Is it possible to effectively sell without ever “pitching”? According to the $10.2M total I helped solopreneurs sell over the last 2 years – it works a minimum of 2x better not to “pitch”.
The truth is, no one likes a pitch – not giving it or receiving it. Even when it sounds amazing. There’s a level of skepticism that can’t be avoided when you get to the part where only one person is talking – and it’s a full-on pitch.
Instead, I’ve found it’s much more effective to weave it into the “discovery’ (questions portion) of a sales conversation.
A lot of people treat the discovery section like an interrogation.
Question – Answer – Question – Answer, etc.
Prospects only have so much patience for this giving information without receiving any.
And the truth is, when you give an answer to something, isn’t it nice when you get feedback? Like you would in a regular conversation vs. a sales conversation.
Imagine someone comes to inspect your roof and asks you a few questions about the material, last time it was fixed, etc.
When they respond to your answers with an “oh that’s normal, we see that all the time. etc.” – are great to hear.
It makes you feel relieved and feel like you’re in the hands of an expert.
Your prospects feel the same way.
And when you provide feedback, it’s a fantastic opportunity to weave in some subtle selling.
In the roof inspector example above, the roofer would say “oh that’s normal (feedback) – we fix that for people all the time. Probably repaired about 500 of those at this point, it’s a pretty easy fix (subtle selling). Have you talked to other roofers? (opportunity to uncover important information)
Rinse and repeat.
When the “selling” is done like this, it’s happening when the person doesn’t have their guard up like they do during the “pitch”.
So, they can actually HEAR what you’re saying without having it filtered through their ears when they’re in skeptical mode.
It’s also a lot easier for them to retain when it’s in these bite size little pieces than going through all of it at the end in one pronounced spot.
Imagine the same roofing scenario but the conversation flows more like an interrogation instead.
Then they get to the part where they “pitch” you.
They talk for about 10 minutes straight, they reference the issue you have and how they fix it all the time somewhere in there along with a lot of other stuff about how great they are.
You get the gist but not the details and so now you’re going to focus on price so you can compare.
Because you don’t have a good grasp of the other differentiators since they were part of the fire hose pitch you just experienced.
Even if they can’t remember everything when you pitch weave, it gives an overall feeling of an expert who understands you and will take good care of you.
Let’s take a coach/consultant, for example too.
If they’re using the standard script that’s popular these days – they’re asking questions designed to uncover your pain vs. actually understand your situation (a topic I cover in a different post).
But when someone is talking to a coach/consultant they want feedback on their answers just as much – if not more – than someone who is helping to fix your roof.
For example, they ask you – what have you done before to solve this problem?
- You let them know you tried working with another coach/consultant but there were things that you felt didn’t work for you – like cold messaging people for business with a thinly veiled “what are your business goals for 2021?”. You really tried implementing it but it wasn’t working and it felt inauthentic and draining.
- But instead of the coach/consultant being open to tweaking it and trying something different that’s a better fit for you, it felt like they gaslit you and made you feel like there was something wrong with you. Sound familiar?
- After sharing something like that, the coach/consultant you’re talking to now could say “That is unfortunately common in this space, I’m sorry you had that experience.
- But honestly, it sounds like nothing was wrong with you – based on your brand and who you are as a person, it makes sense why that approach didn’t work for you – it doesn’t match up with the personality you put out there (feedback).
- We’ve found if the message doesn’t match up with the brand, it’s not effective. That’s why the first thing we do is focus on what makes you different and build something around that you can feel really good about putting out there that doesn’t sound like everyone else and as a result, generates a lot more leads with less time and effort (subtle selling). Have you tried an approach like that before? (question to help them reflect on what you said and RETAIN it moving forward as well as provide important, helpful information for you!)
Rinse and repeat.
How would you feel on the receiving end of that? Probably relief.
You put yourself out there and shared something vulnerable and they responded with “I hear and understand you. I have experience with this and we can make sure you don’t have this experience again – this is how.”
It feels like a conversation with someone who cares about you and has the expertise to help you.
But if instead, after you told the coach your concern that maybe it’s you and they just blew past it with an “ok great” on to the next question?
- You would probably have a lingering feeling of anxiety that carried throughout the conversation – whether you’re consciously aware of it or not.
- You would question that maybe this person doesn’t get you and they might think something is wrong with you too. And for that reason, you’d have the same experience as you did with the other coach/consultant.
- Even if later on, during the coach/consultant’s extended “pitch” they reference your past experience and concern something was wrong with and say the SAME exact thing about how they create something custom to you, you wouldn’t retain it the same.
- And you would feel more like they were “selling” you and saying whatever they could at that point.
Pitchweaving is something I really show you how to master in my Matchmaker Sales™ 6 month Sales Mentorship. I’m helping solopreneurs sell something that is $3k+ to 2x-10x the number of people saying “yes” to their offers (most start seeing results within a few short weeks).
In the mentorship, we’ll uncover how to have a sales conversation without pain or pitching. We dive deep on how to “pitch weave” so your prospect never feels ‘sold’ as laid out in this post.
- And we also re-position the questions you ask so that they’re more about whether your prospects are a good fit and less about trying to uncover their pain.
- I’ll even show you how to help people overcome their own objections without ever getting defensive and tweak your pre-qualification process so that you’re getting better prospects on your calls in the first place.
- You’ll walk away with a custom plan for your sales calls that fits your personality, audience and product like a glove and consistently gets 5-8 people out of 10 saying “yes” to working with you.
As an added bonus you will no longer dread sales calls or find them draining and you can hand off the custom framework we create to someone else and expect the same results!
If interested in my mentorship, please book a call and we can discuss the details to make sure it’s a fit for you 🙂