Category: High Probability Selling

Blog posts that explain High Probability Selling

Seminar Selling and High Probability Selling – An Open Discussion on Zoom, Wed 1 Mar 2023

Seminar Selling is when you make a presentation to an audience about what you offer, with the hope that some people will buy from you.

We will talk about what happens when you combine High Probability Selling with Seminar Selling.

We will use Zoom video conferencing.  The discussions will be led by Paul Bunn and Carl Ingalls. Recordings will be made available to participants only.

We are offering this meeting twice, on Wednesday 1 March 2023, at 10am and again at 4pm (USA Eastern Time). No charge.

If you want to attend, please send us your email address, and let us know which time. 

Rediscovering High Probability Selling – An Open Discussion

Let’s talk about Rediscovering High Probability Selling.  There are new developments in areas like Inbound Prospecting and Social Media, plus a new way of teaching. 

We also want to hear about people’s experiences with High Probability Selling. 

We will use Zoom video conferencing.  The meeting will be led by Paul Bunn and Carl Ingalls, and will be recorded. 

We are offering this meeting on the following dates and times (USA Eastern Time): 

  1. Wed 15 Feb at 2pm
  2. Thu 16 Feb at 7pm
  3. Fri 17 Feb at 9am

If you want to attend, please reply to this email, and let us know which date. 

What If They Complain About the Price?

Suppose you sold an expensive dining room set for $3000, and suppose the customer calls you later and says that their cousin’s neighbor’s sister got exactly the same set for $700 less.

What do you do?

General Rule: Listen more and talk less. Ask questions that get the other person to talk. Don’t argue. Don’t explain or justify yourself any more than is necessary. Don’t try to change the customer’s mind about anything. Let the customer talk more than you do. 

The best thing for you to start with is to say, “Ok.  What do you want to do?”  Say it in a neutral tone, with a downward intonation at the end, and don’t rush it. Pause a bit after saying ok and before you ask what they want to do. Then listen.

Here is a list of some of the things that a customer might say to your question about what they want to do, and how you can reply.

  • Cust:  “I want you to give me $700 back.”
    You:   “That won’t work for me.  You can return the dining room set and receive a full refund of the purchase price, not including the delivery charges.  Or you can keep the set. What do you want to do?”
  • Cust:  “Why did you charge me $3000?”
    You:  “That’s what I sell it for.”
  • Cust:  “Why did someone else get it for so much less?”
    You:  “I don’t know.  You could ask them.”
  • Cust:  “I think it’s really unfair that I had to pay that much when someone else got it for less.”
    You:   “Ok.  What do you want to do?”
  • Cust:  “I want my money back.”
    You:   “Ok.  You can get a full refund of the purchase price of the dining room set, but not of the delivery charges.  Do you want to go ahead with that?”

The above is one example of how a practitioner of High Probability Selling might handle a situation like this, when following the Mindset of HPS.

Questions, comments, and ideas from readers are very welcome.

Judging

We try not to judge, but it’s a difficult habit to break.  Sometimes we do it without intending to.  Sometimes we are completely unaware of it.

I’m talking about the Good vs Bad kind of judging that we do when we apply it to people and what they do.  We form a value opinion, and then we drop our opinion into the world where it does its damage.

In High Probability Selling (HPS), we do our best to avoid this kind of judging.  Nothing positive, nothing negative.  Neither good nor bad.  We consider it too manipulative.  People are less likely to trust us.

It takes a great deal of work to become more aware of how our opinions – and how we state them – make other people feel judged and pressured.  Good intentions are not enough.

If you want to read some guidelines about how we avoid judging, see a previous article on this blog, “You Have to Get Personal“.

Questions and comments are very welcome.

Sales Copywriting Tactics and High Probability Selling

Are sales copywriting tactics compatible with the non-manipulative methods of high probability selling?

The question is:

“Is using a marketing sales letter that uses the sales copywriting tactics of direct response marketing compatible with the non-manipulative methods of high probability selling process?”

