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We all remember those visits at the grandma's house when we couldn’t possibly eat any more food but we forced another portion of cheesecake or egg salad.
Granny could easily smash any objections you had and she didn’t care about your arguments that your tummy was full and you couldn’t even fit breadcrumbs in there.
How can we translate this into sales?
In case of the visit at the granny’s, we agreed to eat another portion because usually we didn’t want to hurt her feelings and we had a strong relationship with her. It’s not as easy with our clients. They don’t know us, they don’t trust us, and they almost always have some objections.
You probably asked yourself “how is that a good thing? If they have objections it means that the salesperson blew something and the client does not feel the value in the product, right?”
A vast number of sales reps treat objections as if they were a thick wall, which has to be carved with a small chisel. In their minds they draw the darkest scenarios, and some of them actually treat clients’ objections as personal failures.
But there’s nothing bad about objections.
If a client has objections, it means that he is engaged. He just needs to learn a few more things to go from having objections to making a purchase.
If we were to end this article here and give you a gold piece of advice it would be to ask the right questions.
Using questions you can learn about the requirements of your clients, but also qualify them to accurately present them with the advantages of your solution. Because it’s not about forcing a product into someones hand but about making them want to buy it - this is your goal.
Below are the six most common objections which sales people come across. We guarantee that after reading this article none of these things will make you tremble, because we’ll also tell you how to deal with them.
This is the sentence which the sales people, who come across some clients who've had negative experiences in the past, hear most often. Such person is usually allergic to telemarketers or any other kinds of salesmen.
For inexperienced sales people this argument is usually the end of the conversation. Logical, if the client does not want to talk and becomes nearly aggressive, why would I want to talk to them, right?
Wrong.
If the client gives you the dismissive: “I’m not interested”, you should remain calm and try to understand what led them to say that.
Each one of us has a rough day every now and then, and sometimes we come across a scripted salesperson who keeps reciting memorised formulas and does not make any effort to react to our questions or doubts.
The key is to show that you are not just another sales robot and you can ask the right questions.
Make sure you speak clearly and that you are well understood. It is often the case that the client automatically informs you they are not interested because they don’t understand what you’re saying.
Let’s get back to neutralising the objection. You can use the following tactics here:
Mr. Smith, I understand that it may seem as if this isn’t an interesting opportunity for you at this time, but, fun fact, the director of XXX initially said the same thing. Today they use XXX. As I understand, developing your company in the area of YYY, which actually improves your production capabilities and increases sales, is important to you, is that right? Then why wouldn’t you consider this possibility?
This way you demonstrate that you’re not just another stubborn salesman who spits out one formula after another. You let the client know that you understand him, you show empathy, and at the end you hit them just right, because who wouldn’t like to develop their company to bring more profits, right?
There is a reason why this objection is second on the list. Sales people hear it equally often as they hear the first one and unfortunately they don’t always now how to deal with it.
Price plays an important role in the sales process, and you may find it interesting, that clients aren’t only concerned when the rates are too high. If prices are too low the product may be perceived as low in quality. In case of high prices they will have reservations because e.g. competing products are cheaper.
As a salesperson you should gently find out why does the client think your product is too expensive. It is often the case, that sales in some industries aren’t going very well in certain months. That’s when you have to cut costs and mind your spendings. Perhaps the client is in a difficult personal situation, which forced them to invest more and stops him from making other spendings?
It’s important because if you manage to find out whether the lack of cash is a temporary sate, you can always ask:
Ok Mr. Daniels, what if I could offer you a 60 day payment term, would you take my deal then?
Naturally, a lot will depend on whether you can actually offer your client an extended payment term. If not, it makes sense to reschedule your call to another date a few weeks from now, when you can find out if the client’s situation improved.
To arrange your next call you can use Appoint.ly. A quick tool which is simple to use. All you have to do is to define your availability and share your calendar with the person you want to speak to. your client can choose the most suitable date from your calendar and arrange the meeting with a few clicks.
Most importantly, focus on the value. This is interesting, because salespeople should all know this, but in the field it turns out that they don’t always do.
Selling on value does magic, because when the client buys a shaver they couldn't care less about the piece of plastic with an electric motor inside. What they’re buying is comfort, time and possibility to shave with no risk of cutting themselves.
This is an example of how it’s done:
Client: I like this laptop, but it’s too expensive for me.
Seller: Good thinking. Today you have to be careful with what you spend your money on, the times are tough. Many companies think the same, but they don’t want to spend additional budgets on servicing their equipment. It often happens that computers simply refuse to work properly and every hour of downtime is a loss of profits, right? How much is an hour of your time worth?
Important! Never give them the price at the very beginning, even if they are pushing for it.
Why?
If you don’t build enough value, the client can have a nearly allergic reaction to this information. You rid yourself of the possibility to ask further questions and learn about the actual needs of your client.
