Modern Selling: When to Question your Questions

Nov. 13, 2017
Timing and understanding a client is far more important than simply asking them at the start

Since Day One of your sales career, you have been taught to ask questions of your customer; in fact, ask questions and listen to the customer has become a sales managers’ mantra. Of course, there are many other sales management clichés that revolve around the skill of asking questions. Some of my favorites include: 90 percent of your success is tied to your ability to listen; Ask about the MAN (Money, Authority, Need); and the best one, God gave you got two ears and one mouth for a reason.

As this phenomenon of consultative selling took full grasp, customers and professionals all benefitted. No longer did the most manipulative, fast-talker have the advantage; instead, as this shift took hold, the advantage went to the sales professional who asked the right questions and understood the most about their customer. Professionalism was winning!

As they often do, things have changed. Today’s customers are questioned-out – they are tired of salespeople asking them the same stuff. I was recently talking about this topic with a CEO of a community hospital, and his comment was perfect and really made an impact on me: “Chris, you know what keeps me awake at night? It is salespeople who ask me ‘what keeps you awake at night.’”

Do Your Homework!

In dozens of other conversations, the general complaint is about salespeople who don’t do their homework. Years ago, a salesperson was forced to ask customers questions about their company; today, they can find most of the superficial information they need online. Unprepared salespeople asking old-school questions are truly broadening the gap between themselves and customers.

Don’t get me wrong – asking questions of your customers is very important; however, when you start your sales call with questions, you will lose them almost immediately. In the 1990s, this type of behavior was novel, but so were the fax machine and boy bands! Today, your customers expect salespeople to know about them before they walk onto the property.

Today, asking questions before positioning yourself as the expert is the wrong thing to do; in fact, asking questions too soon will lump you in with all the other salespeople your customers already feel are unnecessary. You must teach your audience first – then ask them questions.

Prep Them

If you first position yourself as an expert, you will get open-ended, transparent and behind-the-scenes answers that other salespeople don’t get when you finally get around to asking your questions. The customers will coach you with their answers, and bring you into the early stages of opportunities. To accomplish this, follow this three-step process:

Step One: Illustrate your understanding of their problems. Understanding a customer’s business is more important than understanding the technology you are selling. After your typical rapport-building, dive straight into a problem you know about their business. An example: “I have noticed that property managers are struggling with tenants that have a high expectation for security, but most property managers do not have the bandwidth to support that high level of security for dozens of properties.”

Step Two: Share examples of how your company has solved those problems. This is the time to educate – “We have been able to solve this problem for several property managers by implementing our hosted and managed services. An example is what we did at Downtown Property….etc.”

Step Three: Disarm them with humility. After about five minutes of sharing your knowledge of their business, and how you can solve their problem, disarm them – “I’m not sure if this will work here or not, so I’d like to ask some questions to see if we might be able to help you like we did with Downtown.”

Once you use these three steps to illustrate that you know a customer’s business and can help them with their specific problems, they will answer anything you ask.

Chris Peterson is the founder and president of Vector Firm (www.vectorfirm.com), a sales consulting and training company built specifically for the security industry. To request more info about the company, please visit www.securityinfowatch.com/12361573.