How Demanding Customers Can Benefit Your Business
Making a sales pitch can be nerve-racking--even for an experienced salesperson. The best way to get through it is to practice your presentation carefully, hit your stride and get to the end.
When a customer starts asking hard questions and challenging your pitch, however, you can get taken out of your comfort zone. The fact is confrontational customers can be among the most valuable customers to have.
Here are four important reasons why it is advantageous--instead of anxiety-inducing--to be asked difficult questions:
1. Sophisticated buyers are interested customers
The most important reason to be excited at the thought of prospects asking hard questions is that you have someone who is interested in doing business with you. Challenging clients can be quite intimidating, but that does not mean they are not valuable--in fact, the opposite is true. You should be worried when clients are overly agreeable or not asking any questions at all. This means they are not engaged and probably not serious about moving forward in the process.
Prospects who ask difficult questions, on the other hand, are taking the time to really think about your company and how it fits with theirs. You have them on the hook; you just need to see how big an opportunity these customers are and how to land their business.
2. Practice improves future sales pitches
Consistent sales growth is a direct result of a regularly evolving sales pitch, and practice makes perfect. In fact, certain experts believe that how you communicate the value of your product or service is one of the most influential aspects of the sales process. A prospect wants to hear what your company can bring to the table; they cannot get that from marketing materials and a boring presentation. Engaging in a back-and-forth dialogue is the best way to communicate this value to your prospects.
Nobody provides a better opportunity for practice your sales pitch than challenging customers. They ask sophisticated questions and keep you on your toes. If they aren't likely to make a purchase, you have an even better chance to practice your pitch since you don't have to worry about losing the sale. If you and your sales team make the most of these situations, you will be better positioned to successfully sell to all types of customers.
3. Salespeople more easily extract unmet needs
Another reason that it's important to value demanding customers is because they are taking the time to sit down and talk with you. As the information gap between customers and sellers dwindles, many prospects default to independently researching solutions for their specific needs. But when the Internet does not have all the answers, this is when they'll approach your company, exercising just enough skepticism and caution to see if they can make a confident purchasing decision.
When you get into deep discussions with challenging customers, you will learn a lot about how their businesses operate and what their biggest pain points are. Even if you don't close the sale, you can use information that you gather to help influence future product developments and develop more effective sales pitches.
4. Sellers are forced to use more authentic and honest strategies
Customers do not like to be sold to. Instead, they want mutually beneficial conversations that will help them overcome their current business problems. Buyers aren't interrogating you just to be hostile. Rather, their intention is to give you the opportunity to demonstrate domain expertise and introduce ways your product can truly benefit them. Learn how to respond to challenging questions, dig a bit deeper, and subtly highlight your company’s greatest strengths.
It's fun to rattle off the answers to easy questions, but no one learns anything until they're asked challenging questions. Make sure you and your staff are prepared to deal with demanding prospects and taxing objections, and you will end up uncovering more leads and securing new business.
