Ryan Dohrn breaks down a three-step sales framework: build trust by naming satisfied clients, show relevance through research and personalized questions, and offer three price options with the middle one positioned as the best choice. The middle price statistically closes more deals.
What's going on, friends and fans? Ryan Dohrn here, your friendly neighborhood sales coach. And this month we're focusing in on what you can do to sell almost anything to almost anybody at almost any given price. First and foremost, the biggest thing in sales is all about trust. We all know it, and I've observed it for over 30 years in this business. But what used to be is building trust between the salesperson and the prospect is now a little bit different. The first step of 3 to sell almost anything to anybody at almost any price is to recognize that you need to move the trust from you over to your current clients. And the way that I do that is very straightforward and very simple. This is how the meeting flow kind of goes. Hi Bob, we've been working with Company A, Company B, and Company C, and they're loving it. Or if you're in the advertising sales space where I spent a lot of my life, you know, hi Bonnie, we're working with Company A, Company B, and Company C, and they're loving their marketing results with us. The first step, anybody will tell you this in the sales business, is about building trust with somebody. The difference now in 2024 is that the trust has shifted a little bit. People don't necessarily need or want to trust you as a salesperson. What they do believe is they will trust when others have been successful. Successful with you. Obviously, before we go on, make sure anything you share about any other clients is always above board and highly ethical. But I tell people all the time, if you buy from me, I'm gonna scream it from the mountaintops. We're gonna become great friends. I'm gonna be the greatest help that you've ever discovered in buying something. So I think there's absolutely nothing wrong with that. So the first is moving trust off of you, off to your other clients. Alright, the second piece of the puzzle is you have to be relevant. And a lot of relevance is a lot about authenticity, but a lot of relevance is you paying attention. One of the fastest ways to prove that you're relevant is mentioning things that you've seen on LinkedIn, mentioning things that are professional and business-oriented that you've seen on Facebook or you've seen on Instagram, asking inquisitive questions like, you know, there's probably some burning reason that you agreed to meet with me today. If you could wave a magic wand, if this sales call could go any direction you wanted it to go, Where can I take you? How can I be helpful to you? Proving that I'm relevant to somebody is about me sort of living in their shoes, making sure that I've researched before the meeting has happened, and I'm not just doing things on the fly at the meeting. Now, it also flies in the face of those sales trainers that would tell you, or sales coaches, don't show up with anything to a meeting, just ask questions. It's the best way to sell. Well, I don't disagree with asking questions, but if you show up to my meeting without any information about me, I'm gonna call you unprepared. Okay, so the first is moving trust from you as the salesperson over to your current clients. Doesn't mean you should be trust— not trustworthy, just means you're shifting that. The second piece is you've got to prove that you're relevant by doing research, mentioning that research, and getting to a point of relevancy with the client. The third piece of the puzzle is important, and that's safety in pricing. Safety in pricing is about harnessing something that we've had in our lives since we were a little kid and harvesting that safety and passing that on to one of our customers. Let me explain. All of us have heard the fairy tale or the childhood story of Goldilocks and the 3 Bears, and the premise is, oh, my porridge is too hot, my porridge is too cold, my porridge is just right. This bed is too hard, this bed is too soft, oh, this chair is just right. It's all about safety. Since the very beginning of your childhood, you've been taught to color within the lines. When you learn to drive, you're taught to between the lines. It's all about that Goldilocks principle. You go too far right, hey, you're dangerous. You go too far left, oh, it's dangerous. Stay right in the middle. Pricing versus safety is so important. If people feel comfortable with the price, if they feel safe with the price, they're a lot more likely to buy. That's why in every scenario that I preach, I don't do customized pricing and I don't do customized offering. Instead, I give people a lower option, not a rock bottom option, but a lower option. I give them a higher option and then I give them that, oh, this is just right, common, right in the middle. The way that I come up with that common pricing right in the middle is I look at past scenarios of success. What have we done with other customers in the past that have got them really excited? Now, what I'm also going to do is harness that trust from the first piece in the last piece and I'm going to talk about what other customers are doing. Now, obviously we have to make sure we're really ethical, we're not sharing things things that are proprietary. But if I'm talking about that package or that pricing option right in the middle, I might say, you know, if you want to be competitive with company ABC, somebody like that is going to be choosing an option that's kind of right here in the middle. Now I don't want to get pricing, I don't give pricing to them, but it's pretty obvious that if I'm selling it to one person for $500, I've probably sold it to the next person for $500 or to the last person for $500. Just remember now, out there in sales land, you want to make sure that you're very transparent with all of your pricing. Now, are there other factors in the sales business? Absolutely, but those 3 things apply to your prospecting emails, those 3 things apply to when you're hosting meetings, and those 3 things apply to when you're following up and retaining customers for a lifetime. Friends, don't make sales harder than it has to be. First, prove that you're trustworthy and your product is trustworthy or your service is trustworthy by mentioning other clients that are happy with you. The second is do your homework. Make sure that you show up relevant and researched on every sales call and with every encounter. Then the third piece is recognize if you give somebody one price, it's sort of a yes or no. You give them 2 prices, it's like, ah, now I don't know what to choose. When you give them 3 prices, you're actually harnessing that power that you've had through childhood, which is that Goldilocks principle. Give them some balance, give them some lines to stay within And they almost always will buy that middle option. Oh, Ryan, but aren't you leaving money on the table? Shouldn't you push them towards the bigger option? Absolutely. Ask questions and guide people to doing more and more with you, but just recognize when you give 3 options and you follow those 3 steps, you almost always push them towards the middle and your chances of selling almost always go up. It doesn't matter, friends, if you're selling advertising or software or even real estate. Realtors do this as well. Remember, there's safety in that last Trust, friends, so important. Relevance, so important. And pricing it out so that safety makes sense, vividly important to every piece of the puzzle. Never forget, friends, if sales was easy, everybody'd be doing it, and they're not. You're not crazy out there. I used to say that. You're not crazy. This is a great career. It'll feed your family for a lifetime. Love to motivate your sales team. Love to come speak at your national sales conference. I can join you on Zoom calls. You name it, reach out to me over at ryandohrn.com. Thank you, Ryan. All right, friends, get out there and sell something. Make us all proud, will ya?
