Selling for Solo Consultants – Questions are Critical

Preparing a Prospect for Closing the Sale
Okay, you’ve marketed yourself to your target clients and now you’re meeting with a qualified decision-making prospect, either in-person, by phone, or virtually by videoconference,  such as Zoom. How do you get their business?

First, ask short, probing, open-ended questions to discover and deeply understand:

• Their problem or situation, and how it’s affecting them? Quantify it when possible.
• What attempts have they made to solve the problem or improve the situation and how those worked out?
• What do they want done now about their problem or situation?
• What do their desired results look like, and what value would they gain? Quantify it when possible.
• When do they need to solve the problem, in other words, is their urgency?

Now, it’s time to sell
You did very little talking as you actively listened to their answers. So, now you:  

• Explain how your service will produce their desired results and provide client value and benefits.
• Build credibility by citing how you’ve helped clients in similar situations, in other words, tell  a client story.
• Develop trust. Offer client testimonials and contact information.
• Describe your uniqueness and how it differentiates you from other consultants.
• Respond to their concerns.
• Offer content options for pricing. For instance, the full program, less content than a full program, or a minimum or starter program. NOTE: If possible, avoid discussing hourly rates.

Now What?

• You’ve had friendly and productive discussions.
• You’ve shown empathy and not been pushy.
• You’ve built trust by showing sincere interest in satisfying the client.
• They’ve listened, asked questions about your service, and seem interested.
• You’ve addressed objections.
• So, how do you get them to become your client?

Closing the Sale
Closing can happen at the end of your Sales Process, or earlier if the potential client gives early signals that they’re ready to buy. Many opinions exist about the best closing questions. The following closing decision questions might fit your situation and help you close the sale. NOTE: These questions don’t need to be used together and none of the questions are open-ended.

• So, shall I sign you up to start solving your problem with the Full Program option?
• Do you have any questions before we sign the contract?
• When would you like me to start on your project?

Practice and Refine Your Sales Process
Personalize, optimize, and adapt the process above to prepare a prospect to accept your offer. Keep learning, practicing, and improving your selling skills.

Generative AI: A Simple Overview

Generative AI is a fascinating and rapidly evolving field of artificial intelligence that has the power to create new content, including text, images, music, videos, and even software. If you're new to this concept, keep reading for a simple explanation of what generative AI is and how it works.

What is Generative AI?

Generative AI refers to a class of artificial intelligence models designed to generate new content based on the data they have been trained on. Unlike traditional AI, which focuses on recognizing patterns and making predictions, generative AI creates original content that mimics human creativity.

How Does Generative AI Work?

Generative AI models learn from large datasets to understand the patterns and structures within the data. Once trained, these models can generate new content that follows similar patterns. There are several techniques used in generative AI, but two of the most common ones are:

1. Generative Adversarial Networks (GANs)

GANs consist of two neural networks: the generator and the discriminator. The generator creates new content, while the discriminator evaluates its quality. In essence, GANs are like a game where the generator tries to create convincing fake content, and the discriminator tries to catch it. This process helps both parts improve, resulting in highly realistic generated content.

2. Transformer Models

Transformer models, such as GPT (Generative Pre-trained Transformer), use a different approach. They learn the relationships between words or pixels by analyzing large amounts of text or images. Once trained, these models can generate coherent and contextually relevant content. For example, GPT-4, a popular transformer model, can generate human-like text based on a given prompt.

Here's a simple breakdown:

1. Generative: This means the model can create new content, such as sentences, paragraphs, or even entire articles, based on the input it receives.
2. Pre-trained: Before being used for specific tasks, the model is pre-trained on a large dataset of text from books, websites, and other sources. This helps it learn the patterns and structures of human language.
3. Transformer: The transformer is the underlying architecture that allows the model to process and generate text efficiently. It uses an "attention mechanism" to focus on relevant parts of the input text, helping it understand context and relationships between words.

GPT is a powerful AI model that can generate human-like text by leveraging its pre-training on vast amounts of data and its advanced transformer architecture. It's used in applications like chatbots, content creation, and language translation.

Applications of Generative AI

• Text Generation: AI models like ChatGPT, Copilot, and Gemini can generate human-like text for blog articles, social media posts, project proposals, and chatbots.
• Image Generation: Tools like DALL-E, Imagen,  and Midjourney can create unique images based on textual descriptions.
• Video and Animation: AI tools like Synthesia can generate lifelike videos and animations for entertainment and education.
• Music Composition: Generative AI can create original music compositions in various styles and genres, using tools like Suno or Udio.
• Software Applications: Mobile Apps, Web Apps, and Desktop Apps are getting easier to create by people without extensive programming or development experience.

Generative AI is a powerful and exciting field that brings creativity and innovation to artificial intelligence. By understanding the basics of how it works and exploring its applications, we can appreciate the potential of generative AI to transform the way we create and interact with content. Whether you're interested in writing, art, music, design, or software, generative AI offers many possibilities for creativity and exploration.

—Bob Manard

Enhancing Human CapitalSM (EHCSM) Deep Dives

Last Month's Lunch-n-Learn
“AI and Organizational Culture: Adapting to the New Work Era”
As AI continues to reshape the workplace, it’s not just technology that’s evolving — organizational culture is also transforming. Our February EHC deep dive explored the cultural shifts, challenges, and opportunities that AI integration brings to micro and small businesses, including changes in leadership, employee experience, collaboration, and ethical considerations. The group also discussed strategies for maintaining a positive and inclusive workplace culture while leveraging AI’s potential.

Upcoming Lunch-n-Learn
Thursday, March 20, 2025
The topic for March’s Deep Dive will be announced soon.

RPCN’s Enhancing Human Capital Lunch-n-Learns are held via Zoom on the third Thursday of every month. Our program starts and 11:30 a.m. ET and runs until 1:00 p.m. ET. Please join us for the next session on February 20th. To get more information about EHCSM, click here or email the EHC team.