TouchPoint Selling

Apr 24 2009 8:04AM | Permalink | Email this | Comments (1) |
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By Rick Heaston

Consumer research conclusively proves that rapport has the least to do with a customer’s final decision than any other part of the selling process. So why do sales associates believe otherwise? I know the answer, but I’ll make five or six people really mad, so I’ll just continue and forget the reasons. Here goes.

I’m sick and tired of hearing about the meet and greet phase of the critical path. You know what I mean, the claim that building rapport is the key to making a sale, or you have to sell yourself before a customer will buy from you. What a bunch of bunk.

All you have to do is look at things from your customer’s point of view and I’m sure you’ll change your mind. And to do that, means you’ll have to think like your customer thinks. Just consider their agenda and what they’re trying to accomplish and you’ll see what I mean.

Customers visit to see if they like what they see and if you’re worth further investigation. Said differently, to see if you have something that might work in terms of their lifestyle. To accomplish that, rapport is not important to them. Let’s explore this further.

Sure, I know you’ve always been told to build rapport to get the ball rolling, but is that what your customer wants? In other words, do they wake up in the morning and say, “Hey, as long as we’re home shopping, we might as well spend a little extra time and build some rapport with the sales people?”

To get to the core issue of rapport, you have to consider what’s happened before your customer even arrives. By getting out of their car customers are admitting that your side of town works, your community looks pretty good and your elevations aren’t bad. So what’s next?

Customers have one more thing on their mind and it’s a biggie. They now want to know, “Does this builder have a floorplan that might work for the way I live?” Which begs the real question. Is rapport important to customers before the even know if they like what you have? Again, the answer is, “Of course not.” So if rapport isn’t important, you’ve got to be wondering what is? The answer is comfort.

Comfort comes before rapport, and it’s all your customers want and need until they determine if you’re a possible fit.

Once your customer says, “Geez, this looks interesting”, they want what you want … rapport. In fact, now they need it more than ever. And with rapport comes questions and dialog.

Once customers determine that you might have something that interests them, they need rapport to help them navigate through the next part of their shopping process. So at this point, spending time to build rapport is not a waste of their time like it was before they knew if your product might work or not.

PS: Making your customer comfortable is more than cookies and water. And it’s more than just being nice and sitting in your office. It’s using the sales techniques that will get them interested enough to want to investigate further … and that takes work.