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At one time, working in a large company, I was trained in sales. It was led by a fairly well-known coach, and everything was organized at a decent level. However, during the training, I had the feeling that we were being taught some tricks of traveling salesmen who, by all means, need to “suck in” their goods. The importance of asking open-ended questions, how to deliver presentations, how to deftly respond to objections, and how to use closing techniques have been repeatedly emphasized.
Watching the sales process in practice (we sold expensive business solutions), I saw that the process of interaction with the buyer in reality does not fit into the training schemes. After reading Neil Rackham's SPIN Selling, everything fell into place. I realized that the tricks of small sales are useless, if not harmful, for large ones. Despite the fact that the book was published a long time ago and is recognized around the world as the No. 1 guide to large sales, perhaps not everyone is familiar with its conclusions. Therefore, we at MakeRight.ru have prepared an abbreviated version of our summary especially for Megamind readers:
Large sales are fundamentally different from small ones and require a different approach. What?
Developed by Neil Rackham, the SPIN methodology for large sales is based on Huthwaite's 12-year study of 35,000 customer encounters in 23 different countries around the world and examined 116 factors that have a significant impact on the bottom of the sale. Interestingly, no one has done such large-scale sales studies before.What is the difference between large sales and small sales?
One of the main differences is the duration of the transaction. You may need to have many meetings with different people. And even if you gave a brilliant presentation, it is far from certain that this will help the sale.
The most important thing is that " the psychology of sales that require multiple meetings is fundamentally different from sales from one meeting».
Also, large sales are distinguished by a large amount of obligations of the buyer. Agreeing to a big deal is a big decision. There is also an increased risk in case of error in large sales, and they are usually characterized by a long relationship between the seller and the buyer.
Neil Rackham describes an experiment that clearly shows the difference between a big sale and a small one. A spectacular presentation of the product was held in front of potential customers. Everything seemed good - potential clients remembered from 5-7 key points of the presentation from the eight listed. They also said that the likelihood that they will purchase the product is high. It seems that such a result can be rejoiced?
But... A week later, all potential buyers answered the researchers that they had forgotten most of the information, and the purchase of the product was no longer included in their plans.
So why didn't the sale go through despite a great presentation and good customer feedback after the sale?
The fact is that if the contract was concluded immediately after the presentation, then, most likely, if it was successful, the seller would conclude a deal. However, big sales usually don't close immediately after the presentation. They require a long study of the conditions and much more time. The time before the closing of the transaction is significantly stretched.
Based on his research, Neil Rackham drew a number of significant conclusions:
- many of the skills that made for successful small sales prevented successful large sales;
- the style of conducting large sales, requiring several meetings to establish business relationships, is significantly different from the style of the transaction based on one meeting;
- as the volume of sales increases, the behavior of the buyer changes significantly and requires different skills from the seller.
“The rule is this: you can be assertive if you have the opportunity to take an order here and now; but if you part with a customer without receiving an order from him, being assertive will reduce your chances of ultimate success. And because the buyer won't re-engage with you, you may never know where you went wrong. So the pushy, tough style works for small, one-time sales, and it usually works against you if it takes multiple meetings to close a deal.”
In general, large sales are not characterized by the impulsiveness that can determine the buyer's behavior when he makes small purchases. " As the size of the sale grows, the importance of rational elements increases.". Customers are more likely to make an informed decision based on in-depth study of the offer and with the involvement of experts within their company. Decisions are often made collectively and not at all by the persons with whom the meeting was held or to whom the presentation was shown. Purchasing decisions can be made by people that a sales manager might have no way out of.
“Major purchases, by definition, require major decisions from the buyer, and this affects the psychology of the sale. With a small sale, the buyer thinks less about value. As the size of the sale increases, salespeople must build perceptions of the value of their products and services. Building perceptions of value is perhaps the single most important skill for making big sales.”
Research has shown that salespeople usually fail when they unknowingly describe the benefits of a product. Successful sellers, on the other hand, take a different approach - revealing the value of the offer.
In addition, large sales usually involve a long-term relationship between the seller and the buyer. Therefore, the sale itself becomes part of their relationship. Relationships are of fundamental importance in large sales as opposed to small ones.
“In a large sale, the product and seller are often seen as one entity by the buyer.”
