This past week, my wife inadvertently drop kicked our toaster oven and
caused it to experience a catastrophic failure. The toaster oven, the
microwave and my grill are necessary to sustain life at our house if I
have to fix any food. The toaster oven is great because it works well
for just the two of us and I don’t have to fire up the oven to
bake or broil something.
Since I wanted to fix some salmon in the toaster oven and we were
without, it required a trip to our local discount store to find a
replacement. Upon reaching the appropriate aisle, we were confronted
with 6 choices and the only point of differentiation was price ranging
from just under $20 to slightly over $60. It was then that I started
thinking about the different levels of selling and this was the lowest
possible level.
Level 1 is self service. I even cornered an “associate” to
get more information, but she really didn’t have anything to
offer.
It was about this time that I came to realize that there was boxed
inventory above the display. Pulling down box after box, it became
apparent that the manufacturers had outlined the features of each unit
on the exterior of the box.
Level 2 selling is when the product features are provided. This
information may be beneficial to a knowledgeable consumer, but it
didn’t mean a lot to me. It was then that I turned to my wife for
help. She was able to provide me with an explanation for each of the
features.
Level 3 selling is when the benefits associated with the features
are provided. An option on one of the ovens we looked at was a
convection feature. I had no idea what that was and my wife explained
that it helped provide a more even heat. While I thought the even heat
thing sounded good, I didn’t really understand what that meant to
me.
Level 4 selling is when the benefits can be turned into “You
can” statements. What I really wanted was someone to tell me that
because of the convection feature that I could cook my salmon better or
faster. Maybe that the cooked food would be juicier or more flavorful
because of this feature. (Oh well, I can dream can’t I?) I am
such a sucker for a good salesperson that I can be easily maneuvered
from the perfectly adequate basic unit to a high end sale if someone
will just help me justify that the high end unit will help me to do
something beyond what the basic unit will allow me to do.
We finally decided on one of the toaster options, purchased it and
headed home to fix the salmon. All the way home I kept thinking about
the different levels of selling and it dawned on me that I had
experienced another level of selling many years ago when I got my first
apartment in New York. One of my first visitors was an Electrolux sales
person and my first acquisition was an Electrolux vacuum. I had
acquired an old canister vacuum from my parents before I left for New
York, but I remember the sales person dumping dirt on my carpet. I got
out my hand me down vacuum and cleaned up the mess the best I could.
The Electrolux sales person then cleaned where I had cleaned and
demonstrated how much more the Electrolux picked up than my existing
unit. I bought the Electrolux.
Level 5 selling is when the product can be experienced or demonstrated to outperform the other option or options.
When you think about how you market your product, at what level are
you selling your product? Is there something that you could do to help
move to a higher level and increase your sales and/or your
profitability?
About The Author
performance and profitability in their organizations. Check out other
interesting articles available in the Taking Aim newsletter available
at www.cannonadvantage.com . Bob can be reached at (216) 408-9495 or
mailto: bob@decision-makingtoday.com
This article courtesy of http://www.cannonadvantage.com.
You may freely reprint this article on your website or in your
newsletter provided this courtesy notice and the author name and URL
remain intact.
Copyright Bob Cannon/The Cannon Advantage, 2007. All rights reserved.
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Distributed by Hasan Shrek, independence blogger. Also run
online business ,matrix,internet marketing solution ,online store script .
Beside he is writing some others blogs for notebook computer ,computer training ,computer software andpersonal computer,Cyber Forest,internet weapon,talk about business ,business is my blood ,hasan's blog ,cyber business
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