The Human Connection in Transactional Sales with a Consultative Method
"First trust then business is an unwritten law of selling. I have found this to be true in all sales, whether $100’s of dollars or millions of dollars. When two or more humans have to interact in a buying decision, trust is essential" - Dan Lemke.
A critical step is to make a Human Connection in the very beginning of a buy sell cycle, before we get down to business.
During transactional sales, a consultative sales methodology becomes the foundation while selling to buyers who cannot easily visualize how your products can help achieve their needs.
Steven Covey wrote, “Trust = Sincerity + Competence”.
Over the last 30+ years, Dan has focused most of his energy building the competency portion of this equation and training new and existing customer facing personnel to run a buy/sell cycle with a consultative methodology.
The missing link till now in training is making a human connection with prospects and customers. In a manner that can influence and inspire them, and do it on purpose. The essence of this human connection in the beginning and throughout a relationship extends beyond just the buy sell cycle details or steps. It encompasses what buyers and people need answers to in order to make buying decisions.
Transactional sales using a consultative based sales skills, especially those over the phone, still require building a human connection.
During a recent 2-day workshop, Dan helped a group of sales teams determine the most appropriate ways to make a connection over the phone with their customers.
They were able to understand how to connect with multiple buyers in two or three telephone based meetings that resulted in close rates greater than 80%. The elapsed time for these sales was ~14 days with no more than ~60 minutes of prospect connection time to complete the sale.
Effective prospecting and closing sales starts with a human connection to build trust. Training and developing personnel to connect, inspire and influence decision makers upon the first encounter helps create the best buying experience. The power of story is part of the missing link.
The human connection is fundamental to how we all learn to relate and carry on relationships with others. Building a human connection should become part of the consultative selling processes that are used in business today.