Trust Triangle Selling April 2008 Newsletter

April 2008

Issue: 15

Ask Dan

It's good to have questions - now ask them! The only poor question is the one never asked. I may be able to feature your question in the next newsletter. Just email me at dadams@trusttriangleselling.com.

Q: Dan, my manager demands "Win-Win" scenarios and I pretty much know what that means. But I think my manager is unreasonable in her expectations. Is it possible to expect a win-win all the time? And, what if I lose the deal, through no fault of my own?

Sharon Murphy
Summerfield, NC

A: Thanks for your question, Sharon. I will answer your question in two parts. First, what can we expect in striving for a Win-Win situation? Second, what happens if, despite our best selling efforts, we "lose" the deal?

Only Win-Win Deals

★SUPERSTAR SECRET ★
You fall down so you can learn how to get up.

In traditional selling there are four possible kinds of deals: win-win, in which both you and the customer are satisfied with the deal and the business relationship; win-lose, in which you feel good about the sale but the customer doesn't; lose-win, in which you feel you had to buy the business, but the customer is happy; and lose-lose, in which everyone walks away unhappy, and you're unlikely to do business together again.

No sales rep in her right mind wants to be anywhere but win-win all the time. A true superstar believes that it is impossible for the rep to win and the customer to lose. A superstar is interested in the long term and cannot envision a situation, over the long run, in which the rep would benefit if the customer lost. In other words, although a rep may win a battle, if the customer believes that he lost the battle you can bet that in the long run the rep will lose the war. Superstars, always looking at the big picture, never have a sense of a win if the customer lost.

If I ever faced a win-lose situation - in which I could win, but at my customer's expense (for instance, by talking him into something he didn't need, or selling him a solution that truly didn't benefit him) - I would walk away from the deal. This isn't just good ethics; it's good business sense. I am interested in long-term relationships, and if I win a sale in which the customer loses, I will never get any more deals from that customer. In the sales world in which I played, long-term success was crucial.

Once I benefited from another rep's short-term, win-lose approach. A lowly rep from a competing firm went after an immediate sale by plugging a square peg into a round hole. Through price discounting, the rep persuaded a major hospital to purchase a piece of equipment that turned out to be poorly designed and dismally ineffective for this customer. The rep knew the equipment was not going to meet the customer's needs, but still pushed for the sale. When the customer found this out, he was furious. For the next twenty-plus years, that hospital refused to deal with that rep's company. Instead, it often chose to do business with me.

There are rare instances in which lose-win (buying the business) is appropriate - but only on a short-term basis in order to achieve a long-term win. I will occasionally do such a deal because I know there will be benefits down the road, such as a reference, getting traction in the target company, and so on.

What If You Lose The Deal?

★SUPERSTAR SECRET ★

Never lose twice for the same reason.

I hate losing. Losing is hard. If you're a sales pro, you know that people buy or don't buy because of you. You can't help but take it personally. Losing is particularly tough in the world of high-ticket sales, where we're talking not about a turkey sandwich or a hundred-dollar pair of shoes but multimillion-dollar sales that require a great deal of effort - sometimes a year or more of losing sleep and working long hours.

Consultative selling doesn't make losing any easier. Once you understand what a customer needs and you have a solution that fits those needs, you feel strongly that your solution is the correct solution. So if the customer selects someone else, it just adds to the pain. You know that you didn't do your job, you worry that the customer doesn't trust you, you think you're not successful. You conclude that you're no good, you're not a winner - in fact, you're a loser!

For me, luckily - unlike salespeople in some situations - losing a sale never meant not putting food on the table. I hate losing because I'm extremely competitive. I simply do not want to lose!

Consultative selling reframes some of these so-called losses. Even though you don't win the sale, you maintain the long-term relationship with the customer - and that is a win. You maintain your credibility and your own integrity - that's another win. Gather up what you've learned and declare that as your prize.

Sometimes you'll win by actively choosing to lose - by recommending that the customer seek out a competitor's solution. This is the right thing to do if what you have to offer is not in the customer's best interests. Again, the wins in this case are maintaining your credibility and a long-term customer relationship.

In the 2005 movie Batman Begins, Batman asks his father, "Why do we fall?" The father replies, "So we can learn how to get up." Superstars fall down, too - but never twice for the same reason. They learn from their mistakes. That's how you really win by losing. And you don't go whining and crying - that is not a superstar. Further, you should send what I call a "Loss Letter" to your customer. I refer to this as secret weapon #34 in my book and in my workshops.

Good Luck, and Close 'Em!

Dan Adams, Adams and Associates