“Counting is not selling.” This sales mantra comes from the now 74-year-old American sales guru Brian Tracy. And this sales wisdom is still frequently proclaimed by trainers and other sales engineers.

Of course, well-thought-out questions are still valuable, even indispensable, in sales practice. So keep doing it. But there is also an additional way to make an impact on your customer: sharing your expertise. And you do that by…telling.

Why?
Both you as a sales professional and your customer are dealing with impactful developments. Consider the increased availability of information, rapid changes in technological, social and political areas and changed customer behavior. Sometimes it's hard to keep up. Who was concerned with big data ten years ago? Who knew the term AI? Who knew what blockchain was? For customers, knowledge of developments and their consequences for their business is crucial for success. This offers a wonderful opportunity for you in your commercial role.

Claiming credibility v. being credible
Many purchasing decisions revolve around trust. An important building block of trust is 'credibility'. Saying that you are credible leads to distrust rather than trust.
Credibility is something your customers need to experience. How do you achieve that? Including by sharing relevant knowledge and expertise. If you demonstrate your expertise, your conversation partner will more quickly get the feeling that you are the right person to do business with.

Professional preparation is crucial
You can do this, for example, by telling how your product or service has helped other customers solve similar problems. If you want to do this in a targeted manner, professional preparation for a commercial conversation is essential. So sorry: 'just be yourself', 'fall in love with your customer' and those kinds of phrases sound wonderfully romantic and hip, but in serious sales settings more is needed for success. Sharing expertise therefore requires preparation. The amount of time for this varies per type of sales and situation. For many B2B situations, 30-45 minutes is a good guideline. Start with the customer's environment. For example, check things like:

• What are the latest developments at the company?
• What are the most important trends and developments in their industry?
• Who are their main competitors?
• What is their most important target group and what developments are taking place there?
• How can my service or product be valuable to them?
• In what similar situations have customers chosen me and why?
• Etcetera.

Sales friend Google and industry reports from banks or consulting organizations are practical sources for your preparation.

Good timing for good questions…
You start the conversation with your customer well prepared. The moment at which you share your expertise naturally varies per situation. I advise you not to wait too long. Sharing professional expertise increases trust and the sooner that happens, the better. For example, you can indicate: 'During my preparation for this interview, I read that many companies in your industry are dealing with trends X, Y and Z. To what extent is that recognizable to you?' Or 'What we often see is that X (topic, trend) is an important theme in your practice. How do you deal with that?'

In this way you profile yourself as a professional who immerses yourself in the customer's world in advance. This gives you an important advantage over sales pros who limit themselves to asking questions. And especially the talking brochures in the field that tire the customer with promotional talk about their product.

… and telling...
Later in the conversation you can further demonstrate your expertise. An effective way is to describe practical examples that are relevant to the customer. Introduce this subtly by asking, for example: 'Recently we came up with a number of ideas for this in a similar situation. Can I tell you more about that?' Or: 'Another customer of ours also wanted to improve that. We then developed an approach for this that he is very satisfied with. Are you interested in knowing how we did that?'

...is selling
Then make sure that your practical case is concrete, recognizable and realistic. Preferably with numerical substantiation. That's sometimes quite a lot of work, you may think. That's right, it is. On the other hand, it is a powerful tool that will increase the depth of your conversations, accelerate trust and increase returns. So counting and selling; discover the possibilities in your sales practice!