Ask questions. You can do two things with a question:
1. Let prospects know what you think.
2. You can at the same time pay them the compliment of asking their opinion.
A sale is not made in your mind, but in the mind of your prospect. Every word, every question, every gesture you make during your first face-to-face meeting should have only one objective: assisting the prospect in discovering a need.
The best way to get your prospects to think and recognize a need is to ask questions - relevant questions. In many cases, it's the only way you will get prospects to think and become interested in evaluating a possible solution to meet their need.
People do not buy something unless they feel it is in their interest and benefit to do so. The "interest" may be on the part of themselves, their family, their company, their charity or their community. The point to remember is that probing questions provide you with pertinent information.
One of the surest ways to increase your selling effectiveness is to learn more about what your prospects want. Strategic questions develop this kind of information.
Stating your ideas in the form of questions shows prospects how you feel about what they should do, but at the same time, they remain in the buyer's seat.
Cultivate the art of asking questions.
Six Things You Can Gain Using the Question Method
• Helps you avoid arguments.
• Helps you avoid talking too much.
• Enables you to help prospects recognize what they want. Then, you can help them decide how to get it.
• Helps crystallize prospects' thinking. The idea becomes theirs.
• Helps you find the most vulnerable point with which to close the sale - the key issue.
• Gives people a feeling of importance. When you show that you respect their opinion, they are more likely to respect yours.
