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Asking the Right Questions

Thursday, February 12th, 2015

This video hits on a very important aspect of the sales process and one that is specifically emphasized in NCI’s sales training: asking the right questions of your prospective clients. Asking questions is absolutely vital to your sales effort. Doing so obviously helps you gather information about your prospect and their current situation which will inform your approach to the sales and closing process. In addition, asking good questions on a sales call will show that you both care about the prospective client and their circumstances while also beginning to establish yourself as a trusted advisor. So what kinds of questions should you be asking? For starters you need to find out why you are there in the first place. Why did they agree to the appointment? If they currently work with an accountant is there some kind of problem in that relationship? Maybe a late filing paired with a hefty penalty occurred? Is the accountant never available when needed? Have their accounting fees been increased time and time again with little to no explanation? There are any number or reasons that an accounting relationship can sour, but it’s your job as the salesperson to find out what they are in each specific case. Once you do, you will then tailor your presentation in a way that will clearly indicate to the prospective client that they will not have to deal with that nonsense while working with you and your firm. You also want to ask a prospective client if they are having any problems in the business and what those are. What keeps them up at night? If you can identify the “pain” they are dealing with and then offer a realistic solution in the form of the services you provide, that will go a long way towards signing the client.

Asking the right questions at the right time during the sales presentation makes all the difference when it comes to making sales and building client relationships. As part of NCI’s sales training we provide a list of questions to ask each prospect and we go over when and how to ask them during the presentation to maximize the consistent growth of your firm.