101 Best Sales and Marketing Ideas
IDEA 22:
DIRECT THE MEETING
It is without a doubt easiest to sell successfully if you are in the driving seat. Being too circumspect at the start can seem like a soft, comfortable approach, but it may only succeed in putting the customer in the driving seat. From there they sometimes dictate what happens, at worst with pointed questions such as “Before we do anything else, tell me what this going to cost”. You need a way to take control.
Idea
From a financial adviser …
Quite simply, set an agenda. Let me be more specific suggest the agenda that you want and that you feel will make being persuasive easiest, while still making the other person feel the meeting is useful to them. Fist think through how you feel something is best dealt with. Have it clear in your mind ( and put it in writing for more formal meetings). Then table it in a way that presumes it will be accepted. “It may well be helpful to have an agenda in mind, not least so we can do this in a reasonable time. Perhaps I could suggest …” in other words put it over as something that both of you will find useful. Even if it is only three items – “Let’s take X first and then talk about Y and Z” – this is a powerful technique. Especially if you put forward a longer list, this might prompt counter-suggestions that mean you have to compromise a little. But simply taking the initiative means that your suggestions will often be agreed wholesale.
The result is that you can then take things in the order you want. Furthermore, once the agenda is agreed, you can introduce things progressively, presenting them not as what you want, but rather as what the prospect wants (or at least has agreed to). So you should say, “What we agreed to take next was …” rather than something that starts with words “I”.
In practice
- In this way you can ensure that you run this kind of meeting you want, because it is the best route to sale, and yet which the prospect finds they like, because it is efficient.
- It you do it well, the sales technique involved here seems like nothing more efficiency designed to help the customer. Perfect.