Gap Selling

In today's fast-paced and information-rich world, traditional sales techniques are becoming increasingly ineffective. Keenan's book "Gap Selling" offers a fresh perspective on how to succeed in sales by focusing on the customer's problems rather than simply pushing products. This approach, known as problem-centric selling, aims to bridge the gap between a customer's current state and their desired future state.

Introduction

"Gap Selling" challenges the conventional wisdom of sales tactics that have long been considered standard practice. Keenan argues that in an era where buyers have access to endless information about products and services, the old playbook of promoting features, building rapport, and using high-pressure closing techniques no longer works. Instead, he proposes a method that prioritizes understanding the customer's real-world issues and tailoring solutions to address those specific problems.

The book's subtitle, "How Problem-Centric Selling Increases Sales by Changing Everything You Know About Relationships, Overcoming Objections, Closing and Price," encapsulates the core philosophy of gap selling. This approach isn't just about making a sale; it's about creating a partnership where buyers become enthusiastic collaborators in the process.

The Problem with Traditional Sales Approaches

To illustrate the shortcomings of traditional sales methods, Keenan presents a scenario involving a plumbing supplies salesperson and a contractor. In this example, the salesperson follows the old-school playbook:

1. Qualifying the budget and authority
2. Delivering a slick pitch about product features and benefits
3. Providing detailed technical specifications
4. Using high-pressure closing techniques

Despite following these seemingly correct steps, the sale falls apart. The reason? The salesperson completely missed the customer's real problems by focusing solely on product information and sales tactics.

The Power of Gap Selling

Gap selling takes a radically different approach. Instead of jumping straight into a product pitch, it emphasizes:

1. Deeply understanding the buyer's problems
2. Identifying the gaps between their current state and desired future state
3. Demonstrating how your solution bridges those gaps

The key to success in gap selling lies in the first step: diagnosing the buyer's current state. This involves diving deep beneath surface-level issues to uncover the core strategic problems faced by the customer.

A Gap Selling Example

Returning to the plumbing supplier scenario, here's how a gap selling approach might play out:

1. The salesperson begins by asking probing questions about the contractor's current problems and goals.
2. Through this inquiry, they discover that the building has 50-year-old galvanized steel pipes that corrode easily, leading to leaks and rusty water.
3. These issues create costly repairs and tenant dissatisfaction, potentially damaging the contractor's reputation and increasing liability.
4. The salesperson learns that the contractor wants to prevent these problems by using pipes that won't corrode from the city's acidic water.

With this deeper understanding, the salesperson can now present their polymer-coated pipes as a direct solution to the corrosion issues. By taking the time to uncover the real problem, they can tailor their solution and clearly demonstrate how it addresses the customer's pain points.

The Four Steps to Customer Clarity

Keenan outlines a four-step process for achieving customer clarity within the gap selling framework:

Step 1: Gathering Facts

This initial step involves collecting information about the customer's situation. It's crucial to resist the urge to pitch and instead focus on listening intently to understand the contours of their challenges.

Step 2: Digging Deep into Specific Problems

Once you have a general understanding of their situation, it's time to explore the specific problems at hand. This means going beyond surface-level issues to comprehend the true impact on the customer's business.

Step 3: Gauging Tangible Impacts

This step involves quantifying the effects of the identified problems. How much time and money are these issues costing the customer? Consider both immediate and long-term consequences, including reputational damage and indirect costs.

Step 4: Unveiling Root Causes

The final and most critical step is identifying the true root causes of the customer's problems. This might involve gaps in processes, outdated tools, or resource deficits. By pinpointing these underlying issues, you can better position your solution as the missing link between their current reality and desired future.

The Importance of Resisting the Pitch

After completing these four steps, it's crucial to resist the temptation to immediately launch into a product pitch. By guiding the customer through this discovery process, you've allowed them to lay out the ideal solution themselves. Your job now is to position your offering in a way that aligns seamlessly with their narrative.

This approach creates a significant shift in the buyer's perception. Instead of feeling like they're being subjected to a scripted sales pitch, they experience a consultative discussion where their needs are truly understood and addressed.

The Power of Pre-Call Research

Keenan emphasizes that effective gap selling begins long before the first interaction with a prospect. Thorough pre-call research is essential for developing a deep familiarity with the prospect's business. Key areas to research include:

1. Company initiatives: What strategic projects are underway? What goals is leadership emphasizing?
2. Team structure: Who are the main decision-makers? What initiatives do they own?
3. Recent performance: How has the company been performing financially? Where have previous initiatives succeeded or failed?
4. Industry landscape: What macro trends or disruptions is the industry facing? How are competitors positioning themselves?
5. Technology: What systems and tools does the prospect use? Are they outdated or cutting-edge?

This research serves two important purposes:

1. It helps you craft smarter discovery questions tailored to the prospect's specific situation.
2. It builds immediate credibility by demonstrating your knowledge to the buyer.

Active Discovery: Uncovering the Current State

With pre-call research complete, the next step is to engage in active discovery to identify the customer's pain points and show how they create frustrating gaps in their work. Keenan suggests exploring multiple types of problems:

Technical Problems

• What specific limitations exist with current products, tools, or capabilities?
• How do these gaps hinder performance?

