Trusted advisors need to probe to determine if a pain point is perceived as a problem or an ... [+]
Are you a trusted advisor, such as a management consultant, financial advisor, attorney, fractional CFO, Vistage chair, EOS implementer, wealth manager, or accountant? These are just some of the trusted advisor professionals who make their living landing high-paying clients.
During a discovery conversation, when trusted advisors find pain and challenges that prospects are experiencing, they fantasize the deal is as good as done. But reality is different.
“When trusted advisors hear prospect challenges, they start licking their chops because they believe the door has opened to their solution,” says author Lee Salz. “Unfortunately, many of them become disappointed when their deals never advance past the initial conversation.”
Salz’s latest book, written with Jack Daly, is titled Sell Different! All New Sales Differentiation Strategies to Outsmart, Outmaneuver and Outsell the Competition.
According to Salz, trusted advisors are not asking enough questions to determine if the pain they have uncovered is an “inconvenience” or a “problem” for the prospect. Those two words are not synonymous.
“An inconvenience is merely an annoyance,” says Salz, who is a trusted advisor himself. “It’s bothersome. In our everyday lives, we all encounter these hassles. However, we don’t do anything about them. We live with them until an issue elevates to the level of a problem. This is important to remember. Just because the issue causes a headache doesn’t mean prospects will take action to address it. Actually, few will do anything about inconveniences.”
Ah, but prospects take action when they encounter a problem. “When this happens, they recognize that immediate action needs to be taken to address it,” says Salz. “The search for solutions has begun. Prospects will invest time, resources, and dollars to solve a problem, but not necessarily an inconvenience.”
Salz says problems correlate with solutions. We never associate an inconvenience with a solution.
“Here’s where many trusted advisors get stuck,” says Salz, who is a sales management strategist and CEO of Sales Architects. “They don’t ask deep, insightful questions to determine if the shared challenge is something the prospect can either live with or is ready to address. If you don’t definitively know the answer to that question, ask questions to understand their perspective on the issue.”
Sometimes, trusted advisors see issues as problems when their prospects only perceive them as inconveniences. Salz says this is an important opportunity trusted advisors have to create energy in their deals. Through effective questioning, trusted advisors can lead prospects to see the issue as a problem, create a sense of urgency to address it, and motivate them to act on it.
Also, the prospect you are speaking with may feel an issue is a problem, but their colleagues and superiors don’t perceive it that way. How do you know if the other stakeholders feel the same way? Ask! Ask if others in the organization feel the same way they do about the issue. For example, you could ask: “Do your colleagues view this issue as an inconvenience or a problem?” That question will be met by a brief silence as they consider how others feel. Then they will share their perspective.
Bottom line: For every identified pain point, trusted advisors need to probe to determine if it is perceived as a problem or an inconvenience.
