Dan Ariely describes an experiment in his book Predictably Irrational.
MIT students took part in a taste test between two beers: a regular Budweiser and a Budweiser with a few drops of vinegar in it (called MIT Brew).
When the students didnât know the beer contained vinegar, many of them chose it.
But when another group was told in advance what it contained, something strange happened.
They thought it tasted bad.
The exact same beer.
The exact same type of people.
The only thing that changed was the expectation.
Ariely conducted a similar experiment with coffee. The same coffee was served in two different cups:
âïž Exclusive cups
đ„€ Simple Styrofoam cups
The coffee in the nicer cups was perceived as tasting better. Students were also willing to pay more for it.
The exact same coffee.
This reveals something quite uncomfortable:
We donât experience the world as it is.
đWe experience it through the context and expectations that surround it.
And this is where the connection to sales becomes interesting.
Successful salespeople donât start with the solution. They start with the context.
They change how the customer sees their problem.
âĄïž Create a new insight.
âĄïž A new perspective.
âĄïž A mental aha moment.
This changes how the customer interprets their situation and their expectations, just like in Arielyâs experiments.
In B2B, the challenge is therefore often not to make the customer understand the solution.
đ The challenge is to create the right context and the right expectations around it.
This is something most people working in B2B sales have experienced:
A solution can feel obvious and compelling in one meeting, and completely uninteresting in another.
So perhaps the most important question in a sales presentation is:
â
How can we create the right context for the customer when presenting our solution?
Here you can read more about how to develop your sales approach.
