Step 1) Collecting Vital Information - Increasing The Value of Your Services:
Once a prospect contacts you, it is now necessary to start collecting information from them by asking questions about their enquiry. First of all, don't forget to thank your prospect for making the right decision by contacting your business. The next step is to ask the correct questions to help you make a better decision on how to help them. If you simply decide right then and there to answer all of their questions through one phone call, you might not have another chance to talk with them later on. In fact, one phone call might be all the time you have if you answer all of their questions right then and there.
Most prospects don't go into a sales call expecting to sign a contract, these "golden clients" are few and far between. This sales strategy applies to 99% of your sales calls which will need some finesse, and idea making on your part.
What If My Prospect Contacts Me Via Email?
This makes it a little tougher to close the sale. The internet is a great tool for attracting new business leads, it is not great however to close a prospect. Closing a prospect online, vs closing them on the phone is a much greater challenge. The idea is to get them offline and on the phone with you, or if you can, in person as quickly as possible. Computers are very impersonal and cannot show your excitement, enthusiasm, and confidence. These emotions are key to helping clients believe in you, an email cannot provide this vital "non-verbal" communication between you and your prospect.
Planting Seeds For Future Communication & More Business:
The idea here is to pre-setup your next phone call. The reason we do this is to get as much information from your prospect as possible because, the person calling you might actually need more than one service from you, most people don't know that you can actually help them out in other areas.
80-90% of prospects on the hunt for services are actually hunting for multiple services at one given time in order to complete their project needs. The key is to fish out these other ideas! This potential for more business may, or may not be brought up within your 1st initial contact. Before ending the sales call, your goal is to let your prospect know of other options they will have if they choose to go with your business. By doing this, we end up planting future seeds into the mind of your prospect. Planting future seeds will probably induce your prospect to think about how great it would be to go with one company like yours for all of his or her needs, instead of micro-managing multiple companies for the same services.
Don't forget that when you're forced to answer a question, immediately come right back with a better strategy, or another question to keep the prospect interested in your conversation. For ex. "I understand that your research suggests you go with THIS method but, if I can make a suggestion, my experience has shown me that this OTHER method is better, because..."
The best sales people in the world know that the key to adding more services/products from every sales call is by increasing the value of their prospects inquiry. No, I don't mean by increasing the price, I am suggesting that you create a need that wasn't there before, to give our prospects more ideas, and to help them to think bigger. This step helps you to create more value in your expertise, and it also helps to build trust in your knowledge and experience. People want to believe in you, they want to know that if push comes to shove, you'll be there for them every step of the way.
I will use two different examples of creating a need that might not have been there:
1) Retail Sales (Matching Products Together): The best way to create different ideas to make more sales is by accenting the piece of clothing that the prospect is interested in. For ex. If your prospect is interested in a "v-neck sweater", try telling your prospect about a great matching "under shirt" that will look nice underneath the "v-neck sweater". By matching the two up, a person will see the value of the two shirts together, whereas before they just couldn't visualize the two shirts going together.
2) Brochure Copywriter (Complimenting One Service With Another): You know that if someone is inquiring about copywriting for a brochure design, the next logical step for them will be to research for a printing company in order to get their brochure printed for distribution. Take this opportunity to tell your prospect about a printing company, or multiple printing companies that you know of personally, that can offer great printing services. Every sales call could potentially help other companies as well, getting a small kickback from your referrals is always great way to increase your business. Also, if the referral is successful, your newly found client will recommend you to everyone as a "great source".
In each of these examples, you have now proven yourself to your prospect. You have now shown them that you have their best interest in mind, which brings us back to knowing what each individual prospect wants is the key to winning every meeting you have.
Here are some topics that can easily generate more questions & strategies:
Demographics
Their spending budget
Contract details
Deadlines
A more in depth explanation or description
Product details (size, color, additions, etc)
Package options
Payment plans
Referred by? How they heard of you?
About 'their' business
Their goals
The "next" step
What kind of research they've done
and so on...
In Conclusion:
Don't be afraid to get more information from your prospect anyway you can. Always keep the conversation going, don't sabotage your meeting by answering all of your prospects questions by email, or by phone. Always leave some topics open for discussion so you can close them in person. Don't be afraid to tell your prospects on the phone that you're actually late for a meeting and you will be able to answer all of their questions in person. Make sure to book your meeting with your prospect right away. Try giving them 2 different dates for them to choose from. In the end, you want your prospect to think they should really look into this further and meet you in person.
Now that we've proven ourselves, this brings us to the next step...
The Perfect Meeting (step3) - Preparing For The Meeting! The Perfect Meeting (step4) - Meeting Your Prospect!
Martin Lemieux is the owner of a successful article directory network with over 80,000 author submitted articles, with over 30,000 active authors world wide.
http://www.Article99.com - Authors Club
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