Effective sales through DISC
Hello again! Are you in the world of sales? If that’s a yes then this week’s blog is going to be worth a fortune! I am going to help you understand how using DISC can increase your sales revenue- simply by tailoring your approach to the DISC profile you are ‘pitching’ to.
In the last blog we looked at speed reading DISC profiles, so by this point you should have a good understanding of the clues that people give us to help us determine a DISC profile. (If you are struggling to remember, you can always refer back to my previous blog!) Now it’s time to understand how you can use that information to your advantage…
We are going to consider three areas of a typical business meeting. They are:
- The Meeting style
- The Opening
- The Close
We have all experienced meetings where rapport has been great or where a cold wind has blown through the meeting room and the rapport has been, shall we say, frosty? Let’s take that further, have you ever been in a meeting where you have a great chat, sparkling conversation, laughter and then after you get out of the meeting you realise the objectives of the meeting weren’t achieved? Perhaps you have found yourself becoming impatient because people won’t get to the point or keep leaving important details out? Using DISC can ensure that these situations can be avoided.
Let’s start with The Meeting Style. For each profile there are three things you need to be aware of:
- Listening style
- Attention lifters
- Key words
To keep it easy here’s a grid to follow laying these points out for each of our profiles, as follows:
Right, let’s move on to the initial opening of the meeting. It’s always a good idea to have an agenda for the meeting at the outset – this will appeal to all DISC profiles and provides an opportunity to immediately set the tone and send out the message to the person you are meeting with that it will be a productive meeting. As usual there are 4 different ways to do this, like this….
It is at this point that you might want to consider how you are going to present information. Our Influencers and Steady will respond to a conversational meeting, whilst our Dominant profiles will want you to get to the point, and the Conscientious will be looking for detail.
Before we look at the Close let’s take a breather to consider the many ways to present information and, as usual, when considering DISC profiles there are different ways that will have bigger impact and hit home more effectively – always helpful when going for a sales pitch! So, consider these different techniques to help your message:
So, let’s now consider the other end of the meeting – Duh duh dah! (Dramatic music) – The CLOSE!
There are many different ways of asking for the ‘order’. They key to any sale is; if you don’t ask the answer will always be “no”. It is a recognised fact that many sales people can often present well, look great, understand their product or service scrupulously and yet they can let themselves down on the close. Often sales people will be waiting for the other person to say “I want it” in some way, and, of course, that doesn’t always happen.
If we link sales styles to DISC then our Dominant sales person will always go for the close (even if it’s not the right time – they will ask – which is why our Dominant profiles often have higher sales because they ask more people!). Meanwhile the Influencer sales person will use their charisma- although they often talk themselves out of the sale – so if you are an Influencer beware! Our Steady sales people will always listen well – a trait ideal for successful sales people – although they are less likely to ask for the ‘sale’ perhaps because of the fear of causing offence – remember it’s all about relationships with our Steady profiles, which leaves the Conscientious profile – our cool and collected sales people – it’s logic all the way, which can be a powerful sales tool when used well, where our Conscientious sales people need to be careful is they are likely to overload with features and facts which is fine if talking to another Conscientious person – if not – trouble ahead!
The solution to all these points around closing is mix your closing style up and don’t just use the same close every time. OK Steady profiles, stay with it – it will work out OK – I promise! In the table below there are examples of different ways that you can close. So, try these out:
Remember if you don’t change anything then the outcome will also not change or to put it another way, as Einstein said “the definition of insanity is doing something over and over again and expecting a different result”.
So, I guess that means you’d be mad to not try out these techniques! See you next time.
Tags: B2B Marketing, Coaching, DISC, DISC Profiling, Disc Profiling Blogs, Learning and Development, Learning styles