Asking better questions using the SPIN selling model - Prof Derry at WKU

more people to say yes to your presentations well first of all you have to stop selling products or services stop it that's not about what people want and to do that you're going to learn today how to ask better questions when you ask better questions you will create better relationships more people are going to smile during your presentation and you're going to make more sales which will enable you mr harsh parker too make more money so let's start today with thinking through reviewing the consultative process we began it on day one forty percent of the time that you spend with the prospect is spent building trust once you've built sufficient trust then it's up to you to begin to probe and ask questions that's what our discussion is about today this is the consultative selling process now there are several benefits to the process but one thing you have to do that every product oriented sales person has to be careful of is becoming a product evangelist this product is the best for everybody it's gonna do this and that and you have got all your confidence your is supreme and you get people to buy because of your self-confidence stop it yes it's appropriate when you've identified that need but not until so this process of building needs once again what do you do it first starts with you asking strategic questions strategic what that means is is that you thought of questions you're going to ask given what you know about the buyer you're going to ask questions that your company supplies you because they've been applying the marketing concept they have designed products and services for you that meet real needs and you have to use those in your presentation because it's not about whether you have the best product or not it's whether it meets the need second you have to learn regardless of your disc behavior style you have to learn how to listen why because it's not about your product it's whether or not that person has a legitimate need next as you ask questions you want the person to feel that you care about them well what if you're not motivated by the social drive you must ask questions to uncover perspective and that's and identifying the questions that help you do that is a part of the discussion today next once you have ask those questions you have identified the need then you've got to deliver a presentation you've got to select a product that is the right product configuration for them then you have to present it effectively not distracting your buyer from your message and then you have to follow through and it's in the follow-through that enables you to create a client relationship so that someone buys repetitively from you now what stands in the face of accomplishing this is what we call the value gap and it's the gap between the needs that you believe they have which they have not yet acknowledged so how do you close that gap one as every good physician knows you must first diagnose before you prescribe because if you don't in the medical profession that's called malpractice every salesperson who sells a product without asking first whether there's a need as committed malpractice just don't send them to jail yet when you apply this process you will have fewer cancellations cancellations are frequently caused by product evangelism you'll have fewer cancellations and you'll have more referrals one person telling another person telling another person when you understand how to ask great questions that process sets up an endless chain of people who are your prospects and it is the best prospecting system known so the input to that is is understanding how to ask better questions now when you begin to uncover needs the first part of the process is that you must understand what the other person is saying and you must get from them not only what's wrong but how they feel about it because when they express the feeling it's that emotion that emerges that causes them to consider that you may have the solution that that's the innovation the value that emerges ultimately this process enables you to utilize the company's marketing concept the idea that they've already created a product that has the potential to create needs so when it enables you to create a solution in which you take different parts different products and services from your company you package them together to form a customized solution and then you create a proposal to convey to the client and a couple things that are working here that you should understand as you begin to interview for sales jobs there are two great questions that you should ask given this discussion one is how often are your people able to create a complete solution for a client and then second does your crm enable me to create a customized proposal quickly because i got to tell you if you don't have some systematic way to create a customized proposal this will eat up your time like nobody's business how do you create a customized proposal you guys that sell a customized proposal for someone's home you've got to write it out that can take an enormous amount of time but a great crm system today salesforce.com has it to be able to for you in a click click click click choose the products that can deliver the customized solution then when you make your presentation it's a lot easier to connect benefits with and ultimately the end result is you create better relationships you do what you say you're going to do and you build your character now how you do it you ask questions and in this process when you go from building trust into identifying needs we said over and over the reason you build trust is so that when you ask these probing questions your buyer will be honest in their answers so i'm going to challenge you now we're going to talk about your final presentation here in a couple minutes selling culligan your challenge once you've built trust is to ask a series of questions with no intervening statements question question question question question question now before as you transition from building trust to identifying needs there's a magic question that you have to ask you must determine whether the person in front of you is the decision maker and you can do that this way you can say in addition to you is there anyone else who should be present here if you decide you want to move forward with us today in addition to you is there anyone else who should be present today if you decide you want to move forward with my recommendation if the answer is well my boss would have to be here then you say would it be possible to get your boss in on the