Identify Your Customers’ Real Needs
As nearly any sales training program will tell you, needs assessment is among the most important aspects of the sales process. The shortest possible answers to your prospective customers’ questions may not meet their needs, simply because they may not know what to ask.
Before giving a stock answer to your caller’s “Do you?” “When do you?” or “How much?” question, take the time to find out the following:
Are you interested in classes for yourself or someone else? Don’t just assume you are speaking directly to the potential student. The caller could very well be:
- A certified diver obtaining information on behalf of a friend or family member.
- A non-diver calling on behalf of a boss or co-worker.
Exactly whom you are speaking to will impact what you say. For example, a certified diver obtaining information for someone else will most likely understand terms such as “open water” and “c-card,” wbere a non-diver might find such terms confusing. On the other hand, merely giving information to a non-diver who intends to pass this information on to someone else…well, you may be better off if you also direct this person to your store’s website or offer to mail them information, so that nothing is lost in the translation.
Have you been scuba diving before? These days many — if not most — of your potential students will have taken part in some sort of introductory scuba experience, usually in a resort environment. If so, they may have a better understanding of what you are telling them — or they may very well be operating on one or more misconceptions.
A caller once told me that the dive operator who conducted her introductory experience told her that, because she had completed a sanctioned introductory scuba course, she could now skip the first module of any scuba course in the mainland.
In theory, the operator was correct. In reality, missing that first lesson was impractical, as we always taught it in combination with the second course module. Missing the first module would also mean missing critical orientation information explaining how, when and where course activities would take place.
Fortunately, I was able to explain that, because the majority of our students were also “resort course” graduates, we were generally able to teach at a somewhat accelerated pace, combining the first lesson with subsequent modules, and thus being able to provide everyone with a more convenient schedule.
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