"People tend to buy with emotion, and justify with logic."
Barter vs Money
Before we start diving into all the secrets of sales and how to sell anything to anyone, we need to understand something first. "Why do people buy anything?" To answer, let's take a step back in time. In the early days, bartering and trading was commonplace amongst civilization. This meant if I was a potato farmer and needed a mule to help with plowing the fields, I would need to find someone who was both wanting potatoes AND willing to part with their mule. Most folks were limited in their goods for barter, which narrowed their buying audience considerably.
Fast forward to today. Because money is simple to exchange and convert, we have accepted it as valuable to our society. Now instead of transacting with potatoes and mules, we transact with money. This enables you and I to sell a product or service to a worldwide audience, creating higher demand. This is why people buy things nowadays. We have moved past a world where we traded for what we simply needed, and now purchase our needs along with many luxuries and discretionary items.
The Buyers Mindset
With people buying products and services, the question is: "How do I get them to buy from me?" The answer is: Through understanding the buyers mindset and why they make buying decisions. While we as humans have common needs, there are limitless brands, venues, stores, and sales reps who are trying to earn that money.
While each piece of the buying process can feel overwhelming, individually they are simply a metric used to make a decision. You need to understand that people use different metrics in their buying decision, thus making it terribly difficult to know which ones you should prioritize. In the end one principle remains true for all people: PEOPLE BUY WITH EMOTION AND JUSTIFY WITH LOGIC. That right there is the psychology of sales. When you look at a potential prospect, realize that they aren't interested in all the metrics and features, but rather how it appeals to their emotions.
Applying the Psychology of Sales
How can you make the most of the psychology of sales work for you? Whatever your industry, you need to identify what your ideal customer looks like. As they say, birds of a feather flock together. This means once you have narrowed down your audience to a specific group of people, you can assume their emotional appeal is going to be relatively the same.
For example, in door to door sales my pitch adjusts according to the type of neighborhood I'm in. When knocking super wealthy areas, I don't even mention pricing discounts because that's irrelevant for them. Instead, I immediately emphasize the importance of using a premium service which is specialized in bigger and nicer homes like theirs. I help them understand that the reason they should use me is because we are a tailored fit for their home and will provide high-end service to ensure their complete satisfaction. I'm appealing to their emotions by pitching them as a high-end service provider.
Asking Good Questions
The easiest way to appeal to someone's emotions is through learning about them through smart questions. A good sales question will help a sales rep understand what exactly is the pain points the customer is dealing with. These confessions are gold. You must get good at asking the right questions that help you gather info about your customer so that when you explain the features and metrics of your service or product you can focus it on how it is going to solve the issues mentioned earlier.
The very best sales reps oftentimes don't appear as if they are even selling. Sometimes it comes off as if they are just a curious, friendly individual who happened to bump into them and have a solution to a problem they are dealing with. That's when you know you have sold someone on their emotions.
To summarize: Humans have evolved in their abilities to exchange goods. With our new spending habits, it provides an opportunity for you to sell something so long as you understand that there are limitless brands and options competing for that same customer. In order for you to stand out, you must understand that the buyer in modern society will buy with emotion, and justify with logic. Knowing this you can ask good questions and learn what the key metrics for your ideal customer are so you can sell them on the benefits that best fit them.