Sales professionals can assume whatever type of selling style that that their skills and the sales ability will allow.  The consultative selling style counts on the strength of your relationships and your ability to position yourself as a business consultant with the needs of your customer squarely in your sights. We first looked at this in June of 2011 Study this style and you will never be considered a ‘peddler’.

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In the 5/12/11 edition of Black Sales Journal, we examined selling styles and how you need some exposure and experience with all of them to be an accomplished sales professional.  I recognized the importance of this subject and our need to examine some of them more deeply.

If you have used the consultative selling style, you recognize that the strength of this method is the collaboration with the client to determine his/her organization’s needs is time well spent.  It is a time of personal interaction and development.  The fruit of this is a listing of the most important needs of the organization, and a pretty good idea of the priority of these items.

This style allows for relationship development (important and essential for Black sales professionals) as well as a demonstration of your product and industry expertise.

Are You A Problem Solver?

Consultative selling is an art.  It is attempted often, yet should be mastered.

My definition of the consultative selling style is as follows:

“A selling style where the sales professional acts in the role of a consultant, first aiding the buyer in identifying his, or his organizations needs, then recommending the products and services that satisfy those needs.”

The most important aspect of the consultative selling style is problem solving.  Being a problem solver is not necessarily natural, but it is logical.  Recognizing the client’s needs and being able to get agreement on them from the client is ‘job one’.

This means that the sales professional who is adept at this form of selling must exercise the personal skills and industry knowledge to get to the root of the problem, then use the knowledge that has been gained to suggest solutions, which include your organizations products that could solve the problem.

Recognize that if you do not do a thorough review of the problems, needs, and desires of the customer, you will not be able to come up with solid courses of action and products to satisfy the problem.

The consultative seller never suggests a product until knowing that this product will satisfy the need of the customer.  In depth questioning is common in this style of selling. Your objective is to be the expert on your customer, your customers needs, and solutions.

What Are You Adding to the Equation?

Buyers look for problem solvers because that level of consultant to their business adds value.  Think about the fact that there may be very few buyers who have the expertise to think through problems when the products and services have the potential to be very complex.

That is where the sales professional who utilizes consultative selling can come in handy.  Helping the customer understand the most important aspects of his own problem, then solve the problems using an array of solutions and products including some of those of the sales professional’s cadre of products.

If you do this, and do it well, you have enormous value to the customer who wants to do something other than that to make money for his/her organization.

A sales professional can sell “what he/she has” to the customer or be a true business consultant and follow the process of recognizing the wants and needs of the customer, then determining the solutions that make sense.

Remember to always add value to the equation by sorting though the issues to find the problems, and then vetting the solutions well before that presentation of issues and what will make them better.  Your value to the customer will be based on your ability to keep the process focused, and produce a sound “best option” outcome.

When is this a Superior Selling Style?

Consultative selling is extremely effective in the following circumstances?

• The product or service that is involved in the sale is complex potentially including several options.
• The frequency of transaction or purchase is very limited. If your product is purchased on an annual basis, it is a candidate for this style.
• The customer cannot afford to make a mistake on the purchase

So using this as a template, it is simple to realize that the most favorable situation to use this selling is for complex, infrequent, large sales.  When the product or service requires the knowledge and counsel of a professional who is up-to-date on the environment, and product nuances, you need to be there to make it happen.

An Example

I once worked with sales professional who worked with a small to medium business niche.  Working with small manufacturers and contractors he developed a keen sense of their needs, and could begin the relationship learning needs and preferences and quickly move into showing how his product would serve the needs that were developed.

He was the business consultant for those who really could not afford one and he did it efficiently.  He had the largest segment of customers available (small to medium) by segment, and was adept at forming deep relationships only with those who had the highest corresponding revenues.

His process worked so well that he was very successful and wealthy.  Perhaps his only significant problem was that it did not give him the opportunity to develop his other styles as well as he could. His success in the segment did not require them, so when he encountered a buyer that needed a “deep” relationship seller he had limited experience in that realm.  This limited his success as he moved to go upstream to larger clients.

Summary

Master all of the sales styles, and use them as necessary.  Remember always, that the consultative sales style can be used with the other styles.

