The Seven Ps Of The Metal Building Sales Process
By Randall Turner, Turner Financial Consultants
In the go-go days of 2003-2006 it seemed that a construction company salesperson only needed to tell their next door neighbor that he built metal buildings and bam! Suddenly people would come from all over to purchase their buildings.
Ok. Maybe it wasn’t that easy, but it certainly was easier than now. Some sectors of the construction industry have been off by as much as 70% from the highs achieved in 2006.
What happened to all the sales? The struggling economy is the obvious answer. Still, there are metal building salespeople whose sales fell only marginally and other metal building salespeople who have actually improved their sales in spite of the economy.
What would account for the difference between these two types of salespeople: the struggling and the not-so-struggling?
While marketplace, location, and timing can have a good degree of impact on sales success, the more likely answer is that the struggling salespeople have no Sales Process plan in place to compete with those salespeople that do.
The Sales Process, or the Seven Ps©, is a plan to make sales (almost) automatic and not a hit-or-miss endeavor.
Unfortunately, during the halcyon days of building sales the sales process was set aside in favor of just getting the work done.
Now, more than ever, if one is to be successful the sales process must be re-invigorated.
The accompanying inverted pyramid shows how the Seven Ps work together to create sales on a regular basis.
Prospect
Unfortunately, the very first step, prospecting, is rarely a happy thought to salespeople or self-employed contractors. The thought of calling people out of the blue and asking if they need a building just doesn’t motivate many salespeople. Yet, if the entire Seven P process is followed from beginning to end the need to cold call is greatly minimized for referrals would come naturally and displace the need to cold call.
However, if one thinks of prospecting as “networking” the fear of the phone drops, especially if one assumes the mantle of “professional” instead of “intruder”. Suddenly the call becomes one between two professionals looking to help one another.
Plan
How will you approach a prospect that has a genuine need, money, motivation, and land? Will it be a systematic email, phone call, and letter approach or would it be better to first find a stronger referral source? Have you determined what their greatest motivation is? Do they need the building yesterday and you know that you’re strong in “yesterday” deliveries?
What needs to happen on sales call #1 to justify sales call #2? What steps will be involved? Do you need other resources such as an architect, engineer, over-head crane company, etc. to prove that you know how to satisfy your customer? Plan your approach and then work your plan.
Please
It’s the first time you meet your prospect. Don’t pitch your offering. Don’t tell them how wonderful your company is and never become argumentative. Instead, work at pleasing your prospect as you would anyone that you want as your new friend. Friends buy from friends. Help them with struggles that they are facing, whether or not they are related to your offering, and you’ll become thought of as a trusted advisor, not a late-night TV pitchman. At this stage build trust…not the building.
Ponder
Ask questions. Don’t make declarative statements. Not yet. The statements come during your presentation. At this stage you need to understand your prospect better than any competitor and the only way to accomplish this is to ask thoughtful questions.
Remember dating? You were always thoughtful and asked so many questions. It’s the same thing here, except you’re dating for a building sale. First ask open questions to learn underlying feelings, not just “facts”, followed by closed questions to show your prospect that you understand where they are coming from.
Presentation
According to a recent study, presentations are what 80% of salesmen are best at in terms of the sales process. Many contractors know how to produce dozens of pages of proposal documents. They are all so neat and pretty. Yet, they mean little to the prospect if they don’t answer the questions asked in the prior stage. Always remember, people buy 80% on emotions and 20% on facts. If the facts you present are features, not benefits, they don’t mean much to your prospect.
Pledge
Get the Sale! Eighty percent of salespeople never ask for the sale. If you’ve done all of the other steps, became a trusted advisor, and provided great solutions, ask for the sale!
Perform
Perform means to build on time and on budget. “Perform” also means to follow-up before, during, and after the sale. It means to never leave the job until you’ve got names and contract information for at least three prospects your customer knows. It means getting a letter of reference from your customer.
“Perform” is the key step to make all of the other steps so much easier. You’ll notice on the inverted pyramid that the “Perform” stage of the sales process forms a firm base to keep the rest of the pyramid from falling. Every future sale depends on your performance. Always perform in every sense of the word. Always go the extra mile. Be professional and satisfy you customer and you’ll always have business.
Nicknamed, "The Dean of Cash Flow", Randall Turner, MBA, author, teacher, seminar speaker, former record-breaking salesman, CFO, and construction company president now instructs companies across America and Canada on how to improve sales and cash flow. Turner is frequently called upon to provide sales and financial training seminars and to act as a Turn-Around Specialist for struggling companies. To contact him about speaking at your next event, visit www.tfcmoney.com, email cashflow@tfcmoney.com, or call 814-331-9599.
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