The job of a salesperson is to find the pain a prospect has, offer a solution, and negotiate a transaction. But it is more than just salespeople that look for pain. Entrepreneurs, marketers, and even just friends try to figure out the real why to people’s pain. Thankfully there is a simple process that can lead to finding out this real pain: the pain funnel. This funnel is a series of steps and questions a salesperson or anyone can follow.
The first three steps are more general and exploratory to gain a better sense of the prospect’s needs. The first step of the pain funnel is to ask a few key questions. The second step is to just listen. Once you ask a few open ended, broad questions, it is so important to just listen to what the prospect has to say. The third step is to explore the surface pain. Explore what you can with what the prospect has initially told you.
The last three steps of the sales funnel narrow down the conversation. The fourth step is to dig deeper. Ask more probing, specific questions. The fifth step is to find the implications, if there are any, from what the prospect is saying. Analyze what they say and try to uncover something they may have left out with some more questions. The final step is to get to the real why. With all the information you have gathered, you should be able to determine the real pain of the prospect and articulate it in a statement.
Following these steps can be an effective and efficient way for anyone to find the real pain someone is dealing with.
BoweryJE22
This is a good breakdown of the pain funnel, step by step breakdowns really resonate with me so it was nice to see this laid out so concisely.
Asking questions about a customer’s pain points is pivotal in uncovering their underlying needs and challenges. By delving deeper into their pain points, a salesman can tailor their solutions to directly address the issues, and ultimately increasing the likelihood of a sale.