When I entered the world of selling, I listened to a set of recordings called “No Bull Selling,” by Hank Trisler. I do not remember if the tapes were helpful or not, but I do remember his comments about “those Boeing engineers.”
Trisler lived in Seattle and rambled on and on about the challenge that these engineers presented to salespeople. At the time, I was a recent recipient of a B.S. in Mechanical Engineering, so I was amused and excited about being in front of these analytical types. After all, these are my people!
Unfortunately, I quickly understood the difficulty Trisler described, and also noticed that the challenges did not stop with engineers – anyone who was analytical presented a roadblock to sales professionals.
Over the course of the next 26 years, I have developed the following strategies for analytical buyers that work especially well in the security industry. If you implement a few of these ideas, you will be miles ahead of your competition and may even attain the best compliment a salesperson can hear from an analytical buyer: “I actually don’t hate that salesperson.”
1. Write extremely brief emails. Analytical people do not like paragraphs, greetings or emojis. When emailing an analytical person, use their name as your greeting, bullet points instead of paragraphs, and the fewest words possible.
2. Confirm the ending time of meetings. When you start a sales call, every analytical person assumes you will drag on and blow past the ending time of the meeting. If you want to win their appreciation, confirm that you know the ending time and commit to it. Set an alarm on your phone for 10 minutes before the ending time.
3. Finish early. After committing to the end time, go the extra mile by finishing early. If you have 90 minutes, do not just fill until you hit that time.
4. Do not tell them how great you are. An analytical person will not tolerate anyone telling them how to form an opinion; in fact, their tendency is to disagree with everyone, so if you suggest that your camera has the clearest image in the industry, they will disagree – even if you are right. Show them how great you are and let them draw their own opinion.
5. Get to the point. I love telling stories and some of my success has come from my stories; however, I do not tell stories to analytical people. I get to the point. Not getting to the point will frustrate analytical people.
6. Do exactly what you said you would do at the exact time. They may blow you off and act like they are not listening, but they are. If you say Wednesday by noon, that means Wednesday by noon.
7. Proofread everything. Do you know the difference between 3:30 EDT and 3:30 EST? An analytical person does, and they will judge you negatively if you use EDT in December. Proofread – not just spelling and grammar, but every little detail.
8. They still want a relationship. One misjudgment that many sales trainers share is that analytical buyers do not want relationships. Although they act and communicate differently, analytical people want to have relationships and will appreciate their friendships just as much or more than natural socializers do.
9. Do not be afraid. Don’t be intimidated by analytical people – as a general rule, they do not like salespeople, so you have nowhere to go but up!
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, visit www.securityinfowatch.com/12361573.
