Sales training - How to overcome objections

In a sales presentation, it is easy to get caught up in the prospects false objections. Sometimes it is very difficult to get to the real reason for not buying.

When a prospect seems interested, but they still say they want to think about it. You've gone through a lengthy sales presentation and everything seems to be going good, but when you get to the end, the prospect is just not biting.

How do we overcome this? It can actually be very difficult to smoke out a real objection at this point in a demo or presentation. Many times, the prospect simply can't say no, but they won't say yes either. They agree with everything you say, yet they still won't make a decision.

This is why we need trial closing. Trial or test closing is a way to test the "buying temperature" of a prospect no later than halfway through a presentation.

You want to build to a climax in a demo by hitting a hot button with one of your product or services best features. When you notice that the prospect seems to be excited about something you've shown them, then you can proceed to ask yes questions.

Yes questions are basic questions of agreement that allow the prospect to only answer with a yes.

Yes questions would include things like:

"Surely you'd agree that this product would save you alot of money, wouldn't it?"

"If you had something like this, you would use it wouldn't you?"

Then you immediately ask a trial closing question like this:

"So, i mean, if this was affordable, is this something you would like to have?"

By asking this simple question, you not only get the prospect thinking about buying, but you also isolate the objection. If there are other objections, alot of times they will come out at this point.

Basically your goal is to learn how to build value and break the objections down to nothing more than affordability. Which you should always start with a high price learning how to use price conditioning, so that you always have plenty of bargaining room.

This should help you to cancel out fake objections and decrease the amount of time wasted with prospects who are in no way serious.

Breaking the ice - Sales for the new guy

When starting a new sales job, nothing feels quite like that first sale. Selling does not always come easy. The first step should always be to prospect. In other words, identify your target market. You must consider the profile of someone who would most likely be interested in your product.

You should then be in the right type of neighborhood and asking the right types of qualifying questions. If you are having people come to you, then you may need to be even sharper when it comes to asking qualifying questions.

When introducing yourself to people, it is good to have several questions practiced ahead of time that will allow you to engage your prospect in almost every scenario.

The trick is to show acknowledgment. The customer wants to feel understood. Even if it is so simple as understanding that they may not be in the mood to see a salesperson.

You don't want to be over apologetic, but you do want to express acknowledgment as if to say that you do appreciate their time and that you understand that it is very important to them.

By giving the right kind of body language and facial expressions, you can say these things without actually having to speak. Body language is almost everything!

Getting the presentations

Sales is all about follow through. It happens one step at a time. You must first get into a presentation situation. What's the best way to do what?

It depends on what your specific selling situation calls for. If you are a car salesperson, your intention should be to actively bring people onto your car lot.

You may in fact set appointment for people to come see you. Keep a database of every contact or "up" you take. Over a period of as little as 2-4 weeks, you can have a significant database of contacts.

Use them to get appointments, referrals and additional future sales. The main thing is to have as much prospect time as possible. Spending your time in front of a certain number of prospects will get you the sales you want...so you need to be pitching and holding people by pacing your pitching going in and out of conversation about the product and then about something else like family outings or long drives in country...anything that involves a picture in their minds of actually using your product.

Until you paint that picture, they will not accept this new thing, this new addition to their life.

If they can't imagine (Image) in their minds the results of having your product, they will not give you their attention. If they do not trust you, they will not pay a penny.

Now if you are selling something such as a home improvement, you may talk to home owners in a neighborhood. Offer them a basic flyer about your services and let them know you'll be in the are the next day or later on in the week because you have to speak to a bunch of their neighbors....so you'll be in the area anyway and, after you're done talking to some of the other neighbors, you'll just pop by real quick and give them a little free info and let them know what they qualify for.

The key is to get an OK from the prospect before actually seeing an appointment. Once they said OK to the dropping by some free information, ONLY AFTER THEY SAY "OK"...go ahead and then narrow down to specifics such as "Ok and my name is Mike and may I ask your name? Ok great, so I'll just mark you down so we don't forget where your at...now the address here is ...444...?

This will help you to get an initial appointment with a very non invasive or non abrasive approach. In fact you'll find that this only pulls peoples attention more.

Overcome objections