This question was asked by a reader in a comment on this blog, and I decided to write a post about it.

The short answer is: NO.

The most common sales copywriting tactics are completely incompatible with High Probability Selling (HPS). And for most copywriters, even the fundamental purpose of copywriting is incompatible with HPS.

One copywriter explains the difference in purpose between copywriting and other writing in his article, “81 staggering lines in literature“:

“Unlike writing, copywriting exists to get the reader to do something, buy something, sign-up for something or share something.” He goes on to say, “copywriting exists to elicit an action in the reader.”

In High Probability Selling, we DO NOT attempt to get anyone to buy. Not even a nudge one way or the other. We do try to be as clear as possible about what it is that we are offering, and we do try to get the prospect to make an immediate decision about whether they want that or not. But nothing intended to influence that decision.

So, what about sales copywriting? What would that look like if you wanted to make it completely compatible with the methods and principles of High Probability Selling?

Here is what I think sales copywriting would look like if it were to be compatible with HPS.

  • Informative, without attempting to influence or impress the reader. Our primary purpose is to provide the information that someone might want in order to make a well-informed decision.
  • Honest, full disclosure of what is relevant.
  • Balanced, revealing both pros and cons.
  • Neutral, objective (factual), transparent. No exaggerating.
  • Concise, direct, to the point.
  • Short and simple, easy to read. What it’s about should be immediately apparent to the reader, as quickly as possible. If details are necessary, put them further down the page.
  • Focused more on what a customer receives (The Get), and less on what the seller does.
  • Features (what the customer gets immediately) are more important than benefits (potential later outcomes).
  • No pressure. No pushing, not even a nudge.
  • Provide options.
  • Ask for a decision. One of my favorite ways to do this is, “What do you want to do?”

My opinions on this are based on years of conversations with Jacques Werth (founder of High Probability Selling) and others, plus my own thinking and experience.

What are your thoughts and experiences about this?

“What Is High Probability Selling” – An Interactive Video Discussion with Carl Ingalls on Tue 6 Apr 2021

Anyone may attend, including those who have not read the book, High Probability Selling. No charge.

I (Carl Ingalls) will answer a few most commonly asked questions, plus as many questions from the audience as I can.

The discussion will be conducted through Zoom, and it will be recorded. The recording will be made available to the public later.

Details:

  • Date: Tuesday 6th April 2021
  • Time: 1pm USA Eastern Time (same as New York City)
  • Duration: 1 hour
  • Cost: No charge

If you want to attend this discussion, please contact Carl Ingalls by any of the following methods:

High Probability Selling Was Discovered, Not Made

Jacques Werth discovered what he later called High Probability Selling (HPS) by observing and documenting what hundreds of highly successful salespeople were doing.  He invented the name, and he invented a way of talking about it and teaching it, and he wrote the book, but he did not invent the method of selling.  It was already out there.  That’s where he found it.

I asked him why he used the phrase “Re-invents the Selling Process” on the cover of his book.  He told me that, at the time, lots of successful authors were saying things like that on their books and it seemed like a good idea.

In those days, Jacques tended to use conventional methods in marketing.  In later years, he moved toward marketing methods that were more compatible with his preferred selling method.

One of the things that distinguishes HPS from other selling methods is that it’s all about discovery—all the way through the entire process.  Discovering a sale, not making one happen.

I see High Probability Selling itself as something to be discovered, not controlled.  That is the way I prefer to work with it.  Learning, talking, and teaching.

Comments and questions are very welcome and appreciated.

 

Interview of Carl Ingalls About High Probability Selling, Hosted by Julius Csizmazia, Wed 13 May 2020

Julius Csizmazia will interview Carl Ingalls (that’s me) on Wednesday 13 May 2020, from 3pm to 4pm Eastern Time USA.  The topic will be High Probability Selling.  Questions from the audience will also be accepted.

The interview will be conducted via Zoom Video Conferencing.  Participants are welcome to join the meeting live, no charge, up to a maximum of 100 individuals.  For instructions, see below.

