Sales psychology: Reaching into the depths of buyer’s mind

“When people feel that someone genuinely likes them, they are more open to listening to that person and to what he/she is selling.” – Brian Tracy

Liking – one of the six principles in ‘Science of Persuasion’, and an important aspect for you as a salesperson. When a buyer or a prospect develops liking toward you, it directly increases the chances of selling your product.

But we know, it takes a lot more to sell that pen!

So what exactly does it take to sell a product to your prospect?

Stand with me when I say this – “Understanding”.

And to understand your prospects, you must closely observe what they think, how they think, what they feel, and why they feel the way they feel.

This article will help you understand the psychology of selling as a concept, some cool techniques & tips; with fun examples. Of course, the term “Psychology of Selling” was coined by Brian Tracy, and we will talk about his book as well.

The idea is to understand buyer psychology and take steps to your advantage.

So, what is sales psychology?

Psychology of selling a.k.a. sales psychology is simply the understanding of buyer psychology.

When you understand how a buyer thinks, you can act accordingly, and present your products in front of them.

Let’s have a look at some sales psychology techniques that can help you understand prospects better and elevate your sales.

6 sales psychology techniques – Buyer psychology you should know

The way you talk to your boss is never the same as you talk to a salesperson.

When someone tries to sell you something, a new version of you pops up out of nowhere – let’s call him Kevin. Kevin has authority. Kevin also sounds like he has a bit of ego.

Kevin has an ego issue because that’s what buying does to any human being. Kevin is spending bucks, and that’s what gives him a sense of authority, hence ego.

Just like this, there are several other psychologies that we’re going to explore, and we’re keeping Kevin in these examples.

1. Quick response means you care about me

Kevin does not like to wait in any condition, even on a date!

So when any prospect drops an inquiry on your site, it is advisable to call within the next five minutes. It creates a solid first impression of your brand and shows that you care about your business.

This is what Kevin would think:

“Hmm. I just dropped an inquiry on their site and I got a response in a few minutes! That’s fast. They must really care about their business, and they can solve my problem with this pace too.”

Here’s a graph that shows the impact on conversion against time.

We carried out an experiment on 1000 inquiries in the beginning of 2019. Our statistics show that if you call back within the next three minutes of inquiry, it can improve your overall conversion by 391%.

2. Don’t call me at this hour

We all designate our time with different tasks.

Morning is for freshening up and family time, after-9 is about work. We get a little slow after lunch. And the evenings are quite productive.

Call prospects at the time when they are really interested in your product.

For example, if you’re selling a car, you can call in the morning. If you’re selling a business software, call them at office hours.

Just like the hour, there are statistics on the best days to make calls.

Statistically, Wednesday and Thursday are the two best days to make sales calls. But in real sales scenes, you can’t depend upon just two days.

What you can do is – identify the best days to convert prospects by closely observing your past closings. You can simply keep the most important deals for those best days.

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3. That’s consistent

Research says that 72% of calls are never answered and it takes 8 attempts to reach to your prospect.

Oh boy! Kevin is really hard to get.

Although,

50% of all sales happen after 5^th attempt.

Kevin just needs a little bit of attention!

You also want to make sure the prospect is not getting annoyed with your constant attempts; keep mindful intervals.

4. I don’t trust that number

Trust was one of the prime reasons why virtual phone system was introduced. People usually don’t trust the numbers of other countries.

So, if your clients or prospects are residing in the United States, use a USA virtual phone number to build the trust factor.

According to a study conducted by Software Advice, the trust factor also appears when it comes to out-of-state companies. Here are the top reasons why businesses choose local phone numbers:

There are several other reasons to use a virtual phone system:

1. Collaborate with your team effectively.
2. Easily call all over the world using virtual phone numbers at affordable rates.
3. Showcase your business local using specific local virtual numbers.
4. Record prospect calls and use them for support and training purposes.
5. Gather data to analyze calling patterns of your sales team.
6. Enable customers to record voicemails and never miss to help your customers.

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5. I don’t care about your sales targets

Kevin may seem he cares, but he doesn’t.

Prospects care about only one thing – whether you can solve their problem or not.

So the best thing you can do is – listen to what they have to say, and offer the best solution. Your product/service can be a part of this solution. But the baseline is that prospects are seeking a solution, and you must offer that.

6. More options, more confusion

In the article on Psychology Today, Liraz Margalit states and I quote

“Intuitively, people feel that the more options they have, the greater their chances are of finding the choice that will perfectly satisfy their needs. But this intuitive assumption turns out to be an illusion – the more options we have, the less likely we are to make a decision at all.”

People love options, but that does not mean you should paralyze prospects with a truckload of options. Give 2-3 choices, so they can easily compare and find the right product for them.

The idea of providing choices is not to manipulate this psychology but help prospects meet their requirements perfectly. For Salesmate, we used the same ideology and created simple plans for different buyer needs.

5 sales psychology tips to leverage your sales closing

We have seen some important sales psychology techniques, now we will check out some important sales psychology tips.

