101 Best Sales and Marketing Ideas
IDEA 7:
FIND THE DECISION MAKER
Anything selling technique must be directed to the decision maker, whoever that is (it may be more than one person). Identifying who you are talking to and what role they play is vital. Sometimes your contact will have specific brief: perhaps they are a “recommender”, asked by a decision maker to check things out. If you feel other people are involved in the buying decision, you need to engineer a link to them, or better still a meeting with them.
Idea
From a major Volvo car dealer….
It is said that the most important thing in selling a car is to get the prospect to sit in the driver’s seat, with taking a test drive coming a close and linked second. So far so good, but what happens when you identified that a family is involved and yet only one of the key players comes to the dealership? This might be either a male or female partner, and who is to say of the pair is the most important? Once you have persuaded this person to take a test drive, one ploy that can be used here is to organize the route so that in its latter stages it goes close to the prospect’s home.( This assumes they live within reach, but most likely they do, or why would they go into that dealership?) Then as the drive is nearing completion the sales person suggest a stop at the house, using an appropriate phrase such as “Let your wife have a look”.
This creates a meeting within a meeting. Suddenly the sales person has both halves of the decision-making duo together, and can tackle the remaining stage of the sale with both of them. All being well, the drive will already have made a good impression, and seeing the car parked on their own driveway helps stimulate the prospects imagination.
This is a novel response to the problem of involving all decision makers. It is well tailored to the way such sales work, and uses a suggestion that is likely to be seen only as a helpful addition to what is being done.
In practice
- Always explore and identify who the true decision maker is for your prospect, and remember the decision may involve several people
- Make your sales approaches suit, and if possible be special to, all the people involved.