Eliciting Definitions

I'm sure you've heard the old English idiom, 'the devil is in the details.' Involved in any plan or scheme are often things that will take the most thought or time in the long term to smooth out. The same goes for criteria elicitation. Sometimes we need to get deeper than the surface answers we're getting from our prospects. We need to explore the details and definitions of exactly what it is they want.

Criteria is the cornerstone of all sales. It is, to use a sports metaphor, like getting the ball down the alley each and every time. When we further define the criteria, it's a strike dead on every time.

This is how definitions work.

I've done a lot of trainings and had many students in my coaching club. Everyone has their own specific reason for coming, yet many of them have very similar sounding criteria. If I have two students who tell me that the reason they're at the training is because what's being taught is very important to them in their sales, well, that's the surface criteria.

If you ask them, "Is this important to you? Do you really want to learn this?" Both of them will say yes.

When you ask the first person they say they're there because they want to learn new skills. And so your follow up question is to ask what that means and they say that they want to see a list of skills and they want to participate in exercises using the skills so they can learn them.

Whereas the second student, when asked why they believe the training to be important might say that they are doing it to be recognized by their peers, and maybe the teacher or other students.

So these two students are willing to pay for and participate in this training, but the similarities in their criteria re: the training being important to them, are backed up by radically different definitions.

For any of you that have taught in front of a group, you'll know what I'm talking about here. In any group there will be a section of people that probably know your material and maybe reasonably well, or at least think they do. There will be a group of people that are star struck, thinking, wow, I'm really in the presence of a master.

You'll also have a majority of people interested in really simply looking to gain knowledge for the sake of knowledge and value that above all else.

It is very important that you begin to understand that every time you think you know what someone wants, unless you ask the questions, you don't know what they want. You're not on target or on track and until you elicit both the criteria, the meaning, and the definition, you are missing the boat.

Knowing criteria is most definitely a good start. If you want to bowl strike after strike, the key is to learn how to define their criteria.

More articles in this Category

1: How To Market On eBay 2: Internet Marketing-Which Rights Are Best? 3: EBooks- Golden Internet Marketing Idea 4: Online Membership - Hot Topic in Internet Marketing 5: Private Label Rights -Is The Expense Worth It? 6: Writing Your First e Book 7: Your Title Is Critical For Each eBay Selling Ad 8: Drop Shipping Business Dos And Don'ts 9: Looking To Sell Items On eBay? Why Not Try Dropshipping? 10: More Simple Steps To A Killer Sales Letter