What you say can either help you sell, or cost you the sale. Here are strategies on what to say to sell more.
Avoid long openings.
Some salespeople think that customers need to get to know them before the customers will buy. Their strategy is to schmooze and get a feel good vibe going. You’re wrong if you think schmoozing is selling. You’re wasting time if that’s all you’re doing.
Your job is to determine how much small talk you need to build rapport. Customers who use facial expressions and talk with their hands tend to like small talk. They speak with more tonality in their voice. The goal is no more than two minutes.
Think you can’t do it? You can. Hemingway wrote a short story in just six words. Here it is. For sale, baby shoes, never worn.
Help them understand.
You can shorten your sales time if you’re selling a technical product and you find yourself going back and forth with customers trying to explain its complexities. If you’re giving a technical explanation, one way to shorten the time to get it understood is to explain an idea using a powerful metaphor or simile.
A simile is a comparison of two dissimilar things using like or as. Metaphors are comparisons without like or as. What is your idea like? Use that metaphor in your explanation. It helps the listener see the idea.
When Ben Bernanke explained the effects of the complicated government spending cuts and tax increases he used a metaphor. He called it “the fiscal cliff.”
Stop selling.
Your selling job is done when the customer wants to buy. It’s that simple. How many times have you missed a prospect’s buying signal and kept on talking about the product instead of asking your prospect if he was ready to buy? Confirm buying signals. You could say, “Sounds as if we have a reason to do business. Am I right?”
Worse is when your prospect tells you he wants to buy, yet you just keep talking. You then bring up an objection your prospect didn’t think about. Now you’ve not only wasted time, but you’ve just killed the sale.
You’re not getting paid by the word (or the minute) during your sales call. Start thinking like Hemingway and shorten your sales calls. If he can write a short story in six words, how many words will it take you to sell more?
Maura Schreier-Fleming,BestatSelling.com, works with business and sales professionals to increase sales and make more money. She wrote Monday Morning Sales Tips and Real-World Selling. Maura is a Dallas based speaker and sales consultant. She can be reached at 972 380