If you read the sales books, you've learned about Consultative Selling. Some people call it Question-based Selling. You'll find several approaches to it, and some of them even give you good advice. However, there is one huge gaping hole in all of them. It is a flaw that is so immense and so significant that if you over-look it, you will certainly fall right into it and fail. And, that's not all – very few people know how to fill this hole! Let's look at how it plays out in the real lives of financial professionals:
Scenario 1. You sit down with the Tuttle family and say, "Let's get right to it." Then, you start asking probing questions. How is Mr. Tuttle likely to respond to you? Is he going to say, "Thank heaven! Someone is finally asking me probing questions!" No. He's probably going to see you as moving too fast, too far, and getting pushy. Your goose is now cooked.
Scenario 2. You ask Mr. Tuttle an open-ended question and he begins to give you a long and winding answer. As is your habit, you begin to formulate your next question and line up your recommendations. In other words, you stopped listening to Tuttle's answer. Your goose is now cooked.
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Scenario 3. Mr. Tuttle tells you right up front exactly what he wants to do with his money. Unfortunately, that's not what you want him to do. Maybe it's outside of your expertise, or perhaps it doesn't generate the commission you want. Your response is to change his direction and make a different recommendation. Your goose is cooked.
Where is the flaw in your part of those scenarios?Where did you go wrong?
In the first one, you failed to read the Tuttles. You don't know their personality types, their underlying values, their goals or their communication style. And, because of that, you now have no idea how to deliver your information to them or what drives their decisions. The fix is to do what I've been teaching for years – learn to read people so you can eliminate that problem from your life.
In the second scenario, you moved your focus from Mr. Tuttle to yourself. Chances are, Mr. Tuttle senses it. He knows that you're not paying attention to him. How? You telegraphed it in your facial behavior. Your eyes moved and de-focused. You moved your body in a certain way. In other words, even if you had established rapport, you just lost it. Remember this simple advice – you cannot not communicate. Everything you do or say tells the other person something about you. People are simply adding up the messages you send to them. It's like a psychological profit/loss statement. How would you normally fare? Frankly, most advisors have good intentions but bad skills. So, they end up in the loss column.
In scenario three, you're not dealing with the client honorably. However, you'd probably lose that account anyway because you failed to read Tuttle's psychology. A person who tells you want he wants is probably self-determined. We call that "internal." It means you can't change his mind and you can't give him recommendations because he does not care about them. Your failure to recognize that would seal your fate long before you realized it. The fix for this problem is to learn how to read people. It's simple to see the signs of an internal person. And, it's simple to deal with someone with an internal frame of reference.
It's About People! The key to making the Consultative approach work is the people part. It's your ability to read the other person(s) and skillfully build rapport and trust. Until you can do that, you don't have much of a chance of succeeding with the Consultative Selling approach. See, Consultative Selling is not just another technique; it is a different philosophy. It means believing in the value of the person in front of you and doing whatever it takes to connect with that person.
In order for you to benefit from it, you have to adopt it into your every-day activities. Our friends at the Huthwaite Company jokingly told us that they use the SPIN selling approach in their conversations, even when they're talking to the checkout person at the grocery.
Most sales people are great talkers, but not so great at building trust or listening. With that in mind, what type of person do you think makes the best practitioners of Consultative Selling? There are four personality types: Driver, Analytical, Amiable and Expressive. Which one do you think can succeed most easily with Consultative Selling? This question comes from our work with Compass Bank in Houston. The answer surprised them.
As is my way – let's look deeper. Let's look at the specific reasons people will reject you or say "NO" to you in the course of your selling activities.
As experts in psychological language, we constantly look for the reasons people say "YES." The converse of that is the reasons people say, "NO." We conducted some pretty extensive research into these questions and developed some specific answers for you. If you're brave enough to consider improving how you conduct your selling conversations, we're brave enough to help you. Here are three of the answers:
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Confusion. Confusion is actually a state of hypnosis. So, if you've ever been confused, you've been hypnotized. As a hypnotherapist (like me) or sales person (like you), confusion works – but only if you can use it to shake someone out of a negative position. Let's say my investments are heavily weighted in risky areas. Maybe I still think Enron will come back. That could be a negative position, right. If you can shake my belief such that I get confused as to what to do next, you've moved me from No to a spot closer to Yes. The continuum of states from negative to positive are:
- No
- Confusion
- Hesitance
- Frustration
- Impatience
- Yes
Once you see me in a confused state, all you have to do is give me a procedure to get out of that confusion.
- Insufficient info. Question – for my financial situation, what is the most important thing for me to know? If you answered that question, you failed the test. The correct answer is, you don't know. The only answer is – what's important to me. If I got burned in the downturn, maybe it's most important for me to learn how to protect my money. On another hand, there is a good chance the most important information for me is that you are the type of person I can trust. That is an emotional decision, not a logical one. Meaning, you have to connect with my core values and emotions and not my intellect. Failure to do so, will cause me to say, "NO!" In fact, research proves that even if you make a perfect logical case but don't make the emotional case, I would wonder, "OK, but why go with this guy?"
- Lack of credibility. Many years ago, I went to my ophthalmologist to get my glaucoma test conducted. When I informed my primary care physician (an internist), he said, "Next time, give me a shot at providing that service for you." Needless to say, I stood there speechless. What credibility did an internist have in the on-going treatment of glaucoma? None. Your ability to subtly show your knowledge in a relevant way is your ticket to proving your credibility. Your ability to read and connect with your prospects is your ticket to proving your credibility.
In Conclusion
What do you now know about Consultative Selling that you didn't know before? It is a philosophy. You need to employ it in your daily conversations. That it will fail unless you learn how to read prospects and connect with them. That it will fail unless you focus on better listening skills.
Consultative selling is perfect for people who want to developing long-term, loyal clients. It is not so good for those who operate a business that is built on making one-time sales. It's also perfect for people selling products or services with a high value. But, it's not a good option for people who approach their products or services as thought they are low-priced goods.
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