A simple and effective method for building your sales pitch

First, note that each column refers to a specific aspect of your products and services:

• their features: here you simply list the features of your products and services in a factual way. Let's take an example: you launch a coaching service for employees in transition and you offer evening coaching sessions to fit your clients' schedules. You can then simply note this feature: evening coaching hours. This exercise is more difficult than it sounds because you need to be as descriptive as possible. Don't try to write down the benefits of what you are selling just yet. We'll get to that!

• the benefits they provide: you need to express the value your customers get from the features of your products and services. Let's go back to the example of coaching for employees in transition: the evening coaching hours bring flexibility to your clients. Here we have a benefit. It is part of your value proposition.

• The evidence that proves these benefits: each benefit promised to your clients must be proven by tangible elements. Do your evening coaching hours offer flexibility? Prove it by inviting your prospect to book a personal audit session directly in your online calendar, with several evening slots available.

Then, on the left-hand side of the table, you will find the customer's buying motivations, classified according to the acronym SONCAS(E) for “Security, Vanity, Novelty, Comfort, Money, Likeability and Ethics”.

The last one is put in brackets because it is an increasingly important buying criterion but can sometimes be hard to justify depending on the product or service you are selling. If you are able to include this dimension in your sales pitch, great. If not, that's fine.

We have already mentioned the SONCAS(E) method in this article on the 4 Must-know techniques for your first sales meeting. Its importance in the sales process has been proven...

Each letter corresponds to a psychological motivation that drives a purchasing decision. You should detect them during your sales meetings so that you can adapt your speech to your customer:

• Security: you need to reassure your customer with guarantees, feedback, reliability, certifications, etc.
• Vanity: here you need to value your customer, to consider him/her as a valuable element. To do this, you can develop the uniqueness of your offer, its rarity, its quality, its high-end nature, your brand image, etc.
• Novelty: innovation, the latest trends will appeal to a certain type of customer. You need to know them well enough to know which argument will work.
• Comfort: your offer must be pragmatic; it must make life easier for your customer.
• Money: your customer will inevitably be concerned about the price of your product or service, their own earnings and their return on investment.
• Likeability: people who are sensitive to this factor will be interested in the relationship you have with them. For this type of psychological motivation, emphasise the following aspects: friendliness, sympathy, proximity.
• (Ethics): your prospect's decision to buy will be motivated by the social and environmental benefits of your offer, by the transparency of the origin and/or production of your products, or by the particular deontology and ethics respected in the provision of your services.

The SONCAS(E) method in practice

Let's get down to business. For each buying motivation, list how your offer's features, benefits and evidence will meet your customers' expectations. To do this, put yourself in your customers' shoes! Here we have filled in a sales pitch table using the example of coaching for employees in transition. You can use it as a guide to understand how the SONCAS(E) method works, but of course adapt each cell to your own project!