One of the best ways to improve your script for setting appointments by phone is to include some pre-qualifying questions at the core of the script.
What are Pre-Qualifying Questions?
Pre-qualifying questions are questions that determine if there is at least a slight fit on the prospect’s side for what you are trying to sell. These are very soft questions that try to learn more about what the prospect is doing in the area where your product fits.
This can help you to identify if the prospect is using anything similar to what you sell. Or if they are having any of the problems that you help to fix. You could also ask some light questions to determine if the prospect is the right person to speak with or if the business fits in terms of being the type of company that you work with.
Why this is Helpful
Your time is extremely valuable and not everybody fits well with what you have to offer. One of the keys to protecting your time (and the prospect’s time) is including a few pre-qualifying questions in your script for setting appointments by phone.
Decreasing the time you waste on bad prospects should translate into dollars in your pocket. But the power of centering your pitch around good sales questions does not end there. Here are some other ways this will transform your game:
- Shifts the focus of the call from you to the prospect—less “all about me” type of approach
- Makes the call more interactive and engaging for the prospect
- Gives a purpose to the call—looking to ask a couple of questions
- Extracts valuable information
- Helps you to protect your valuable time
- Makes you seem more professional and consultative, less pushy
- Makes you seem more trustworthy because you are asking them questions before selling
- Helps to build rapport as it shows you as being interested in learning more and caring about the prospect—operating with the prospect’s interests ahead of yours
- Presents you more as a consultant or business person than a salesperson
- Provides one of the best places to turn for objection rebuttals—redirect to one of your pre-qualifying questions
How to Create Your Pre-Qualifying Questions
Unfortunately, we cannot just give you a list of pre-qualifying questions for your script for setting appointments by phone because everybody’s questions can be different and very tied to what you sell. What we can do is provide you with a logical process to follow to build your own list of pre-qualifying questions.
- Step 1: Identify the benefits that your products and features offer to the buyer persona that you are targeting
- Step 2: For each benefit, identify the corresponding problem that is resolved, minimized, or avoided
- Step 3: For each problem, compose a question or two that probes for the existence of the concern or problem, and these will be a good start for a list of pre-qualifying questions
We hope this helps you with creating a script for setting appointments by phone.