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Conceptual Selling
Written by the authors of Strategic Selling, this is the revolutionary system for face-to-face selling that's used by America's best companies.
- GenresBusinessNonfiction
Paperback
First published March 1, 1987
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Displaying 1 - 13 of 13 reviews
August 10, 2021
Read this book a couple of years ago and recently re-read my notes - many of the "lessons" are still applicable and the book is worth reading. Below are some of my notes:
https://libraryof.xyz/portfolio/the-n...
If the old rules said “talk it up until your prospect bites”, the new rules say “start by listening to the prospect”. Your product or service is not unimportant. But it is secondary to the customer’s perception of his own situation. People buy for their own reasons, not for yours. The “concept” often signifies the preproduction blueprint – the theory that the marketing and R&D people had in mind before the product became a reality. That “concept” will not be equally significant to all potential buyers – or ever going to be as significant to the customer as for the developer.
INDIVIDUALS HAVE CONCEPTS. What is bought is what the customer thinks the product or service will do for him or her. The concept is subjective, linked to individual values and attitudes, and different for every customer. By ignoring or working against the customer’s decision-making process, you ensure confusion, resentment, and – sooner or later – lost sales.
UNHAPPY CUSTOMERS. A study conducted for the White House Office of Consumer Affairs in 1985 showed that 96% of unhappy customers never complain directly to the salesperson, but 91% of them will not buy again from that salesperson. The average unhappy customer will talk to at least nine people about the experience. 13% will tell over twenty other people. Customers ending up in “buyers remorse” or “buyers revenge” is not good for business.
BUILD LONG-TERM. The individual order is never enough. You also need satisfied customers, long-term business relationships, solid, repeat business with your “regular” customers and enthusiastic referrals to new prospects. This means that sales transactions involve mutual dependence. The philosophy of Win-Win selling recognizes that mutual dependence and gives you a reliable method long term. The goal is not to increase just any business, but good business – which is by definition Win-Win business. Don’t oversell expectations, don’t get suckered into a giveaway, hear the customer out and be willing to talk.
WHY WIN-WIN DOESN’T HAPPEN. When Win-Win doesn’t happen, it’s often because the salesperson has not made a conscious enough effort to ensure that it does happen. Most commonly, she assumes her win is more important than the customer’s win, or that the customer will win automatically because he’s gotten a “great buy”. In other cases, salespeople don’t even think about this at all. In all these cases, they end up with Win-Lose.
THREE TYPES OF THINKING. You will always encounter the same natural order: (1) Cognition thinking allows the decision-maker to understand the situation he or she is facing, (2) Divergent thinking helps the person to explore options and solutions, (3) Convergent thinking enables the person to select the best solution.
THE CUSTOMER DECISION-MAKING PROCESS. The new conceptual selling is a road map where every customer makes buying decisions in a series of predictable and logical steps, that can be identified and tracked by the seller. By systematically following this sequence and helping your customer to follow it, you discover either (a) there is a solid fit between his needs and the solutions you can offer, which can lead to a quality sale, or (b) there is no such fit, and you should not be doing business together in this particular situation.
THREE KEY PHASES. Phase one is getting information – involves finding out the customer’s reasons for being interested. Phase two is giving information – involves describing and demonstrating your product or service, but only in relationship to the needs of the individual customer. Phase three is getting commitment – so that the two of you share commitment to the buy/sell process (it doesn’t mean “overcoming the customer’s objections”).
CUSTOMERIZING. Customizing the sale is the only way the seller can survive, long-term. Understand the customer’s concept, and connect your product/service by relating cost/price, descriptions, packaging, technologies, specifications, demonstrations, capabilities, and proven results. Broad knowledge in highly technical products can become a liability if you fail to distinguish these essentials.
ACTION COMMITMENTS. What is the minimum commitment to accept to continue to invest in this sale? Does he or she really want to play Win-Win? Otherwise, you may be wasting both of your time. As your expenditure of time and energy increases throughout the selling process, your customer’s degree of commitment must also increase. If commitment isn’t mutual and incremental, you’re spinning your wheels.
THE MYTHS OF TRADITIONAL SELLING. Four common beliefs constitute a kind of mythology of traditional selling. (1) “push the slinky sphinx” – i.e., product push, (2) trial-and-error of your bag of selling techniques until something work, (3) memorize a script, (4) do more legwork – i.e. assume that your techniques are fine and that the problem must work harder, and (5) “you gotta believe” – i.e. all you need is positive thinking. Don’t buy into these myths.
https://libraryof.xyz/portfolio/the-n...
If the old rules said “talk it up until your prospect bites”, the new rules say “start by listening to the prospect”. Your product or service is not unimportant. But it is secondary to the customer’s perception of his own situation. People buy for their own reasons, not for yours. The “concept” often signifies the preproduction blueprint – the theory that the marketing and R&D people had in mind before the product became a reality. That “concept” will not be equally significant to all potential buyers – or ever going to be as significant to the customer as for the developer.
INDIVIDUALS HAVE CONCEPTS. What is bought is what the customer thinks the product or service will do for him or her. The concept is subjective, linked to individual values and attitudes, and different for every customer. By ignoring or working against the customer’s decision-making process, you ensure confusion, resentment, and – sooner or later – lost sales.
UNHAPPY CUSTOMERS. A study conducted for the White House Office of Consumer Affairs in 1985 showed that 96% of unhappy customers never complain directly to the salesperson, but 91% of them will not buy again from that salesperson. The average unhappy customer will talk to at least nine people about the experience. 13% will tell over twenty other people. Customers ending up in “buyers remorse” or “buyers revenge” is not good for business.