Many salespeople start sweating when they hear this, because this means the client is slowly moving away. It flips a panic switch in their minds which tells them to look for ways to quickly close the deal.
This often leads to a situation where the salesperson makes the client feel uncomfortable with their behavior, and this pushes the sale even further away.
When the client says they need time to think, you actually have two options:
You can say: I understand Mark, but I’d like to know what is the reason of your concern? Is the price too high? Perhaps you’d like to find out more about how the product works?
Once you know the reason you can try to neutralise it. But don’t push too hard if the client really needs time, then…
Just remember to arrange a call for another day. it makes sense to raise the feeling of urgency at the end of such conversation by saying:
In this case I will give you a call at 2.00PM on Friday and we will speak about the details. Please remember that this package is only available until the end of the day on Friday.
Perhaps you should check out what Edward can do for you? The app helps to plan all the important client calls, gathers them all in one place and displays a reminder on your phone so that you remember about the promises you’ve made.
The job of a salesperson is all about building trust and relationships. Oftentimes it takes several meetings or phone calls for the client to make a satisfactory decision. For this purpose you should have Edward installed on your phone. It’s an application which helps you remember about every meeting and phone call. You can also describe your client, their concerns and questions, which then allows you to take a look at your notes and optimize your next steps.
Even if you sold the given product many times with high level of client satisfaction you can always come across those who’ve used similar solutions before, with no good results.
Therefore it’s natural, that initially they will be full of doubts, worries, and perhaps they will respond in a rough manner.
First of all, gather all client success stories you have, show them it really works. Remember, those closest to what your client does will influence them the most.
Don't just throw lots of general statements around, show them numbers (if you have any), and explain in a clear way how the product converted to success of other clients.
A guarantee of success plays an important role. One which will allow the client to test the product at no risk, so that they can make the decision once they know if it works. Think about this. Can you offer something like that? Because it will greatly influence your chance for closing the deal.
To make the decision easier for your client you can use TechValidate. The software gathers information about the results of your business activity and presents it in the form of diagrams, case studies, references and user testimonials. With this much data dispelling doubts becomes simple.
It often happens, that when a salesperson reaches a potential client they are already using another solution. That’s when they give up, because what can you do? If the client already uses something else speaking to them is a waste of time. Seems logical, but…
Show them how they could improve
Beware, you should never make the mistake of speaking badly about a competing product. Remember that this strikes the client too, because what you’re saying between the lines is: you were dumb to pick that solution!
There is a better way to do this, for example:
Mark, I’m glad you use A from B. It tells me that you strive to develop your company by improving X and Y. The reason for my call is that aside from increasing your X and Y, we’ve also worked with companies like C, to increase their Z. This allowed them to increase their results by 25% year-over-year. Would you like to hear how they did that?
See the difference there? At the beginning you stroke their ego and show them how much you appreciate the choice they’ve made. Then you make them aware, that there are other fields they should look at to achieve success in business. Naturally this strategy can be simply translated into other industries, not necessarily B2B.
When a client tells you they have to speak to their partner, friend, boss or parent you should find out what are their concerns and what could be the questions the other person asks. If they are present with the client speak to them and find out if they will create obstacles in closing the deal, then go back to speaking to your client.
In case the other person is not in the room, ask them if they could be present during your next meeting. Then you can learn about their concerns directly.
You have to keep in mind that the other person could cause problems and slow down the process, which will push your sale away. Evaluate the situation well. Find out if the client really has to consult, or if they are just looking for excuses not to make the purchase.
We have discussed how to deal with particular objections but many of those situations come to one thing in general. You have to know your client well, build a relationship with them, build trust. Once you do that you will see that selling will become a much easier job to do.
There is no way to avoid making detailed notes after each conversation with a client, because this will allow you to overcome one objection after another with no need for additional frustration.
Edward supports planning the process and allows you to make detailed notes/report conclusions and thoughts about the conversations you’ve had, which may prove very significant in “disarming” the client of their doubts. When you remember the context of the relationship with all the important details regarding needs and doubts of the client you can face those issues in future talks. You also know the history of their objections. If you regularly make notes you can be sure that you will miss no important information which will make it easier for your to optimise the script for your calls and meetings.
Many people treat sales as something deadly serious which causes problems at some stages. First of all, they treat every objection or no-deal situation personally as their own personal failure. They lower their self-esteem, lose confidence and we know that in sales this leads to nothing good.
Simply accept the fact that clients will always have doubts and not every single potential client will make a purchase. There are many different factors in play, and they don’t always depend on you - the salesperson.
That’s why you have to focus on drawing conclusions. Even if in the next meeting you don’t successfully dispel all doubts of your client, that’s no big deal. Think what you could improve, and you will see that next time you’ll to much better.
