Typically we hear: I want to make the prospect feel comfortable doing business with me. I want them to be motivated after leaving the call. I want them to be passionate about my passion. So when they leave: they're energized and thrilled with how it may fulfill their needs.
I think it is also important to build trust. As we only have a very short time in a sales call to build trust, rapport, and credibility, anything you can do in that regard is critical.
When is the last time you made a purchase? I'll bet you remember how the salesperson made you feel as well as the features they explained about the product.
That’s how you want your prospects to feel when they're talking to you.
How many times do we stand there and obsess over how many slides do we have and what color pallet we have in graphs? Or do the fonts on slides match with our one-pager? But none of it really matters if we aren't connecting with prospects effectively or aren't creating a desired sense and feeling.
Do you want your customer to feel excited? Interested? Engaged? Trusting?
Once you know how you want them to feel, you can start tailoring your content and communication style around that emotion.
So here I offer you to figure out this task together by using the template below.
Worksheets are available to download later below.
STEP 1: Ask yourself a question.
Start by answering the first question - What are the key three emotions you want your prospect to feel during the call? Or what are the emotions you want them to leave the meeting with?
Just take a minute right now to write down the emotion number 1, 2, & 3.
If you successfully did the previous instructions I offer you to move forward!
STEP 2: Look back at your experience.
Now, try to recall your previous 5 sales conversations. For each call, rank yourself on each of the three emotions you wrote in the last step from one (Prospect was not feeling that at all) to ten (Definitely yes).
What would the prospect say if someone asked them right after you left - "Hey, how did that salesperson make you feel?" Circle your rank out of 10 for each:
Typically most experienced salespeople have some 1s, some 9s, and some 5s. So no need to beat yourself up if you don't get it right every time.
However, if you have more 5s and 1s instead of 9s, the clear lesson is that you need to be more intentional about the emotional aspects of your calls, not only the content and design of your presentation.
STEP 3: Figure out the future improvements.
As a final step, list down things that you can do before or during your next sales calls for evoking each of the three emotions that you’ve listed in STEP ONE. So, from now on, you'll be able to pick and target at least one feeling that you want the prospect to leave with.
By taking a few seconds to really center yourself before that sales call and get a sense of how you want to connect with the prospect. And, I assure you, if you do that, your message will have a higher chance of landing successfully while evoking the emotion you want.
Go through each of the three feelings you identified and write down how you can be more intentional about creating this connection with your prospect. What can you do on your call to create this feeling and environment?
To get the most out of this activity, from now on rate yourself from one to ten for at least one of the three targetted emotions every time you get off a call. At least until you start getting mostly 8s and 9s.
I hope this was useful. And you now have a plan with different things you can do in your next call to evoke the kind of emotion you want your prospect.
Download worksheets
And, as promised, feel free to download these worksheets to practice new knowledge!
