Challenges happen in sales and it is vital that we make ourselves as prepared for them as we can be.
You may have watched my video on a sales methodology called BANT before. If you haven’t then take a look HERE.
BANT covers Budget, Authority, Need and Timing aspects you need to help you qualify your prospects to win more business.
In this blog, I’m going to talk through another sales methodology that you can use to help you qualify your leads.
G=GOALS
One of the key things we must do in sales is to understand the goals that our prospects has, both as a company and as individuals.
What are the things that they’re trying to achieve?
What is on their agenda that they want to make happen?
One of the key elements around this methodology is you need to ask the right type of questions that can help us understand what their goals are. If you then start using techniques like probing and mirroring to find out a bit more, then you’re going to get insights that are going to help you.
When a prospect says to you “we’ve got the goal to grow our business in the next 12 months”, I would respond with something like “Growing your business? That sounds intriguing! Tell me more.”
I can then use my emotional intelligence to build empathy with them and really try and find out what that really means to them and how important it is. Identifying your prospect’s goals is critical!
P=PLANS
It’s all very good having a goal that says we’re going to grow our business within the next 12 months but what action are they actually looking to take in order to make that vision a reality? What is their plan?
There’s no point in having a goal unless you have plans on how that goal will come to life. Find out what have they tried in the past that hasn’t worked, or what’s so important about these goals that make this plan different. What actions are they going to take and how does it fit within their priority list?
Make sure you ask the right sort of questions so you can get to know what’s critical for them and where this all fits for them, and (more importantly) what action they are going to own themselves in order to get where they want to be.
One great question I like to use when someone has talked to me about their goals is:
“Sounds great! How do you want to make this happen?”,
or
“Sounds great! How are you going to go about making this a reality for you?”
I want the prospect to own their own plan because if they own their own plan, they’re going to commit to it.
C=CHALLENGES
Most businesses will always have goals and plans that they want to have put in place, but there are always bumps in the road and challenges that can get in the way, especially when it comes to implementing a new solution.
Our job as salespeople is to understand what these barriers are and what could be the challenges that could get in the way. Maybe there are a few difficult members of the team that don’t want to move forward towards the solution? Or maybe there is a strict deadline that could effect the project? Find out what are the critical challenges that are stopping their goals and plans coming together.
The key element with any sales opportunity is that you’re going to get objections. Sometimes things don’t happen the way we envisioned them to… Our job is to overcome the challenges and build empathy and rapport with our prospects so that we deal with the barriers and get through to the end point.
T=TIMING
What is the timescale that your prospect are working with? If you are selling services, chances are that you want the time frame of execution to be within the next three to six months.
If you’re going to commit time, effort, and energy to work with someone, we’ve got to bear in mind our sales cycle. The key is to also understand the time skills that your prospect is working to.
What are the factors that are pushing them to make a decision in the next month/two months?
You can have the best opportunities and work you’re going to do, but if it cannot fit in the agenda of the person right now then you’re not going to get it over the line in the timeframe you had hoped for. Make sure you ask the right questions to figure out the timeframe that your prospect is thinking about.
GPCT is a qualifying method that you can use to help qualify your sales leads.
Why do you need to qualify your leads? So that you don’t waste time and emotional energy chasing people that are never going to work out!
Put these elements in place, use the right questions to get the information you need from your prospect to see if they’re a good fit for forming a working relationship.
I hope this has been useful to you and given some ideas and tips, that you can use when using this method. Give it a try and let me know how you get on.