What factors influence sales success?
Observing how salespeople work, Neil Rackham's team conditionally divided each meeting into 4 parts:- Start of the meeting - actions before the start of sales, which are designed to set up a sale.
- Research - obtaining information from the client through questions.
- Demonstration of Capabilities - In this stage, the seller shows that he has a solution to the customer's problems.
- Obtaining commitments. In small sales it's usually closing the deal, in large sales it's what Neil Rackham calls "progress" - gaining access to the decision makers or agreeing to test the product. It is important to note that if the seller considers the meeting successful, this does not mean that it is such in fact, even if positive feedback is received from the client. The main criterion for success is progress.
Importance of questions
Neil Rackham explains why questions are so important in sales:
- Questions help clients speak. In successful meetings, the buyer usually talks more than the seller;
- Questions focus attention. For example, a teacher asking questions to the audience attracts much more attention than just giving a lecture;
- A salesman who excels in explanations will not convince people at all. People don't give up on their beliefs so easily, and a salesperson who insists they're wrong is more likely to cause rejection than to make progress. But competent questions just can contribute to the fact that people will change their beliefs.
The questions are definitely important. In any sales training, you hear about the importance of questions. Moreover, it is believed that it is better to ask open-ended questions, that is, those for which it is not enough to answer “yes” or “no”. Where did this belief come from and is it true? Neil Rackham's research team found that there is no relationship between open questions and successful meetings. Some of the sellers used them, some did not, but this did not affect the outcome of the meeting.
But what questions help sell, if not open?
We identify needs - hidden and explicit
The researchers suggested that it is not open questions that affect the success of the sale. Important questions that help to find and reveal the needs of the buyer. A sales specialist needs to understand that the buyer has not only explicit, but also hidden needs. What are hidden needs?
“Latent needs are the buyer's presentation of problems, difficulties, and grievances. Typical examples are the phrases “Our current system has insufficient throughput”, “I am unhappy with the waste rate”, or “We are not satisfied with the current speed of the process.
Explicit needs are specific statements by the buyer about the need or desire for a purchase. Typical examples of explicit needs are “We need a faster system”, “We are looking for a more reliable machine”, or “I want to be able to backup”.
Hidden needs indicate that the client is dissatisfied with something, he has a problem.
He may want to fix the problem or leave things as they are. How does he make a decision? Based on the equation of value - weighing the cost and importance of the decision. If the customer feels that the cost of solving the problem is too high compared to the magnitude of the problem, they will not buy. If he sees that the problem is serious, he will acquire its solution. Therefore, the salesperson must direct their questions to identify hidden needs, and then show the client how significant his problem is. It should be remembered that the client himself may not understand how significant the problem is and how much it costs him to delay in solving it.
As for explicit needs, as Neil Rackham notes, they clearly indicate the client's willingness to purchase. In successful meetings, the client expressed more explicit needs. How should the seller act so that the client expresses more explicit needs?
If we are talking about small sales, then it is necessary to ask questions that identify problems (hidden needs), and then offer their solution. In large sales, a different approach is required - "the purpose of questions in a large sale is to identify hidden needs and develop them to the level of explicit ones."
How to do it? Using the SPIN technique developed by Neil Rackham.
SPIN sales
SPIN is an abbreviation for four types of questions:
WITH- situationalP- problematic
AND- extracting
H- guides
These questions are aimed at clarifying specific data. As the author notes, many sales trainings teach you to ask situational questions. For example, “how many years has your company been in operation?”, “what are your indicators ...?” etc. But in large numbers, such questions begin to annoy potential customers. As it turned out during the study, successful meetings are characterized by a smaller number of situational questions compared to unsuccessful ones. Sometimes they can indicate poor preparation of the seller. The author advises only a little time to devote to such issues and only when necessary.
P- problematic. These questions are aimed at finding out hidden needs, possible problems and difficulties that potential customers have. They are good for success in small sales, but not in large ones. Their role in large sales is to provide the raw material for building the sales process. These are questions in the spirit of “Are you satisfied with this?” or “Are you having difficulty with that?”.
- write down before the meeting three possible customer problems that your proposal can solve.
- write down questions that can identify these problems.
