"Without good communication, a relationship is merely a hollow vessel carrying you along on a frustrating journey fraught with the perils of confusion, projection, and misunderstanding."
Cherie Carter Scott
How would you rate the conversation and communication with your clients?
Without meaningful and rich conversations, where do you believe the relationship sits, really?
You never know when one conversation will lead to exponential sales growth.
The way you open conversations, carry on conversations and strengthen conversations has a direct impact on what happens next. The direction of those conversations along with the intentionality behind them; all will have a direct bearing on sales opportunities, referrals, cross-selling, relationship building and your prospecting success.
The struggle for many, you rely upon scripted questions which yield you scripted answers that closely resemble a tennis match.
Real conversations require complete participation. It requires you to be present. Genuine or even meaningful conversations are invitations, an invitation to "what is really going on" unfolds during the conversation.
How do you achieve authentic, meaningful, genuine and real conversations with your clients? Quite simple, you let your guard down and stop acting like a salesperson.
Engaging in real conversations requires you to be in the moment.
To be fully engaged during a conversation you must be able to move from communicating to connecting.
Connecting requires intentionality and focus during conversations. What do you think you could uncover about your clients with extreme focus during your conversations?
Allow your conversations to flow. Enter a realm of uncertainty and watch what starts to happen to genuine engagement.
How comfortable are you making your clients feel about you, so in return they become comfortable enough sharing their uncomfortable business concerns?
A meaningful conversation is a business adventure into the unknown. This is where you allow the conversation to flow, unscripted, not guarded and you welcome in what you uncover. This is where new possibilities and opportunities to help await you.
Conversations are organic, sometime a bit chaotic and not scripted.
Think about the conversations you are having with your clients and ask yourself... Is there any substance behind my communication that is helping me to uncover more than I anticipated?
Pay close attention to what excites your clients. Look at how their eyes light up and notice the emotion in their voice. Continue the conversation around the things that excite them and be willing to set aside the questions you had in mind. What you start to uncover is pure gold and relational betterment.
This is further reinforced in the book, "Together: The Healing Power of Human Connection In A Sometimes Lonely World", American physician and author, Dr. Vivek Murthy challenges us to ask ourselves questions like:
“What was it about that conversation? Did I have a breakthrough moment where I let my guard down? Allowed myself to be vulnerable and was real with the other person? Or was it that they did that with me? And by being vulnerable they actually empowered me to be the same with them?”
Think about this for a moment... Are you brave enough to start proactive conversations that matter? Are you and your clients having break through moments with your conversations?
PROACTIVE & PURPOSEFUL CONVERSATIONS
"Be brave enough to start a conversation that matters."
Margaret Wheatley
Let this quote sink in for a moment as we dive into the difference between reactive and proactive conversations.
Reactive - It’s something you haven’t planned for and something that has caused you to respond in an unforeseen manner. The result is often defensive in nature, after the fact.
Proactive - You prevent problems before they arise. You're answering questions before they ask you. You work with your clients and have open conversation about issues important to the both of you.
Proactive conversations are planned, purposeful and deliver on their promises.
Proactive and purposeful conversations:
Shows You Care — Dedicate the additional time to provide insights and creative ideas for your clients to help them grow their business.
Builds Trust — In a post trust sales world, proactive conversation shows that you are invested in their business growth. Closely monitor your client's business and routinely engage with knowledgeable insights to help them cast vision about their business.
Prevents Future Issues — Make sure there are no surprises. Prevent your clients from "making a mountain out of a molehill". Proactive conversations will help you gain a better understanding about your client's needs, wants and desires before they turn into issues.
CONVERSATION CREATES KNOWLEDGE ABOUT YOUR CLIENTS
The single best source of help are your clients. Engage with them. Ask them questions. Learn something new about them. What is really going on inside their business? These become conversation starters when it comes to prospecting for new conversations with future clients.
Sales professionals understand their clients, their business and their competitive landscape?
How can you improve the business lives of your clients? Quite simple, just ask them. Make it about them.
Getting to know your clients starts with proactive, intentional curiosity driven conversations.
Intentionally listen to your clients and seek to understand.
It is about engaging with conversation with great questions.
It starts with triggers such as:
- Tell me more...
- In addition to that, what else?
- Imagine for a moment, what would happen if...
- I'm curious...
"Knowledge is like money: to be of value it must circulate, and in circulating it can increase in quantity and, hopefully, in value."
Louis L'Amour
Are the conversations you are having with your clients circulating with value?
I understand, I get where you all are coming from. Every day, I walk in your shoes. I am fully committed to helping your sales team integrate social aspects and heartfelt strategies into your current sales process to grow new business. I want you to get results. This is why I am passionate about doing this the right way, the genuine way, the authentic way! It's about understanding value before visibility.
Selling From the Heart is making a difference! I poured my heart into every page of this book and I believe you're going to love it. You can find it on Amazon in paperback, kindle and in audio.
In a world full of empty suits, I'm passionate about helping sales reps become sales professionals. I help sales teams understand the true value they bring to the market.
With great pride I transform, challenge, coach and inspire sales teams to grow new business by helping them share their story and how they communicate it out by integrating the use of social and Selling from the Heart.
You can follow me on LinkedIn, Twitter, Facebookand on my podcast by clicking on Selling from the Heart.
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