Adaptive Selling for Relationship

Building
Chapter 6
 Important Questions Answered

 What is adaptive selling?

 Why is it important for salespeople to practice
adaptive selling?
 What kind of knowledge do salespeople need to
practice adaptive selling?
 How can salespeople acquire this knowledge?
 How can salespeople adapt their sales strategies,
presentations and social styles to various
situations?

2
“I’ve learned the importance of adapting to
the specific needs of each customer.”
~Katherine Bowe
Account Executive

6-3
 Types of Presentations

 Three types of presentations

salespeople use are
 Standard memorized presentation
 Outlined presentation
 Customized presentation

4
7.5
Standard Memorised Presentations
 These are memorised by the sales persons. The
salesperson presents the same selling points in the
same order to all customers.
 Some companies insist that their salespeople
memorize the entire presentation and deliver it word
for word. Others believe that salespeople should be
free to make some adjustments.
 Also called a canned presentation
 Completely memorized sales talk
 Ensures salespeople will provide complete and accurate
information
 Limited effectiveness
 Standard, memorized presentations can be delivered at low cost
by unskilled salespeople
  Way back in time there was a salesman selling panes of
7.6 glass to the hardware stores of Makro .
 His company had invented a type of very tough safety glass
that would not shatter.
 He went to the hardware stores and said... "tell me, do your
customers buy glass from time to time to repair broken
windows?"
 "Why Yes they do" was always the reply
 "do you make good profit on it?" he asked
 "Not really, explained the store keeper, "you see, every one
sells glass round here and the completion between one store
and another drives the price of glass down until its hardly
worth keeping in stock"
 "whats your margin on it these days?" asked the salesman
 "five (5) cents in the dollar" replied the store keeper
  Suppose your customers could buy a special, tough,
shatterproof pane, available only from you - do you think
7.7 that they'd pay a little more knowing that broken panes
could be a thing of the past?"
 " yeah, i guess that would interest them, but shatter proof
glass? I'm not sure that stuff like that really exists" said the
store keeper
 At this the salesman pulled out a pane of glass, put it on the
counter then hit it hard with a ball peen hammer!!!!....
"Guaranteed to earn you fifteen (15) cents (6.6 Paisa) in the
and no competition within your zip code! said the
salesman... "how much would you like to stock?"
 Well that approach was extremely successful! 
 BUT Later that season the salesman changed his
presentation so that this time round he put the pane of glass
on the counter AND GAVE THE HAMMER TO THE
STORE KEEPER. 
  The store keeper would strike the glass as hard as he
7.8 might to prove that shatter proof glass was just a
gimmick and that the sales man was being to soft
when he hit it.

 Now the store keepers would ASK... "How soon can

you deliver?"

 It may be fiction but that sounds like a great canned

presentation to me.

 When you have a framework like that, you can find

ways to bring power to the things that you sell or
should i say, to the solutions that you provide.
7.9 Elevator Speeches
 For A Management Consultant
 “I keep your company out of Dilbert's comic strip! I'm Alyson Abrams, a
Silicon Valley management consultant specializing in change. If your
company is experiencing rapid growth or change I can offer experience
and wisdom to keep your employees happy and your profits in the black.”

 For A Customer Service Representative:

 “I have a calling. I am a customer satisfaction representative who calls
customers to insure they're satisfied. “Yes” is my favorite word. What's
yours?”
 Cont..
7.10
 For A Credit Agent:
 “I'm Anees . I give credit where credit is due. I'm a
commercial credit agent. Wouldn't you like some
credit too?” (smiles!)

 For The Self-Employed

 “Hi, I teach people how manners make money &
politeness promotes profits in the market place. I
teach etiquette to youth and adults. I'm Anam
Kaneez, and it's my pleasure to meet you!”
•

Elevator speeches, or elevator pitch, is a short speech that allows you to convey
what you or your company is all about and what your goals are. Delivered within a
span of 30 seconds to 2 minutes

The goal of an elevator speech is to generate enough interest for you to lengthen the
conversation, schedule a meeting, submit a proposal, or even just a chance to give
your business card, once the “elevator ride” is over

7.11
Short But Powerful
7.12  The Elevator Speech Template for Delivering a Short Sales Pitch is
a Word Online Template that you can use to deliver memorable,
compelling, and persuasive elevator pitches to any audience.
 you can open and edit it anytime. Simply open any browser on your
mobile device and access the template through your Microsoft
account. You can also opt to save it in your own computer and
modify it from there.
 Grab Every Opportunity To Pitch
7.13
 A set of Elevator Speeches that are 12 seconds, 30 seconds, and 3
minutes long. They are divided this way to provide you options on
how long or short you need your pitch to be depending on the
circumstances.
7.14
Outlined presentations
 These are prearranged presentations that
list the most important sales points. An
outlined presentation can be very effective
because it is well organized.