However, in large sales, it is not worth spending too much time on problematic issues. The most important task is to turn the identified hidden needs of a potential client into explicit ones. What can help this?
As the author notes, " enough evidence has been collected that the main and only difference between salespeople who are amazingly successful in large sales and average sellers is that successful people are able to develop hidden needs to the level of explicit ones. The question is how do they do it?».
A study by Neil Rackham's team found that successful salespeople ask questions in meetings to:
- the problem began to be seen by the client as more serious. That's what extractive questions are about - they reinforce the problem.
- the solution to the problem began to seem more meaningful to the client. For this, guiding questions are used.
Example:
« Salesperson (retrieving question): From what you've said, the difficulties in using these machines can lead to a turnover problem for your trained operators. Right?Buyer (realizing that the problem is more serious than it seemed): Yes, people do not like working on these machines, so operators usually do not stay with us.
Salesperson (pulling question): How perceptible is agent turnover in terms of training costs?
Buyer (gradually realizing the severity of the problem): It takes about two months for an operator to gain sufficient experience and approximately $4,000 in salary and benefits for each operator. In addition, we pay Contortomat $500 to train new operators at their Southampton plant. Also add about a thousand for transportation costs. It turns out that we spend more than 5 thousand dollars on training each operator, and this year we have already trained five.”
Exploratory questions should be used in meetings with decision makers.
Neil Rackham recommends preparing extraction questions ahead of time by:
- write down a possible problem of a potential client;
- suggest what difficulties are associated with it;
- write down questions that you can ask about each difficulty.
H- Guiding questions. Their task is to focus the attention of a potential client on the way out of problems.
“Typical examples of such questions are: “Is it important for you to solve this problem?”, “Why do you find this solution so useful?” or “Could it be useful to you in something else?”.
Guiding questions also reduce the number of objections.
The advantage of guiding questions is that the salesperson does not need to overcome the resistance of the client and describe the benefits of the product, since the client himself will name the benefits and agree with himself rather than with someone else.
An example of using guiding questions:
« Seller (guiding question): If you can control subscribers' access to the long-distance network, will it help you?Buyer: This will certainly prevent some unauthorized long distance calls, most of which are the result of illegal long distance use.”
However, it is important to remember that it is best to avoid asking guiding questions at the very beginning of the meeting, as they make the buyer tense and defensive, as, for example, in the case of the question: “If I show you something worthwhile, will you be interested?”. Another example of an inappropriate start to a meeting: "If I now show you a way to increase productivity, will you include us in the list of bidders?" or “Are you interested in a faster way to work with invoices?” and also they should not be asked if you do not have a suitable solution for them.
Summarizing the above, we can draw the following conclusions:
- Successful sellers start the meeting with situational questions - to get general information. But they strictly observe the measure, since situational questions in large numbers can annoy the buyer or annoy him.
- Salespeople then quickly move on to problematic questions, which bring to light problems, difficulties, and dissatisfaction. By asking problematic questions, they find out the hidden needs of the buyer.
- In small sales, solutions can be offered at this stage, but for large sales to succeed, probing questions are needed to make the latent need larger and more pressing.
- When the buyer agrees that the problem is serious enough to justify action, successful salespeople ask guiding questions that encourage the buyer to focus on solutions and describe the benefits of implementing the proposed solution.
Benefits in large sales
You can often hear the opinion that the salesperson needs to show the client the benefits of the offer, and not just list the characteristics. This seems quite logical, but another surprising discovery from Neil Rackham's research was that " benefits, in the sense that we have all been taught, are ineffective in large sales and are very likely to cause a negative response from the buyer».The study found that descriptions of the characteristics of the offer have a small positive effect in small sales, but in large sales they have a negative effect if used at the beginning of the meeting or neutral if used later. In addition, characteristics are usually more responsive to users than to decision makers.
To delve deeper into the issue of demonstrating benefits in the sales process, researchers have identified two types of benefits:
- Benefit Type A is an advantage. Shows how the seller's offer can help the buyer.
- Benefit type B is a benefit. Shows how the seller's offer satisfies the explicit need of the buyer.
In order to present a benefit, you must know the explicit need of the customer. Most often, this requires developing it from a latent need with the help of extracting and guiding questions.
If you describe this strategy in terms of psychology, then sellers need to shift their attention from their offer to the needs and desires of the client.
