Consider this situation.
You’re at the doctor. It’s a regular check-up, but you’ve been having some pain for a while in your stomach area, so you’re glad you’ve got this appointment. You don’t have any other issues that you know about, but you’re hoping the examination will be exhaustive enough to give you peace of mind.
The doctor comes in and says/asks/does the following:
“Hi, what did we discuss the last time you were here?” You tell him about your last visit where there were no issues.
“Before I begin my examination, let me ask you a few questions – first, when driving at night, can you see other cars clearly enough”. You respond, “not totally”.
The doctor then asks, “what’s your occupation”. “Uh, Sales Manager”, you respond. “Great occupation – If I wasn’t doing this I’d definitely be a Sales Manager – I love helping people make money” he responds. You’re not sure what that’s all about, but you think, hey, he’s a doctor, he knows what he’s talking about.
The interview proceeds in this all-over-the-map manner and the doctor finally tells you to drop’em and get ready for the exam (sorry for the graphic). He asks you if anything has changed since your last exam and you explain to him that your stomach has been causing you some issues – mainly pain but also you’ve had issues holding food down. The doctor utters “hmmmm” and begins to bang your knee with a rubber mallet. “You’re healthy as a horse”, proclaims the doctor and he continues into a 10 minute diatribe about the effect of fat and alcohol in your diet.
As the patient, how does your experience with the doctor make you feel?
What is your impression of the doctor?
Would you recommend the doctor to your friends?
This is an exaggerated example of why it’s important to adopt an effective probing strategy. A salesperson who probes poorly can leave the prospect or customer feeling much like you did in the example above, perplexed and frustrated. Probing properly gets you the information you need to help your customers understand and meet their needs. Probing badly can sabotage a relationship or a sale.
An effective probing strategy has several elements that you can use as a check list to ensure you’re prepared to probe (sales probes that is!)
- Are you aware of the ratio of Asking, Listening & Telling that you’ll employ in your sales interaction?
- Are your probes effective – do they peel back the onion in a way that is conversational and logical?
- Are you prepared to respond to the customer’s response to your probes?
- Do you know what expressions of need or pain you should be listening for? And are you prepared to respond to a customer’s identified pain/need with an appropriate solution statement?
- Are you clear on the objective of your upcoming call?
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