"[the gap] between where they [the customer] are now and where they want to go [..] represents the value of the sale to the buyer. And the sales person. Without it there is no sale", says Keenan, author of the book "Gap selling".
It takes a sizeable gap to trigger change
All sales are about change. In the most simple case it is a change in a customer's financial situation - they need to spend resources on your product or service. But usually it is a lot more complex:
There are administrative cost involved in setting you up as a supplier.
The customer needs to develop trust that you can deliver on your promise.
There are operational changes to be made to handle your product.
And all that is before we even talk about your product being either significantly different from the previous solution or something entirely new for your customer.
So why should your customer go through all that change to buy your product or service?
That only makes sense if your target customer sees a significant positive impact from the change. "Customers do like change when they feel it's worth the cost" says Keenan.
The gap is unique for every customer
And this impact comes from solving a problem. A problem that creates a gap between the current state your customer is in and the desired future state. And while the evident need, the product or service a customer is considering to buy, might be the same for several customers, their problem is always unique and so is their gap.
Think about two people wanting to visit a concert. For one the concert ticket might be worth little, as he/she is only looking for an entertainment for the evening.
But it might mean everything for the other person if that person is a life-long fan and this is the goodbye tour of the band.
It always depends on the internal and external situation of your customer.
In order to evaluate a gap you need to understand not only what the customer believes they want, but why they want it.
For the first person the gap between the current state and the desired future state is to feel entertained. He/she might be equally happy with a ticket to any other kind of event. Or maybe a home event with friends. Therefore there are plenty of solutions able to close this gap. The gap is small and the value of the impact is low.
For the second person the gap between the current state and the desired future state is to create a life-long memory he/she will cherish deeply. There are very few offers which could close the gap. The gap is significant and the value of the impact is high. These are the people, who happily pay thousands for a ticket, others pay only hundreds for.
What you need to know to evaluate your customer's gap
So in order to evaluate your customer's gap you need to discover:
the 'problem' your customer needs to solve,
the unique impact solving that problem has on your customer,
quantitative data to evaluate the impact,
the size and scope of your solution to determine how much of the impact you can deliver.
And while that might already sound like more work than the usual acronym named sales frameworks, it becomes even 'worse'.
Because your customer might not be aware of any part of the gap
Yes, it is quite likely that your customer is not fully aware of the problem that needs to be solved, nor the impact it would have to solve it or the value that would have.
This is usually the case because customers don't know what type of solutions are available, they only know their direct immediate need. So it is your job to discover it for them. Like Keenan says in his book:
"[Gap] selling is a process of tactfully challenging buyer's assumptions, exposing or confirming the true size of their problem, then correctly assessing the impact it will have on their lives. And finally offering a solution to solve or reduce."
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