Are you looking to get B2B customers online? Then you need a sales process.
Remote sales is a different animal compared to in-person, and B2B typically involves more decision-makers. You may be struggling to get prospects interested online, or struggling with them going cold in the process.
What you’ll need is a well-designed sales process to walk prospects through the stages of initial interest into becoming a customer.
If you’re selling any kind high priced offer, such as a consulting service or premium software, it’s likely not an impulse buy for your prospect. The bigger the purchase or more customized the solution, the more a prospect will do their ‘homework’ to make sure it’s a good fit before pulling the trigger.
The simple secret is that if you help them do that ‘homework’, then in their eyes you hold the answer to their specific problem.
So, how do you walk them to the point of making a purchase?
Well, for starters, it’s not usually all done on a single call. Second, make sure your sales process isn’t plagued by these most common issues.
Instead, you design a series of stepping stones that you guide the prospect through to:
- Qualify the prospect
- Analyze their situation
- Prescribe a solution
You’ve probably heard it before – it’s like going to the doctor. Your doctor is not going to prescribe any pills before diagnosing your symptoms.
To do that in B2B sales, we recommend the following three-step sales process. After helping hundreds of companies increase their sales, we’ve found this approach to be most effective.
Use this as a starting point, and tailor it to your specific audience, offer, and brand!
The analysis call is your ‘tripwire’. That’s the secret sauce.
The Three-Step Consultative Sales Process
1. First Meeting →
The “Intro Call” (15-30 m)
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The first introduction, and also initial filter. Feel out high-level fit.
- Introductions
- High-level fit
- Pitch value call
Briefly describe what you can offer them of value, such as a free “analysis”.
Don’t get too far into the weeds and don’t give a quote, they need to come back if they want the value.
GOAL: Sell the value call. “Get a free assessment, or sample”.
2. Value Call →
The “Free Assessment” Call (30-60 m)
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Discovery call to diagnose their situation. The ‘tripwire’ that really drives the process.
- Gather info
- Demonstrate expertise
- Pitch the feedback call
This requires them to commit and invest in the process process so you can provide them with value in return. Involve a technical team member, if appropriate.
GOAL: Sell the feedback call. “Get the game plan that we’ll create for you”.
3. Feedback Call
The “Closing” Call (30-60 m)
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Share your analysis and recommended solutions. Lead into engagement and pricing details.
- Connect pain points to solution
- Demonstrate value
- Support with credibility
Stack up supporting evidence, and credibility factors, such as awards or stats.
If they’re not ready, have alternatives ready, such as a smaller test engagement. Also have incentives & reasons to act now.
GOAL: Pitch the sale!
Has the prospect already signed-up for your lead magnet? Then you can start by reaching out and offering the value call because they already know a lot more about you.
How to have a great first meeting that turns into more meetings
We recommend the first meeting be a phone call where you call the prospect. Therefore you get their number and you’re ringing them.
Zoom links often get jumbled. Meeting passwords can get buried. Your prospect may be on the go, on their phone, and then Zoom isn’t as convenient.
Everyone knows how to use a phone. Start with that. Then you can schedule your next call to be on Zoom, and you can tell them to expect the link.
A few important points to make sure you hit on your call:
- Build rapport: “Hey John, I’m glad we were able to connect – how’s your Thursday off to?”
- Introduce yourself: “Well, I work in the PR space and help doctors get the word out about their new medical practices so they can get more patients. I noticed you started your practice a couple of years ago. Plus, I noticed we have a mutual connection, Sean Ryan, so I had to reach out!”
- Pitch the value call: See that section below!
The goal of this call is to pique their interest, but not go too far. They must be invested in the process by committing time and information.
Want better customers?
Schedule a call today to start filling your pipeline!How to craft an effective value call that prospects want to get on
Having trouble with prospects ‘ghosting’ you in your sales process?
That means they don’t perceive enough value in what you have to offer. If that’s happening, amp up your pitch – it starts with a great value call hook.
The hook of this value call becomes the ‘tripwire’ that really shifts this into a sales process (selling mentality). The prospect must commit time and information in order for you to deliver them value in return.
Effective examples:
- Free 30-Point SEO Audit
- Free Software Trial
- Free Legal Document Review
- Free Lesson
- Free Sample
The simplest way to find your tripwire is to think about splintering off a small first step of your full offer. An SEO company needs to do an audit before they start their work anyway. A software platform needs to sign-up a user before they can pay.
Whenever you’re providing something for free, it’s reasonable to collect applicable information from the prospect. With a free sample, ask the necessary questions to select the best sample. If it’s a software trial, build questions into the sign-up flow. This requires the prospect to invest time and info into the process.
Caution: a plain ‘free consultation’ is a weak offer in this context. Make it specific and concrete. The more tangible the value, the more interested they’ll be.
Offering the value call in a way that gets a ‘yes’
How you say something is often more important than what you say. Use these tips up to here for the ‘what’, and now let’s talk about the ‘how’.
Sales and social interactions can be nuanced. The smallest red flags can turn off a prospect.
Here are some examples of how to pitch your value call:
- “Over 1,000 financial advisors are on our platform, would you like to try it out?… Great, let’s set up a video call and I can get you set up with a free trial. When’s good for you next week?”
- “We just helped another hospital reduce patient wait time by 50%, would you like to see how? Great, I’ll grab one of the specialists from that project and we can do an end-to-end process analysis. Are you free on Friday?”
- “I can show you how other software companies are cutting their hosting costs in half, would you like to see how much you can save? Perfect, I’ll grab a few of the top optimizations from similar software companies… Let’s get on-call later this week to do a 7-point hosting audit and go over those optimizations, when works for you?”
Your Turn
This is an effective process that we’ve seen work across many different industries.
It’s best to tailor each step and each script to your audience, offer, and brand. So take what you learned above and remember to test and tweak it for your company.
Sales is like any other new skill or new process – the first time you do it will be the roughest. Practice, practice, practice, along with following these principles is what will refine your sales process into an extremely effective pipeline for your business.
For further reading, we recommend The Challenger Sale and The Ultimate Sales Machine.
And if you need help getting great prospects into your pipeline, get in touch with us here.
Go get started!