Hundreds and thousands of books and lectures and after spending millions of dollars in market research, we are still convinced that rapport and relationship are the best ingredients to make a successful sale. Unless there is a huge difference in price, it is your relationship with your customer that will help you win. In deals big or small. And it is as much true for small home businesses too!
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For a small business owner, you have to start relating your (and that of your business) identity to your personal relations with your customers. Empathy, understanding and trust are vital. Let us put it in the context of a small home business and see how it works.
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A friend walks up to you and asks for your advice on buying a camera. Your answer is similar to “Hey I buy from so-n-so and they give me good service. You will find a link on my site, so buy through that link and you will get a good price”. What you are saying in your mind is “please please, if you buy from the link on my website and spend a thousand dollars, I will get a reseller’s commission of fifty bucks”. You have done almost everything to break your friend’s trust. People can see through cheap selling.
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Instead, you ask him questions to genuinely help. You find out who is going to use, how will the camera be used, what is the budget, what he / she has in mind, and then give him your suggestions on why you think a particular camera would be right for him or her. Remember, your friend’s problem was to finalize on a camera, not where to buy it from. If you leave your friend with the information to make a good decision, in all probability he he / she would come back to you in a few days for help on where to buy it from. Again, give him all the options from your heart. Here it is absolutely all right to mention that you are a reseller of a certain company who also sell the same stuff and you would benefit if your friend buys through your site.
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Either way, your friend will have to pay the same money whether he buys through your website link or directly. So to him / her it is no difference. But to return the favor of your advice, there is a very high possibility that he / she would finally click that link on your site and buy through you.
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Taking things a little forward, you might like to check on them for any help even if he / she did not go through you. Even if you did not earn this time, he / she is still your potential customer and above all someone who looks to you for advise. And thats not going to change!
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This art of consultative selling is difficult to master, but patience, empathy and trust could help you build this relation with your customers for a long term relation. You will remain to be a “trusted partner” to your customer for ever.
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Filed under: Home Business, Selling | Tagged: consultation, consultative selling, reseller, Selling, trusted partner.
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