“Have you ever noticed that sales suddenly start to rise at the very moment when salespeople become frustrated with a new product and lose their enthusiasm? While the product is new, it is predicted to be an unprecedented success, the sellers are full of enthusiasm and devote a lot of time to mastering it. But once they are disillusioned with the novelty, their focus shifts from the product back to the customer.”
Objections?
Another finding from the Neil Rackham team's research challenged the conventional wisdom that it takes a lot of time to manage objections. Most often, objections are caused by the seller himself, and not by the client. Successful salespeople get a lot less objections because they know how to prevent them in time.For example, price anxiety is more common among potential buyers during meetings in which the salesperson lists many features. Psychologically, this increases attention to the price. This will be a plus if you are selling an inexpensive product. After listening to the list of characteristics, the buyer will prepare for a high price. And will be pleasantly surprised low. But when selling expensive items, this method is ineffective and will cause objections from buyers - listing characteristics will force them to focus on price.
Another approach that provokes customer objection is to describe the benefits of the offer (that is, statements that show how your offer can help the buyer take advantage of it).
Advantages are objectionable because they address a problem that has not yet been clearly formulated.
What should be the correct approach to objections?
It should be focused on preventing objections. First you need to create the value of your offer for the buyer with the help of extracting and guiding questions, and only then reveal your capabilities and ways to solve the problems of the buyer.Start and end of the meeting. How to avoid mistakes
Research by Neil Rackham concluded that one of the most common mistakes at the start of a major sale is prematurely talking about the possibilities and solutions.
“How often do you discuss your products, services, or solutions during the first half of a meeting? If this phenomenon is not uncommon in your practice, it is most likely a sign of an ineffective start to the meeting.
Keep in mind that the beginning of the meeting is not the most important part of a big sale, and focus on asking the right questions to the client.
When it comes to closing deals, Neil Rackham's team was in for some unexpected discoveries. It disproved the need for frequent use of various closing techniques during the meeting. Closing is, to a certain extent, a way of putting pressure on the buyer. Perhaps it works well in small sales, but in large ones it causes a negative reaction.
"Closing techniques, like all other forms of pressure, lose their effectiveness as the 'size' of the solution increases."
The study found that sellers who frequently used closing techniques closed fewer deals than those who did not.
However, it is important to understand that the absence of a closure also has negative consequences for the meeting. For the meeting to be successful, the seller needs to get a commitment from the buyer. Successful salespeople use four sequential steps to do this:
- Pay attention to research and demonstration of opportunities.
- Make sure all key questions are covered: We have found that sellers who excel at getting commitment from buyers always take the lead and ask the buyer if there are any other questions or points to consider.».
- To sum up the benefits: Successful salespeople put all the pieces together, summarizing the key points of the discussion before moving on to making a commitment. In small sales, summing up is not necessary, while in large sales it almost always helps to focus on key issues. Be sure to summarize key issues, especially benefits».
- Suggest a commitment: " At the moment of making a commitment, successful salespeople don't ask, they tell. The most natural and most effective way to bring a meeting to a successful conclusion is to offer the buyer the next step.».
In order for the closing of the meeting to be successful, you need to know what goals you want to achieve.
“Don't be content with deferral goals like 'gather information' or 'collaborate in the future'. However, do not set yourself unattainable goals. It is necessary to support the promotion of the sale and offer as closing actions that ensure the progress of the sale.
How to move from theory to practice
Neil Rackham gives a number of tips on how to properly master the SPIN method in practice:
- Practice only one type of behavior at a time. When mastering the SPIN method, you concentrate on one type of question in turn.
- Practice the new behavior at least three times. Failure is natural. " Never judge if a new behavior is effective until you have practiced it at least three times.».
- Quantity is more important than quality (better to sell at least somehow than unsuccessfully trying to sell "well").
- Practice in safe situations. " Always try new behaviors in safe situations until you feel comfortable. Don't use important meetings to practice new skills».
The following steps will help you improve your SPIN selling skills:
- Focus on the exploration stage instead of the demonstration stage. What you ask the customer is more important than what you tell them.
- Arrange the questions in the order of SPIN. Start with situational and problematic questions and only after them move on to extracting and guiding questions.
