Magical Sales Pitch for Your Training Business

Magical Pitch for Your Training Business

July 1, 2015 9:27 by Onno Schuit

Photo credit: Maja Petric, published under CC

You need a magical sales pitch to get the best leads for your training business. A magical pitch enchants your customers because it starts by talking about them. Not about you, not about your training, but about the problem they have, the pain they are feeling.

For instance, if your training is meant to increase employee retention then start talking about the problem: employee turnover. Do your homework, find out what the current employee turnover rate is for your customer. Use that number in your pitch.

So, start by tailoring your sales pitch exactly to your audience. Remember that the magic is in actually listening to your customer. Not just while preparing the pitch, to make sure you’re addressing their problem, but also during the presentation, meeting, or phone call.

Let’s break it down into 3 steps:

Preparation: sales pros always make sure they’re well prepared
Execution: use your trainer skills to deliver an empathetic pitch
Follow-up: get to a Yes or No quickly

Pros Do Perfect Preparation

Sales professionals always prepare their meetings and presentations exhaustively. Here are 5 questions to guide you while crafting your sales pitch:

What problem do you solve?
How does your training solve the problem?
Whom is your training for?
Where is the pitch taking place, through what channel (phone, presentation, meeting)?
When is a good time to engage them – what time of the day, season, or day of the month?

Photo credit: Glen Carrie, published under CC

Find Your Ideal Customers

The most important question is: How do you solve their problem? This question should help you find the right prospects (potential customers). While you’re collecting leads (i.e. scouting for prospects), you should always try to find out as soon as possible if they have a pain you can remedy. If they haven’t, remove them from your list of leads. You only want to get in front of the right prospects, the ones who are ready to purchase your training services.

Identify Decision Makers

If a prospect contacts you about your training services, try to find out whether they’re a decision maker. To put it crassly: are they in charge of the money? If they’re not, try to get the name of the actual decision maker. Failing that, make the employee your ambassador in their organization. Give them the means to convince their boss to hire you. If that means calculating their ROI (return on investment) for your training, then ask for their numbers and start computing.

Find Their Pain

Once you’ve created a list of prospects, start talking to people inside the prospect’s organization. Try to gather as much information as you can, get their numbers. Just keep asking questions until you know exactly what their specific problem is. And please keep in mind that you’re looking to solve a business problem. The decision makers may have the best intentions for their employees in mind, but in the end they’re not looking to enrich their employees lives, but to further the business goals (in the ideal scenario, these go hand in hand).

Photo credit: Daniel Ruswick, published under CC

List All Possible Objections

Generally speaking, objections to your sales pitch center around Budget, Authority (“I have no authority to make the buying decision”), Need, and Time (“The budget is already set for the next two years”) – abbreviated to BANT.

But if you’ve been pitching to the same type of prospects for awhile, you’ll also see the industry specific objections popping up again and again. Don’t try to avoid the objections in your pitch, hoping that nobody will bring them up. Instead, address them yourself, especially the industry specific ones.

Get Relevant Referrals

Ask your current customers for referrals. Create a few case studies. Select the ones that are most relevant for the prospect you’re pitching. There’s nothing that sells better than being able to say “We solved the problem you’re facing for people who were in a similar situation as you are now”.

Get Pumped up

You’re a trainer, so I’m going to assume you’re not shy. But if pitching is new to you, there may be some anxiety. So, build confidence by wearing your favorite socks, listening to great music, or whatever it is you need to do to get in the right mood.

Use Your Trainer Super Powers to Deliver Your Pitch

Photo credit: Sonja Langford, published under CC

As a trainer, you’ve got a leg up because you’re already used to giving presentations and talking to people in a professional setting. This means you probably already know how to pay attention to your body language and intonation. And how to listen for feedback: be really empathetic towards your prospect.

To start your actual sales pitch, state the prospect’s problem, in their words, and use their data to illustrate the problem. Ask your prospect for confirmation to indicate you’re listening to them. Then show how your training solves their problem. Address the most common objections, and ask for feedback again, along the lines of “do you think this could solve the issues you’re currently facing?”

Photo credit: Padurariu Alexandru, published under CC

Determine the next steps. This can be as simple as making a specific appointment for the follow-up. Specific, as in: establish a date and time for the next call or meeting that is convenient for both parties. Or, if you think the prospect is ready for it, ask the question “Are you ready to become a customer?” And if the answer is “no”, ask the question What would it take for you to become a customer?

At this point you want to become aware of any remaining obstacles. So after they’ve given you the answer, something along the lines of “my boss is going to have to give a go on this”, keep asking: “After your boss have given the go, then what happens next?” You want to map out the entire path to a sale, for this particular customer.

Follow-up until You Get A Yes Or No

Get to “yes” or “no” as quickly as possible. And don’t expect the prospects to contact you. Seize the initiative and call them first. And keep following up until you actually get that “yes” or “no”, no matter how many phone calls or emails it takes. In the words of Steli Efti, ceo at Close.io:

“Most people will assume after following up 1-3x that there is no interest and will stop. I don’t. I simply assume that the person is busy and that I need to follow up until they have a moment to respond. If I keep reaching out my chances of getting to that perfect moment are massively higher.”

Photo credit: Jeffrey Deng, published under CC

Be ready to deal with rejections. You’re doing fine if 1 out of 10 prospects actually turn into a paying customer – great even. This means it’s okay to get rejected 9 times out of 10.

Once you land the deal, always ask for referrals because they’re great to start the cycle anew.

Okay, you’re ready to craft a magical sales pitch for you training business now. Remember that it all starts by listening to your customer very carefully and addressing their specific problem.

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