These tips will definitely add value to your sales efforts, and will eventually help you close more deals.

1. FOMO

Fear Of Missing Out a.k.a. FOMO is widely successful when it comes to sales closing. People also use a fancy term for FOMO – loss aversion.

But it all leads to basic psychology of the human mind – I don’t want to miss out on that!

I believe FOMO was already very popular, but it hiked after the evolution of social media platforms.

In sales, when your prospect is in the negotiation stage, you can drop an email that creates the effect of FOMO. Here’s an example:

2. What other people are saying?

According to an analysis by Spiegel, displaying reviews can increase the conversion rate by 270%.

Kevin loves to know what other people are saying about your product. We all have scrolled down to the bottom of Amazon pages and checked for the reviews.

We all are Kevin, apparently!

When it comes to using customer reviews to your advantage, make sure you’ve understood your prospect really well. Ask yourself these questions to find a perfect customer review:

1. What is the industry of my prospect?

2. What kind of customer review would leverage my sales closing?

3. Would the customer like honest mixed reviews or all-positive reviews?

4. What are the main needs of my prospect?

Typically, if you share customer reviews from the same industry as the prospects’, it would highly influence them to purchase your product.

One way to find the perfect review is – you understand the prospect’s needs very well, and pick the reviews that talk about those needs.

For example; the prospect who is looking for a CRM to help him streamline his sales pipeline, you can use such a review:

“With Salesmate, we can see our pipeline, including the sales process stages and the dollar volume at each stage. Since our inception 90 days ago, our pipeline has grown 100%.” – Jacqui Sabo (Vice President – Faciliteq)

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3. Did you say Free?

I think there’s a misconception that people like free stuff. Psychologically, people like gestures.

When you offer something to someone, it builds a positive emotion in the receiver. Such emotion will eventually help you build a business with that prospect.

But the idea is not to offer something for free with an expectation to close sales. Offer something valuable – things that can help the prospect in his business.

Like; content, ebooks, educational resources, etc.

When the prospect will utilize your help, it will be reciprocated in some form when you propose your deal. Like; a sign up or a demo schedule.

4. Did you just diss your competitor?

There are two ways to deal with situations when your prospect talks about your direct competitors.

Way 1:

Way 2:

Way 1 will leave a negative impression on your prospect. Way 2 will leave a solid positive impression because you’re actually trying to help him pick the right product. That brings out real respect and can help you close the deal!

5. Mystery matters

When I visited an age-old perfume manufacturing brand a couple of months back, I experienced the power of mystery in sales. I asked for mild scents for everyday use, the guy at the back of the counter blew me away!

He said,

“We were established in 1984, and we haven’t kept any perfume samples to date. But I assure you, once you try our perfume, you’ll be a lifetime customer and you’ll recommend to your friends. We produce scents from natural ingredients, and completely safe for your skin. Do you want to try?”

I dug that mystery and said yes. I just purchased my third bottle a week ago!

Let your prospect enjoy some mystery about your product, but don’t keep him unguided.

This psychological tip may not be useful for services, but it can do great wonders for products or software. The idea is to guide the prospect to sign up into your product, and let him explore the product all by himself.

Here’s how the conversation would go:

The important thing in this approach is not to keep your prospect unguided in any way; make sure he gets every kind of support. You also have to make sure the product is top-notch, so the mystery you’ve created is worth it.

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Take outs from the book – Psychology of Selling by Brian Tracy

Now that we’ve checked out some sales psychology techniques and tips, it’s mandatory for us to take a quick check on the book – psychology of selling by Brian Tracy.

Here are some important takeouts:

1. 80% of the sales are done by 20% of the salespeople. So small differences in one’s ability will make a huge difference in results.

2. Prospecting, Building rapport, Need identification, Presentation, Handling objections, Closing, and Resale & referrals are the key result areas for any salesperson.

3. A salesperson should identify his income history and set an annual income goal. Take the highest earning of the year and increase it by 25-50% – that should be your goal.

4. People buy stuff to be better at physically, psychologically, or spiritually. Understand why a buyer should buy your product and what values can your product add in anyone’s life.

5. Your creativity will make a huge impact on your sales. Be ready for surprises and challenges. How do you solve these problems will define your sales future.

6. By controlling your appearance, voice, and attitude, you can be one of the best salespeople in the industry.

These are the main points that I found valuable in Psychology of Selling, but there’s a lot more to it. So, I would suggest you check out this book and grab everything you can.

Bottomline

Sales is a humongous field, and psychology is even bigger. It’s a deep-deep sea when you try to explore humans. These sales psychology techniques will keep evolving, but the important idea is to understand Kevin and act accordingly.

Remember Kevin? This article was based on his psyche!

At Salesmate, we try to develop a product that can help you understand your prospects better. You should know the exact reasons why your products are selling or why not. Our solution helps businesses streamline their prospects and manage the sales pipeline effectively.

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