- Analyze your product in terms of solving customer problems, rather than looking at it in terms of features and benefits. Plan questions that you can then use for these purposes.
- Plan, implement and review. Planning should be combined with the analysis of the meetings.
Neil Rackham recommends asking yourself the following questions after every meeting:
- Did I meet the goals of the meeting?
- If I were to have this meeting again, what would I do differently?
- What new things have I learned that can be used in future meetings with this client?
- What new things have I learned that can be used elsewhere?
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SPIN-selling is a sales technique based on 4 types of questions: situational, problematic, extracting, directing. How to use the SPIN sales technique to improve my skill level as a sales manager, I will describe in this material.
This is not a review of Neil Rackham's SPIN Selling. This is a method of using his technology in the realities of the Russian market. Neil Rackham is an outstanding human being. He managed to systematize what many sales stars intuitively understood, but could not explain it to the younger generation. I definitely recommend reading the book SPIN Selling. Neil clearly lays out the statistics on the shelves and creates a coherent system. But not being a person with sales experience, he added a lot of information that is relevant, but not of practical use.
Therefore, I took the liberty of telling you how I use the SPIN selling technology in my work. This scheme is simple and easy to apply, and it takes a little ingenuity and constant practice to actually apply it.
2. Where can the SPIN technique be used?
On one of the coaching forums, I ran into a heated discussion about where Neil Rackham's technology could be used. It is difficult for me to understand these disputes, because having understood the essence of the system, the SPIN technique is used not only in sales or training, but also in the family. For example, I don't get into an argument with my strict grandmother, but I just ask her a few questions and that's where the objections end. I would call SPIN not only a sales technology, but a conversation technology. So my answer is SPIN can be used not only in any kind of sales, but also in any kind of persuasion.
3. What is the essence of SPIN sales technology?
If you tell a person:
"- You are a fool!" – how does he react? In most cases, he is offended or starts arguing.
If he himself says:
"- I'm a fool!" – can he be offended and argue with it? Of course, there are individuals who constantly argue with themselves, but they are dealt with in a special institution.
What's happening? In the first case, I give information that he needs to believe. He is in no way involved in this decision, so it is alien to him, and he will resist it. In the second case, the interlocutor himself makes this decision, it is already his own and he will defend it and fight for it.
So, we just have to get the person to say it himself. This is the whole point of SPIN - the technique of asking questions. 🙂
“- Buddy, you repeatedly repeat the same mistake. What are these people usually called?
Of course, I simplified the chain of questions, but this is enough to understand the essence of this.
4. How to formulate questions that will lead a person to a certain opinion?
In fact, everything looks very simple in theory, but all the problems with using the classic version of SPIN sales. How to formulate these questions? This is where my know-how begins. The mechanism that allows you to convey information to the trainees at the training, make sales and convince your grandmother.
Let's take the previous example. I want to convince a person that he is a "stupid". If I want to convince him, then, most likely, I think so myself. And if I think so, then some actions of a person made me think so. Therefore, I do not tell the person the conclusions I came to - "that he is a dumbass", but I focus on what made me think so - "the repeated repetition of the same mistakes." That is, I give him my logical chain. The more far away I start my chain, the more independent his decision will be. The more he has to put in the effort to form conclusions, the more valuable this decision will be, and the less he will doubt it. But in order for a person to make a decision, he needs to be convinced of this, for this there are certain types of questions in the SPIN-selling technique.
5. Why do we need as many as 4 types of questions?
In fact, 4 types of questions are just steps in building a logical chain. The chain can consist of 1 question, as in our example, or maybe 20 - 30, as is most often the case in sales. Questions can answer all types at the same time, or they can only lead to thoughts. There is no need to think that "Now I will ask such and such a question." It is very difficult. You just need to build this chain in your head and follow it without thinking “what type of question did I ask now?”. Well, it is 4 types of questions invented by the author of SPIN sales, Rackham, that will help us build these chains.
In our example of a booby, we assume that we know about the mistakes repeated several times by our interlocutor. If we don't know, as often happens with a client, we need to find out.
“Is this not the first time you have made such a mistake?”
That is, a situational question gives us and the interlocutor the basis for building a logical chain of SPIN.
