One Simple Strategy for Turning Objections into Closed Deals

Published on May 7, 2019

In sales, it’s not uncommon to face certain objections again and again. So how do you turn those common objections into closed deals?  Simple: You stop having conversations that are driven by past experiences or fear of the future. Let me explain.

In 1980 I landed my first sales job: selling copy machines. But before long I began to believe I was limited by the features we offered. We had a great unit that produced 15 crisp copies per minute. My problem was that I could not compete with the big Xerox that could collate, make booklets, and so forth. I was trying to sell a “copier” and go head-to-head with Xerox, and everyone seemed to object that my unit couldn’t do what the Xerox did. I got kicked out of a lot of offices.

After this happened a number of times, things got even worse, because my reaction to the situation started getting in my way too. My mind would immediately go to those other calls where I bombed. Then my fear of the future would kick in—my fear of losing this deal and getting kicked out.

When you hear an objection and respond from PAST EXPERIENCES or out of FEAR of what might happen, you are not allowing yourself to operate in the PRESENT. Only when we operate in the present can we turn most objections into closed deals.

When I realized what I was doing, I decided to forget my past experiences and not allow fear to drive my actions. Instead, I began operating in the present. I turned the conversation around by inviting the customer to agree that a copier is nothing more than a communication vehicle. 

Then I asked the magic question regarding the customer’s present circumstances: When it comes to communications via copiers, what are your company’s three biggest challenges?

BINGO! Immediately the conversation took a turn and the issue of Xerox’s other features never came up. Instead, most people talked about how to make one single copy, and the fact that it would take roughly the hours of two full-time employees a week to waste their time to walk up to the third floor, chit chat along the way and wait in line behind big jobs to make a SINGLE copy.

That led to the close: Well, Ms. Customer, how would you like to gain those hours back? They would ask me how, and I explained that by putting one of my small units on every floor, productivity would skyrocket and costs would go down. I started selling three units at a time.

This would never have happened if I had continued to respond from my past experiences or out the fear of what I thought would happen.

Do you want to close more deals?  Stop letting your past experiences and fear of the future drive your conversations. Operate out of the present and you will have more powerful conversations, allowing you to close more deals with Velocity. This is selling in the VELOCITY MINDSET.™

To learn more about the VELOCITY MINDSET™ visit https://velocitymindset.com