One of the prevalent themes in recent blog posts has been “overcoming objections.” Traditional sales training focuses all too much time and energy on overcoming objections. What they need to be focusing on is overcoming stubbornness. If you find yourself constantly overcoming objections it is likely you have either pitched something your customer does not want or need, or you failed to connect your value to their drivers, or you did not hear “no”, or you are simply not communicating effectively. Regardless, those situations are avoidable provided you weren’t so interested in selling something, first. In this economy, all the sales training in the world is not going to help you convince a customer to buy something they do not want, need, or value. And the operate phrase here is what they want, need or value.
What you want is not important. What the customer needs is. In order to be effective at getting at what they want or need requires understanding your customer’s issues and perspectives. I came across a great blog by sales productivity insider Nancy Bleeke that puts the customer vs. salesperson perspective into a great light. Simply by focusing on what we think we see and hear only from our viewpoint, we are only looking at half the equation. The customer also has a perspective. How well do you know or care about their perspective or what they see and think? How empathetic or sensitive are you to their issues, needs, and challenges? If you are having trouble closing deals and are constantly having to overcoming objections, chances are quite high you have not really invested in learning, understanding, and internalizing what the customer’s perspective is. Quit trying to make deals. Focus on solving problems–your customer’s problems, not your sales problems.
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