What is SPIN Selling? Technique and stages

2024 Author: Howard Calhoun | [email protected]. Last modified: 2023-12-17 10:16

Neil Rackham's SPIN sales were patented by him as a successful means of promoting products on the market. It has been tested by many enterprises that have had large sales all over the world. Transactions with such economic entities are the more successful, the more competence and qualifications the seller has.

Origin

SPIN sales started with a study conducted by Huthwaite in the 1970s. 35,000 meetings were held, during which the following issues were raised:

1. Are there special skills to guarantee success in large sales?
2. Are fundamental skills different from those of any other implementation?

Sponsored by such research companies IBM and Xerox. They hired the best sellers who were good at small sales but failed at big deals.

As a result of the study, it was found that success was accompanied by those who, in largein sales used a special skill called SPIN.

Today this technology is used everywhere in all the world's largest companies. It is believed that using the practical guide to SPIN sales, it is possible to sell goods to such buyers, to whom it would seem impossible to sell anything under the classical scheme.

Steps

This system consists of four steps. This is noticeable by the capital letters present in its name:

• С - situation;
• P - problem;
• And - extraction;
• N - direction.

If the sequence is followed, then the sale of goods is successful.

At the C-stage, the seller needs to figure out for what purpose the client wants to make this particular purchase.

At stage "P" the seller must find out with the help of a leading question the problem that worries the buyer. At the same time, you need to try to give the impression that he is only trying to find out, and not solve it.

Step "And" suggests that the solution to the problem will be reached by the buyer. At the same time, the seller begins to ask questions more actively, and the client must formulate a solution to the problem himself.

The last step "H" assumes that the buyer will make an independent decision on the need to make such a purchase, based on the advice of the seller.

Advantages of Technology

SPIN selling has a number of advantages:

• this technology can be used in any area of trade;
• keach client has his own special individual approach;
• the seller for the buyer acts as an adviser, not an imposition of goods;
• the client believes that he made an informed choice.

Competent selling should be based on the principles of customer satisfaction. Thus, customer focus is essential to ensure success in the distribution of goods.

Factors that made SPIN a successful technology

There are only three of them:

• more sophisticated salespeople have emerged with an emphasis on building relationships;
• customers have changed, who began to pay attention to those business partners who understand their problems;
• specificity of the large sales sector, where the research is most important.

Situational questions

The SPIN sales technique involves several types of questions. At the “situation” stage, sellers find out the current situation or facts from the client. Questions are mostly of no interest to the buyer and are more important to the seller. He can ask the following of the situational questions:

• How many people work in your office?
• How long is the production cycle in the company?

As shown by Rackham, SPIN sales should include a minimum of situational questions. Usually they are asked more than even planned. Buyers quickly get bored, seem boring and boring.

Customer information should be found from other availablesources. However, a minimum of such questions should be asked. Successful salespeople don't use a lot of them when communicating with customers.

Problem issues

They relate to the dissatisfaction, difficulties and problems that the buyer has in relation to the current situation, which can be solved with the help of the goods sold.

The following are examples of these:

• What problems does your company have in this area?
• What is keeping you from reaching your goal?

For experienced salespeople, problematic issues make up the main group. This is due to the fact that any goods solve someone's problems. If the seller correctly determines what products the buyer needs, then by doing so he contributes to resolving a certain difficulty.

For example, buying a Rolls-Royce, the buyer raises his self-esteem by demonstrating his status. In the same way, any product can be brought up to solve certain problems.

However, some believe that problematic questions do not solve the problems of large sales, but only small ones.

Extraction questions

They are the most powerful. However, they are set by a few and only the best sellers. Their presentation of solutions and products is not done at the very beginning of the conversation with the buyer. The seller should be aimed at asking the client about his problems, which will contribute to the emergencerelationships between them and potential solutions.

Extraction questions include those in relation to the essence and consequences of the problem under discussion. In SPIN selling, for example, you can use the following questions:

• How do the issues discussed affect your company's position relative to your competitors?
• How will the problem affect the productivity of your workers?

These questions hurt the client and make them work. As a result, he seeks a solution to get rid of these unpleasant sensations. Thus, first you need to create pain in the buyer, strong needs, and only then offer them a solution.

The seller must proceed from the following provisions:

• you need to choose the problem that can be solved or in the solution of which the seller has a competitive advantage;
• mentally imagine a conversation with a client;
• you also need to understand that the problem may seem insignificant to the buyer, not worth the effort to resolve it;
• need to think about how to convince the client that this problem is important, that it is worth the effort and cost incurred to solve it.

In order for a seller to understand the essence of extractive questions, he must understand the reasons that will prove that the buyer is wrong.

Guiding questions

They refer to finding out the usefulness of the solution or its value to the client. For SPIN sales, these include, for example:

What is the reason for the importance of the problem being solved?

What would be the savings for your company if the time spent on a specific operation could be reduced by 15%?

That is, these questions are aimed at solving. That is why buyers perceive them positively as useful and constructive.

Guiding questions can be the mirror image of extracting questions. For example, the latter might sound like this: “Could unreliability lead to additional costs?” The guiding question will sound like this: "If you increase the reliability of the system, will the company's costs decrease?"

Good sales people use both types of questions in their work. With this type, the implementer asks the client for things that are implicit. The buyer himself talks about the benefits that such a decision will bring him. The seller should not talk about the benefits of a particular product, but direct the buyer to the correct answer. For example, the question “How can the system that we are implementing help you?” The buyer himself offers solutions, the seller acts as a less assertive person.

Thus, guiding questions allow you to create conditions under which buyers will convince themselves of the benefits of purchasing this particular product.

Tech highlights

Neil Rackham's "SPIN Selling" is not about treating a model as a fixed formula. It describes how the best sellers of big sales do it. They usually start the discussion with situational questions.for help, then switch to identifying one or more issues.

At the same time, the seller should ask problematic questions until the client switches to these problems himself. Then you need to increase the pain by asking extractive questions, after which they move on to guides. However, this sequence is not strict. In the course of the discussion, it may change somewhat. Good sales come from flexibility.

Objection avoidance

Experienced successful salespeople have few objections because they know how to prevent them.

The advantages that the seller lists may cause various objections from the client. This may be due to the fact that the buyer may consider overpriced one that is offered for only a little, in their opinion, an improved product.

Neil Rackham's book on SPIN selling aims to resolve this dilemma. The buyer must decide for himself that he needs this product at this particular point in time. The salesperson must master the art of asking the right questions. In this case, the number of objections will be reduced to a minimum. It is also necessary to develop the needs of customers.

In closing

SPIN Selling brings new customer acquisition methods to the big selling sector that are used by the world's leading sellers. They involve a departure from traditional situational questions.leaving their minimum number with switching to problematic and extracting varieties, during which problems are identified. The client, with the help of the seller, searches for a solution that would satisfy him.

The latter can, with the help of correctly formulated questions, direct this decision in his favor. The sequence of SPIN, incorporated in the name, is not a panacea, which must be strictly adhered to. The discussion can also take place according to a slightly modified scheme. The main thing at the same time is to achieve a minimum number of objections and bring the buyer to the point where he makes his own decision.