Have you ever passed by a bakery display case without feeling
urge to buy at least one cookie, dessert or cinnamon bun? Have you ever taken a child into a candy store and not had them ask to buy at least one of their favorite sweets?The smell of fresh baked goods and memory of taste of a candy bar makes us want to buy more. The owners of bakeries and candy stores don’t have to spend a lot of time extolling merits of their goods or length of time they’ve been in business; they can concentrate on helping us satisfy our appetites.
Wouldn’t you like to be in a similar situation with your marketing? How would you like to have prospects who were so eager to buy that you didn’t have to sell, but could focus instead on taking more orders?
If you are like most small business owners you’d like to increase your sales but you don’t enjoy selling. You don’t want to be seen as a pushy person, whether it is on phone, in person or in your marketing materials. The problem is that you don’t sell baked goods or candy - instead you may sell accounting, design, engineering, or informational products and services.
What can you do to increase your sales and spend less time selling?
Stop Selling Stop worrying about closing sale. Focus instead on understanding what your prospect wants, and open door to a mutually profitable relationship. When a prospect thinks that all you care about is getting their money, they’ll view relationship negatively and this can easily kill sale.
Start Helping Once a prospect is at your web site or on phone with you, they’ve demonstrated an interest in finding a solution to one of their problems or concerns. Take next step and demonstrate your interest in them. Use your conversation or your site to ask them questions that will identify what they want to accomplish and how you can help them.
Help them clarify problem they are trying to solve. Even our prosperous bakery owner has questions to ask. Is hungry customer looking for bread for lunch, or a dessert for a celebration? How many people are they feeding? Once you have all details, you confirm it by repeating information back to them. “You are planning a party for five couples and want a chocolate cake with mocha frosting. Is that right?”