conversation right now because the answer is no you're dealing with a no po no power and cut your time short the one thing that you can use a no-pro for is to take your message with enthusiasm to the boss and second to create then you're gonna have to close on a meeting with the boss and the buyer whom after your presentation could become an advocate but just be careful you can make presentations and notepods all day long and you won't get in advance okay so you've asked the question the whole objective here is to begin getting the other person to talk so that you don't ruin it by yeah yeah yeah yeah because this presentation is not about you it's about them so how do you do it well value emerges because of the insight that you get from your company and your products and your questions those emerge from your a better understanding of the problem a better understanding about how the product can solve it in the old days we looked at the old model of selling we talked about the value of qualifying a buyer and when you qualified a buyer you simply had to know you had to to apply the mad acronym do they have the money do they have the authority do they have the desire today it's completely different you have to apply the marketing concept and understand needs because ultimately your job is to build trust trust is the thing that hastens the selling process that causes the person to believe you then you will create a real dialogue so what's a real dialogue it's what you have with your mom with your your brother that you've been with for 20 20 years you don't have to worry about what you say to that person because of the level of trust so how do you get there let me introduce neil wackham and spin selling i know there are several different selling processes that the authors in this chapter present to you i'm going to hold you accountable to spend selling that's what i've used almost 30 years old it works but it's not easy so let's start we're going to go through the process so you'll understand it and then i'm going to apply selling culligan and you are going to be the buyers i'm i'm going to be the buyer and you're going to be the sellers and you're going to ask me questions configure the way that neil rackham teaches you so stage one situation questions now through this process i'm going to plot a pain diagram the pain diagram is when pain emerges in the conversation the graph goes up when pain goes down the graph goes down that's what pain stands for there's no acronym it's real pain like ouch i don't like that so the question is if you're going to persuade someone will they respond to you if you say you're going to be better off or can i solve a problem you have and what neil rackham discovered he went on 35 000 sales calls with a clipboard and he simply documented what the sales person said and then how the customer responded and then what the sales person said next and how the customer responded so he created this model with the top sales people with the process that they use it's been available now since 1988 it's almost 30 years old it's still best model so what's the situation question as you ask questions you start at the top of the funnel so you're going to ask very general questions and then more specific more specific more specific once you come out the bottom you're moving from identifying needs into the presentation so a situation question is a question in which you confirm what you already know i'm telling you if you go into your presentation and you say tell me something about your company a person's going to go why didn't you learn why don't you go on the internet and find out they're not going to say they're going to go well we do this and this and this and this so you lose immense credibility if you don't know something already you haven't done your homework what is your company that will answer the questions it's going to be called culinary because that's the product you're going to sell we're sewing in in the final project you're going to be selling culligan bottle-free coolers or a filtration system that enables your your retail customers or your business customers to have bottle quality water on the tap so do we need those i think you have the company that's all right you knew no what i'm going to do is i'm going to bring in real people that have real needs and two of the people on each of your teams you're going to select as the presenters they're going to get a bit higher grade and they're going to be the ones this is the input to the national collegiate sales competition so you're going to select two out of the six or seven they're going to make the presentation in there to a real buyer we're going to watch it out here that's a soundproof room i'm sorry the rest of the team are the coaches the rest of the team they perform three roles one they're the role of the product expert to know everything about the culligan product the role of the buyer expert i'm going to give you the name of the person and you're going to find out lots about him or her and third the process because we're going to mimic the process that's used at the mcsc because in in this competition if you miss one of the stages you're out it's like a slalom race you miss a gate you're out so you're going to practice and practice and practice and practice and the team is going to get a team grade based upon the performance of the person and how well each of the members has prepared so today what we're going to do once i go through the spin questions is i'm going to walk you through how to apply spin in those presentations right situation questions you want to perform as much research as possible and then articulate the situation as you know it your company has been in business for 75 years you do this and this and this my question is blah blah how does this work now situation question is just trying to help you understand the landscape on the pain diagram no pain unless the buyer believes that you're asking 20 questions so if you say how long has your company been in existence how long have you lived have you worked here how many people work for you blah blah the person's going to go oh crap this is why i'm wasting my time here i only get three situation questions you gotta make them work then you've gotta ask a problem question here's what happens up toes the pain what's a problem question it could be as simple as saying so what challenges do you face over the next six months with this the high eyes here's what happens do you like to ask problem questions you do well good for you most high eyes oh no does that mean somehow i know it's wrong no i don't want to ask that