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Getting the second appointment
If you want to up your chances of getting a second appointment you'll stop selling! An excerpt from "Getting the Second Appointment" How to Close any Sale in Two Calls." By: Anthony Parinello What's your definition of the word "Selling?" Here's mine: "Representing your products, services and solutions in the best interest of the other person or party - so that their requirements, needs and visions are overachieved in a time-frame that they define." I am more comfortable with this definition than with any other I've come across, because it actually reflects what I should have been doing in the first ten years of my selling career . and what I actually learned to do successfully in the eighteen years following. There are four activities that can help us implement this newer, more accurate definition of selling when we're pursuing second appointments Important note: Only two of the four involve making "buy" recommendations. Let's look in depth at all four activities. Exploring To explore means to search out, to investigate the unknown, to learn something new. Each and every time you connect with someone with the intent of finding out information, you are engaged in the task of exploring. Exploring typically means asking questions like: "Tell me all about how your business operates." Or: "How many employees work here?" Or: "How many different locations do you have?" Or: "How much do you think you spend each month on network services?" Or: "How many output devices do you currently have in your department?" Quick quiz: If you were to choose from a hierarchy of players that included a recommender (someone who's opinion is respected), an Influencer (someone who can change the minds of others), a Decision- Maker (someone with the "yes" power), or an Approver the person with the ultimate veto power), who would be your first choice for a conversational partner when it comes to Exploring? If you said "recommender," congratulations - you're on the right track. The most important thing to bear in mind here is that it's usually a waste of everyone's time trying to get these people to decide to buy from you! Initiating To initiate means "to begin to put into motion, or to introduce knowledge relevant to the subject or discussion at hand." Initiating is the point in our sales process where we begin to map our products, services and solutions to the needs we've uncovered during our exploring activities. Given the four players we're working with - Recommender, Influencer, Decision Maker, and Approver - who would be your first choice as the person or group to interact with when it comes to initiating? Of course - we want to match our initiating sales activity with the Influencer(s), those analysts who serve, perhaps in addition to other formal roles, as the important advisors to the organization's Decision Makers and Approvers. It's important to understand what Influencers can - and can't - do for you. Anyone who's sold professionally for more than, say, a year or so knows that these people, like recommenders, are not the best people to target for "buy" decisions or your "sales" efforts. Think of your own experience. Haven't you ever had a meeting with someone who could influence the purchase decision, and then noticed the conversation stopping dead in its tracks when you started to deliver your "pitch"? You perhaps heard: "stop trying to sell me and just stick to the facts." Sponsoring What comes to mind when you think of the word "sponsor"? For most people, "sponsor" calls to mind related words like, coach, champion, mentor, or backer. A sponsor is someone who may speak for or, act on the behalf of someone else - someone who has a strong belief in another person or idea, or will vouch for another's credibility. When applied to our sales process, sponsoring means acting in such a way that the best interest of others can be served. This, of course, connects back to that definition of selling we looked at a little earlier. Whenever we serve someone else's best interest, our best interest will in turn be served. When we sponsor our own sales process, we seek a sponsor within our prospect's and customer's organization. Given the four people within the organization we could be connecting with - recommender, Influencer, Decision Maker, and Approver - who is the best candidate for us to target as the sponsor of our sales process? You've got it, of course. It's the Decision Maker whom we want to take on the role of sponsorship for the acquisition of our product, service, or solution. The reason that Decision Makers make perfect sponsors is that they know what's going on and who's making it happen. They have direct access up and down the hierarchy. It's not a problem for them to connect with the Approver and relate to the Influencers and recommenders. Successful Decision Makers are in alignment with the entire enterprise and for the most part are upwardly mobile. They're the folks we want on our team. Once you've got such an ally, there's really only one important rule to follow: tell your sponsor everything, the good, bad and ugly. If you've got delivery problems, tell your sponsor first. If you've got product reliability issues, tell your sponsor first. If your organization is getting ready to stop supporting any particular revision of a product (such as a piece of software) pick up the phone and tell your sponsor the moment you learn of the decision. In other words, never let any news about you or your stuff get to your decision from any source other than you. Leveraging Whenever you are leveraging, you are consciously drawing another person's attention to any one (or all) of the following circumstances: 1. Your products, services and solutions can measurably add value to your prospect's/customer's enterprise. 2. You can clearly articulate and demonstrate (with referrals, case studies, and/or testimonials) that you can deliver this value. 3. Your conviction about your products, services and solutions is unshakable and evident. What do I mean by "value"? Well, if any result you deliver is measured and articulated with a number or a percentage that's considered "hard dollar value." (For example: reducing the time it takes to go from concept to product launch by 35%, or increased add- on business from existing accounts by $12,000 per account.) There's also "soft dollar value," which reflects important organizational contributions that are harder to measure. (For example: image and reputation in the market place, goodwill, peace of mind, better on- the-job attitude from employees, and so on.) When it comes to leveraging, who within the organization would you target - Recommenders, Influencers, Decision Makers, or Approvers? Okay, this was a little bit of a trick question. You must be prepared to engage in leveraging with Approvers - which is the answer I bet you came up with. But . you must also be ready to leverage with Decision Makers, too. Just like Approvers, they are interested in hard dollar and soft dollar value, and you must be willing to make your case to your sponsor before you make it to the Approver who will be giving the final go-ahead on the sale. (You tell your sponsor everything, remember?) Let me emphasize that you must be willing to articulate, with credibility and passion, both hard dollar and soft dollar value results in your discussions with Decision Makers and Approvers. Sometimes salespeople focus exclusively on one or the other, and that cuts down your opportunity. Putting it all together: You'll get more first and second appointments and sales when you incorporate Exploring with Recommendors, Initiating with Influencers, Sponsoring with Decision Makers and Leveraging with Approvers. In other words you'll not be "selling" all the time! I invite you to "re-categorize" your activities: * Exploring: Non-selling * Initiating: Non-selling * Sponsoring: Selling * Leveraging: Selling Anthony Parinello is a Wall Street Journal best-selling author, nationally known sales trainer and Talk-show host. His books have sold hundreds of thousands of copies and he has personally trained more than one-million salespeople. To find out more visit his web site at www.sellingtovito.com or tune-in to his weekly Internet talk- show at www.sellingacrossamerica.com. You can order his newest book "Getting the Second Appointment" How to Close any Sale in Two Call on http://www.amazon.com and www.Barnes&Noble.com
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