Going down quote road...

In my travels, riding with sales people, I am amazed at how willing many sales people are to go down the quote road and think that they have something. "We got one boss" I remember hearing my sales guys say... only to find that we were compared to the existing supplier and enrolled in the race to zero margins... even with all the new training available, sales people resist having what I call a "discovery" conversation that could even lead to "no, you are not a fit for us"... and that is the sales person saying no...!

We can only say no if we know what we are saying yes to in ourselves. A great book by William Ury The Power of a Positive No. Saying no to a quote request is saying yes to "I will not be used, my time will not be wasted and yes I am looking for customers to help solve a problem and not just quote to help them beat their existing supplier down". We sales people have a right to know the reason that a prospect is looking. Our time and our company's time is valuable.

We can only get the information we need to make an informed decision, the decision of moving forward with a prospect or not, if we engage in a discovery conversation. Our goal is to discover if there is a problem that needs solving, then we diagnose the problem and design the solution if and only if the prospect has agreed to buy our solution if we design it WITH THEM... together with them... or you end the sale... or start with "what did I miss, I thought we were moving forward with our solution?"

Successful sales people of the future, will learn how to say what they are feeling and how to end a call... and how to effectively get information and not give it until they reach the "design a solution together" stage.

I have been successfully teaching this method for over ten years and I know it works... plant your feet, know what you will say no to and start at going past "Quote Road"...

Gratefully yours,
Steve