There are 4 questions that will open up a conversation easily. FORM is how I used to remember the order of the 4 big questions when I was in the Investment Advisor business. Family - Occupation - Recreation & Money.
F: Ask about their family and then tell them about yours
O: Ask them about their job. Compare notes about how your jobs compare or differ.
R: Ask them what they do outside of work for fun. Sports, hobbies, volunteer work. Talk a bit about what you have in common.
M: For Investment advisors, of course Money is the key topic, but it shouldn't be discussed till you have gotten to know the person, so it comes last. For non-investment advisors, the M can be Motivation, not Money, where the discussion might be about politics, or religion.
You should be able to have a great initial conversation around these 4 questions, and of course, these same questions can be revisited in future meetings to form the basis of the next conversation.
Mitch Anthony, author of StorySelling, has this to say about the above:
Your level of inquiry reveals your level of interest in the client.
If you don’t invest in sufficient discovery, you appear to be more interested in pushing a product than you are in helping your client.
The laws of intelligent selling:
- The more you learn about the experiences and views of your clients, the more weight they will give to your experience and views.
- People like being asked.
- People like to talk about their life.
- People respect you for asking.
- People feel more important because you asked.
