In order to give a customer those things that are going to motivate him to give you what you want in return, you have to know what his wants and needs are. Unfortunately, research shows that anticipating another person’s wants and needs is not something most of us do well. This is especially true when it comes to dealing with customers. There is a tendency on the part of most of us to assume we know what a customer’s wants and needs are, rather than to do the legwork necessary to find out what those wants and needs actually are.
This was exactly what happened at Vingresor Airlines in Sweden. The top managers of this firm, most of whom were just over thirty years old, had come to realize that senior citizens were a category of customer worth pursuing in the travel business. In their infinite wisdom, this top management team assumed that Swedish senior citizens were fearful of traveling abroad and would want to stay in special hotels filled with other Swedish senior citizens. They also assumed that older people preferred getting out and seeing the sights, as opposed to sunbathing on the beaches. So they arranged lots of brief excursions interspersed with plenty of restroom breaks.
The top management at Vingresor never bothered to verify these assumptions. They went ahead and invested $100,000 in brochures alone to promote their tour packages, only to have no one sign up. Subsequent market research revealed the cause of this colossal failure. As it turned out, Swedish senior citizens actually preferred to be mixed in with younger adults in hotels that catered to active lifestyles. In addition, over sight-seeing, they preferred sunbathing in places like Mexico, the Canary Islands, and Sri Lanka.
Often we fail to realize that wants and needs have two dimensions: business and personal. The business dimension deals with the factual aspects of a sale—things like price, quality, level of service, and so on. The personal dimension deals with the human aspects of a business transaction. Any highly successful salesperson will tell you that while both dimensions are important, paying attention to the personal aspect of a sale is what really makes the difference.
A number of years ago, shortly after I completed my Ph.D., I decided I wanted to get into the consulting and training business. I had picked up a few small jobs, but nothing of any great size. Finally, my chance came to land what I considered a biggie. The job involved forty days’ worth of training per year for an indefinite number of years. I was excited and started putting a selling strategy together to make sure I landed this job. I assumed, as there were lots of good consultant/trainers running around, that I was in a very competitive situation and the customer would primarily be interested in price. Thus, I decided I would lower my already low asking price by 25 percent in order to make sure I would have a fighting chance to land this job.
I arrived at the corporate headquarters on a Monday morning at 8:15 to be interviewed and, I hoped, to negotiate the price and terms of an agreement. I was met in the lobby by one of the members of the corporate staff who informed me that the meeting would start a half hour later than originally scheduled. The reason for this was that the corporate staff was supposed to have met the previous Friday to jointly plan the meeting with me. However, the president called them into another meeting, which lasted past 5:30 p.m., and the planning meeting concerning me never took place. This staff member apologized for inconveniencing me and took me to his office where he told me to make myself at home until the meeting started.
As it turned out, this staff person had a secretary who was very friendly and personable. After we had talked for a while, I felt comfortable asking her some questions about the training program. When I asked if her company had ever conducted such a training program in the past, she told me they had during the previous year, but it had ended in disaster. She went on to say that the instructors had done such a poor job that the program participants had gotten up and walked out before noon on the first day of the program. Moreover, she informed me that the corporate staff was really under the gun to find a quality instructor this time, because the president himself was going to sit in on the program to make sure it was done right. She also volunteered that because one of the staff members had attended one of my seminars during the previous year, I was the only person they were considering for the job!
As you can see, my initial assumptions could not have been more wrong. This staff’s main concern was not low price; it was whether or not I would make them look good in front of the president. If I could convince them that I would do just that, the job would be mine and price would not even be an issue (as long as it was within reason). I immediately raised my asking price by 50 percent and quickly developed a strategy to convince the corporate staff that I would make them look good in front of the president. I got the job and the price I asked was not even questioned. The president loved the program and I went on to do it for five more years until everyone in the corporation who needed the program had been through it.
