August 27, 2019

[E97] Closing Week: Professionals don’t ask for the sale

10 minutes

I won’t say never…but in my opinion salespeople should

almost never ask for the sale.

That is not what a professional would do.

Yes, ultimately, it’s up to the prospect to decide if

they want to buy, but stop asking them!

In this episode, I talk about what to do instead, and why.

Episode 97 – Transcript

Welcome

back to another episode of the sales experience podcast, so glad that you’re

here. Episode 97 thank you for listening, downloading this. Hopefully you

subscribed. If not, go back to wherever you downloaded this from. Hit the

subscribe button if it’s possible, if it’s their iTunes, leave a rating, leave

a review. All of that really helps. I appreciate it. It just tells other people

the value you’ve gotten out of this show and explains to them what they could

also get out of this and I appreciate that.

I’m so

grateful for everyone who shares these episodes. I don’t always look at the

stats for this because I don’t necessarily do it for the stats or the likes or

that kind of feedback. However, I am enjoying it when I check in and see that

it’s expanding and there’s more and more downloads all the time, as well as the

expansion around the globe.

It’s so fun

to see these episodes downloaded in so many different countries. I appreciate

that. If you’re in sales or a sales manager, share it with your team. Share it

with other people you know in sales. Share this with people who are thinking

about getting into sales and aren’t sure if this could be for them. Have them

listen to literally a hundred episodes of this and then they’ll realize whether

or not they want to be in sales and this is a good guide for that.

Today’s

episode goes along with the topic of this week, which is closing topics. It’s

closing strategies in the sales process. Now, if you listened to yesterday’s

episode, episode 96 then you know that I talked about the fact that you

shouldn’t need a closing strategy. That shouldn’t be your first priority. Your

first priority should not be memorizing tons of sales, closing strategies, so

you have those on deck.

Now,

there’s always a time and a place. There’s some of those that can work, trial

close, different things like that. Yeah, which could help with your sales

process, but you want to be careful. I just want to recap from yesterday. You

want to be careful because if you go hard with closing techniques, you could

trend towards manipulation, which means you’re going to be enrolling people and

selling them your product or service and that could lead to some cancellations

and people who didn’t really want it, but you kind of pushed them and drove for

the sale instead of them coming to you to buy.

Now for

today’s episode, I want to talk about a close that’s very effective that you

should be using 100% of the time. Now, how can I say this close? You should use

100% of the time. Well, if you’ve been doing things right that I have set up in

this podcast for 90 something episodes and you’ve gone through the different

phases or steps where you’ve applied what I’m talking about, what I’ve covered

to your individual sales process.

Again,

business to consumer, business to business. It could be a one call close, it

could be a three or six months sales cycle, could be a product, could be a

service. You apply these things, what I’ve been talking about and you mold that

around your sales process and around your personality. Then what you will end

up with is a consultative sales process. Not a hardcore closed process, not a

overexplaining talking, throwing tons of stuff at people, process, not a

hitting them with so much information that hopefully they’ll be so confused

that they’ll buy from you process, but a consultative process where you’re

asking questions going through your series of discovery based questions,

getting at the root as deep as you can go, as deep as they will let you go at

their issue, their pain, their goals, their wants, their desires, whatever that

is that your trying to resolve wherever you’re trying to get them from where

they’re at right now to where they could be in the future.

Hopefully a

better place. Whether you’re solving a problem or achieving the goal on either

end of that spectrum you are going to be asking questions, uncovering

information that you can then apply to whether your product or service actually

is a good fit for them.

End Result

of your questions of your sales process as it leads up to the final

transactional parts of what you’re selling is all about seeing if their issue

matches your solution and you can actually help them get into a better place.

It’s diagnosing their issue. Kind of like a doctor and then seeing if your prescription

is the right thing. If you know how you can solve it and how you can get to

where they need to go. Talk about it. I’ve mentioned it many times, I’m going

to cover it again. You heard it. It’s going to be repetitive. That’s the best

way to learn.

When you go to the doctor, here’s how a normal appointment would go. Maybe it’s 15-minute appointment. You go into that doctor’s appointment for 14 out of the 15 minutes. I bet you based on my experience, the doctors asking you questions, poking [inaudible], testing, checking, having you stand on one leg, having you take this test, do this, do that, read this chart, whatever it might be. They are asking you questions and putting you through the gauntlet for 14 out of those 15 minutes of the employment, and that’s on top of what the nurse did before you even got in the room and all this stuff. They checked and tested and wrote in your chart. Then at 14 minutes into the appointment, the doctor then says, okay, based on what I’ve discovered from you, here’s my diagnosis and then here’s the prescription. Whether it’s physical therapy, whether it’s medication, whether it’s [inaudible], maybe more testing, maybe it’s surgery, whatever that is, here’s the prescription.

