Sales Process
Selling is all about needs and wants. It's also about people and more importantly it's about process.
Meet & Greet
People establish several conclusions about us within the first few seconds of meeting us. The way in which we greet our customer is just as critical and requires just as much practice as any other step of the selling process.
Fact Find
(Needs & Wants)
Two of the most basic of all human needs are to be valued and understood. We must take this time to build rapport and help our customer to relax and feel comfortable working with us. We must make sure that the questions we ask serve our customer as well as ourselves. Through skillfully constructed questioning, we can help them see that we are interested in them as people, as well as wanting to discover how we can best serve them. Remember this; they don’t care how much we know until they know how much we care.
Walk, Drive, Appraise
One of the early questions a potential customer asks is, "what's my car worth?" A fair question when you consider the values involved. Fear of loss and the need to pay as little as possible drives this feeling.
It's a smart salesperson who acknowledges this fact early and, prior to going on a test drive, completes a "walk, drive appraise" of the customers trade-in vehicle.
You need to "write up" the trade-in details anyway, so take the customer with you as you complete this task and allow them to "sell" you their vehicle.
Ask the customer to read out the km's. Then ask them to repeat it. A very high odometer reading will help explain the lower than expected trade in value later.
Then, drive the trade-in with the client. That's right, drive the customers car with the customer in it.
Show interest, whilst mentally noting any damage and wear and tear the vehicle may have.
6 Position Presentation
A “good deal” is when the value received is greater than or equal to the amount spent. We provide our customers a “good deal” when we present the features and the benefits and build value in those things that our customer places value in. Also keep in mind, that we as sales professionals need to add value to the buying and total ownership experience as well.
Controlled Test Drive
Our customer continues to take mental ownership when they get behind the wheel. It is our job to make the demonstration ride as enjoyable as possible by driving the vehicle first and by using a preplanned route. By sharing with our customer the background of our dealer principal, and the dealership, also, by introducing them to our associates in the other departments, (eg: Service & Spares) we give our customers more opportunity to feel comfortable about doing business with us.
Trial Close
You need to determine, usually in writing, exactly what it's going to take to reach an agreement, TODAY. Touch on all the variables. Trade in, initial investment, monthly investments and price. Stay flexible at this point.
The Close
The average customer must be asked up to five times before the decision to buy is made. Our job is to make it easy for them to say “yes” and hard to say “no.” We cannot be effective if all we know is “If I could…would you?”
Our customer’s game plan is to go from dealer to dealer, get the best price, and leave. They will sometimes tell us the most outrageous things to throw us off of our game plan, to convince us that they cannot possibly do business today, and to sell us on the “fact” that the only hope we have of ever getting their business is to give them our “rock bottom BEST price.”
What they actually learn shopping this way is nothing more than a lesson in futility. There is no such thing as a “best price” because this is a business with negotiated prices, for most of us at least, and many variables enter into the pricing structure — things like availability, color, equipment, age, time of the month, the moods of everyone involved, and how the transaction was set up. These variables are dynamic — always changing.
What our customers are really looking for is someone they can trust. With product parity pretty much a reality, and with the easy access to, or the posting of, market driven prices, the only true advantage we have over the competition is our own personality and empathy.