 Prearranged presentation that usually includes

standard introduction, standard Q&A, and a
standard method for getting the customer to place
an order
Customised Presentations
 Such presentations are based on detailed
analysis of customer’s needs and are
prepared carefully and separately for various
customers as and when the needs come up.
 The salesperson may bring in specialists to
conduct the study. The customer recognizes
the sales representative as a professional who
is helping to solve problems, not just sell
products
 Written and/or oral presentation based on
a detailed analysis of the customer’s
needs
 Allows the salesperson to demonstrate
empathy
 Customized presentations can be very
costly, requiring highly skilled people to
analyze the customer’s needs

15
 7.16

 First came bespoke Levi's jeans, M&Ms

with your own printed message, and
custom images on credit cards. But then
there are more recent (and more
mundane) examples:
 Go to LL Bean, order one of many
products, and have your initials added.
 Want your own fancy coffee? Go crazy
at a Starbucks. They'll make it, no
matter how much the barista shudders at
the strange combination.
Adaptive Selling and Sales Success

 AS is using the customized presentation illustrates

because the presentation is tailored to the specific
needs of the customer.
 Adaptive selling forces the salesperson to practice the
marketing concept.
 The world is made up of diverse people.
 Salespeople should adapt to the customer’s desire for a
specific type of relationship.
 Adaptive selling gives salespeople the opportunity to use the
most effective sales presentation for each customer.

17
 How Knowledge plays a role in
Adaptive Selling
 A key ingredient in effective selling is knowledge .
Salespeople need to know about the products they are selling,
the company they work for, and the cus­tomers they will be
selling to.
 Product and Company knowledge
 Organising knowledge of sales situations
and customers into categories
 Approaches for developing knowledge

18
Product & Company knowledge
 Sales people need to have a good knowledge of
their product, their company as well as their
competitors.
 Purchasing agents rate product knowledge as one
of the most important attributes of good
salespeople.
 Effective salespeople need to know how products are
made
 What services are provided with the products?
 How the products relate to other products?
 Hhow the products can satisfy customers' needs?

19
 PRODUCT KNOWLEDGE
Know everything.
•External characteristics
The Product •How to use
                                         
Itself •All available options
     
•Adaptability
•Life expectancy
•Tolerance to wear and stress
Performance
•Maintenance and supplies
needed.
                                        
•How is it made
Manufacturing
•Quality control

•Distribution strategy.
Distribution •Pricing policies
Channels •Media support
•Target markets

Service •Service policies

Available •Service personnel20
 Benefits of Gaining Product
21
Knowledge

 Gives you pride self confidence in the product

 Gives you self assurance
 Allows you to diagnose the customer's problems
 Enables better customer service
 Gives you an air of competence
 Can sell to experts and to beginners
 22Knowledge of the Competition
Differential Competitive Advantage
Product Superiority Service Superiority

• Appearance
• Versatility • Design • Delivery
• Efficiency • Mobility • Merchandising
• Inventory
• Storage • Packaging • Installation
• Credit
• Handling Time • Life Expectancy • Maintenance
• Training
• Safety • Adaptability

Source Superiority People Superiority

• Personal knowledge and skill

• Time Established • Knowledge and skill of support
• Competitive Standing people
• Community Image • Integrity and character
• Location • Standing in the community
• Size • Flexibility of call schedule
 Organising knowledge of sales situations
& customers into categories
 Even more important than product and company
knowledge is detailed information about the
different types of sales situations and customers
salespeople may encounter and which sales
presentation works best in each situation.
 By developing categories, salespeople reduce the
complexity of selling and free up their mental
capacity to think more creatively; they also use
knowledge gained through past experiences.
 The ability to organize knowledge into categories
leads to better performance in personal selling.

23
7.24
7.25
 Approaches For Developing
Knowledge

 The approaches for acquiring knowledge are

 Tap the knowledge of sales experts
 Read manuals and trade publications
 Ask for feedback on what you are doing
 Analyse success and failures
 Develop an intrinsic orientation toward your work

26
1. Tap The Knowledge Of Sales Experts
 Companies frequently tap the knowledge of their
best salespeople and use this knowledge to train new
salespeople. The company developed role plays for
each sales situation and used them when training new
salespeople.
 Such role playing enabled the new salespeople to
experience the variety of situations they would
actually encounter on the job.
 The strategies recommended by the top salespeople
served as a starting point for the trainees to develop
their own sales methods for handling these situations.