Now go do

it. Do you have any questions? Okay, great. Now go. It’s not one minute of

questions and then 14 minutes of back and forth and explanations and all of

these things. It’s 14 minutes of questions and discovery leading into literally

one minute of diagnosis and prescription and then sending you on your way.

Your sales

process should literally mirror that experience depending on what you’re

selling, you know, some combination of that timeframe and percentage of time.

And the key that a doctor does, and this is the whole point of this episode I

wanted to cover, is that when it comes to the end, the doctor is assuming

they’re using the assumptive close on you, the patient, you booked the

appointment, you came in, you spent the time, you answered their questions. They

take that permission to resolve your issue and get you into a better place by

all of you.

The actions

you have taken as that patient, you have given them permission and then they’re

going to assume that you also want a solution to whatever it is that they uncover

that you’re struggling with. And so that’s the same thing in sales. The

assumptive close is so important as you get to the end of your process of

questions, uncovering discovery, you know, empathy, trust, building, all of

those things that come up to the end.

Once you

get to the end where you want to prescribe the solution that solves their

issue, just assume that’s literally it. All you want to do is just assume and

say, okay, well based on everything you told me, here’s the solution I have it.

Here’s what it looks like. Now the next step is we need to go into this, this

and this. Any questions before we move forward? That’s literally it.

The

assumptive close, in my opinion, is the only clothes that you should use 100%

of the time and when everything is done right leading up to that point, it

should be effective almost every single time because you already know their

problem and then you know the solution and you’re providing it and then you’re

moving forward. The assumptive close is so important and I see so many

salespeople do this wrong and the reason why I say they do it wrong, they

actually mess this up, is that a lot of salespeople are in order taker mode. So

they get to the end and they say, okay, what would you like to do and what do

you think is best for you, Mr. Prospect. Instead, they have come to you, you’re

the professional, and again, they could be an inbound call to you. They filled

out the form on the website.

They were

transferred to you or you cold called them and you reach out to them or you

knocked on their door or whatever it is, but they should see you as the

professional. No matter how the conversation started, no matter what the

relationship started like they should view you as the professional and as such,

like the doctor example, you’re giving them the prescription and then assuming

they want to move forward every single time. Assume that if your product or

service fits for them, that you’re going to move forward.

Now, of

course if it doesn’t, if you find out they have an issue that you can’t solve,

don’t force it. Don’t move forward. Don’t try to close that deal because that

will bite you in the butt later on. If that’s the case, tell them a different

prescription. Point them in a different direction, provide them some value and

help them move along in a different way.

But if you

know you have the solution, it’s 100% you can solve their pain or you can get

them into a better place or achieve their goals. Then assume the close and just

move forward. Make them stop you. And again, like I tell everybody, I use my

powers for good and not for evil. I want to solve problems and help people

transform into the better version of where they could be as a prospect for me,

right?

Not just my

consulting clients, not just sales reps in general, but I’m talking like front

lines, dealing with sales, dealing with that prospect and moving them to a

customer. I want to transform and help them get to a better place and once know

I can, I’m assuming and I’m going to make them stop me. I’m not going to stop

me. I’m not going to ask them if they would like to move forward if they think

this is a good idea.

I’ve

already determined that I’m the professional. Your doctor would never say, Hey,

you have cancer, and I think a surgery would be best. What would you like to do

to handle the cancer? Or your leg is broken. We need to fix it. We need to

straighten it, and then we need to put a cast on it. What would you like to do,

sir? Which way would you like to go with this? No, they just tell you what

they’re going to do.

They might

get a little bit of permission from you, but then they’re off to the races.

They’re assuming that that’s what you’re going to want to do unless you stop

them because they’re the professionals. That’s what you need to do in sales. If

you do that, it will create dramatic results in your sales career and create an

amazing sales experience.

That’s it

for this episode. I appreciate everyone who listens. I appreciate all of you

taking the time to listen to this.

I hope you

can put this in practice in your sales career and as always, remember that

everything in life is sales and people remember the experience you gave them.

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By Jason Cutter

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