Making a sale requires us to be with the person that can make the decision. Unfortunately, many companies you sell to will not allow access to the people that really “call the shots”. Or at least they will make it seem that way. Instead, they force us to deal with information collectors who will bring “the committee” the information without having to meet with the salesperson. Or, people often make themselves out to be the decision maker when in fact they are not. In either case, we are stuck with a non-decision maker and dramatically lower our chances for success.
We have learned that finding the decision maker can be easy to do when you think about the decision process or how the decision is made rather than who makes the decision.
Suppose you were talking to “Joe” at Acme Industries. Rather than ask Joe if he is the decision maker, a better strategy to follow is to ask Joe how Acme makes this type of decision? This process oriented question will now get Joe to begin to divulge their decision making process. Joe might say, “In order for me to make this type of decision I would need to see a proposal.” To determine if Joe is the decision maker we would need to ask, “If you get the proposal and let’s say you like what you see, what would a next step be for us?”
Joe has two options:
The first is to say, “If I like what I see I will buy it.”
The second is to tell us what the next step is in the decision making process. He might need to say, “If I like it I would then bring it to Bob for his approval.”
By asking “What happens next?” we find out if they are able to buy or if there is another step in their decision making process and we need to stay on top of them. The key in finding the decision maker is to not ask “Who is the decision maker”, but to ask questions regarding the process they use to make decisions.
Remember, after each step of their decision making process always ask “What happens next”. Understanding their process is the key to getting to the real decision maker.
