Helping Customers Purchase What They Need, Realistically

While the old adage says “the customer is always right,” perhaps we’ve come to take it a little too literally. When it comes to selling business VoIP to customers, knowing what they want versus what they need is an important distinction to make.

This is because customers typically think they know what they want, but it’s not always what’s right for them, and what they ask for is sometimes not what they are actually looking for. The difference is knowing, as a salesperson, how to meet those needs, rather than the wants, but in a way that shows obvious benefits.

According to Nextiva, selling should be about what customers require to succeed. The only reason to not pursue the sale is determining whether you want the customer’s business, otherwise it’s imperative to understand the customer’s objective and prove that you can not only meet their needs and expectations, but exceed them while saving their bottom line.

Understanding your customers helps you to sell more. The more you know about them and their needs, the easier it is to identify opportunities to sell them new products and target them with appropriate offers.

Understanding your customers helps you see which of their needs your product can satisfy. You may, for example, be able to up-sell, explaining why a higher priced product would suit them better.

You may also find opportunities to cross-sell other products that fit their profile and they may not even be aware of this. If you know why they are buying a particular product, you can tell which other products they may also need.

You can learn a great deal about your customers by talking to them. Asking them why they're buying or not buying, what they may want to buy in the future and asking what other needs they have can give a valuable picture of what's important to them.

Strong sales are driven by emphasizing the benefits that your product or service brings to your customers. If you know the challenges that face them, it's much easier to offer them solutions.

Edited by Alisen Downey