The Challenge of Solutions-based Sales
Making the change from transactional-product sales to relational solutions-based selling is not easy. It’s the difference between talking and listening, between telling and asking, between being an actor or a detective.
The actor follows a script intent on giving a persuasive performance. The audience watches as the actor delivers well-rehearsed lines with precise timing to evoke laughter and tears from spectators. If the performer forgets a line, the prompter in the wings whispers help to jog the actor’s memory. The careful choreography is designed to win the approval of the audience who render their verdict, polite applause or standing ovation, at the close.
Detective work, on the other hand, is discovery and problem solving. Although they obey policies and procedures, detectives don’t follow a script. They ask questions, lots of questions. Detectives are really the prompters in any who-done-it and their audience of suspects and witnesses are the true performers.
Show ‘n Tell vs Look and Ask
The typical transactional-product sale makes the salesperson an actor. The rep follows a sales “track” highlighting product features and benefits, usually supported by such prompts as printed brochures or computer slideshows. The salesperson does most of the talking, asking closed-ended, rhetorical questions designed to gain the prospect’s agreement and approval. The customer may feel manipulated.
The solutions-based sale requires the salesperson to be a detective. Rather than show-and-tell, this sales process demands a look-and-ask approach. Using our actor-audience-prompter metaphor, the customer is the “actor” (they do the most talking the in the solutions-based sales conversation) and the salesperson is the “prompter.” One might wonder who is the audience in the solutions-based sale. In the B2C sale, the company is the audience; that is, they approve and reward the salesperson and the customer. In B2B environments, the audience is both the sales rep’s company and the end-user of the customer company, a win-win for everyone.