What does your customer already know?

Don't Say too much
© DavidDennis

When I did the series on selling, we talked about qualifying the customer then going over the features advantages benefits in order for the customer to make a decision. I also mentioned that you need to do trial closes and ask the customer for the sale.

One of the things you should qualify your customer on is how much they know about the product. After all, if they have a good knowledge of the product in the first place you will just spin your wheels if you try tell them too much about it. Plus you might get caught not knowing as much as you think you know about your product.

Let give you an example:

A few years ago an elderly woman totaled out my car when she got confused at an intersection and made an illegal turn so I had to find a new car. Now I worked in the automotive industry for a few years and kept up on new cars so I knew a few things about cars.

I went to the Ford dealership that was owned by someone I knew and started looking at vehicles. I was interested in a Ranger since at the time my job had me driving deep into the back roads of Washington and Idaho.

The salesman takes me on a test drive of one Ranger and starts telling me everything he knows about the Ranger and never stops. He told me about the gas mileage, the history of the Ranger, the seats, all the buttons on the radio, the airbags and how they worked and so on. In fact he was still explaining features to me after the test drive ended and I had started walking away from the vehicle.

Now clearly he was spinning his wheels because I knew most of the information he already told me. I also knew that he told me the wrong engine size, he stated it had dual airbags but it only had single, and he told be the bed was 8 feet but it was not.

This guy had talked himself right out of a sale, not counting the fact that he tried to push me into a vehicle that did not have the options I wanted.

While it is important to know what to say to a customer, it is equally important to know when not to speak and just sell the product.

For more see a guest entry at the Sales and Sales Management Blog.