A situation is just a situation – it is neutral. In order for a person to behave in one way or another in different situations, you need to give him a reason. The best reason might be a problem. It needs to be identified and defined. Who should do it? The interlocutor. That is why we ask these problematic questions – without them, it is impossible to build a chain of SPIN sales.
“- If you do not draw conclusions from past mistakes, then this can be repeated all the time?”
With this question we define the problem. Unless, of course, the interlocutor himself came to such a conclusion.
We figured out the situation with the help of a situational question, we identified the problem with the help of a problematic one, now according to Rackham we must EXPAND this problem. To indicate what difficulties the client will have in connection with this problem, how this can affect his whole work and life.
“- So, if you have a habit of repeating the same mistakes, you will constantly mark time?”
“- If you do not draw conclusions and take concrete measures to correct mistakes, will you always suffer losses in such situations?
We helped the interlocutor understand what the refusal to realize that he is a "stupid" can lead to.
Now the simplest question remains - to direct a person in the right direction, to suggest a solution. Guiding questions are the last link in the SPIN selling chain.
“- What are the names of people who understand that they constantly suffer losses and mark time because they cannot draw the right conclusions?”
What remains to answer the interlocutor? Most likely, to voice what you wanted to convey to him. But we will go a little further. It is unlikely that we will need to explain to the client in sales that he is an idiot, we need to get him to act. In this situation, we can ask another guiding question and steer it in a different direction:
“- And if you develop a mechanism for analyzing your mistakes and always draw conclusions from them, will this allow you to make fewer identical mistakes?
I hope it’s clear what the interlocutor will answer, and I hope you understand that we were selling this phrase to the interlocutor 😉
6. How to sell using SPIN technology?
In the practice of using SPIN, it is very difficult to separate one type of question from another, and understand which one should be asked now. To master the SPIN selling technique, you need to:
- know the product very well;
- know possible customer situations;
- prepare all types of questions for each situation;
- train.
You can start by listening to recordings of your conversations with clients and, pausing the recording from time to time, come up with questions that we could ask in the situation in which the client finds himself. With all the simplicity of the approach to such a sale, without a lot of practice it will be quite difficult for you to formulate. Try to use SPIN in real sales, I'm sure you will succeed.
And if there are any difficulties, we will be happy to prepare the right questions for your business and teach you how to use them. call
How to win the trust of a client? As leaders avoid typical sales mistakes? Are there any differences in selling a material product or an intellectual product? And most importantly, what is the strategy for success in sales? To these and other questions Executive.ru answered Neil Rackham.
Read the exclusive interview and chapter excerpt from books"SPIN sales".
Executive.ru: What are the basic skills a professional should have?
Neil Rackham: It is persuasiveness, energy and enthusiasm. But everything is slowly changing. Creativity, listening and business strategy will be important in the future.
Executive.ru: How win the trust of the client? What is more important - psychological skills, the ability to talk a lot, product knowledge or something else?
N.R.: No way. Psychological skills are overrated. Yes, there is a set of psychological skills that motivate people to buy. Understanding customers is very important, but it is more about understanding the needs of the customer's business than a psychological understanding. Talking too much is bad. Successful meetings are characterized by the fact that they are spoken more by the buyer. In fact, most salespeople talk too much. Product knowledge is not as important as it used to be, because thanks to the Internet, this knowledge has become available to customers. Salespeople who win the trust of the buyer and listen to him, focus on the needs of the buyer, they are honest, do not exaggerate, and never pretend to know something they do not know.
Neil Rackham, a sales and marketing researcher, analyzed 35,000 salesperson-customer conversations over 12 years to develop a SPIN selling methodology. We invite you to learn its nuances in 5 minutes and analyze a successful case in order to use the SPIN sales technique wisely.
SPIN technique: how it works
The essence of the SPIN technology in sales is to ask the client questions, answering which he will want to purchase your product. Neil Rackham figured out that to do this, you need to ask 4 types of questions in sequence:
- situational
- Distressed
- extracting
- Guides
Four types of questions
1. Situational questions: not for everyone
This type of questions includes those that are aimed at establishing contact and collecting general information about the client and his affairs. Speaking about SPIN selling, Neil Rackham called situational questions an optional item in the program: “I believe there is a place in hell for bad salespeople where they have to sit and answer their own situational questions for infinity.”