right no because i want things to go well i don't have problems high eyes you have to go from here it's not the caveman brand you got to go here cognitive i have to ask the problem question because unless you find pain no solution so you ask problem questions now ahead of time you understand the problems that your product or service already salts so you know some questions that you have the potential to ask before you even go in you strategically identify them you know the benefits so i can ask a question about this and this and this and this and try to figure out whether they have a problem with any of these those are problem questions now pain works this way can i use your shoulder for a second yeah okay if you've got a sore shoulder and i press on it you go ouch do i have your attention yeah that's what a pain question does the person goes well yeah i do have some challenges and they're thinking yeah but why should i tell you what's this about but if you build trust then they'll say well you're in this business one of the challenges we have is blah and you say really really that really is a kind of a next question implication an implication question makes the pain hurt more like ah sore shoulder ah stop it now do you have their attention well big time but be careful if you do that to a d miss childress they'll fight back hey get out of here no that's not our conversation you can blow it but just be careful so what you want to do is say really why are the fight one of those challenges is going to be particularly difficult for you well it's going to be this how do you respond or why is that question question question remember their jobs to talk unless they're talking they're not divulging the problems they have the potential needs you can fulfill you gotta shut up once you ask implication questions you've got their full attention and they're now describing the difficulty you relieve the pain need payoff the payoff relieves the pain when you say suppose i could present to you a way we can help you with this challenge what personal benefits would you get if we were able to do down goes the pain really what personal benefits well i could go on vacation i guess you ask where would you want to go well i'd love to go to greece why is that with whom well with my family so you convert it from pain to gay gain pleasure pain to gain that then is the transition from identifying needs into the presentation that's your transition suppose i could show you how we could solve this problem for you what personal benefits would you get it's magic you don't get that when you promise they're going to be better off but you must identify the pain and you must press on it even if you don't feel like doing it because then they're interested in the solution then your presentation you're going to go over this much later but your presentation then is simply connecting the benefits of the product to the needs that they want to fulfill to the solution of the problems it should be very easy questions at this point well now let's have fun and let's talk about culligan so final project two people one each one's going to be in this room one's going to be in this room this will be in one room so you can't hear what's going on and there'll be a one-on-one presentation with a real person this person will be a sales manager will be somebody in the company who wants to recruit oh yeah this is real time and they're also coming here to recruit are you going to be videotaping this yes whole process and then our group the rest of our group is going to be in this room no the only the other presenter will be in that room the rest of your group will be out here wow 15 minutes to make your presentation 15 minutes all right so now we got the process let's apply spin so the process here i will alter these the consequences desire yeah we did that transition did all that stuff now this is the original a replica of the original culligan product the old water cooler where you go up get water anytime you want and somebody has to lift a 40 pound jug of water up on top of it make sure you don't need it and make sure you don't miss it gets water all over the place but this is how it's been done for eons culligan invented a new system this system goes underneath the sink and it replicates it's called reverse osmosis it replicates the process that all water filtration companies use to purify water you can put it underneath your sink takes up the last place good that's an objection good no that's not bad let's talk about a real situation i will be the the homeowner you will be calling in sales people you're gonna start the situation questions what would be a good starting situation question right up here at the top of the phone so you're a homeowner yes i am do you use filtered water do i use filtered water no i don't why not hold on a second hold on a second you're asking closed-ended questions what's the difference between open-ended and closed-end you're going to get close-ended starts with a verb are you do you will you open-ended starts with who what how when if so as you start the process they should be open-ended questions to get me to talk okay what is your primary source of water what is my primary source of water good i just go to the town get the glass forward is it high quality is that so is that the best question to ask here no so what i would say to that is well yeah it's what i do every day i guess when i can just get a glass of water can you find the health benefits so what question would you ask now you got enough situation questions do you understand the situation are you aware of how bad tap water is for you okay this is called are you aware of how bad tap water is this is called raising the straw man are you aware how bad it is i'm going to explain to you how bad it is and once i learn how bad it is then i'll say yes how well does that work it doesn't it doesn't work don't do that that's not a process that makes sense but i've got this value gap right how do i close the value gap i start with situation questions so give me another do you know enough now to ask a problem question i'll think through what are the benefits of a culligan filtration system at home you don't have to buy a bottle of water you can save money like that i don't have to buy bottled water so it's convenience right okay what else health benefits could be tastes better could be taste the only thing you do is the sink no more lifting you got it right hold on but at home what you really oh it looks like you know like the system itself you wouldn't have to like you could go off of what you said you wouldn't have to buy