If You Don’t Ask, You’re Selling in the Dark

Josiane Chriqui Feigon, www.tele-smart.com

“Questioning is your first chance to get inside a company and look around,” says Josiane Chriqui Feigon, author of Smart Selling on the Phone and Online. “Your questions act as your eyes on every phone call. Questioning is still a skill that is best accomplished by phone and not via e-mail, and technique is critical to uncovering customer needs and opportunities.” Feigon explains:

Does your questioning style create comfort and trust? Do your questions sound relevant and insightful, or do your prospects feel as though they are being interrogated with rapid-fire questioning?

Skillful questioning habits build rapport and trust. If you ask good questions and listen to the responses to hear your prospects’ needs, you will guide them straight to their comfort zone, hold the focus through all their confusion, and very likely close a sale.

With so much automation in selling now, there is a greater need than ever for the high-touch aspect of effective questioning and listening skills. These critical skills cannot be managed online, because they require a dynamic dialogue, a conversation, a discussion—a direct human interchange best served by the immediacy of live voices over the phone. Think about it: Will a busy prospect really want to spend time responding to a long e-mail string filled with qualification questions they must answer?