Jack Griffin - How to Say it: Creating Complete Customer Satisfaction: Winning Words, Phrases, and Strategies to Build Lasting Relationships in Sales and Service

HOW TO SAY IT

Creating Complete
Customer Satisfaction

HOW TO SAY IT

Creating Complete
Customer Satisfaction

Winning Words, Phrases, and Strategies to Build Lasting Relationships in Sales and Service

JACK GRIFFIN

Prentice Hall Press

PRENTICE HALL PRESS

Published by the Penguin Group

Penguin Group (USA) Inc.

375 Hudson Street, New York, New York 10014, USA

USA / Canada / UK / Ireland / Australia / New Zealand / India / South Africa / China

Penguin Books Ltd., Registered Offices: 80 Strand, London WC2R 0RL, England
For more information about the Penguin Group, visit penguin.com

Copyright 2013 by Jack Griffin

All rights reserved.

No part of this book may be reproduced, scanned, or distributed in any printed or electronic form without permission. Please do not participate in or encourage piracy of copyrighted materials in violation of the authors rights. Purchase only authorized editions.

PRENTICE HALL PRESS is a registered trademark of Penguin Group (USA) Inc.

Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data

Griffin, Jack.

How to say it : creating complete customer satisfaction : winning words, phrases, and strategies to build lasting relationships in sales and service / Jack Griffin.

p. cm.

Includes bibliographical references and index.

ISBN: 978-1-101-62368-8

1. Selling. 2. Customer services. 3. Consumer satisfaction. 4. Business communication. I. Title.

HF5438.G8837 2013

658.812dc23 2012040877

First edition: March 2013

Text design by Tiffany Estreicher

While the author has made every effort to provide accurate telephone numbers, Internet addresses, and other contact information at the time of publication, neither the publisher nor the author assumes any responsibility for errors, or for changes that occur after publication. Further, the publisher does not have any control over and does not assume any responsibility for author or third-party websites or their content.

Most Prentice Hall Press books are available at special quantity discounts for bulk purchases for sales promotions, premiums, fund-raising, or educational use. Special books, or book excerpts, can also be created to fit specific needs. For details, write: Special Markets, Penguin Group (USA) Inc.,
375 Hudson Street, New York, New York 10014.

To Flora

PREFACE

Like my other How to Say It books, How to Say It: Creating Complete Customer Satisfaction provides practical, results-oriented guidance for effective communication, with emphasis on words, phrases, scripts, and strategies applied to real-world examples and scenarios.

In contrast to the vast majority of books that deal with customer communication, How to Say It: Creating Complete Customer Satisfaction does not separate sales from customer service communications, but instead integrates the two fields into a single book. This innovative approach is intended to directly engage the current realities of business in two key dimensions:

How to Say It: Creating Complete Customer Satisfaction is a book for anyone today who has, who needs, who needs more, and who does not want to lose, customers. It is a book for the new business reality that volumes focused exclusively on sales or service do not adequately address. It is a book about using language to create satisfaction in the whole customer all the time and in every phase of the sales-service cycle.

SPEAK THE LANGUAGE OF YES

The six chapters that follow will teach you the essential language of sales and service, including how to prepare yourself to communicate in ways that always address the customers needs and wants, how to identify prospective customers, and how to develop a vocabulary of value. You will also learn the time-tested AIDA formula for making a sale and creating a loyal customer; you will learn to welcome resistance and convert it into a selling opportunity; and you will master the all-important art of the close.

CHAPTER 1

Prepare Yourself

Youve probably heard about it. Maybe its even happened to you. You get asked the infamous sell me this pen job interview question. It goes like this: You apply for a sales job, and you snag an interview. Now youre sitting face-to-face with the boss. Suddenly, she takes a pen from her desk and hands it to you.

Sell me this pen, she says.

What do you do?

Your first impulse is to object that you dont know anything about this particular brand of pen. So how can I sell it? A salesperson has to know the product, right? How can I sell something thats just been handed to me?

But you resist the impulse to protest. (Good thing, too. You really want the job.) Instead, you scramble to make stuff up about the pen. You invent a feature. You comment on the style. You talk about the price. If you can tap-dance like this for three or four minutes, you may even create a favorable impression. After all, the question didnt make you go blank, which is what would happen to a lot of people. Will the tap dance be enough to get you the job? Maybe, provided you dont sweat too much or start to look sick or gaze down at the floor, the ceiling, and every place but the other persons eyes. Maybe just the ability to say something and to look reasonably convincing will be enough.

Maybe. Probably not.