Closing the Sale Sales

How to Have a Successful Sales Call

By WeddingPro

Selling tips for wedding pros

There are a lot of things that have to align in order for you to book a full calendar of business as a wedding professional. From an eye-catching portfolio and engaging brand to an effective marketing strategy and sales funnel, you’re responsible for wowing potential clients at every turn. Because of that, having confidence in every aspect of your business is crucial to reaching your goals—especially having confidence in your ability to close a sale. The thing is, sales can be uncomfortable for a lot of people (even people who are good at it). So today, we wanted to make sure that you have what you need in order to book that full calendar. Read on to learn about what you need to do to have a successful sales call and get the sales tips that will help you be as confident as you can! 

 

Ways to prepare for a sales call

Just as it is important for you to prepare for a wedding day, it is important for you to prepare for every sales call or consultation. Because, regardless of how many years you have been in business and how many couples you have worked with, each one is unique and what is going to get them feeling good about hiring you is different. From getting some insight into their personality to trying to figure out what might be the biggest selling point you can make, sales calls are too important to show up and wing it. That doesn’t mean you have to spend a ton of time doing your best detective work; rather, you simply need to make sure you have reviewed the important information and refreshed your memory.

• Re-read the initial inquiry exchange to make sure you have pulled out the helpful information they provided, took notes about anything that might be unclear, and prepared answers to any questions they expect 
• If appropriate (meaning you are not in-person) pull up your website and open any sales or pricing information you have sent them and might need to refer back to
• Have your calendar open or nearby for reference as well (in case any additional meetings or calls end up being scheduled)   
• Prepare your thoughts or notes about what services you are going to sell to them (this is essentially the answer to when they ask, “How can you help us?”)  

 

Create a sales call sheet

One of the most effective ways to make sure your sales call is going to be successful is to come to it with a sales call sheet. This is essentially a template that you can tailor to each consultation as a part of your preparation and then use on the call to make sure you ask all of your questions, organize the details, and take notes. The key here is to create a template that doesn’t just help you collect the basic information you need but actively moves the conversation along—giving you the details you need to put together a proposal that really helps you close the sale. As you sit down to create yours, think about the way you want the sales call to flow; which might look like this:

• A welcome and a few minutes to kick off the conversation with small talk
• Questions that help you qualify them as a lead by understanding things about their budget, expectations, and priority
• Questions that help you understand if you are a good fit based on style, personality, and resources
• An opportunity for them to express any concerns or questions they might have
• An opportunity for you to present your initial sales pitch based on your conversation
• A closing that includes next steps for both you and them

When you build your sales call sheet around the structure of the conversation itself, it might not look how you expect if you are including housekeeping details for the end. But, doing this allows you to work through the document in a chronological order (meaning you aren’t bouncing around to make sure you’ve touched on everything you need). And, if you need a place to start, go ahead and copy and paste the details you see below—just be sure to customize it with the additional questions you need to ask to your potential clients on your sales calls!

 

Couple’s names:

Referral:

Wedding date:

Wedding venue:

 

Estimated guest count:

Ceremony start time:

Reception start time:

 

Services needed: 

Budget for services needed: 

Priority:

 

Other vendors already booked: 

Name:

Phone:

Email:

 

Name:

Phone:

Email:

Feeling more confident about your upcoming sales calls and want to feel just as good about the rest of your sales funnel? Learn more about the content you should be creating in order to market your business during engagement season, how to reply to online leads, and how to close a sale based on personality.

 

 

Photo Credit: Pixelhead Photo DigitalSkillet/shutterstock.com