The biggest miss in outbound sales: understanding the problem

View profile for Will Aitken

Trust Me, I'm a Salesperson | Sales Trainer, Keynote Speaker, Author, and Pisstaker | Fluent in English, Memes, & Sarcasm 🇬🇧🇨🇦

The biggest miss in outbound sales. Until you know someone has a problem and what's causing that problem, any "selling" points or features are being shouted into the void Focus on the problem (it's dark), get someone to resonate, then give a diagnosis so you know: - There's a fire risk - Their power bill is high - Their lights are too bright - They're struggling to focus - Their lightbulbs are the wrong wattage - Their lightbulbs burn out every few months - They stub their toe trying to find the light switch - They're using non-dimmable bulbs on a dimmable switch

Brigitta Ruha

Co-Founder @Growth Today | We Build Repeatable GTM Engines Across Sales, Marketing & Partnerships 🚀

1mo

selling before understanding the problem is just noise

I'm a big proponent of "illuminating a deficit" with folks. People don't know what they don't know. 🤷♀️ *scurries away in the dark*

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Wesleyne Whittaker

Your Sales Team Isn’t Broken. Your Strategy Is | Sales Struggles Are Strategy Problems. Not People Problems | BELIEF Selling™, the Framework CEOs Use to Drive Consistent Sales Execution

1mo

Nailed it, Will. Too many reps pitch features before diagnosing the real problem, it’s like selling lightbulbs to someone sitting in the dark.

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Muhammad Usama

Automations that just work | Founder RedQuark | Making business work processes smooth through automations

1mo

Great post! Thanks for sharing.

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Devanshu Sinha

Send videos that play inside Linkedin DM 👉 quibbly.co / CEO @ Rehers & Quibbly / MuckerLabs 23

1mo

That's why discovery calls are important.

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Brian LaManna

AE @ Gong | Closed Won 🦙 | 7x President’s Club

1mo

Problem first!!

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Chaz Kochel

Probably thinking about CT scans right now

1mo

One the best "cold" sales interactions I had as a buyer was from a door-to-door salesperson for pest control. He knocked, said, "hey, I saw like 4 wasps around your front door. Also saw the chalk drawings on your driveway. Is it hard for you and your kids to play outside because of these guys? Like are they always around when you're outside?" "Yes, actually. We have to shorten play time outside because of it sometimes." Rep: "oh well, not to be a pest, pun intended, but my company does pest extermination. If you want to setup a contract with me, we can get out here in 2 days so your kids are out playing by the weekend. Without the wasps." It has been the only d2d service I have ever bought. If he just pitched me about his bug company, I would have just politely declined him. But he focused on my problem, wasps messing up our family/kids' time outside.

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