Is there any difference in the how you sell to a man compared to a woman?

Is there any difference in the how you sell to a man compared to a woman?

I really believe that with all sales there is a process which needs to be adhered to, regardless of the size of the sale, length of time it takes to make the sale or the gender of the buyer.

I am also very clear about the fact that selling is about relating, and to the extent that men and women relate differently.

These are to me the essential steps of the sales process:

• Initial contact: the greeting, the smile, the welcome.
• Personal contact: “How are you today?”, “You look great today”, “How did your footy team do at the weekend?”
• Create desire: this is the discovery process which starts with targeted questions to help determine the level of the buyer’s interest and leads to presenting the product or service in the exact way required by the customer.
• Proposition: once we know exactly what the buyer wants or needs and we have shown that we have a solution, product or service we can put forward the proposition, “So when can we get started? How soon do you need this?”
• Close: really has already been partially done through the discovery and then through putting the appropriate proposition. So now we are ready to sign, agree to buy now or do whatever brings the sale to a close.

Through each of these stages we need to relate and connect to our customer, regardless of gender.

However, it would seem that men and women connect on different levels. Men may be more interested in technical facts, for example about a car, women more interested in simply whether it will be reliable. But it would be wrong even in the case of cars to assume.

I think the real decider here about the difference in sales approach relates more to the product being sold than gender of the buyer.

Equally important is the fact that regardless of gender we are all different and need to be treated as individuals.

That is why the art of relating is more important than the gender of the buyer.