Dave Guide: Sales Pitch (Talk) – Part 3 (People – Audience)
Hi buddy this is last part of my series Sales Pitch (Talk), I hope you would have gone through earlier parts which I explained. Product and process are 2 stepping stone for you to present yourself to any customer/organisation, who needs your service.
This part will explain why you need to understand People (Audience), they are the final destination for your sales process. The structure of people who you would meet would be something like. Sponsor (CEO, MD, Director), Negotiator (CIO, CTO, IT manager) and Buyer (IT Admin, Technical team). Each level has their own role to play, you cannot talk in the same stance with all 3 audience. You need different Pitch to talk to all.
How do you approach them?
It depends how would you want to take this cycle, from top to bottom or bottom to top. This all depends on relationship you have with those audience within any customer organisation. I know you would not want to come from TOP to BOTTOM, cause they may not give an ear to you.
If you wish to traverse TOP to bottom then you need support from within your organisation, they are the best bet to start conversation or relationship. Let me give a good example that you would understand. “Try this at your own risk :), you wanna get married and are willing to marry anyone girl your parents choice (Arranged Marriage)”. Your parents would start looking for girl and would meet parents or elderly people to match your life partner. “This in my language TOP to Bottom approach”. You would agree if you like the girl and get married.
Bottom to top “In my language is “Love Marriage”, you know this girl from school, collage or in neighbour, she as well knows you. Now its your age to get married you are madly in love with her (IT Administrator). So what do you do, you meet her bother, cousin mom (Negotiator). Finally your target is her Father (Sponsor)”. The easiest and fast way to get married to a girl you already know. (Don’t, don’t please don’t start dreaming its just an example)
So the sponsor’s are your parents or your in laws, your in laws would ask about your family and your capabilities. If all points are matching then the nuptial is done and you win the girl
Sponsor – (CEO, CFO, MD)
They would like to know who you are and why do they need you technical advice when they already have a team who can guide them within their organisation those are people in level 2 and 3 people. So what best you would do call your superior to discuss how to take this further. Your seniors are the best of breed to explain about your organisation (Your parents).
Sponsor’s does not want to know what technology you are selling, but they would like to know with whom they are trying knots. Whether, is your organisation the best in selling solutions or products. How big is your organisation, How well your organisation is structured, What is the team size to meet their requirements, How do you treat other customer organisation (References), How would you support them in case if issues and emergency or after sales.
If you are confident enough then you should proceed on your own, but make sure you do not talk about technology at all with Top management, “they do not want to hear your jargons or technical abilities”. “Do you remember the process which I explained in part 2”, always have examples, hands and body motions, success stories, these will be your best ammunitions to handle Top management of any of your customer organisation.
Here you have to explain abilities about your family to your in law family, you have to build confidence, to sell yourself.
Negotiator – (CIO, CTO, IT manager)
They are the master negotiator, they are the one who wants everything that is beneficial for their organisation but at the their cost. They understand technology, they know what you are saying is beneficial for them. Still they want to have the technology at the cost which they decide “Dont worry they are the one who has to perform in their organisation and show to their organisation what are they buying and how far they have negotiated”. They are the best whom you can feed information based on the process which I explained in my Part 2.
If you as a sales guy cannot do that, then take a help of Pre-Sales (Example: Your elder brother who will vouch you while you go to see a girl). When will you take the pre-sales?, “Hello pay attention”, when you already have feed the information what your organisation can do for your customer IT needs.
Most important, before you take your Pre-Sales guy, you should have completed the process of understanding customer needs “Precise or one of the product or solution NO LAUNDRY LIST” for which they showed interest to in corporate within their organisation IT.
Buyer – (IT Admin)
“Wow this is your Girl, you had dreamt of”. The IT admin, are always lookout for new and easier way to tackle their IT tasks. They would want you to show them what they are looking for “you have to master this secret recipe, Ingredients I had already explained you in Part 1 and Process in Part 2”.
You will have explain about the solutions in depth, “This is where your Technical-Pre-Sales team will come handy”. The more you listen to them the more you explain, “Using hand gestures”, the more you get involved with them. This will help you to create strong bond with your customer.
Buyers are always technical, do not talk about cost with this audience, they are least bothered about cost. They need technology, your techno sales script will play a huge role. Once sale is done make sure solution is in place as designed and what customer asked for it. No Loop Holes, No Lingering around, No copy & paste, Do not divert from subject.
“Hello listen”, You have to be a good listener, “Finally you are getting married”.
In the above all process you will have to make sure that you always look into eyes and listen to your customer. Top level Audience, if not ready to listen to you make sure you stop, do not ever, ever, ever argue or ask for more time. (This shows how much do you respect them)
Now the last part: Do not ignore this part:
After you have got married, you have to make sure you keep her Happy.
This is called as after sales support, continuous touch, keep calling, keep updating, engraving new Ideas.
Few Bullet Points:
To win deal, you have to win Heart “Same goes in marriage”.
I hope you all enjoyed all my 3 part of Sales Pitch:
Sales is not magic, struggle – Its an Art you have to excel this art if you wanna win it.“Remember be remembered when you are not around”
Enjoy and will be back with something exiting.
If you would wish to know more about any other topics do let me know.
Posted in D-Guide Tagged with: sales management, Sales Pitch, sales techniques