27
2. Read Manuals & Trade Publications

 Information about the salesperson's company,

its products, and its competitors is available from
many sources, including
 Sales manuals
 Newsletters
 Sales meetings,
 Plant visits
 Business and trade publications.
Knowledgeable salespeople read sales bulletins
and announcements from their companies and
articles in the trade publications about their
customers and their industries. They ask company
employees questions about new programs and
products
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 3. Ask For Feedback On What
You Are Doing
 Frequently the feedback salespeople get from
their supervisors focuses on performance.
However, diagnostic feedback is much more
useful than performance feedback for improving
performance over the long run.
 Diagnostic feedback provides information about
what someone is doing right and is doing wrong.

29
 4. Analyse Success And Failures

 Effective salespeople learn from their mistakes, using

them to build a greater knowledge base. They also
learn from their success .
 After making a sale, they should analyze what they
did to achieve success.
 The performance analysis Should focus on sales
strategies used, identifying the specific strategies
causing the performance and determining weather
or how they should be changed in the future.

30
 5. Develop An Intrinsic Orientation
Toward Your Work
 People can have two types of orientation towards
their job.
 Intrinsic orientation: People in this category enjoy their
work. They find it challenging and fun.
 Extrinsic orientation: People in this category view their
job as some thing that has to be done to get rewards or
to avoid punishment.
 When salespeople find their jobs as a challenge and
fun, they want to learn how to do it better.

31
 The Social Style Matrix
 The social style matrix is a popular training
program that companies use to help sales people
adapt their communication styles.

 Dimensions of Social Styles

 Assertiveness : The degree to which people have opinions
about issues and publicly make positions clear to others is
called assertiveness. They attempt to influence others to
accept these beliefs.
 Responsiveness: Responsiveness is based on how emotional
people tend to get in social situations. Responsive people
readily express joy, anger, and sorrow. They appear to be
more concerned with others and are informal and casual
social situations

32
Indicators of Assertiveness

33
Indicators of Responsiveness

34
 Relationship Between Responsiveness
& Social Styles
Low responsiveness

High assertiveness
Low assertiveness

s
er
c a l

iv
yt i

Dr
nal
A

i ve
a ls es s
i ab xpr
Am E

35
High Contd.
 Social Style Matrix
7.37
 Suggestions For Accurate
Assessment
 Concentrate on the customer's behavior and disregard
how you feel about the behavior.
 Avoid assuming that specific jobs or functions are
associated with a social style
 Attempt to get customers to reveal their styles rather
than react to your style. Ask questions rather than
making statements.
 Test your assessments. Look for clues and information
that may suggest you have made an incorrect
assessment of a customer's social style.

38
 Categories of Social Styles
The two dimensions of social style, assertiveness and
responsiveness, form the social style matrix. Each
quadrant of the matrix defines a social style type.
 Drivers
are high in assertiveness and low in responsiveness.
 Expressives
are high in assertiveness and high in responsiveness.
 Amiables
are high in responsiveness and low in assertiveness.
 Analytical
are low in both assertiveness and responsiveness.
39
 THE BEHAVIORAL OR SOCIAL
40 STYLES MODEL
Four basic styles based on four functions of human personality
Function Characteristic

Driver Quick reactions to here and now sensory

[Sensor] input
Expressive
Imagination and thought
[Intuitive]
Amiable Emotional and personal reactions to
[Feeling] experiences

Analytical
Logically organizing and analyzing data
[Thinking]
Drivers
 Drivers are high on assertiveness and low on
responsiveness. Drivers have learned to work with
others only because they must do so to get the job
done, not because they enjoy people.
 They have a great desire to get ahead in their
companies and careers. Drivers are swift, efficient
decision makers.
 They focus on the present and appear to have little
concern with the past or future.
 To influence a driver, salespeople need to use a
direct, businesslike, organized presentation with
quick action and follow-up. Proposals should
emphasize the effects of a purchase decision on
profits.
41
Highlights of Drivers

 Decisive in action and decision making

 Likes control; dislikes inaction
 Prefers maximum freedom to manage self and
others
 Cool, independent, and competitive with
others
 Low tolerance for feelings, attitudes, and
advice of others
 Works quickly and impressively alone
 Seeks esteem and self-actualization
 Has good administrative skills

