The Single Biggest Mistake Many Sales People Make

One of my favourite sessions when training Sales Teams is, “How to Handle Objections”.

I’ve lost count of how many breakthroughs I have seen during this session.  Plus, I love hearing the feedback from the team when they see a massive improvement in their results just by applying, The 10 Step Objection Turnaround™

Objections are seen by many as a barrier to closing a deal.  Whereas with a small amount of the right training it becomes very clear that objections are actually your friend.

If you know how to handle them, they really provide you with the strongest opportunity to close the deal.

Here’s the thing:

Because many sales people see an objection as a barrier, they naturally “fight” an objection with a view to pushing the objection down or out of the way with force.

Unfortunately, this is the worst thing you can do.

WHY?

Because as human beings we naturally push back when someone applies pressure on us.  You only get push back when you push too hard.

It’s the same with sales objections.

If you try to push against an objection or try to quash it, the other person will naturally push back and the more you push, the more they will push back.

If you keep pushing the discussion ends up becoming heated and becomes about who is going to win as opposed to, “Is this deal right for your client”.

If you do this, you will stack the odds against yourself closing a deal.

So what should you do?

Hear Them Out

Let your customer/prospective customer speak.  They have an important point they want to make and deserve to be listened to.

This will give you two things:

• It will give you a window into your client’s mind about what’s holding them back. Also pay close attention to the exact language that they are using.  You will find that using that specific language in future sales conversations and in marketing collateral when addressing potential objections will be very effective.
• Many times they will also talk themselves out of the objection.

So next time you meet an objection don’t fight it.

Hear them out.