Use the Problem to Sell the Solution

Word Count: 1,539 Estimated Read Time: 6 Min.

Problems are opportunities and every company is in the problem-solving business.  The goal of sales, then, is to understand each customer’s very specific problem / need and help find the optimal solution.  When a salesperson can identify a customer’s problem and then offer the best fix, the customer is more likely to buy.  Seems obvious and yet so many companies get it wrong.  They spend a lot of time describing the products or services they sell rather than the solutions they provide.  Here’s the difference and why it matters. 

One customer’s problem – from the biggest pebble in the shoe to their worst nightmare — can be a sales opportunity for a smart business.  It does several things at the same time.

1. For a business that helps solve a client’s problem, it shows the customer that the company understands their needs.  There is a chance to demonstrate expertise.  A company that understands their pain points is more likely to devise the right solution to eliminate that pain.
2. It also shows that the salesperson cares.  It gives that person a chance to build rapport with the customer.  When talking to a customer about the customer’s problem, there is an opportunity not just to understand but also to bond.  That customer will be more likely to trust the salesperson and open to buying from him.  By understanding the customer’s problem and offering a solution that solves that problem, a salesperson can be more successful in closing the sale.
3. When a customer is willing to talk about a problem, it shows interest in solving it.  It means the customer is more likely to be receptive to a solution.  If the customer believes the company can solve their problem, they’ll be more likely to buy from it.

This can turn an obstacle into an opening and a problem into a possibility.   Case in point.  In the late 1800s, Levi Strauss started out as a dry goods merchant in San Francisco.  He wasn’t having much success doing that.  But he saw that the gold miners and other workers in the area needed durable pants that could withstand the rigors of their work panning for gold in the rivers. Strauss partnered with Jacob Davis, a tailor, to develop a new type of pants made using rugged denim fabric used in their tents plus rivets. The rivets were designed to reinforce the seams and prevent the pants from tearing.  The first pair of Levi’s jeans was sold in 1873 (a full 24 years after the initial gold rush that led thousands to move to California), and they quickly became popular with miners and other workers too.  The jeans were known for their:

• Durability: Levi’s jeans were designed to be durable and to withstand the rigors of hard work.
• Comfort: Levi’s jeans were designed to be comfortable to wear, even for long periods of time.
• Affordability: Levi’s jeans were designed to be affordable, so that they would be accessible to a wide range of people.

Levi’s Jeans have continued to be popular for over 150 years and are now worn by people all over the world.  They are seen as a symbol of American culture.  They were a major innovation in the clothing industry and helped to revolutionize the way people dressed.  The fact that they are still popular today demonstrates the lasting value of a product that was created as a solution to a problem.

For a company to provide solutions for customers, it must:

A. Be able to identify a customer’s problem. 

The first step in solving a customer’s problem is to identify what the problem is. Salespeople need to be able to ask the right questions and listen carefully to the customer’s answers in order to identify the problem.  This might seem obvious, but many salespeople often have blinders on when it comes to their product or service.  As the saying goes, “If all you have is a hammer, everything looks like a nail.”  First coined by Abraham Maslow in his 1966 book, “The Psychology of Science”, this expression is based on a cognitive bias that involves an over-reliance on a familiar tool.  This means that if you are only familiar with one way of solving a problem, you’ll tend to see every problem as if it could be solved with that one tool.  For example, a carpenter who only knows how to use a hammer, might try to use a hammer to solve every problem that comes along. This might work for some problems, but it would not work for all problems. For example, a carpenter can’t use a hammer to fix a leaky faucet or unclog a drain.  Some problems call for a plumber, with other skills and tools, rather than a carpenter.  So a company should try to have different tools that its clients can use to solve different problems.  It is important to be flexible and have a slate of different tools to solve different problems.

B.  Offer solutions that solve a customer’s problem.  

Once the salesperson has identified the customer’s problem, they need to be able to offer “the best solution” for that problem.  Not just any solution, but the optimal one.  The solution should be something that the customer is interested in and that they believe will solve their problem.

C.  Build rapport and trust with the customer. 

In order to be successful, the salesperson must be able to connect with the customer on a personal level and inspire confidence that he has the customer’s needs at heart. When the customer trusts the salesperson, they are more likely to be open to buying from them.

In fact, Marc Andreessen, once said that “The best companies are the ones that solve problems that people didn’t even know they had.”  That means looking ahead and identifying the pain points before customers have even had a chance yet to articulate the need.  Steve Jobs at Apple did that with laptop computers and smart phones.  Like Jobs, Andreessen knows a thing or two about solving customer problems.  An American entrepreneur, venture capital investor, and software engineer, Andreessen was the co-author of Mosaic, the first widely used web browser with a graphical user interface.  He was also co-founder of Netscape and today is co-founder and general partner of Silicon Valley venture capital firm Andreessen Horowitz, which funds startups that are solving customer problems.  Andreessen says that to determine if it is selling a product/service or solution, see if the sales pitch or marketing materials starts with:

• Our company is…
• What we do is…
• We’re in the business of…

What the sales and marketing team should be saying is:

• The problem we address is…
• The value we create is…
• The issue we tackle is…

Forget PR.  Solve the Problem!

For a company to be successful, the key is NOT to describe what the company does.  People buy to solve their own problems and it is the company’s job to make it clear that they understand what the issues are and have a way to solve them.  It is not necessarily important for a business to be widely known and popular, but rather to be essential even if it is from behind-the-scenes.  There are many little-known companies that offer products or services that are widely used by a multitude of industries even if the general public is unaware.  

For example, for internet-based, e-Commerce companies, there are a multitude of businesses that comprise the tech stack that makes everything work smoothly.  They do this with little fanfare.  For example:

• Cloudflare is a content delivery network (CDN) that helps to improve the performance and security of websites. Cloudflare is used by over 25 million websites, including some of the most popular websites in the world. However, most people are not aware of Cloudflare because it works behind-the-scenes.
• Twilio is a cloud communications platform that allows businesses to send and receive text messages, make and receive phone calls, and build voice and video applications. Twilio is used by over three million developers and businesses, including Uber, Airbnb, and Square. However, most people just enjoy the benefits that this service provides to its corporate clients behind-the-scenes.
• Stripe is a payment processing platform that allows businesses to accept online payments. Stripe is used by over a million businesses, including Lyft, Shopify, and Zoom. However, most people have never even heard of Stripe. 

In every industry, there are such businesses.  In finance, for instance, there are many little-known companies that offer products or services that are widely used behind-the-scenes. 

• Ripple is a blockchain-based payments protocol that allows for the near-instant and low-cost transfer of money globally. Ripple is used by banks and other financial institutions to transfer money between each other.
• Securitize facilitates the issuance and trading of digital securities. Securitize is used by companies to raise capital and by investors to trade securities.
• Treasury Prime provides banks and other financial institutions with the tools they need to manage their treasury operations such as liquidity, cash flow, and foreign exchange exposure.
• Fintruity is a data aggregation platform that provides financial institutions with access to a wide range of data about their customers in order to better understand their customers’ financial needs and to offer them more personalized products and services.

These are just a few examples of little-known companies that offer products or services that are widely used — and yet flying under the radar — in finance. They aren’t popular but they do solve problems. These companies are essential to the smooth operation of the global financial system. Like Levis, these companies offer products or services that are widely used behind-the-scenes by millions. The most successful companies focus on solving problems, not being well known or popular. They use the problem to sell the solution.

Quote of the Week

“If you’re not solving a problem, you’re not a business”. Guy Kawasaki

© 2023, Keren Peters-Atkinson. All rights reserved.