Money. For some people money is a difficult thing to talk about, but having the budget discussion is vital when in a sales conversation. Budget discussions only make sense in the context of: having a true assessment of the real pain of the prospect and having the prospects perception of your solution can solve that pain and to see if it is worth the price you are offering. There are multiple different ways to open a budget conversation:
- Mind if we talk about budget for a minute?
- Have you personally set any kind of budget parameters for this project?
- Ask on a scale of 1-10, with 10 being the highest , where would you rate how important cost is to you in the effort of the project?
- Have you thought about what something like this might cost?
Since money can be such a difficult thing to talk about to prospects, finally coming to a clear and concise price can be difficult. So having clear goals walking into a sales meeting can also be beneficial to the salesman, getting a real price budget, getting a price range, and getting a price threshold.
Also, maybe to try and get the prospect to think even more about their comfortability with a price budget you could ask them a could of questions to get their gears moving in their brain: If I were to come back with a number between ___ and ___ , how would you feel about that?, or If the project were to cost ____ would that surprise you?.
As the sales person, another thing you need to consider is reading the prospect and trying to judge their comfortability on the topic. Try and evaluate how easily does the prospect talk about money, are they comfortable or awkward or nervous, do they suddenly act in a controlling way, does the conversation immediately feel awkward or weird, and how could you solve and get over the awkward feeling.
Although this can be a very awkward part of a sales conversation, it is also a very vital part of the process.
BoweryJE22
I agree, personally, I find it difficult to talk about money with people because oftentimes, that is a very personal matter. These different questions and techniques can definitely assist in being more comfortable in asking and the prospect often should respond more easily to them as well. It’s a straightforward approach, but also with subtle wording and questioning to get the real answer out of them about how they feel about the financials.