THE 31ST SECOND

As sales reps we have all been taught that we need to have a GREAT 30 second elevator speech. Most of us have written and rewritten our elevator speech dozens of times and have spent untold hours practicing delivering it into recorders, mirrors, and don’t forget to your spouse (or dog if you’re not married).

But once you have delivered your elevator speech and have gotten the appointment or at least the attention of your prospect, what do you say next? While I am in the field with reps the most common mistake I see is their inability to build upon what they started with their elevator speech.

During the thousands of field rides I have taken with reps, across a dozen industries, the biggest breakdown I see in their sales presentations is their inability to back fill the information from the elevator speech.

We need to practice the second part of the sales presentation as much as we did the beginning. When we get our chance to give a full sales presentation we need to have a full sales presentation to give.

Most of us have been taught, and rightfully so, to ask questions. We need to find things out about the prospect and their business. I have to admit that the majority of reps I have been with do this rather well. The breakdown is what they do with the information they gather.

A good sales presentation will take the information gathered and pair it with the information about the product or service you are selling. Now I don’t mean sell features and benefits, not at all. During the discovery or questioning, you should have uncovered some problems the prospect is having or points of pain in their business. What you then want to do is use the features and benefits of your product to show the prospect how owning your product or using your service will eliminate or at least lessen the problem or pain. This is establishing VALUE. The price of your product or service vs. the amount of pain or number of problems your product or service will solve.

The best way to start this process is to have some “industry stories”. These are bits and pieces of information that you have discovered talking to other businesses like theirs. These will be issues and problems that the overall industry shares. Telling a prospect that you have been told by other shops that… or you have heard that…. is a problem, will give you some immediate credibility as to at least knowing the industry. Couple that with your ability to then talk about how by using your product or service the problem is solved and now you are an industry consultant.

Don’t get caught in the trap of giving too much information. You always want to assure that the prospect needs you to solve the problem. Don’t volunteer so much that the prospect can go elsewhere, you want to feed them small amounts that leave them wanting more and wanting it from YOU!

I have been with sales reps that have called themselves sales story tellers. These reps have taken the questioning and feeding of information to such a level that they don’t even feel like they are selling anymore. The customers ask them for the product or service because they feel so good about the rep they want to do business with them and them alone.

Getting to the presentation takes 30 seconds, a difficult 30 seconds in many cases, but making the sale starts at the 31^st second.

Lorin