42
Expressives
 Expressives are high on assertiveness and high
on responsiveness.
 Warm, approachable, intuitive, and competitive,
expressives view power and politics as important
factors in their quest for personal rewards and
recognition.
 People with an expressive style focus on the future,
directing their time and effort toward achieving
their vision.
 They have little concern for practical details.
Salespeople need to demonstrate how their product
will help the customer achieve personal status and
recognition.
 They prefer presentations with product
demonstrations and creative graphics rather than
factual statement and technical details.
43
Highlights of Expressives

 Spontaneous actions and decisions

 Likes involvement
 Exaggerates and generalizes
 Tends to dream and get others caught up in
those dreams
 Jumps from one activity to another
 Works quickly and excitedly with others
 Seeks esteem and group identification
 Has good persuasive skills

44
Amiables
 Amiables are high in responsiveness and low in
assertiveness.
 Close relationship and cooperation are important to
Amiables.
 They achieve their objective by working with people,
developing an atmosphere of mutual trust rather than
by using power and authority.
 Sales people may have difficulty determining an
Amiables true feeling. ‘
 Amiables are particularly interested in receiving
guarantees about a product's performance.
 They do not like salespeople who agree to undertake
activities and then do not follow through on
commitments.
 Salespeople selling to amiables should stress the
product's benefits in terms of its effects on the satisfac­
tion of employees.
45
Highlights of Amiables

 Slow in making decisions or taking actions

 Likes close, personal relationships
 Dislikes interpersonal conflict
 Supports and actively listens to others
 Weak in goal setting and self-direction
 Seeks security and identification with a group
 Has good counseling and listening skills

46
Analyticals
 Analyticals are low on assertiveness and low on
responsiveness.
 They like facts, principles, and logic.
 Salespeople need to use solid, tangible evidence
when making presentations to analyticals.
 Analyticals are also influenced by sales
presentations that recognize their technical
expertise and emphasize long-term benefits.
 They tend to disregard personal opinions.
analyticals' loyalty is based on their feeling that
well reasoned decisions do not need to be
reexamined.

47
Highlights of Analyticals

 Cautious in decisions and action

 Likes organization and structure
 Dislikes involvement
 Asks specific questions
 Prefers objective, task-oriented, intellectual
work
 Wants to be right, so collects much data
 Works slowly, precisely, and alone
 Seeks security and self-actualization
 Has good problem-solving skills

48
Cues for Recognizing Social Styles

49
 Social Styles & Sales Presentations
 The presentation style depends upon the
personality of the sales person and the type of the
customer.
 Effective selling involves more than communicating
a product's benefits.
 Sales­people must also recognize the customer's
needs and expectations. In the sales interaction,
salespeople should conduct themselves in a manner
consistent with customer expectations.
 Although each customer type requires a different
sales presentation, the sales­person's personal social
style tends to determine the sales technique he or
she typically uses.

50
 51 Presenting To Each Of The Four Social Styles
Driver
Planning
o Short term results
o Your product should show immediate benefits
Presenting
o Personal relationship is not important.
o Don't spend too much time on the relationship
o Move quickly to a substantial benefit with a payback
o Be brief stress the bottom line
o Get them involved. Let them lead
o Drivers test your mettle. Prepare for a debate.
o Answer objections. Don't bluff
o Present alternatives. Let the prospect choose
o Use an action close.
Analytical
Planning
o Structured. They study everything
o Know their business thoroughly
o Use facts
o Prepare several alternatives
Presenting
o Data oriented
o Structured approach
o Low key, logic based
o Be sure that they understand your structure
o Emphasize test proven benefits
o Visual aides, charts and graphs. "Leave behinds"
o Don’t exaggerate or act flamboyantly
o Point out positives and negatives of your offering
o Use a detailed summary as a close.
Expressive
Planning
o Discover their goals and plans at the preapproach
o Concentrate on your offering's exclusive aspects
o Stress their personal and company benefits
Presenting
o They are visionaries, dreamers
o Open with innovative suggestions for them to grow
o Learn and relate to their "game plan" Lots of questions
o Discuss ideas and concepts with respect
o Use some showmanship
o Don't get into arguments
o Ask if they want you to respond to their "blue sky" comments.
o Testimonials are important
o Let them see how it fits into their plan.
Amiable
Planning
o They want to know you.
o They need your enthusiasm
o Approach with lots of personal information
o Bring testimonials, case studies and third party references
o Develop a personal relation ship with the prospect
Presenting
o Convince of your sincerity.
o They have a hard time saying yes.
o Don't sound "canned."
o Make it look real informal but well organized
o Empathize. Reflect their feelings
o Spend time on the relationship during the presentation
o Be open and candid
o Use an interesting, entertaining style
o Assume the sale and move to the next step.
Customer Expectation Based On Social
Style

