I don’t know if you ever watched The Wolf of Wall Street or not. It was a great movie starring Leo Dicaprio and directed by Martin Scorsese. Sure, it is inappropriate in tons of ways and the dude was a criminal, but there are still things to learn. One scene, featured above, has Jordan Belfort (Leo) asking his friends to “Sell me this pen.” The scene is repeated at the end while at a sales conference.
I want to share this article with you about this question. Here are some highlights from the piece and how it relates to DPC.
- This is the value-based approach.
- “This pen is gold — that positions you as a person of value to your peers.”
- “This pen has refillable ink cartridges, so you’ll never need to buy a new one.”
- “Compared to other pens, this pen is very smooth and comfortable to hold.”
The problem with value-based selling is that you show zero knowledge of what the buyer feels is important to them.
2. This is the solution-based approach.
- “What is the most important thing for you when buying a pen?”
- “What color pen are you in the market for?”
- “What were the strengths and weaknesses of the last pen you owned?”
Candidates with an enterprise sales background typically demonstrate strength in this area. However, many of them still hit a roadblock when the questions they ask lead to a conclusion where the customer needs a solution they can’t offer.
3. This is the problem-creation approach
Problem creation is, without question, the best way to “sell me this pen.”
Reps who use this tactic establish a clear “ladder” for buyers to follow using questions that make them concerned about problems they didn’t even know about in the first place.
Okay, my thoughts. You need to know what is important to your prospective patients. The solutions based approach is actually good for DPC as long as you have the answers for some of the patients concerns. For example, what about specialists or hospitalizations?
Number 3 above (problem-creation approach) is something for you to think about. What problems do patients don’t even know about?
I recommend you think of questions to ask prospective patients. I will start you off:
- Why are you looking for a new doctor?
- What experiences or problems in healthcare did you have that turned you off?
- What do you know about Direct Primary Care?
- What concerns you about Direct Primary Care?
I will finish this post with a quote from the article:
The moral of the story? A good salesperson can solve a problem a buyer can see, but a great one can solve a problem a buyer didn’t know they had.