Ditch the Pitch

Unpopular Opinion: Ditch the sales pitch (until the very end)

Why?

Because your goal is to start a conversation with a stranger and initiating that relationship with a sales pitch out of context isn’t the best move.

Capturing your prospect’s attention isn’t achieved by pitching your product or service, you accomplish this by getting them engaged in the conversation - by quickly drawing out their priorities.

So, the next time you catch a prospect live, ditch the pitch and instead throw in a priority drop to pull your prospect into the conversation.

Let’s talk real life:

We’ve all been in a scenario in which your prospect picks up the phone, you deliver (what you think) is a great opener and they hit you with “Wait, who’d you say you’re with?” « this type of response causes most salespeople to jump directly into their sales pitch as a knee jerk reaction. Don’t do it!

Typical response: My name’s Cooper with ABC Company, we help companies like yours solve Problem A with Solution B…with ramblings about the features/benefits to follow…

In this instance, if you can stop yourself from diving into a sales pitch and instead, substitute a calm and collected priority drop - you immediately separate yourself from 95% of salespeople.

Priority Drop Response: “My names Cooper with ABC Company and I know I’m calling you out of the blue so I’ll be brief. Typically when we speak with (Leaders like you) they tell us they’re focused on one or two things:

1. Problem A

2. Problem B

Which one of these is a bigger focus for you right now?”

This is an approach used and popularized by Jason Bay of Blissful Prospecting and something I personally used for several years as an Individual Contributor.

Here’s why it works:

It’s a small psychological trick (for lack of better terms) that dramatically increases the probability your prospect responds with a specific answer because you’ve given them specific options to choose from.

Opposed to a non-contextual sales pitch that’s reactionary out of fear/anxiety of losing the call, or an open-ended question that doesn’t walk your prospect in a certain direction, providing them with a few finite options helps you pull them back into the conversation.

Also, it relieves you of any pressure to have a great sales pitch. Because the reality is, you can’t put together a great sales pitch when you don’t yet know your prospect’s problems to be solved.

That’s all for today people, have a great week!

Get access to our #FinishStrongFriday editions, monthly community calls, 1:1 coaching, and much more by upgrading to our membership group here. First community call is this Friday, hope to see you there!