Business Problems

• What processes, workflows, or constraints are driving the technical gaps?
• How are these tied to business objectives?

Quantifiable Effects

• What concrete, measurable impacts do these problems have on operations?
• Which of the customer's goals become harder to achieve because of these problems?

It's crucial to push beyond vague or superficial answers when discussing problems. Use probing follow-up questions to grasp the nuances and root causes of both technical and business issues.

The Art of Questioning

Effective gap selling relies heavily on the ability to ask insightful questions. Keenan provides guidance on how to structure your inquiries to uncover the most valuable information:

1. Start with open-ended questions to encourage detailed responses.
2. Use follow-up questions to drill down into specific areas of interest.
3. Ask "why" multiple times to get to the root of issues.
4. Encourage the prospect to quantify the impact of their problems.
5. Explore both the current state and the desired future state.

Some example questions might include:

• "What's the biggest challenge you're facing in your role right now?"
• "How is this problem affecting your team's productivity?"
• "If you could wave a magic wand and solve one issue, what would it be?"
• "What have you tried in the past to address this problem?"
• "How would solving this problem impact your bottom line?"

Building Trust Through Understanding

One of the key benefits of the gap selling approach is its ability to build trust with prospects. By taking the time to truly understand their challenges and goals, you position yourself as a trusted advisor rather than just another salesperson trying to push a product.

This trust-building process involves:

1. Active listening: Giving your full attention to the prospect and showing that you value their input.
2. Empathy: Demonstrating that you understand and care about their challenges.
3. Expertise: Sharing relevant insights and knowledge that add value to the conversation.
4. Transparency: Being honest about what your solution can and cannot do.

As trust builds, prospects become more open to sharing deeper insights about their business, which in turn allows you to provide even more tailored solutions.

Bridging the Gap: Presenting Your Solution

Once you've thoroughly understood the customer's current state and desired future state, it's time to present your solution as the bridge between the two. This presentation should be highly tailored to the specific gaps you've identified during the discovery process.

Key elements of an effective gap-bridging presentation include:

1. Recapping the customer's current challenges and desired outcomes.
2. Clearly articulating how your solution addresses each identified gap.
3. Providing concrete examples or case studies of similar problems you've solved for other clients.
4. Quantifying the potential impact of implementing your solution.
5. Addressing any potential objections or concerns proactively.

Remember, the goal is not to overwhelm the prospect with features and benefits, but to show a clear path from their current pain points to their desired future state.

Overcoming Objections in Gap Selling

Even with a thorough discovery process and tailored solution presentation, objections may still arise. In the gap selling framework, objections are viewed as opportunities for further clarification and alignment rather than obstacles to overcome.

When faced with an objection:

1. Resist the urge to immediately counter or defend your position.
2. Ask questions to understand the root of the objection.
3. Relate the objection back to the gaps you've identified together.
4. Collaboratively explore how addressing the objection fits into the larger picture of solving their core problems.

By maintaining a problem-centric approach, you can often turn objections into opportunities to strengthen the case for your solution.

The Role of Price in Gap Selling

One of the most significant shifts in the gap selling approach is how it handles pricing discussions. Instead of focusing on justifying the cost of your solution, the emphasis is on the value of solving the identified problems.

When the time comes to discuss price:

1. Remind the prospect of the quantified impact of their current challenges.
2. Frame your solution's cost in terms of the value it delivers and problems it solves.
3. If necessary, break down the return on investment over time.
4. Be prepared to walk away if you truly can't deliver enough value to justify the cost.

By anchoring the price discussion in the value of solving real problems, you shift the conversation away from pure cost comparisons and towards a more holistic view of the solution's worth.

Implementing Gap Selling in Your Organization

Adopting a gap selling approach often requires a significant shift in mindset and processes for sales teams. Keenan offers advice on how to implement this methodology across an organization:

1. Train salespeople to be curious problem-solvers rather than product experts.
2. Develop a robust pre-call research process and provide the necessary resources.
3. Create discovery question frameworks tailored to your industry and common customer challenges.
4. Align marketing materials and sales collateral with a problem-centric approach.
5. Adjust performance metrics to value quality discoveries and solutions over pure sales numbers.
6. Encourage collaboration between sales, product, and customer success teams to continually refine the understanding of customer problems and solutions.

Conclusion: The Future of Sales

As Keenan concludes, the era of slick product pitches and high-pressure sales tactics is over. Today's buyers are sophisticated, well-informed, and immune to traditional sales approaches. To thrive in this new landscape, salespeople must embrace the consultative, problem-centric approach of gap selling.

By focusing on deeply understanding customer challenges, identifying gaps between current and desired states, and positioning solutions as bridges to cross those gaps, salespeople can create genuine value for their prospects. This approach not only leads to more successful sales but also fosters stronger, more trusting relationships with customers.

The key takeaways from "Gap Selling" are:

1. Prioritize discovery over promotion.
2. Dig deep to understand the root causes of customer problems.
3. Quantify the impact of current challenges and potential solutions.
4. Position your offering as a bridge between the customer's current state and desired future state.
5. Build trust through genuine understanding and problem-solving.

By mastering these principles, salespeople can transform their role from mere product pushers to trusted advisors, creating value for both their customers and their organizations in the process.