for a longer period of time maybe well it would give you a benefit is you would have a an unlimited supply of bottle quality water on tap that could be a benefit okay what else are potential benefits for the environment good environment got it any other one you make it flavored that's a small man again you want to put chocolate in it so now you know what the benefits are what questions do you need to ask to uncover a need how much spend water so if the person is if you ask what do you do when you get thirsty which is a good opening question you can say well i buy bottled water then you can say how much money how much money do you typically spend on a week or a month buying bottled water good question okay what other other question can you ask is it ice bowl whenever you get it out of the tub this system is is tap water it is room temperature there's no electricity that's attached to this system it's all water pressure okay that's another question how many other people do you have great question how many other people but have you identified my need yet no okay keep asking how often do you get thirsty no do you open up water do i drink enough water that would be amazing probably not i definitely would comments to the water bottle affect refrigerator space hold on a second so i'm going to play me the real me before i bought my culligan system so the real me i don't buy blah blah okay okay i know i just go to the tab and i get thirsty how does it taste it tastes fun have you ever had a problem with your tap water being that contaminated bowling green did have a problem yeah okay the answer is no i don't know about that so you got to stop now you could say i got a report here that shows and two years ago it was contaminated straw man i'm gonna go two years ago i've never had a problem if i listen if i don't know about it you can't force a knee down my throat you know i haven't i'm just in the habit you know when i brush my teeth i just drink tap water if you can't ask a question that identifies my need i won't buy yes that's why most sales people don't use it they don't think in advance the questions they need to ask based upon the needs that this person has could you ask like does your wife enjoy the tap water try and bring that in if she doesn't like it no she doesn't she has a brita filter in the refrigerator how often do you feel that i don't she doesn't i'm annoying how annoying is it constantly she does that she does it she's never said anything to me that's a good question for her i don't know the answer how much are you concerned about your health well i am i work out every day i am concerned about math how much do you know about the safety of tap water compared to filtration you know i don't know the difference between those and my belief is you know we pay our taxes and they filter they process the water and maybe drink it what if i told you that strawberry has to be a need that i have see if that's how you're selling that's why people are responding you can't raise the straw man and then knock it down do you have access to enough clean water to compensate for how much you work out clean water well i guess but you know i just i just like diet coke so you didn't get that out of me you see you have to ask questions that get so what do you do other than tap water when you get thirsty do you drink anything else i'll say yeah i love diet coke then you ask i was gonna ask if you would want to make your wife's life easier could be i need to get my wife in right now yes could be that could be that would be but let's say so get my name first how much do you spend on diet coke well a better question is how much do i drink right now how much diet coke you drink i say this is true oh not very much maybe a two liter a day because the water didn't taste good and i never real i never put those two together i'm busy but i know when i brush my teeth i used to go and i'd drink it but it was when you drink good water it just goes right down you drink tap water so you have to force it down so the culligan guy said oh you drink a two liter every day now you don't go oh that's bad for you because listen i'm interested in my health i just have never put those two together so the first question you ask is so how much do two liters cost and i'll say well i buy them you know a 10 a 10 for 10 and an extra free one so maybe a buck a piece so you're saying to me so you're spending about 30 dollars a lot on diet cokes yeah okay what's the pelican system cost i don't know this two feet no cost twenty nine dollars a month [Music] now it's the sales person i go oh it's 29 no no you put that bullet in your gun i don't fire it right away you put that now i got one i could shoot i got one remember there's this value gap you got to get me so now we got the cost issue and you say to me you say to me i wonder why is it that you only drink water out of the tap when you brush your teeth but at no other time i don't know i just like diet coke you might say could it be that maybe you don't like the taste of your tap water i don't know then you could say let's test it you see many times when you make a sales call you can't close on the first one you may have to you may have to identify you may have an appointment with me go home do a water test do a taste test unbiased get my own tap water out and you buy a bottle of any any bottled water you put them together you switch them around i come and i do a taste test bingo i discovered man that tastes better ah now you got a reason to close and you also know that i'm spending every month the same amount would cost me to put in a culligan system per month okay that's just me now let's expand it what other questions can you be prepared to ask to identify problems other people will have you know the solutions you know the benefits so benefit is vomits so if i say to you yeah we drink bottled water at home because we don't like the taste of tap water then you say you ask so if i could give you don't you close lower your d you're not ready yet you've got to go through the pain cycle of course this is another it's another person so and you've uncovered that that we like bottled water at home how much you buy how much money well i guess for the four of us we probably and we go to the supermarket probably twice a month we come home with two cases of 24 each so now when someone when you know there's a problem there and the other person doesn't think it's a problem it's chronic right so so i take 24 224's and now we got a problem is how do i get in the car so what's the next question you ask that's a lot of where do you store it where do you store it's