By Kendra Lee, President, KLA Group
Are you wondering how to close those opportunities lingering in your funnel? While these are admittedly challenging times for many, I still see lots of sales being made. So what’re those sellers doing differently? They’re showing their clients the financial justification behind their decisions.
Ask clients if their people, processes or budget are causing their biggest issues. This question will help your customer pinpoint where their biggest challenges exist and you can begin to develop a plan to resolve the situation together. In today’s economy executives need your help to discover the financial justification behind their decision to work with you – for themselves and their board. They want to be confident they are doing the right thing. And if you can show them the money, you’ll close the business.
So, now’s the time to master financial questioning with your clients. And you don’t have to have a Masters degree in accounting like I do to do it!
One IT seller I was working with couldn’t get his prospect to close even though the prospect’s computer system crashed twice a month like clockwork. The prospect felt the pain for the multiple hours the system was down, told the seller he really wanted to fix it, but couldn’t bring himself to open his wallet to do it. It just wasn’t in his budget and business was too slow.
In good conscience the prospect didn’t feel it made good business sense to invest in fixing a problem that only happened a few times a month.
With my coaching the IT seller worked with his prospect to identify the impact the downed computer system was having on his business. He questioned his prospect about:
- Revenue his business wasn’t able to generate when the system was down
- Customer dissatisfaction when they couldn’t schedule appointments
- Duplicate work that occurred across the staff
- Lost invoicing when the system didn’t recover properly
- Employee dissatisfaction when they couldn’t do their jobs and had to work overtime
The seller examined every financial impact he could think of that the downed system was having on his prospect’s business. He helped his prospect realize that the status quo really was costing his business much more than a consistent service contract would! When the prospect saw all the money he was spending, he signed immediately.
This seller didn’t need an accounting degree to ask financial questions and show his prospect the money. So how can you do it with your opportunities?
- Think about all the issues resulting from your prospect’s business issue and the impacts they could have on his business
- Use your questioning skills to help the prospect determine which impacts are important to him
- Document your findings in your proposal to provide your prospect the financial return he needs to justify and sell his decision internally
Now you can show your prospects the financial gain they’ll get by moving forward with your recommendations. You’ll find yourself selling in spite of the current economic environment, and your client’s business will reap the rewards.
Kendra Lee is a top IT Seller, Prospect Attraction Expert and author of the award winning book “Selling Against the Goal” and president of KLA Group. Specializing in the IT industry, KLA Group works with companies to break in and exceed revenue objectives in the Small and Midmarket Business (SMB) segment. Ms. Lee is a frequent speaker at national sales meetings and association events. To find out more about the author, read her latest articles, or to subscribe to her newsletter visit www.klagroup.com or call +1 303.741.6636.