The true sales professional will work to integrate all styles in their sales lexicon.  When they are all used at the right time, they increase the effectiveness and…income.

We welcome any comments.

Are you currently being threatened with termination?  Have you been put on a performance program?  I have seen both sides of this issue, and want to make some comments that I hope will be beneficial.

As a threatened sales professional, my sales program was fortunately loosely put together, but it was program nonetheless. Performance programs for sales professionals are structured tightly now, and you should know that what you’ll see when you view the performance program is essentially a template document from past programs and even terminations.  It will be fairly tight, if the managers that put it together are good.

As a manager, I put together sales performance programs that were designed to get someone to generate sales results or be out within a prescribed amount of time.  I suppose that you would call it ‘sales justice’.  These programs should be designed to be fair and equitable.  It probably will be based on the current goals and how those goals would apply in a shortened time period.

Owning and maintaining a sales force, or even a single sales professional is expensive.  Whether it is a single professional or a sales force can be expensive.  It is a wasted resource if it is not productive, even for a short period.  Programs are a necessary process and when used correctly can reform some behavior,

Can You Beat a Program?

The answer is yes… if the program is fairly constructed.  Sales professionals beat programs often if they have been working hard.  A well constructed sales program is potentially beatable if:

• Your goals are constructed fairly and the time limits are granted correctly
• You have been working hard and are not starting from ‘scratch’
• You have never stopped prospecting and recognize that prospecting is a required activity
• Your company’s products are solid and priced properly
• You have the sales skills necessary to be successful

To capsulize, if you have fair goals and have been working hard, you have a chance.  That chance is enhanced if you have been prospecting and working to sell your products to a wide base of prospects, and thus creating real, sellable opportunities.  If you don’t have the above bullets on your side, you are toast!

Defining Fairness

I would be remiss if I did not cover this portion.  Fairness is a concept that defines an employer’s actions.  Here is a simple example of fairness:

Your goals are as follows:

Sales in Dollars – $500,000

Cases sold – 25

New Prospects – 250

Quotes – 125

What you have here is a results and activity requirement.  New prospects and quotes are activity standards, and dollar sales and cases sold are result standards.  Activity leads to results, so both are necessary.  Some sales organizations will rest on the results standards and require their sales professionals to reach the results goal, but the best organizations realize that they must us both.  The presence of the prospecting and quote portion requires that those activities necessary to have future and continued success are being done.

So a fair performance program for 3 months would look like this:

Sales in Dollars – $150,000

Cases sold – 6

New Prospects – 63

Quotes – 31

The simple fact is that the goal for the performance program is an elementary 25% of the annual goal.  A simple but potentially fair goal.  It is based on the previous goal, and is apportioned in a way that probably could be justified and would hold up if tried in a court of law if the sales cycle worked in terms of lead-time and production time.

It Happened to Me!

As a fledgling account representative I was put on a program at a time when nothing would go right for me.  It was a time when our company’s product was good, but priced a little higher than the competition.  The program had a component that was centered around activity (how many quotes?) and on production (how much did I sell?).

I was successful and beat the program, but the key to that was that I had never stopped working, but had just not had success.  The activity portion does not guarantee anyone continued employment, but it is the process that counts.  I refer you to BSJ 2/28/11- How Many Prospects Do I Really Need? It is probably more than you think!

I will be honest that I was not confident that I would make it.  I had worked hard, but just had not been able to convert.  For some reason during the time when the program was in effect, I generated some sales and locked myself in. It also created an expectation that I worked hard to keep up with.  Remember your chances are always better if you never stop working!

If the Program Is Not Fair

If your program goals are not attainable, then you have a couple of problems that may be insurmountable.  You need to have the conversation with your manager re making the program ‘doable’.  If that does not give fruit, you need to have a conversation with human resources.  Do it immediately.

If you are behind the “8” Ball my suggestion is to do what is above while you try to work through it.  In most programs there is a clause covering any other deterioration of work.  In other words, you could be terminated earlier if you solow down your work effort.

Drop a note regarding your program and how you will beat it.

Always be the best.

Your comments are welcome.