a good question but before that you ask who carries the water out of walmart exactly who shops at walmart and i say oh my wife does normally oh oh well you got it now so then you they got a potential problem right so so your wife is she the one she takes it off the shelf and she puts it in the basket 24 so 24 the pints a pound the world around so a pint weighs a pound so 24 so 24 pounds so your wife is lifting 24 pounds bottom shelf and what i'm doing is i'm replicating i've got i'm behind his eyeballs and i'm thinking she picks it up and she lifts it into twice has she ever said anything about that to you yeah she has what if she says no though keep following the train of thought well yes she has come in a couple times and it's kind of a pain because it's not that it's just to put him in the trunk lift it out of the trunk and carry it all the way into the kitchen you go so does she enjoy that what's that that's an implication question right no she doesn't it's chronic have i thought about it i haven't thought about but now you bring it to mind okay another bullet click in my do i say oh we got it we could solve it no no no no i want three bullets because when i fire i want to make sure i got another bullet if i miss the first time ask another question what's another question so she picks the water up four times in that same cycle right so the problem is inconvenience and the wife is lifting it up she puts it in the garage and sits in the garage so it gets pretty warm during the summer you have to go out yes it can it can okay follow your train of thought but the inconvenience of going out to the ground oh well it could manage just one so then you have to ask get behind so then how do you get the water from the garage in the refrigerator well i usually do that and i bring it in you know probably three or four bottles at a time so do you ever drop them well not very often so you say well so if you drop one what happens well they're bottles they usually don't break so i'm testing that problem no it's not a problem so so then you put them in the refrigerator any issues with your wife and storage in the refrigerator you test that idea no that's not enough that's not a problem you get behind their eyeballs and you look at their situation to their eyeballs so then okay they're in the refrigerator and so two 24-packs what does a 24-pack cost like some places for five dollars okay we have a big discussion on that person's gonna say about five bucks so you're spending about twenty dollars a month on bottled water yes that's true bulletin a gun click i got two you get inconvenience and now i got cost any other questions you can talk about like the water bottles take up a lot of space in trash it's a lot of trash all those plastic so get behind my eyeballs walk me through my process what do you do after you drink the water what do you do i just throw them in the trash the trash basket so are you aware of the environmental consequences of that and i'll say yeah yeah my wife gets on me for that you say really well yeah i know we recycle and sometimes she gets on me because she finds plastic in there i know it i know i should really be more environmentally friendly okay so i got three bullets in the gun now need payoff so what i've learned today is you like bottled water and you and the issues i've learned is that they're a little bit inconvenient especially for your wife lifting it coming in from walmart and then they go in the garage and then you have to carry it in sometimes you just you you drop them and it could break and then you're concerned i've learned that you're spending twenty dollars a month doing this and i've learned what's the other thing i've learned environmental that sometimes you know you're not recycling if i could solve all of those problems for you what would be the personal benefit yeah to you what personal benefits would you get i'd like to be happier i'm gonna get in arguments about that less waste i wouldn't pay the 20 bucks i'm thinking what have you got transition into the presentation ladies and gentlemen that's how it works all right now let's now talk about how now you know the value of asking better questions and you understand the four series of questions now you have to listen so how many courses have you had in listening in your college career okay taking a listening course i know the communication department has one listening course but the business department don't business people need to know how to listen we don't take courses is it any wonder that we are such crappy listeners so listening course number one what good listeners do is they make sure they understand what the person meant when they said what they said you have to verify this now your challenge in this process is to ask all questions until you get to the presentation portion the first thing you can do is you can mimic what someone says that's the lowest level of effective listening so you can repeat repeating is not bad except someone will say to you so i say this and you just repeat this like i don't get it i think you're a salesman or something so the answer to this is you rephrase without repeating so what i understand is blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah blah a person says yes that's my concern now when you rephrase and the person says this what's happening inside the person's mind you are building trust because i know now that you understand my point but even more deeply you need to reflect the feeling so what i understand is that your wife has to bring in the water and the two of you then bicker over who's going to bring it from the garage and sometimes this little tiny thing can be very frustrating between the two of you yes you got me you're going up the implication cycle reflect the feeling ready for more info this is a general comment for you to become a more effective listener mimic you rephrase and you reflect the feeling you got those three now you're building trust with the other person and i challenge each one of you to do this between now and wednesday you do all three today i started and challenged you and i said how are you going to get people to say yes more often you gotta stop selling products you can't be a product evangelist to do that you gotta ask more questions and better questions and when you do that you're gonna build a better relationships people are going to smile more often and you're going to make more sales which will enable you to make more money now on wednesday

Channel: Chris Derry

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Length: 50min 39sec (3039 seconds)

Published: Mon Oct 30 2017