Key Takeaways
- Consultative selling is the process by which you get to know a customer personally, understand their needs, and put their needs first in the relationship.
- Relationships are vital to success in most selling situations. When you understand what the customer wants and needs, you can provide solutions to help your customer meet their goals.
- Lifetime value is a term that refers to the amount of business that you do with a single customer over the course of the relationship. When you have a long-term view of your relationships with customers, you have an opportunity to realize even greater success.
- R-commerce, or establishing and developing relationships with customers, focuses on the “little things” you can do to take advantage of opportunities and set yourself apart.
- Trust is the cornerstone of every relationship. If you do not have trust, you do not have a relationship.
- A solid relationship is essential especially when delivering bad news. Always be honest and timely with your customer. They will respect and trust you for it.
- Networking is the art of building mutually beneficially relationships, and is an indispensable tool.
- Adaptive selling occurs when you adapt and customize your selling style based on the behavior of the customer.
- The social style matrix is based on patterns of communication that characterize communication behavior based on two dimensions: assertiveness and responsiveness.
- Analyticals focus on facts, details, and analysis to decide but are reserved in their interactions with people. They want to know the “how.”
- Drivers are similar to analyticals in that they like facts, but only the ones that will quickly help them achieve their goals. They are people who are in a hurry and do not really care about personal relationships, except as a means to their goal. They want to know the “what.”
- Amiables focus on personal relationships in their communication style. They like to agree with everyone and focus on team building. They want to know the “why.”
- Expressives enjoy building relationships, but do not like focusing on day-to-day details; they like to paint a vision and inspire everyone to follow it. They like to focus on the “who.”
- Most people use a combination of styles, depending on the situation.
