Psychologists suggest that there are five essential steps to the process or cycle of selling. Whether the selling is done face-to-face, in a group presentation, over the telephone, via e-mail, through direct mail, the internet or over a social media platform, there are specific objectives for each step in the selling process. We discussed these in the previous piece to this series.

Depending upon your level of proficiency, you may need to focus more energy on one step or another. And, depending upon the needs of the prospect or customer, you may spend more or less time on a specific step in the selling cycle.

Remember Five Essential Steps to the Psychology of Selling:

• 1. Attention (initial engagement)
• 2. Interest (needs analysis via controlled questioning)
• 3. Presentation (solution illustrating a viable solution to their needs)
• 4. Desire (demonstrating how the solution meets their needs and illustrating the gains to be attained)
• 5. Close (gaining the buy-in and transaction, whether transactional or relational of the other party to want acquire the offer).

If your sales conversation with the prospect or customer is effective, you will know when and how to interject an appropriate solution to the need of the prospect or customer that you have discovered. Remember, always present to the most dominant and pressing need you have discovered in step two. The elements that a complete Presentation include when presenting your solution whether a Product or Service Recommendation:

• 1. Claim is the attention-grabbing assertion statement, typically includes some sort of “est” words – “This is the best option for you …” or “This is the newest …”
• 2. Feature or Fact statement is the tangible of the offer …
• 3. Benefit statement is “What this means to you ….” Or “How this will benefit you is that you will be able to ...”
• 4. The Naildown is a confirming solicitation question to gain firm agreement or ownership by the prospect after you have sequenced the previous three elements into a sentence, you now say something like, “And you do want to have …., don’t you?”

As a sales professional, guard against the tendency to invest too much time talking or visiting at step one, rather than establishing good rapport for a smooth transition to the second step, where you will identify the prospect’s or customer’s needs and level of interest in what you have to offer. It is important to accomplish step one quickly and move into step two, because with effective questioning in step two, you will find out how much or how little information to provide in step three.

Build powerful Claim + Feature + Benefit + Naildown statements into your response in step three. Become adept at effectively communicating the gains the customer will realize by accepting your offer. Many sales professionals fail to accomplish this valuable step; but building the want (or Desire) in the mind of the prospect or customer works to seal the customer’s mental acceptance of your offer.

If you follow the sequence of the five steps to selling, you will successfully Close and gain the business.