52
 Style Summary
  Driver Expressive Amiable Analytical
53
Backup Style Autocratic Attacker Acquieser Avoider
Measures Accuracy
Personal Results Applause Security "Being
Values By: Right:
For Growth Needs
Listen Check Initiate Decide
to

Allows to build Inspires to reach

Needs climate that Provides Details Suggests
own structure goals

Takes time to be Efficient Stimulating Agreeable Accurate

Principles
Conclusions and Dreams and Relationships
Support their and
actions Intuition and feelings
thinking
Present benefits
What Who Why How
that tell
Testimonials
For decisions give Options and Guarantees and Evidence and
and
them probabilities assurances service
incentives

Their specialty is Controlling Socializing Supporting Technical

Versatility
The effort people make to increase the productivity
of a relationship by adjusting to the needs of the
other party.
 Versatile salespeople : Those able to adapt their social
styles are much more effective than salespeople who do
not adjust their sales presentations. effective salespeople
adjust their social styles to match their customers'
styles.

54
 The Role of Knowledge
 Social style matrix illustrates the importance of
knowledge, organised into categories, in determining
selling effectiveness through adaptive style.
 Sales training based on the social style matrix teaches
salespeople the four customer categories, or types
(driver, expressive, amiable, and analytical).
 Salespeople learn the cues for identifying them.
Salespeople also learn which adjustments they need to
make in their communication styles to be effective with
each cus­tomer type

55
Adjusting Social Styles

6-56
 Alternative Training Systems for
Developing Adaptive Selling Skills
 Training methods such as the social style matrix and
expert systems are simply a first step in developing
knowledge for practicing adaptive selling.
 Salespeople should avoid rigidly applying the
classification rules.
 When salespeople prepare for global assignments, they
learn to categorise customers according to the culture.
Here it is important to know in detail, the
 Expert systems
 Limitation of training methods

57
Expert Systems

 A computer programme developed to assist

salespeople to be able to understand the customers
and develop effective sales strategies.

 The computer programme mimics a human

expert. The program contains the knowledge,
rules, and decision processes employed by experts
and then uses these elements to solve problems,
suggest strategies, and provide advice similar to
that of an expert.

58
 Limitation Of Training Methods
 Training methods like social style matrix and expert
systems are a first step in developing knowledge for
practicing adaptive selling.
 They emphasize the need to practice adaptive selling to
use different presentations with different customers and
stimulate salespeople to base their sales presentations on
an analysis of the customer.
 But these methods are limited; they present only a few
types of customers, and classification is based on the
form of communication (the social style), not on the
content of the communication (the specific features and
benefits stressed in the presentation).

59
 Features and Benefits
 Features
 The components of your product or service
 They are the same no matter who uses the product or service.
 Benefits
 Benefits are the value to the customer
 Translating features into benefits is one of your most important
skills
 Transitional phrases connect features to benefits
 Because ..
 This lets you …
 That means …
 What this gives you …

60
 Sales Force Automation Systems
 Also known as SFA system to support their salespeople. It has an online
collection of information such as policy manuals, sales literature,
analyses, price lists and product description. It has following categories:
 Key business issues facing the customer
 How can salesperson’s company meet these needs
 Competitive offerings.
 Most effective sales presentations for a particular customer.

61
 Sales Force Automation-Computers in
62 Selling
•Laptops
•Pen based computers
•Palmtops
Personal •Contact Management Software
Productivity •Mapping programs and GPS
•Calendar and scheduling
•Geodemographic segmentation
•Smart Card Reader

•E mail
Improved •Internet and videoconferencing
Communication •Telecommuting

•Electronic data interchange for order processing

Transactional •Corporate contact management
Processing •Online databases for ordering

•Marketing strategy built around benefits important to customers.

•Emphasis on service
Product •Focusing on the few attributes that really set you apart means you can’t be all things to all
Positioning people.
•Keep an eye on how your competitors are positioning themselves.
•Positioning: The Battle for Your Mind

•A computer system that coordinates the marketing elements and provides feedback for
measurement.
Using computer databases to coordinate all marketing function
Integrated •Combining demographic characteristics with geographic variables to develop clusters of
Marketing similar individuals.
Summary
 Extensive knowledge of customer and sales
situation types is a key ingredient in effective
adaptive selling.
 Experienced salespeople organize customer
knowledge into categories.
 The social style matrix illustrates the concept of
developing categorical knowledge to facilitate
adaptive selling.
 The social style matrix is one example of a
categorical scheme salespeople can use to
improve their knowledge and adaptability.

63
End of Chapter 6
Thank you