The main rule is to ask situational questions only when you cannot obtain any data yourself from the preliminary study.
2. Problem questions: what does the client see?
These questions are needed to identify the difficulties and inconveniences of the client. But how to formulate them? In the book SPIN Selling: A Practical Guide by Neil Rackham told how Xerox Corporation, one of the first users of the SPIN model, dealt with this.
The first faxes cost incredible money - about 25 thousand dollars, and no one wanted to buy them. Most companies used teletype instead. Then Xerox management asked managers to look at their product through the eyes of customers. It turned out that the most important advantage of a fax over a teletype is the ability to transmit not only text, but also images. Just imagine: oil companies were forced to transmit seismic measurements by helicopter! It was necessary to send pictures to hospitals, universities, and the police. Now that the problem has been identified and the target audience has been identified, sales have skyrocketed.
Neil Rackham believes you should come up with at least three customer problems that your product can solve and prepare questions to make sure you have them.
3. Extracting Questions: When Hormones Turn On
These are questions about the consequences of the problem for the client. By answering them, a person becomes more aware of what will happen if the situation is not changed. It is believed that the best salespeople ask the most probing questions.
By the way, the technology of SPIN sales is not only psychology, but also biology and chemistry. When a client does not trust the seller who imposes the goods, a stress hormone is produced - cortisol. It interferes with sound thinking and forces one to defend oneself. Oxytocin(aka “love hormone”) is associated with positive emotions, trust, interaction. The production of oxytocin is stimulated by frankness, openness to complex discussions, and the search for mutually beneficial solutions.
All "oxytocin" activity falls into the category of SPIN selling features. Nature itself wants you to use them!
4. Guiding Questions: Don't Rush
To increase the value of the solution in the eyes of the buyer, the manager asks guiding questions. Examples of questions in SPIN selling: “If you could…would you do it?”, “Would it solve your problem?”
But take your time. The main mistake that can be made is to ask such a question at the very beginning of the meeting. Neil Rackham gives the example of an inept salesman who immediately asks, "Sir, if I show you something worthwhile, would you be interested?" Or: "Are you interested in a faster way to work with invoices?". This question in itself is not a bad question, but at the very beginning of the conversation it will put the client on the defensive or make him feel that he is being manipulated.
It's ideal to ask a guiding question - after you've demonstrated the severity of the problem with elicitation questions, but before you've offered a solution.
Case: SPIN sales example
Co-founder of Invola Sergey Pokazaniev on the blog of the Spark website, he told how the SPIN sales technique helped a startup from Skolkovo to conclude several million contracts.
Representatives of an engineering company compiled a script, according to which they called the quality departments of factories and asked if they had quality control tasks - this situational question. Many employees were frank: they shared problems and pointed out weaknesses. After that, representatives of the company went to the factories and began to ask technologists, metrologists and economists extracting questions:
- Why do you want to solve this problem?
- What do not suit (why not suitable) the current methods of control?
As a result, a number of shortcomings were revealed that affected labor productivity, the percentage of defects, and so on - the problem turned out to be serious. At the same time, the client became annoyed and hurried to find out what the representatives of the company had to offer. This was a good sign: the client recognized the problem and was ready to work with it.
Next, the representatives of the company compiled a financial model for the customer, demonstrating that the investment would quickly pay off and help reduce losses. It remained to “fix” the idea with the help of guiding questions:
- Will this affect productivity in any way?
- If you implement a solution, will it help reduce the defective rate?
According to the representatives of the company, the use of SPIN technology allowed them to receive 8 pre-orders for amounts from 5 to 15 million rubles almost without investment.
Don't think about SPIN questions!
In order for SPIN questions to fit harmoniously into your speech, try to focus primarily on the desires and needs of the client. Successfully using the principle of SPIN sales in its activities Jaina Cook recommends following two principles:
- You need to please your interlocutor: questions should “scream” that you sincerely wish prosperity to his business;
- Genuinely want the customer to sell to themselves and keep asking questions that lead them to buy. And then sooner or later he will be interested in your proposal. "The 7 Best Selling Techniques of the Last Century". And if you want to put SPIN sales on stream, then use the convenient one, which itself will remind managers - when and what question you need to ask the client in order to complete the transaction faster.
