How To Qualify Leads - Get To Know Who's Going to Buy Before They Waste Your Time!

Qualifying

Being a friendly, personable, and an attentive salesperson are all helpful traits, so are being aggressive and persistent. But even more critical is being able to qualify your client.

Qualifying your client is asking questions such as what are your budgetary restraints. How is the company’s credit? Getting references and so on before determining the needs of the company. 

Investing time in understanding the perspective client rather than simply qualifying them is a good idea. The difference is as wide as the ocean. This would be the salesperson who asks a lot of questions to gain an exhaustive understanding of the client’s operations with the objective of uncovering what is being done well and where there are unresolved and often unidentified problems. But beware, and be tactful. Not everyone can take being told how their business is faltering. Others will welcome the help.  

Every salesperson should be adept at qualifying a client. No one wants to spend time getting an order only to discover that there are credit issues or other problems. But ‘qualifying’ has another meaning – finding out if a client is ripe to buy.

This may also mean getting to the correct or final decision maker. The best qualifying question you can ask is: “[client’s name], how will this decision be made?”. The client will give you an answer and you will ask, “Then what?”. The client will then tell you how the decision is really made and you ask again, ‘then what?’ and four or five times of this and viola! You have the name of the real decision maker!

To avoid making your presentation more than once, try to qualify the client as the decision maker or get to the decision maker early in the relationship with the client by asking a simple question: “Is there anyone else you work with or confer with before making decisions that should see the presentation before we move on?”. The idea is to find out if there is another decision maker before you make your presentation.

Another way to resolve the double presentation is to simply state, “If you’re interested in our product/services, when were done discussing them, we could possible go speak with the CEO and perhaps show him the presentation.”. This shows the client you are not afraid to go to the top decision maker and are willing to do what it takes to get to the qualified decision maker. It is a simple statement, not meaning to be going over anyone’s head. And we will talk more about what words to use and in a persuasive manor, later in the book.  

An additional way to qualify a customer is to qualify yourself to the customer first. This way they become relaxed, open up more and become more confident in doing business with you.

Make friends with your customers before you ever begin to talk business with them. Friendship is the basis for open communication in any relationship, as well as business. And you would hope that your friendliness is contagious. Exchange stories with one another, find some common ground to talk about; you may just have a new friend as well as a potential client.

By communicating openly and friendly, the conversation is more relaxed and less “salesy” and this is how I would qualify myself before qualifying my potential client.  

Of course every salesperson wants to make every sale possible; however, they must recognize that from today’s contacts come tomorrow’s sales. This is quite different from a commitment to understanding them so they see you on their side and not just another salesperson trying to make a quick sale. 

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My father said: “You must never try to make all the money that's in a deal. Let the other fellow make some money too, because if you have a reputation for always making all the money, you won't have many deals.”                         J. Paul Getty