If you are a seasoned sales professional you know that overcoming objections will often be the key to landing a sale. Learning how to reduce objections has also probably helped you as well.
If you are a new salesperson learning the ropes, you may be struggling with Objection Handling and may have found, in some instances, that your lack of effectiveness has actually cost you business.
Learning how to handle the objections which arise in the sales cycle will be key to your survival as a salesperson.
What if you could eliminate an objection before it even came up? Good idea? You bet it is!
Handling an objection is crucial and because it’s often difficult to deal with a customer that has an objection, I want to explore how you can keep those objections to a minimum.
Objection Handling Basics
So what exactly constitutes an objection?
Objection: a problem or concern voiced by your prospect that is an impediment to closing the deal.
It is essential for you to know the difference between the questions and statements made by the prospect during the sales process. Many times an objection is confused with a prospect needing more information or wanting clarification of some point you’ve spoken about.
An objection is not the same as asking for more information about your product or service.
For example, if you sell cars a client may ask you if the model is available in any other colors. This is not an objection, it’s a request for more product information.
However, it’s an objection when you show your prospect a blue car and he or she blurts out – I don’t like blue!
Handling this objection might be dependant upon whether or not you have that model car available in other colors but even if one is available, you’ve lost a measure of control at that moment and it will be up to you to get it back.
In your initial contact with the customer, you could have found out what color cars they like so you could show vehicles available in those colors.
It’s up too you to control the experience and not be caught flat footed!
Anticipate Objections
The point here is that you must find out how important the color of the vehicle will be in their buying decision before the showing so you can eliminate the potential objection of color.
As a salesperson it’s your responsibility to be thoroughly knowledgeable of your product or service. This knowledge also extends to knowing what variations of the product is available and which configurations and features are popular. You can find out this type of product sales history from past invoices.
You must involve your prospect in the conversation by asking questions all throughout your sales presentation. It is also important to ask questions before you start presenting your offer.
The process is called Probing and it helps you get information from the customer about what will determine their requirements to make a purchase before they have a chance to object. More about probing in a future post.
So, when you understand your product or service and it’s sales history, you will often be able to anticipate what your customer might want or not want. This will instruct you on what kind of questions to ask your prospect.
Get your prospect to tell you what is important to them before you try to sell them something. When you ask the right questions you can reduce objections because you will better know what features and benefits to focus on in your presentation!
This will enable you to, at the very least, reduce most objections and eliminate some altogether before they ever come up.
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