DiSC for Sales
Key Takeaways
- DiSC® assessments offer many benefits for salespeople and others in customer-facing jobs.
- Discovering your natural sales style allows you to hone your strengths and adapt to your customers' preferences.
- Using the DiSC model, you can understand customers and practice tailoring your approach to their needs.
Sales are based on relationships
We often prefer to buy from someone we trust, someone local, or someone recommended by a friend. Our relationship with the seller might be shallow, but it’s important. It makes the sales experience more enjoyable.
How can we build satisfying sales relationships? Psychology tells us that we’re more at ease with those who mirror our style. We turn toward people we think will understand our priorities and validate our own choices.
How comfortable are you with adapting your selling style to the way your customer behaves? Do you note the clues customers offer to their own style and preferences? Do you notice he doesn’t like to shake hands when you greet him? Do you remember she likes to chat about the weather or traffic before she’s ready to discuss anything business-oriented? Does he seem to always be in a hurry?
These may be indications of your customer’s particular buying style. Knowing how to adapt to better meet those needs may make your customers feel more comfortable purchasing from you.
This video from the Everything DiSC® Sales Facilitation Kit shows an example of a customer with DiSC D-style tendencies.
In the two videos below, you can see how this customer reacts differently to different behaviors from the salesperson, Eric.
As an S-style individual, Eric is naturally humble and accommodating, meaning his instinct is to defer to the customer. This deference, however, can frustrate a D-style customer like Ann, who is looking for confident recommendations from an expert. In the first video, Eric doesn’t stretch toward Ann’s style. In the second, he does.
What is your sales style?
Everything DiSC Sales is an excellent tool for learning about your selling style and your customers' buying styles.
One of our staff members who took the assessment has an iD style. She was pleased to read about the strengths of her style. Salespeople with iD styles are energetic without wasting customers’ time. They are good at balancing customers’ emotional needs with their business goals.
On the other hand, she also learned that she might fail to give customers time to reflect or analyze. She might even appear bored when they talk. She now understands that she needs to work on being more responsive to customers who are more analytical.
DiSC sales training teaches salespeople how to connect with people of different styles. The profile benefits employees beyond just sales staff, too. The cornerstone principles of Everything DiSC Sales make it clear that it's a tool for building relationships.
The Sales profile encourages you to be curious about the person you're interacting with. It helps you understand how your priorities and theirs may differ, and how to shape an interaction that works well for both of you. Those emotional intelligence skills will serve you well whether or not you work in sales.
Read about the eight DiSC sales styles >>
Using DiSC for hiring sales personnel
Nearly every organization requires effective salespeople, and selecting those who will be successful is challenging. We know there are employers who believe there is a best disc profile for sales. DiSC is not a predictive tool; it won’t predict success in sales or any other discipline.
Hiring for a particular DiSC style for sales positions is a flawed strategy. Don't assume that because you have a successful salesperson who is an i style, your next salesperson should be an i, too. Humans are adaptable and have different skills and unique experiences. Thus, two people who appear to be identical on paper may present quite dissimilar sales talent.
There are, of course, different strengths and priorities that individuals with various DiSC styles bring to their jobs. One style might easily show dependability and sincerity. People with this style may build good relationships but need some training to take more direct action when needed. Rejection might be harder on this style, but nurturing long-term relationships with customers might come more easily.
The Sales assessment can help discover soft skills a new or experienced sales professional needs to build or practice. It might also show gaps in your sales team’s strengths.
For example, you might have been hiring people comfortable learning and explaining the complicated features of your product. But you could also use a sales team member who excels at maintaining long-term relationships with clients. We endorse Everything DiSC Sales as a developmental, not predictive, tool. (We recommend using the PXT Select prehire assessment for hiring.)
It’s clear in most organizations that nearly everyone employed there is in sales in one form or another. Each person is building relationships with customers and vendors or networking with other professionals in their area.
Having employees beyond your sales team take the Everything DiSC Sales or Workplace assessment can be helpful. This will allow customer service, purchasing, and other employees to understand their own needs better. They will understand the communication needs of their internal and external clients.
Using DiSC to build the sales relationship
When you take the Everything DiSC Sales assessment, you’ll have the chance to consider a specific customer and their buying style. Is she skeptical? Is he focused on dependability? With the Customer Interaction Mapping tool, you can consider the behavioral traits of an individual customer and complete an Action Plan for working with them.
Here’s an example from the Everything DiSC Sales sample profile (PDF):
Address the Need for Sincerity
SC customers have a need for sincerity during the sales process, which may clash with your frequent emphasis on results. To convince Justin Hancock that you truly understand his needs, make it clear that you have a genuine interest in resolving his problems. Devote the energy to take a thoughtful, well-reasoned look at his concerns.
- Explore his doubts.
- Take time to listen.
- Refrain from relating everything to the bottom line.
The Customer Interaction Mapping tool is useful when handing a lead off to the sales team or transferring a current customer to a new sales team member. Instead of hearing “Oh, they’re great to work with—an easy customer” you can get real tips for working with this customer.
You might find that they’re interested only in white papers and take a long time to make a final decision, thereby draining your energy. You prefer customers who like to engage in small talk and are moved by your enthusiasm for the products you sell. An easy customer for one person might be challenging for another.
DiSC doesn’t teach you how to sell, nor does it suggest that you be inauthentic in your approach to customers. It does provide valuable insights into your natural sales tendencies, some of which you might overuse. It gives tips that can help you adapt to your customers and build satisfying relationships—a win for both you and your customers.
Posted 12/20/2022
