed my analytical detailed focused side of things, I think it’s quiet a useful combination when I use it correctly!

Here’s what blue people look like:

• Analytical
• Detail focused
• formal
• detached
• deliberate
• systematic
• perfectionists
• slower paced
• logical

Quite a reverse to some other traits we’ve looked at!  I have my days I can tell you!  I remember wanting to by my first stereo system with a cd player for my 16th birthday.  I mean what 16 year old goes down to the detail of total harmonic distortion and maximum power output in ohms etc when comparing stereos? An extreme blue that who!

Here’s what to do with these guys:

• Be well prepared
• Listen carefully
• Be factual and specific
• Question thoroughly
• Be formal
• Give them time

No no’s for the blue!

• Be disorganized
• Be late
• Push or coax
• Be flippant
• Be vague
• Use testimonials
• Exaggerate
• Be too emotional

You see the blue person is reflecting and taking in info all the time, so again for diffferent reasons to aother color people you can’t use socail proof in the form of testimonials and you can’t rush them because their nature dicattes that they are reflecting on the information and they will come to their own judgement which of course ranks higher than that of someone elses.

If you sell in a market that has lots of data and trials etc you really will come up trumps when you deliver concise and spot on numbers to the blue’s and they will remember you for it as well!

I have to say again some powerful insight on how you can use this information to your advantage and be a better sales person by improving your awareness of the needs of different types of people. Even if you did just a few things right you will get a favorable feeling from the person that you are interacting with.