Lean Communication for Sales: Reducing Waste
Famed retailer John Wanamaker once said: “Half the money I spend on advertising is wasted; the trouble is I don’t know which half.” Bad as that may have seemed to him, he actually had it pretty good, compared to salespeople. I contend that much more than half of sales communication consists of waste. Anyone who has ever listened to a “spray and pray” sales presentation knows intuitively how much clutter and waste there can be in a sales conversation. I would estimate that 80% of the words in a sales call or presentation are unnecessary; even worse, they may detract from the message you’re trying to get across.
Why is this important? The obvious first answer is that it wastes time, but it also obscures the value you bring the customer. There is a study that showed that one week after a ten-minute presentation, the audience remembered 10% of what was said. Assuming that your customer is going to make their decision in the week after your presentation, how sure are you that the 10% they will remember is the most important 10%? If they remember your interesting anecdote which had nothing to do with your main point, then 100% of that meeting was a complete waste.
So many forms of waste
It would be impossible—not to mention wasteful—to list all the ways that salespeople can waste their customers’ time. Here are just a few examples:
- Talking too much about yourself
- Trying too hard to establish your credentials; if you’re in the meeting, the credentials have already been accepted
- Talking too much about how the product works and not connecting it to what it does for the customer
- Presentations that take too long to get to the point
- Asking questions about things you should have found out on your own
- Off the shelf slide decks that do not directly target this specific customer’s needs
- Missing concerns or opportunities
- Trying to answer objections without understanding the real objection
- Trying to close too soon
- Closing too late: missing buying signals
What are some reasons for waste?
There are many reasons that we talk far more during sales conversations than we should; psychology, our planning (or lack thereof), and our skill set.
Psychology
- Enthusiasm: we love talking about our kids, but don’t like hearing others talk about theirs
- It feels good to talk about ourselves
- Fear: we think as long as we’re talking, they can’t say no
Planning and Preparation
- Lack of planning: no clear call purpose, not having stuff you need, not being ready to answer questions
- Being so focused on your purpose that you miss unplanned opportunities
- Lack of customer knowledge
Skill set
- Level/language mismatch, e.g. speaking technical specs to C-Level
- Trying too hard to manipulate without taking time to truly understand
- Not qualifying properly
- Poor listening
How do you reduce waste in sales conversations?
But here’s the problem: even if you know that 80% of your words are waste, how do you know which 80%? Fortunately, lean communication provides us a tool for discerning what is waste. Remember our simple definition of waste: anything that does not directly contribute to value. So, having defined what value is in our previous posts, we can use that as a guide to see if the words coming out of our mouths support our key message: what the customer needs to do and why they should do it. With a clear conception of value in mind, you should also cultivate these powerful habits:
Research: Do the work to know as much as possible about what they will care about, and what they need and want to hear. That will help you before you go into the meeting, and during the meeting you can begin by asking questions or validating your view of the situation before launching into your closing pitch.
Have a plan but don’t fall in love with it: Have a focused plan for what you expect to accomplish, what value you will provide to the customer, and how you will accomplish it through agenda and questions. But remember that the customer always has a vote, so be prepared to deviate when you’re going off-track or an unexpected opportunity pops up.
Share the map: Using your agenda, as discussed in the previous post, will go a long way to establishing right up front what they want to hear and what you can skip.
Apply the So What test: Before you say something, apply the so what filter: what does this mean to the listener? How will it help them? This will help eliminate the irrelevant and merely interesting, while ensuring that what is integral or important to your message is not lost in the clutter. It will be integral or important if it’s customer-focused, if it brings new insights, and if it’s unique to you.
Focus on the critical few: You may have a ton of appealing features or seven good reasons to buy, but they won’t remember all seven. Some of the weaker reasons may dilute the effect of the stronger. For example, you might have a lot of satisfied customers, but you can make that point by simply listing the one that that particular customer will find the most impressive or relevant. As Churchill said, “Facts are like cigars: pick only the strongest and the finest.”
Listen: Apply the pull concept, which will be covered in more detail in a future article. Listen to their words and pay attention to nonverbal cues. If you ask good questions and listen carefully to their answers, they will give you plenty of clues about what’s important to them. While talking, if you see them get distracted, you need to ask a question to find out where you went off track and to reengage their attention.
Don’t just save time, give some back
As a salesperson, reducing clutter is one of the best ways to add value to your customers. Yes, they have oceans of information at their fingertips, but that creates its own problems—they have trouble finding the pony in the pile of manure. If all you do is bring more information, it just adds to the pile. But if you can home in on precisely what they need to know to improve their own situation, if you can strip out the irrelevant and merely interesting, there’s a good chance you will give them back time. How welcome do you think you will be if, instead of seeing their time with you as a cost, they see it as a net saving of time?
Lean Communication for Sales: Talk Less, Sell More?
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