Arm your team with sales skills that will accelerate revenue growth for your company.
Sales is the lifeblood of your pest control business. Are you taking the right steps to make sure your team has the necessary knowledge to perform to the best of their ability?
There is a lot of advice out there for pest control sales on all of the different ways to “improve your pitch” or “negotiation tactics” you can use to close more business. However, before you can provide a solution or start talking pricing, you have to make sure the customer wants to keep talking to you!
That’s where Sales 101 comes into play. We’re going back to the basics to look at the importance of a value statement and how to overcome objections. By focusing on developing these two key areas with your employees, you will see the greatest impact on making sure your sales staff gets to the contract signing stage with a prospect.
Define Your Value Proposition
As a business owner, you are probably pretty comfortable with telling people why they should do business with you. But how good are the rest of your employees at it? If you stopped and asked someone in your office to tell you, in a few sentences, why you should purchase an annual pest control maintenance program with your company, what would they say? Can they answer in a concise way that explains the value of the program and the benefits of your company’s solution over the competition?
If they can’t, they need some practice. A well-crafted value proposition will effectively differentiate your company’s products and services from the competition and make it clear why your pest control company is the best choice for the job. The good news is that this is a skill where the more you say it, the better you get at it!
There are 3 key items you can include in your value statement:
1. Relevancy
Explain how your product or service solves customers’ problems or improves their situation.
2. Quantified value
Deliver specific benefits.
3. Differentiation
Tell the customer why they should buy from you and not from the competition.
Your value proposition should be a unique identifier for your business. It can also help take the focus away from selling solely on price. Let’s say you have someone call in with a cockroach problem. At this point, the caller may just be shopping on price. But your team member listens to their needs and responds, “We can solve your cockroach problem with a gel bait insecticide (relevancy) and by acting immediately, you can avoid food contamination (quantified value). Our company offers hassle-free, round the clock service and a 1 hour response time to complaints (differentiation).” You’ve just given this customer 3 great reasons to immediately schedule an appointment with one of your service technicians. You’ve offered them value beyond the price of the cockroach treatment.
Work with your staff on defining value propositions for each of the core areas of your business. Have them write them down and practice saying them during team meetings. Collaborate with each other to come up with the best value propositions everyone can use. The more comfortable they become with stating value propositions, the more natural it will become to work them into customer conversations.
Overcoming Customer Objections
Another area to focus on for immediate impact is overcoming customer objections. Do you have any people in your office that hear one “no” from a customer, and they say, “Ok thanks anyways,” and hang up the phone? We’ve been conditioned from a young age to stop what we’re doing when we hear the word “no,” but in sales you have to view an objection as a challenge you can overcome.
Top 10 Customer Objections Heard in Pest Control Sales:
- Pest Control Maintenance is too expensive.
- I’m under contract with another company.
- I’m a renter.
- It’s cheaper to do it myself.
- I’m worried the chemicals are bad for my children and/or pets.
- I only want a one-time service.
- I’ve never heard of your company.
- I don’t have the budget for an annual plan.
- I’m busy. Can you call back later?
- I never see any bugs in my house.
Do some of these sound familiar? I’m sure you’ve heard every reason in the book on why someone can’t do business with you. Objections can be frustrating; however, try to consider them in a positive light.
It’s an opportunity to address your customer’s concerns upfront and reemphasize the value of your services. As long as you keep the conversation positive and consultative, it’s an opportunity to strengthen your rapport with the customer and move the sales-cycle forward in a non-confrontational way.
Here are four steps you should follow to overcome an objection:
Step #1: Listen–Don’t interrupt! Active listening reassures your customer you have their best intentions in mind.
Step #2: Understand–Empathize with your customer and repeat a summary of their objection back to them to make sure you clearly understand their concern. Ask clarifying questions if you need additional details.
Step #3: Respond–State your rebuttal that overcomes the customer’s objection.
Step #4: Confirm–Ask the customer if they’re satisfied and comfortable moving forward.
Now that we’ve covered the steps, let’s take a look at how applying these to a customer objection might go:
Customer: Pest control is too expensive.
Salesperson: I understand you feel pest control can be expensive, but having an annual preventative program in place can actually save you money. If you wait until pests are already present, not only do you have to pay to get rid of them, but you might also have to spend extra money to repair any damage they cause to your property. Have you had a past experience with a pest issue where you feel like you didn’t get the value associated with the cost?
Customer: Yeah, I signed up for a quarterly maintenance plan once before, and I never knew when they were coming or if they actually did the treatments.
Salesperson: Yes, I can see how that would feel expensive when you’re not sure if you’re getting what you’ve paid for. Our company sends you a text message 2 days prior to when we’ll be in your area. That way if you have a problem area that needs additional attention, you can call our office to have that included with your quarterly treatment at no extra cost. We also send you a text message when our technician is 30 minutes from your home. If you’re not home, no worries, we will place a company door hanger on your front door letting you know we’ve been there and completed treatment.
Customer: Wow, it sounds like your company really goes the extra mile.
Salesperson: Yes, we pride ourselves on our customer service, on top of getting rid of any pest problems. Do you feel as though I’ve answered your questions, and we can move forward with setting up an appointment for your first treatment?
This salesperson acknowledged the customer’s objection, empathized with his cost concern and gave a solid rebuttal demonstrating how not paying for preventative maintenance can actually be more expensive in the long run. He then asked a follow up question to understand why the customer perceived pest control as costly. By asking that question, he learned the customer’s true objection was his lack of perceived value due to the poor customer service he had previously experienced. This gave the salesperson an opportunity to describe his company’s customer service and secure an appointment for a new service contract.
