Hard Selling vs Soft Selling - What is right for you?

Hard selling vs soft selling, which strategy will result in more sales and higher revenue? Both strategies have benefits and limitations that can affect how effective they are for your business. Vonage shares that 53% of customer loyalty is driven by their sales experience, so choosing the right sales strategy is crucial. Here is everything you need to know about both methods.

What is the difference between the two methods?

To identify the difference between the two methods, we must first define what each one is.

Hard selling

A hard sell is a short-term direct sale to a customer. Hard selling will include overt and direct language to make a sale as quickly as possible. There is a focus on creating urgency about your product, and attempting to get an immediate result with a prospect. It does not focus on building long-term relationships with customers.

Soft selling

Soft selling is the complete opposite of hard selling. Rather than being direct with the sale you are trying to make, soft selling focuses on relationship building by asking prospects questions about their context. This is a gentle approach to selling which focuses on longer, more personal sales cycles.

How to differentiate the two

The simplest way to differentiate hard selling vs soft selling is that a hard sell is a short-term direct selling strategy that focuses on results, while soft selling is a long-term indirect selling strategy that focuses on relationship building.

Hard Selling vs Soft Selling - What is the better method?

Firstly, let’s take a look at both the benefits and drawbacks businesses could experience when attempting a hard sell.

Benefits:  

• Create urgency - Hard selling focuses heavily on creating urgency by highlighting the benefits of the product or service that is being sold. This reduces the customer’s fear of regret, as there will be a massive emphasis on how the customer will benefit, with urgency to make a quick decision to make the purchase.
• Stay ahead of competitors - You will reduce the risk of losing a customer to a competitor. Due to a quick sales cycle, your customer will not have the opportunity to weigh up their different options when deciding to make a purchase.  
• Win deals quickly - Hard selling can yield faster results. Although some customers may be put off by hard sales, clients will come to much faster sales conclusions than they would during soft sales. This will help your business generate revenue at a faster rate.

Drawbacks:

• Risk losing customers - Hard selling can be an intense sales method that can overwhelm some customers, resulting in your business losing sales.
• Lower chance of a long-term relationship - Hard sales focus on the product instead of the customer, which can reduce a chance of a business retaining a client post-purchase.
• Risk of negative brand image - If a customer has an overwhelming hard selling experience from a team member being too pushy, your brand image may be damaged.

The benefits and drawbacks of soft selling

Here are the crucial benefits are drawbacks of soft selling strategies.

Benefits:

• Increase customer loyalty – With a slow more personal sales process, your customers will form a better relationship with your business through a more memorable experience. This will increase your customer loyalty and reduce your churn rate.
• Less risk of losing a customer – Soft selling does not run the risk of being too pushy and overwhelming your customers. This makes it a more reliable sales method that has a higher conversion rate.

Drawbacks:

• Requires a slow-paced sales environment - Soft sales are ineffective in many fast-paced sales environments, due to the long sales cycle that it entails. In the short term, it is unlikely that soft sales will generate your business as much revenue as hard sales.
• Does not suit all situations - This sales method can be ineffective if used at the wrong time. For example, if someone was selling street food, a soft selling technique would not work here as customers will want to have a fast streamlined experience.

Examples of each strategy

To get a better understanding of when and how to use each strategy, here is an example of each technique in action.

Example 1 – Hard sell – Car dealership

When you walk into a car dealership, a sales representative will come to you and begin to determine what car is great for you and why you should make the purchase. They want you to make the purchase before you walk out, so there is a lot of urgency and focus on the product, making this a great example of a hard-selling scenario.

Example 2 – Soft sell – Subscription service e.g., Netflix

Subscription services usually take a soft selling approach to customers as they will want to try to maximise their customer retention. An example of this is Netflix, which instead of actively trying to sell the customer their service, indirectly sell to them. Netflix does this by focusing on the enjoyment people get out of the service, sharing what is on the platform and offering free trials to customers. This indirectly guides customers in deciding to purchase their service. Discover all you need to know on mastering the art of sales communication.

Refine your strategy with TEB

Regardless of if you choose a hard-selling strategy or soft-selling strategy, TEB will be able to give you useful insights with unrivalled data visibility to drive great results. TEB is a sales automation CRM software that will streamline your entire sales process and give you these game-changing benefits:

• Get a holistic view of your sales activity – View your entire sales activity with TEB to understand how your sales pipeline is performing, and where it can be improved.
• Understand your customer’s buyer journey – With TEBs storyboard feature, you can see your customers’ entire buyer journey to get a great understanding of their requirements.
• Drill down on your data – Generate countless preset reports, as well as generate custom reports to drill down on the data that you need to see to get useful insights to incorporate into your sales strategy.
• Track your team members – Track your team members to view which representatives are performing the best and provide support for the ones who need assistance.

Want to see these features and more for yourself? Book a demo and with just 30 minutes of your time, you can see how the future of your business can be completely transformed with TEB.