The Most Important Question In Sales and Management.
I spent many years on the ‘corporate’ team with my former employer, and we had many discussions about making changes to the way we did business, the way we compensated our sales teams, the way we went to market. Often, I would sit and watch these discussions, and when the conversation came to me, I would ask the one most important management question:
What problem are we trying to solve?
This question allows the discussion around these management decisions to focus on the critical goal of any change. If we were to be successful in this, how would we know? What would change? How would we measure it? Why are we doing this?
This is also the most important question when it comes to selling. In order to make a sale, you need three things.
A customer with a problem that your product or service can solve.
An idea of the budget available to solve this problem or the Return on Investment the customer is seeking.
You need to understand who the decision maker(s) are, and be sure you are getting their input on #1 and #2 above BEFORE you ask them to spend money.
No matter who in a prospect or client organization you are talking to, unless you understand what problem you are trying to solve, it’s not time to propose a solution. It used to be enough to have ‘an idea’ or a product. Now days, you need a problem to solve.
Michael Doyle, the MD in MDMediaSales.com has nearly 40 years experience turning around media properties large and small. His focus on driving long term success, developing systems and people that will continue after he is long gone has been critical to his personal mission. If you give a person a fish, you feed them for a day, if you teach them to fish, you feed them forever. Michael develops fishing communities. He is available as a fractional Sales Manager, CRO or business consultant by contacting him at mdoyle@MDMediaSales.com