HARDISON’S TIPS – MARCH 22, 2021 – HOW TO ASK POWERFUL QUESTIONS
Don’t just interpret your prospect’s answers. The less you base your understanding on assumptions, and the more detailed responses you elicit, the better in sync the prospect will be with you.
Here’s an example.
Prospect: “Ease of use is really important for us.”
Bad sales rep: (assumes: oh, they want a slick user interface and easy onboarding) “Oh great, our software is really easy to use!”
Great sales rep: “Ok, what precisely do you mean when you say ease of use? What about the experience needs to be easy? The initial setup and deployment in your organization? Or the usability for the end-user who’ll work with it daily? Do you have an example of an application you’re working with now that is easy to use? This would help me to precisely understand what you’re looking for when you’re thinking about ease of use.”
So when a prospect gives you an answer, ask follow-up questions that go deep, that explore things in more detail. This will a) help you gain a better understanding of the prospect’s wants and needs and b) show the prospect that you care and are truly listening to him.
Just by doing that, you’ll stand out from 90% of all the other sales reps from competing vendors. If a prospect feels truly understood by you, they’ll trust you and feel better about you and your product.
Great follow up questions to ask
These questions aren’t rocket science, they’re pretty straight-forward.
- What does that mean?
- Do you have an example of that for me?
- Can you tell me more about this?
Let’s say a prospect tells you that five people will be using your software. Rather than just taking note of it and moving to the next question, you can ask further questions:
- Ok, tell me about these people. Have they been with your organization for a long time, or have they just joined?
- Will these people keep using it for a long time, or is this typically a high-turnover position?
- What’s their workflow like?
- Are they all working from the same location?
- Will this team grow over the next 12 months? If so, how?
- How do they communicate with each other?
The exact questions you ask, of course, depend on the specifics of your product and their organization.
Record yourself
Just use what you learned here about asking questions in sales to improve your next sales calls. Record them and listen to how you’re asking questions.
Our sales CRM makes it easy to record your calls automatically and play them back as MP3 anytime you want. Studying your own sales questioning approach this way can help you to quickly take your sales game to the next level.
