Few people wake up thinking, ‘I hope a salesperson calls me today.’
Why is that, when we have a life-changing product or service to offer them?
It’s because most salespeople focus on themselves and what they’re selling instead of the challenges our prospects face. The few salespeople who are solution-focused experience more return calls, engagement and a shortened sales cycle. So how do we increase prospect receptivity even if we can’t change what we’re selling?
To show us how to systemize increasing prospect receptivity, we sat down with Adir Ben-Yehuda, an Israeli Defense Force veteran who understands the power of systems when they’re applied to sales. He showed us how to deconstruct our product demo and begin delivering it as soon as outreach begins.
Since we’re trimming hope from our sales strategy, we’ll use the acronym TRIM to guide us through creating a system with a trigger, ensuring it’s repeatable, building in ways to improve it, and of course, ensuring it’s measurable and getting us results.
T – Trigger: Adir says this system starts with understanding the pain point of your prospect and enter your conversation with one intent; instead of selling, show up with the intent of resolving that pain point. From there, you can deconstruct the product demo you’d normally make prospects wait for and front-load solutions into your outreach.
To better understand your prospect’s pain points, you can ask current clients about what caused them to reach out and purchase from you, scan social media channels where your prospect is active and see what they’re talking about, and of course by studying industry literature.
R – Repeatable: Once we understand the pain point of our prospect, Adir says the repeatable steps we should follow begin with a succinct product demo that explains how their pain point is resolved rather than making the prospect participate in discovery calls that add no value to their lives.
The second step is to follow up with the prospect after the initial call with customized material that further helps them understand their pain point and what it will take to solve it. At this point, you should have confirmed their pain point and gathered specifics about how it’s impacting that prospect. When you send follow-up material, be sure to incorporate the numbers and data the prospect gave you so they see a solution that’s customized to them.
I – Improvable: To improve prospect receptivity, Adir says to judge yourself and your efforts in an honest way. That means taking the time to assess whether the pain points you’ve assumed are really the top challenges your prospects are facing or if you’re missing the target.
We can also talk to current customers and ask them if the way we added value earlier in the sales process had an impact in how soon they became customers.
M – Measurable: Adir says leading indicators are important in measuring success with this system. That means measuring outbound activity that you control (emails, phone calls, etc.) and the ones you don’t control (prospect responsiveness, time spent with you and reading your materials).
Putting your prospect’s challenges front and center will ensure they see you as a solution provider and as someone dedicated to their success – not just your own.