Evolve Resource

The Ultimate 8-Step Sales Call

Introduction

This process was developed and refined using our own experiences and those of hundreds of clients. These steps have been used to successfully sell to Fortune 100 companies and across the kitchen table. Typically, sales people do a great job of presenting their product or service but a poor job at setting up and controlling the sales call as a tool itself. Our process is effective because

It sets control right at the start of the meeting
It gets to an agreed upon outcome at the outset of the meeting using the agenda.
It ensures you discover multiple issues and ways you can help before transitioning.
It transitions to a few options you can provide instead of just a single option.
It makes the next step decision easy for the prospect.
It allows you to guide them right through to a successful sale without any awkward moments.
It is structured as informative and cooperative instead of high pressure.

Set It Up

Don’t bring in a lot of pre-canned sales presentations; have them with you, if needed, but keep your materials discreet and ideally on the floor. Poor sales people show up to do a song and dance performance indicated by all their sales presentation materials.
Sales professionals come to have a conversation and discuss business like adults, there is no setup of presentation at the beginning of the meeting. You are peers at this meeting evaluating if you have anything to discuss, not pitching a product at all costs.
When you arrive, prospects are potentially watching you get out of your car. Be organized early on so you’re smooth from the second you arrive.
Be presentable, from your car, to your materials, to your shoes. Every detail of who you are is being evaluated.

Set The Agenda

People often accept the meeting but don’t really have a plan for the time they’ll spend with you. Before encountering a potential client, be sure to create an agenda and use it as the first step in controlling the sales meeting. Some keys to note in a well-written agenda are:

Confirm the schedule availability so you know your window (if your 60 minute meeting has become 6 minutes then simply reschedule it, don’t deviate from your plan and sales approach).
Share a little about you, your company and your background.
Allot the bulk of your time to talking about the other person’s business and current circumstances.
After some discussion, if you BOTH see an opportunity to work together, discuss options for next steps.
Get an agreement on the agenda from them, so you both commit to the same goals.

Here is a sample script,

“John, thanks for your time today. I had us schedule for an hour, does that still work with your schedule today? Great. Can I outline what I see as an agenda for our time together? I’d like to spend a few minutes telling you about me, our company and some of my background. Then I’d really like to spend the most of our time together getting to know your business and understand what you might need or require. If, at the end of our discussion we both see some opportunity to work together, then I’d like to make a decision around next steps. Is it all right if we proceed like this today?”

99% of people don’t have an agenda, so accepting yours is usually a given.

Prepare Your Story

Since people buy you, your company and your the product, in that order, you need to have a compelling and interesting version of these stories.
Your story about yourself needs to be two minutes long and truly authentic. Touch on topics like where you attended school, past careers, hobbies and interests, and your family life.
People connect to the little details and non-business items you mention. You may find you and your prospect have similar interests. The goal is to find common ground and build a relationship.
Your story about the company should be one minute long and you must hit the highlights of your business. Examples include, if it’s family owned, number of years in business and in which countries, if it’s owner-operated, etc.
Your product story comes later but should be woven into the overall presentation.
Differentiation is a key to the stories you use. Take the time to develop your stories about you, the company and your product or service. Make it sound smooth, natural and effective.

Ask The Right Questions

Asking questions creates control in the conversation. In order to drive the conversation where you want it to go, asking questions is a skill to master. Most sales people talk about their product or service and don’t ask enough questions of the prospective buyer.
Many sales people ask surface questions and never drill down. They ask, how do you like the service? Someone responds, “It’s good. This effectively gives no meaningful information to the sales person or the conversation. Sales professionals must ask specific questions, “What specifically do you like about the service? What could be improved? Is it a program you’d brag to your friends about?” The follow-up, drill down questions generate meaningful conversation and insights.
Have a list of up to 50 pre-established questions. You can’t be effective in your questioning if you haven’t done your homework know what type of insights will be meaningful.
Internalize those questions. Know them, without looking, and be able to choose questions without delay. This takes lots of rehearsal, true understanding of the goals, and practice.

Understand The Pain Points

Many sales people get to a pain point and let it go. Conversations usually go like this:

“So, how has your overall experience been so far?”
“It’s not good”
“Oh, that’s too bad.”

Again, the ability to ask more questions and really understand why it’s not good is essential. You must collect three pain points or oppportunity points (places you know your product or service can perform better and solve an issue of theirs) before transitioning to next steps. Finding these pain points or opportunities for your product/service might mean asking questions for 20-30 minutes, sometimes longer. It’s your job to create a case for your product or service that’s air-tight. It takes at least three solutions or opportunities to convince a buyer.

Transition To Closing

Normally, people can’t remember what you talked about for the last 45 minutes and often quickly forget about the areas in which you can help them. Therefore, a summary to transition is key. Summarize the ways you can help and then outline two ideas for solutions. Here is a sample script of a summarization:

“Doug, during our discussion over the last 40 minutes, I’ve identified three areas where we can absolutely assist you. The first was with your poor delivery schedules. We have a delivery guarantee that will eliminate your worry about the product showing up on time — we will guarantee it. Secondly, you mentioned the ability to get good billing data. We have a very simple billing structure and both myself, and our accounting rep, Julie, are available to discuss questions and concerns. The third piece I know we can help with is with your quality control issue. You mentioned having to send back product regularly. We have a QA program that is top in the industry. We have a company role that is exclusively dedicated to quality control. Gary, in our office is solely responsible to ensure nothing ships that isn’t 100% top quality.”

You must have three areas you can help with before transitioning. Three ways you can help or improve their current situation is enough to convince a prospect of your acumen and get them to really consider your solutions.

Choose Them

Instead of waiting for the prospect to choose us and our program, we make a recommendation and we choose them. We have led the whole meeting and now is the time to keep leading the meeting in order to bring it to a closed agreement, by doing the following:

Here’s a sample script:

“John, I know our premium service package is going to work well for you and will actually save you money. I also want to say that I think you and I would really work well together. I’d like to work with you, how do you feel about working with me?”

Most will reciprocate and respond with, “Yes, I think we’d work well together.” This allows you then to move to next steps and paint the future.

Painting The Future

Now, it is time to quickly transition into breaking down your next steps:

Identify the next steps and be able to explain them effectively and efficiently. So many sales people fumble through writing up an order that it makes people wonder. Is this the first time they’ve written up a contract? Understand your paperwork and your process.
Understand the resistance points of someone switching services or getting started. Think about the process of changing banks, and how you need to move all your auto deposits and debits. Some banks offer to manage all this for you. How can you make your process easier for your soon-to-be client?
Map the next three steps for the new customer. Set a timeline, look at dates on the calendar and schedule all future meeting requirements, find out who needs to be involved and ask for introductions.
Collect a deposit or payment — ALWAYS.

Conclusion

Using the steps provided here, you will feel more prepared for all future sales meetings and they will feel more controlled and organized. Meetings will run more effectively and they will flow smoothly from discussion, to advantages, to next steps without the traditional emotional hesitation or stress.

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