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How to Close More Sales: The Art & Science of Closing

by Debbie Jenkins

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Word Count: 1002
Character Width: 60
Resource Box: Objections! Objections! Objections!

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How to Close More Sales: The Art & Science of Closing

- by Gavin Ingham

(c) Gavin Ingham. All Rights Reserved.
http://www.BookShaker.com

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One of the questions I often get asked as a sales coach by
sales people and business owners alike is, "How do I close
sales better? What closing techniques would you recommend?"

In my experience, closing is one of the three most feared
areas of the sales process. The other two are fear of
canvassing and fear of objections. But the real question
is, what is it about these three that creates such a fear?
Especially, when even some of the most successful sales
professionals face challenges in one or more of these three
areas. The answer is simple - fear of rejection. Humans
are social animals and the fear of rejection is one of the
primary human drivers so it takes a different line of
thought to face this issue. Mere techniques will not
suffice.

There are books about closing with hundreds of different
types of closes in. Some are great examples, some are awful
but all of them have one thing in common. They are just
examples. They are often not usable as "off the shelf"
solutions for your sales scenarios because they each
represent a model and that model only works if the person
you are dealing with is "running" a similar model in their
personality and if your situation is nearly the same too!

Now, I am not saying don't study about sales. Infact, quite
the opposite. I do recommend that you read everything you
can about sales and human communications because you will
learn more about sales and communications in that way than
from virtually any other. What you learn however may not
always be what the author intended as you should be a
student of human behaviour and influence, not beholden to
any one particular book! When Bruce Lee studied kung fu he
took the best of each style of kung fu and designed a new
art which had no set forms and changed to be the most
effective for each and every situation. A good sales
professional will be aiming to achieve the same.

The first tactic for achieving a better close ration is to
change the words that you use. Why not "ask for the
business" or "take the order" or "provide a solution"
instead? These words don't create the same fear. I have
tested this on dozens of sales people and removing the word
that the fear is associated with removes the fear too. If
anyone has read Anthony Robbin's material he describes how
you can only experience feelings that you have words for and
that words only have the meaning that you ascribe to them.
He describes how, because the quality of snow is important
to their survival, eskimos have dozens of different words
for snow but we just have sleet and snow. Their experience
of snow is different than ours and we cannot comprehend that
because we have no words to describe it.

Secondly, it is important that you start with the end in
mind. Whenever you go to a meeting or make a call think
through it in your head first. Think about what outcome you
want from the meeting or call and think through the possible
ways this might occur. Think also of what the minimum
outcome is that you are prepared to accept from the meeting
or call. When you have built rapport, asked questions,
uncovered your clients' needs and provided a solution it's
only natural to ask for the business. After all, you have
provided a solution so asking for the business is the next
step! Why would you accept less than your minimum
acceptable behaviour from the client?

I once worked with a talented sales professional. He made
fantastic cold calls, built elegant and effective rapport
and uncovered client needs effortlessly but he did little
business. In a short coaching session I discovered that he
disassociated the sales process from "closing" hence he
would "do the meeting" and then think, "Oh dear! Now I need
to close!". Cue panic. His customers could see it and the
sale was lost, every time. He was in "sales" mode and they
were resisting and he was a nice guy so it was easier to
walk away than risk rejection or upsetting the client!
Simply by viewing the sale as one seemless process with a
natural conclusion he was able to see the "timeline" and
"path" of the sale. If the client deviated from this he was
able to maintain control and bring them back on track. He
achieved a sales breakthrough literally overnight.

At this point, I might add that you must remain flexible.
There will be times when you cannot make the sale for
unexpected reasons. On these occasions, it is important
that you assess your performance objectively. Ask yourself
whether next time you could ask better questions to uncover
the unexpected situation earlier. If the answer is "no"
then reset your objective for the meeting. If the answer is
"yes" then take on board what you have to learn and reset
the objective for your next meeting. But, and this is very
important, always remember to set a new objective for the
meeting.

When was the last time you heard this conversation:

"How was the sales meeting?"
"Great".
"How did you get on?".
"Oh, great I think he / she will use us!".

My next question for you is, "So what's the next step?"

This should have been agreed, with time-scales with the
client. If it hasn't then you haven't reached your
objective. Maybe this was because you didn't set one or you
didn't achieve it but this sales meeting was not "great"!

Let's face it, you work hard to find clients and get that
all
important meeting with them and you listen hard to
understand their true needs not your perceived ones. When
you provide a solution that matches their needs they are
expecting you to "ask for the business". When this becomes
a relaxed, natural part of the meeting you will achieve more
and effortless sales.


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Gavin Ingham specialises in maximising sales performance
under intense competition. Get Gavin's book acclaimed
book on selling, "Objections! Objections! Objections!"...
http://www.bookshaker.com/product_info.php?products_id=117
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keywords: selling, sales, objections, handling objections,
objection handling, close sales, closing, closing sales,
sales closes

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