731: Why You Should Flip the Sales Script, with Oren Klaff

Oren Klaff, Managing Director of Intersection Capital and bestselling author of Pitch Anything: An Innovative Method for Presenting, Persuading, and Winning the Deal and Flip the Script: Getting People to Think Your Idea is Their Idea, joins me on this episode. KEY TAKEAWAYS Buyers have become increasingly empowered in the years since Oren wrote Pitch Anything. Now, buyers receive your proposal and then can search everywhere online to find the lowest price. Buying options reduce conversion rates and take the margin out of selling. That’s why Oren wrote Flip the Script. When the buyer chases you, you close sales deals. Andy and Oren discuss maximizers and satisfiers. Anyone who asks you for a proposal plans to ask you for a discount when they compare proposals. Oren finds from his consulting that when buyers are motivated and decide to work with you, that decision is resilient throughout negotiations and distance. But when buyers have many objections, you don’t close deals. Objections come from two reasons: 1. Your status as a salesperson isn’t high enough; 2. You’re not perceived as an expert. Status measures your trustworthiness and credibility. Expertise provides certainty for the buyer. When the buyer assigns you trust and certainty, they want you to do business with them. Oren says the basis of feeling like or being an insider wins deals. It involves being able to talk to someone in their language about their business. People are skeptical of outsiders and their promises. Inception (with credit to the movie) refers to the writing a storyline to ensure that the audience deduces the solution before the characters do. That aha moment makes you feel good. Oren applies that to selling. Oren discounts decision-making theories. Oren does not recommend storytelling in spite of the storytelling culture in which he was raised. Storytelling is too hard for most people to use effectively. Oren explains the Flash Roll. Give the buyer details about your business, their problem, and the probable solution, in their technical language, told quickly, in under 30 seconds, as if you have delivered the solution 1,000 times. Andy recommends listeners to get Oren’s book, FLIP THE SCRIPT. Most of Oren’s customers are respected, technical people of high status who are not interested in cheesy tactics and don’t want to sell. The book shows you how to get your buyer to want and need to buy from you. Powered by ringDNA: the revenue acceleration platform that helps businesses scale growth through AI. Visit ringdna.com/andy for exclusive Sales Enablement content. _ Formerly the Accelerate! Your Sales podcast with Andy Paul