When sales presentations fail, it’s usually because the salesperson neglected to understand and address the buyer’s motivation. By the time a member of your staff is speaking to a prospect, the buyer’s decision-making process has already reached a critical stage – almost all prospects ‘know’ what they are going to do once they find what they “want,” if it’s affordable.
The simple buyer
A small percentage of potential customers who visit or inquire about your club exercise regularly and are just looking for a new gym. Maybe they’ve recently moved into the area or taken a new job near your club; or maybe they’re dissatisfied with the services offered by their current club. A simple request such as, “Tell me about your current exercise program,” will identify these buyers immediately. Once this type of buyer is identified, the sales process becomes a simple conversation of matching the person’s current workout with your gym, and having them visualize being satisfied with your facility. A trial workout, with a little attention to detail, will almost always close the sale in these situations.
The complex buyer
The rest of buyers are much trickier. Unfortunately, the first task faced by your staff is to uncover a “want” that is almost never revealed to them. The vast majority of prospects usually decide to begin a new exercise program because of an unpleasant perception of themselves. Maybe their doctor has told them if they don’t exercise they’ll become seriously ill or be on medication for the rest of their lives. Maybe they’re afraid their spouse or significant other is no longer attracted to them. Maybe they’re embarrassed to wear a bathing suit. While the specific reasons vary from individual to individual, the important point is that the primary motivation for starting a new exercise program for the majority of prospects is usually derived from an unpleasant thought about themselves.
It gets worse. Before the prospective customer makes the effort to call or a visit a club, he or she has already translated this unpleasant thought into a strategy, or secondary motivation, such as losing weight or “toning up.” This secondary motivation is then further translated into a practical action or solution for achieving the secondary motivation, such as starting a cardiovascular or weight training program.
Here’s what the mind of the complex buyer looks like:
1. “I look horrible” (unpleasant perception)
2. “I need to lose weight” (secondary motivation)
3. “I should join a gym and run on the treadmill” (solution).
Now, guess what happens? Your phone rings and the person on the line asks, “How many treadmills do you have?” If someone on your staff simply answers, “We have 24 treadmills,” your chance of converting them into a sale is drastically reduced because your staff member spoke to the buyer’s solution instead of their motivation.
Uncovering the buyer’s motivation
First-time visitors or callers will often begin a conversation with your staff asking some sort of question related specifically to their pre-determined solution (I need to run on the treadmill). Because a prospect will never initially reveal their unpleasant perception (I look horrible), the task of the salesperson is to shift the conversation in a way that circumvents the solution and addresses the prospective customer’s secondary motivation (weight loss). This is the middle ground where a successful sales conversation can occur.
The best strategy for uncovering the buyer’s motives involves answering any inquiry with an open-ended question that requires some degree of detailed response. Using the above example, a well-trained salesperson would reply, “We have a variety of treadmills. Are you looking to lose weight, increase stamina or achieve some other result? Or, what are you interested in doing for yourself?” These types of open-ended questions can’t be answered with a simple “Yes” or “No,” and they place prospective customers in the position of describing what they actually “want” – in other words, supplying their secondary motivation.
Once the secondary motivation is discovered, the remainder of the sales presentation should be directed to how the features of the club (and exercise program) benefit the buyer’s motivation.
Take the following steps to increase your staff’s ability to successfully engage the mind of the buyer:
1. Have your staff categorize all new prospects into simple and complex buyers.
2. Make your staff aware of the complex buyer’s thought process (unpleasant perception, secondary motivation, and solution).
3. Have your staff list the 10 most common initial questions they are asked by new prospects. Then, reduce the list solely to solution-oriented questions (if necessary). Finally, have them practice converting these solutions into openended questions designed to reveal the buyer’s secondary motivation using the above strategy.
Chris Mikulka is the President of Sellfitness.com. He can be contacted at 866.864.4572, or by email at chris@sellfitness.com, or visit www.sellfitness.com
