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The Art of Closing the Sales Call!
| Guest post by: Meridith Elliott Powell |
Article Overview: There is not a winning technique, not a single magic bullet, nor any secret sales closing course you should take to increase your rate of closed sales calls. If you want to consistently close sales calls, consistently move business, and consitently increasing the number of prospects that turn into customers, then you need to simply work to engage the prospect, listen to what they need, provide value and yes ask for the business.
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Free Download - The Power of Responsibility! By Meridith Elliott Powell |
The Art of Closing the Sales Call!
I often wonder how many
articles, books and millions and dollars have been made trying to help sales
people "close the deal." As if there were some magic phrase, some
vital word, or some secret way to ensure the prospect signs on the bottom line.
Let me ensure you there is not - engage the prospect, listen and add value -
that is how you close a sales call.
The truth is, while the close and actually asking for the business are key to
closing the deal, if you do not structure the sales call correctly, put
effort into all the other steps, then closing the call will be an extremely
difficult thing to do.Why make calling harder than it has to be?
Turning your prospects into customers and your customers into champions, is
about creating a long term relationship. To create a long term sales
relationship, you need to be interested in selling your product or service to
someone who can actually benefit from and wants to buy it. That means doing
your research, defining your purpose, asking great questions and transitioning
with a meaningful support statement.
However, once you do all that and you do it well, you do still have to ask for
the business. You still have to close the sale. You have to make it easy for
your prospect to take the next step with you and create desire for them to do
business with you. So how do you close the sale?
First, you have to understand that turning a prospect into a customer is
actually a series of small closes and not just one big close. Especially, in
this day and age when trust, value and connection are key to building long term
relationships, prospects need time to get to know you and you need time to
prove you deserve and truly want the business. The close needs to be
based on and directly tied to your purpose. What did you want to accomplish?
How does that translate to a close. For example, if your purpose was to
schedule a second meeting and present a proposal for how you can save them
money on their banking services. Then that is your close for this call. To
schedule a second meeting to present your proposal. If your purpose was to get
your prospect to discuss and commit to the proposal. Then your close is to gain their commitment and set an
engagement start date. Whatever your purpose is it should tie directly to
your close.
Second, your close needs to be the action that moves the sales call
forward and let's you determine quickly if the prospect is interested in
discussing this further or doing business with you. So many sales people either
ask for too much at the first close or they avoid the close all together not
wanting to be rejected. If you ask for too much and do not connect the close to
your purpose or what you learned from your prospect then you risk the prospect
feeling you are only interested in what you stand to gain. If you avoid the
close all together, then you risk not only not closing the sale but looking
pretty foolish in front of the prospect. They expect you to ask for business. I
mean what have you been doing all this time, just wasting your time and their
time? Prospects want to do business with people who are confident and
asking for business positions you as someone who will work hard for them.
Third, if your prospect says no embrace it! All you were told was that you did
not create enough value or benefit for them to want to do business with you
right now. Great, learn from this and change and develop your value add
approach for future sales calls. If you work at developing value you will have
your shot with this prospect again. We never know what is going on with our
prospects or clients really. All the events that are happening in their lives.
Often people say no because the timing is wrong, and we did not create enough
of a sense of urgency, enough value for them to want to make a move right now.
Learn from rejection and use to to improve your future calling efforts.
Yes, the close is key to turning prospects into clients, but if you work the
process, if you invest in learning and adding value, your prospects will close
the sale for you all you have to do is ask!
The Close
QuickBooks 2011: Improvement to Closing Date Functionality
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CLOSING THE SALE - IT'S HIGHLY OVERRATED
Closing Sales Skills --- Improve Your Sales Techniques
Article Tags: business sales, close sales calls, sales calls, sales success
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About the Author: Meridith Elliott Powell RSS for Meridith's articles - Visit Meridith's website Click here to visit Meridith's website   Confidence Equals Sales Success Are You Really Adding Customer Value Master The Art Of Listening Be Easy To Do Business With Turning Your Prospects Into Clients Sell More By Giving Away Control |
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