one of my favorite shows is “property virgins” on home & garden tv. why do you ask? the host, sandra rinomato, is a very smart saleswoman. she’s a master at the fine art of starting towards a sale. far too many rush into a pitch — cutting corners and trimming attention away from some of the most important steps. she’s fond of saying that “you gotta take them there” before making the sale. what she means is that any consumer must be brought to the place where s/he can be sold. you can’t just launch into a pitch straight out of the gate, without putting in some meaningful work.
so what are the critical initial steps? first — warm up. like a professional athlete, you don’t want to rev things up too fast and hurt yourself. start by getting them to talk. some complete a brief questionnaire for this purpose. listen carefully. share a few nuggets of knowledge that show you’re an expert and put the consumer(s) at ease. only do so in response to what’s been shared. second — seek initial consensus, then set expectations. if there are multiple consumers at the end of your pitch, then find out whether they are in agreement, or close to it. if they’re in the ballpark, then see if you can isolate and overcome obstacles. your goal is to minimize the differences or eliminate them to create one target for your pitch. once you have them on or close to the same page, then set expectations. generally, you’ll need to lower the dream bar to a more manageable level through common sense anecdotes. let them down easy, as the saying goes. you can’t leave things in the clouds when you know that the typical sale involves compromise and sacrifice. third — “price condition.” this means your consumer(s) must come to an early sense of reasonable costs. it’s best when you get them to guess the price incorrectly first, then you educate them. do this with some light humor. most people understand the psychology behind why things seem expensive upfront (it’s mostly wishful thinking). use third party information to support your pricing claims, where available and sensible to recall. this establishes you as the authority on the matter at hand. salespeople always hear how the price is high (even when it’s not), which becomes a recipe for not buying. there’s sticker shock at play and not enough comfort with the salesperson. by price conditioning upfront, you bring expectations to a point where the shock is gone. value can be demonstrated and built. a close can be attempted because the gap between where the price needs to be versus where expectations lie has been narrowed or removed.