The meeting will be recorded (audio and video), and the recording will be offered for sale later.  The price for the recording will be somewhere between $5 and $10 (free).

Instructions.  If you want to join this video conference live, please send an email with your request to Ingalls@HighProbSell.com, and I will reply with detailed instructions for signing onto the Zoom meeting.  The price to attend is zero.  Questions in advance are also welcome.

About Julius Csizmazia.  His LinkedIn profile at www.linkedin.com/in/juliuscsizmazia/ gives an overall description.  His team building business at www.JuliusTeamBuilding.com describes his relationship with High Probability Selling more deeply.

Note added on Wed 24 June 2020 by Carl Ingalls.  The recording of this interview is now available for viewing on You Tube.  See www.youtube.com/watch?v=ugB5p0XDpGQ (no charge, no registration).

Mindset, a New Mini-Course in HPS

The next HPS Mini-Course will be a short webinar session about the Mindset of High Probability Selling, on Thursday 9 January 2020 at 11am USA Eastern Time.  39 minutes for $39

The Mindset includes attitudes, feelings, beliefs, habits, concepts, principles, guidelines, and language.

This is a very condensed version of a much longer course (see the High Probability Mindset Discovery Workshop).

The webinar will be led by Carl Ingalls in real-time (live).  Content is mostly audio (speaking), with some video (text, graphics).  The session will be recorded (audio and video, plus transcript), and the recording will be made available to everyone who signs up (and pays for) the mini-course.  The recording of this session may be offered for sale later.

The webinar platform is GoToMeeting.  If you have not already downloaded and installed the GoToMeeting app on your computer or mobile phone, I strongly recommend that you do so at least 30 minutes before the webinar begins.  And even if you have the app and are already familiar with GoToMeeting, please note that they have changed their user interface quite significantly recently, so I recommend joining the meeting 5 or 10 minutes early.

The price is $39 USD per person.  However, I have 10 introductory discount coupons to give away, each $9 off.  If you want one, please contact me (Carl Ingalls) by phone at +1 610-627-9030 or by email at info@HighProbSell.com (before you click on the purchase link below).

If you want to purchase this HPS Mini-Course about the Mindset of High Probability Selling now, you may use this link:  https://high-probability-selling.myshopify.com/cart/31226966409276:1?channel=buy_button

Future HPS Mini-Courses will appear on the HPS Training Calendar at least a week before they are scheduled.

More info can be found at www.HighProbSell.com/workshops/index.html#minicourses

Operating a Car vs Driving One – A Metaphor About Learning High Probability Selling

I learned how to drive on a tractor.  No, I take that back.  I learned how to operate a tractor on a farm, and from that, I learned how to operate a car.  That’s not the same as learning how to drive a car on roads that include other cars.

We lived at the end of a very long and narrow gravel driveway, and therefore the cars driving on the paved road at the other end of the driveway were not really visible.  Imagine if I had never seen anyone driving a car on a real road (nor ridden in one).  And further imagine that I believed that I knew how to drive, and was confident enough to take a car on the road.

To me, this scenario seems a bit like learning the how-to part of High Probability Selling (HPS), without learning the mindset of it.  The process without the understanding.

Jacques Werth preferred to teach HPS as a step-by-step process, a recipe or script.  He was very successful with a number of people.  For those people, understanding came after the doing.

However, focusing on the process as a recipe or script does not work at all for a lot of other people.  For some of them, it can create misconceptions about HPS.  Without the underlying understanding, many of them seem to have difficulties in remembering the details of the process correctly.

I prefer to focus more on the mindset of HPS and less on the process, both in my teachings of it and in my application.

I plan to offer a very short mini-course on the Mindset of HPS as a 39-minute webinar, sometime in January 2020.  It will appear on the HPS Google Calendar, and also as an announcement in this blog.

I also offer a 3-week workshop on the Mindset of HPS, which goes much deeper into the material.  Scheduling is based on demand.

Comments and questions are welcomed.

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