BUILD LONG-TERM. The individual order is never enough. You also need satisfied customers, long-term business relationships, solid, repeat business with your “regular” customers and enthusiastic referrals to new prospects. This means that sales transactions involve mutual dependence. The philosophy of Win-Win selling recognizes that mutual dependence and gives you a reliable method long term. The goal is not to increase just any business, but good business – which is by definition Win-Win business. Don’t oversell expectations, don’t get suckered into a giveaway, hear the customer out and be willing to talk.
WHY WIN-WIN DOESN’T HAPPEN. When Win-Win doesn’t happen, it’s often because the salesperson has not made a conscious enough effort to ensure that it does happen. Most commonly, she assumes her win is more important than the customer’s win, or that the customer will win automatically because he’s gotten a “great buy”. In other cases, salespeople don’t even think about this at all. In all these cases, they end up with Win-Lose.
THREE TYPES OF THINKING. You will always encounter the same natural order: (1) Cognition thinking allows the decision-maker to understand the situation he or she is facing, (2) Divergent thinking helps the person to explore options and solutions, (3) Convergent thinking enables the person to select the best solution.
THE CUSTOMER DECISION-MAKING PROCESS. The new conceptual selling is a road map where every customer makes buying decisions in a series of predictable and logical steps, that can be identified and tracked by the seller. By systematically following this sequence and helping your customer to follow it, you discover either (a) there is a solid fit between his needs and the solutions you can offer, which can lead to a quality sale, or (b) there is no such fit, and you should not be doing business together in this particular situation.
THREE KEY PHASES. Phase one is getting information – involves finding out the customer’s reasons for being interested. Phase two is giving information – involves describing and demonstrating your product or service, but only in relationship to the needs of the individual customer. Phase three is getting commitment – so that the two of you share commitment to the buy/sell process (it doesn’t mean “overcoming the customer’s objections”).
CUSTOMERIZING. Customizing the sale is the only way the seller can survive, long-term. Understand the customer’s concept, and connect your product/service by relating cost/price, descriptions, packaging, technologies, specifications, demonstrations, capabilities, and proven results. Broad knowledge in highly technical products can become a liability if you fail to distinguish these essentials.
ACTION COMMITMENTS. What is the minimum commitment to accept to continue to invest in this sale? Does he or she really want to play Win-Win? Otherwise, you may be wasting both of your time. As your expenditure of time and energy increases throughout the selling process, your customer’s degree of commitment must also increase. If commitment isn’t mutual and incremental, you’re spinning your wheels.
THE MYTHS OF TRADITIONAL SELLING. Four common beliefs constitute a kind of mythology of traditional selling. (1) “push the slinky sphinx” – i.e., product push, (2) trial-and-error of your bag of selling techniques until something work, (3) memorize a script, (4) do more legwork – i.e. assume that your techniques are fine and that the problem must work harder, and (5) “you gotta believe” – i.e. all you need is positive thinking. Don’t buy into these myths.
December 3, 2018
A challenge. The book takes the most violent stance in debunking sales myths. most of which I've succumbed to. I grew as a professional with the idea that being able to sell ice cubes to Eskimos was the height of it all. only to be corrected after a few weeks with Robert Miller's conceptual selling approach. The idea that not every one is my customer, never really crossed my mind. Sales people are rightly described as guerrillas waiting to ambush their customers. The most puzzling parts are seemingly obvious facts which haven't been so obvious to me thus far. "The traditional sales person is actually fighting the natural order of the customer's thinking". "people love to buy, but they hate to feel they've been sold" "People buy for their own reasons not yours".
The lessons learnt might take a while to sink in, but I believe this changes everything about sales.
Quality over quantity.
It's a must read for sales people, and anyone who ever wants to pitch anything.
The lessons learnt might take a while to sink in, but I believe this changes everything about sales.
Quality over quantity.
It's a must read for sales people, and anyone who ever wants to pitch anything.
January 28, 2018
A solid approach to sales with executable ideas. Isn't just general advice, but actually breaks downs details on how to approach sales as a collaborative partnership. The challenge with this approach is helping people make realistic decisions such as go/no-go instead of viewing every possibility as a real opportunity.
February 11, 2018
Solid fundamentals of customer-focused B2B selling.
November 14, 2018
Very basic common sense guidance on how to prepare for and behave on a sales call. The contents of this book could have been packed into 20 pages instead of 363.
May 30, 2019
Good compliment to Strategic Selling, not nearly as exciting
January 17, 2022
Nice complement to strategic selling.
November 18, 2023
Some good stuff, some basic stuff, but if you need er did this type of selling it would be a good place to start
May 13, 2010
Might be a good book to read if you are selling something super complicated, like high tech gizmos or . . . anything else that is so expensive and crazy that you would only need a sale a week to make decent commissions.
For advertising sales, didn't help much. Then again, I'm generally not a big fan of business books, so you oughta ask someone who actually likes reading this stuff.
For advertising sales, didn't help much. Then again, I'm generally not a big fan of business books, so you oughta ask someone who actually likes reading this stuff.
February 5, 2015
This is the second HM book I've read this year based on some sales training we're doing at nazori. This book is (from what I gather) for developing green sheets which I'm excited to start putting together. The only thing I'll say about this book is there is a lot of content in here that's also in the Strategic Selling book. It's fine, as I know the books need to stand alone.
March 3, 2009
spin on sales technique taking a detailed look at understanding the customer and how to identify decision makers within organizations. very long (lot of text) and redundant. took the concept and simplified focused around the goals and am now implementing.
July 5, 2012
Great way to enhance skill sets in problem identifying and resolution when selling in complex enviornment.
January 23, 2015
Very easy to apply to any sales call. Ask questions and get results.
Displaying 1 - 13 of 13 reviews