It’s not easy being a “prospective customer” in today’s society. If you’re the targeted prospect, you’re constantly barraged with advertising, marketing hype and never ending sales pitches. Whether it’s in your mailbox, in box or the radio during your morning commute you’re bombarded with competing messages seeking your attention.
If you’re a sales professional vying for your prospect’s attention, then you may be experiencing the challenge of attempting to cut through all the hype and have a meaningful conversation.
Given today’s climate, the initial contact with a prospective customer leaves little margin for error. The first contact is the most critical and least forgiving point in the sales process. Within the first few seconds you must establish value and credibility – or you’ll be rejected as just another piece of marketing hype.
How do you respond when a prospect asks, “What do you do?” Do you respond with a slick and crisply canned “elevator pitch” or “30 second commercial”? If you’re new to the industry there is nothing wrong with starting with a canned response, but hopefully you’ll move past this type of sales tactic into a more meaningful dialogue. There is a better, more effective way to engage prospects in the first few moments of interaction.
One problem with canned sales pitches is that they hit prospects from too many directions. The elevator is full of salespeople with a quiver of arrows ready to fire at will. Many times, listeners respond with a mundane reply like, “Oh, really…that’s interesting.” Of course, that response is a good indicator they’re not interested at all.
What are the consequences of this situation? In most cases, a lost opportunity. Not only do you waste their time, you miss opportunities that might have opened up a quality dialogue if the initial contact had been managed more effectively. In this case you diminish your own value and credibility by appearing to be just another self-absorbed salesperson.
Don’t focus on your world, concentrate on your prospects world.
Discuss issues your current merchants may be experiencing, but don’t come across as certain they are experiencing them or that you can resolve them. If they are indeed having the same challenges, they will be open to exploring them further. This is a powerful way of turning a brief, opening communication into a value-rich conversation that leads to a potential sale. When the prospect believes you understand their problem, they will most likely believe you’re also the solution. Now you’ve established relevancy.
Consider the initial moment of contact. It must be highly relevant, carefully prepared and thoroughly rehearsed. Here is an example of the structure:
We work with companies that are facing escalating payment processing costs, who are looking at reducing expenses and risk by exploring alternate payment methods. We help them analyze the risks and potential benefits of accepting additional forms of payment from their customers and have the capabilities to provide those services if we are a good fit.
This takes roughly 20 seconds to say, but it covers a lot of ground.
Let’s break the statements down:
“We work with companies that are facing escalating payment processing
costs, who are looking at reducing expenses and risk by exploring
alternate payment methods”… - this speaks to relevancy. Describe who you are by the type of company you serve and major challenges they are experiencing. The prospect now knows who you are and should be thinking “That sounds like me.”
“We help them analyze the risks and potential benefits of accepting additional forms of payment from their customers”… - we now introduce how we work with prospective customers.
“…and have the capabilities to provide those services is we are a good fit”… - here we state the value we can provide.
This isn’t a pitch in the conventional sense; there is a real dialogue occurring within this short monologue. You’re speaking, but the customer is replying silently and agreeing through their thoughts that they are experiencing the challenges you are describing.
You are addressing, in order, the questions that are popping up in the customer’s mind. Who is this person? What does he do? What’s in it for me? Can he help me? When we establish relevancy, we are providing customers with the information they need to answer these questions and they invariably agree to move forward in the conversation.
Considering how much is at stake with regard to initial impressions and their impact on perceived credibility, it’s surprising how few salespeople address this issue in a thoughtful and disciplined manner.
There is much to gain, or lose, in the opening moments of a conversation.
It’s paramount to take the disciplined steps necessary to build credibility in that first contact, ensuring the conversation continues and matures. Otherwise, your prospective merchant will always be just that. And don’t forget, you never get a second chance to make a first impression.
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