Salespeople who try to overcome objections always shoot themselves in the foot. 

They are actually adding insane, unnecessary complexity to an otherwise simple conversation, wasting tons of time, likely destroying trust, and moving further away from a successful transaction.

In fact, there is no such thing as an objection.  Like so many problems that detract from effectiveness in sales conversations, the “objection problem” lies squarely between the ears of the salesperson.   Sales effectiveness begins with a correct mindset and an understanding of buyer psychology (AND seller psychology).   Your personal sales success emerges primarily from the conversation you have with yourself.

Before getting too deeply into your head, let me share a few things you should know about objections…:

            Overcoming an objection will increase a buyer’s resistance.

Objections tend to increase as a salesperson gets closer to the end of a sale.

The objection is rarely the real problem.

If there are two people in the room, only one of them can be the expert.

Buyers want to be the expert.

You’ll never score points by correcting a buyer (aka:  overcoming their objections).

If you handle one objection, you’ll almost always get another.

A buyer can only object if you give them something they can object to.

If you believe my assertions, you may be wondering…  “So what the heck am I supposed to do now?”

First things first: If you never get an objection, you don’t need to worry about how to handle them.   

From a tactical standpoint, buyers will not object to your questions, curiosities, sincere interest, empathy, or understanding.    They only object to statements, presentations, proposals, pitches, closing techniques, manipulations, and other forms of Premature Satisfaction.   They object to being sold.  So if you’ll stop throwing up all over them and exercise just a bit of patience, you will quickly see buyer objections evaporate. 

There are many other ways to create an objection-free zone, but the best place to start is with your self-conversation.   When most salespeople “hear” an objection, common sense makes them hear “bad news”.  As their emotions and blood pressure begin to race, they typically try to overcome the objection so they can begin breathing again.   Conversely, superior UnCommon Sense salespeople never hear good news or bad news.  Great salespeople never hear objections.  They only hear information and opinions.   Consequently, they do not become emotionally involved or lose control.  They remain 100% present in the conversation and are viewed by buyers as differentiated value-adders instead of sales reps.

Rather than overcoming an “objection”, an effective salesperson will simply learn more about the buyer’s “opinion”.   In response to a buyer’s opinion, they can choose to listen, learn and create a new opportunity instead of a talking, telling, dancing and handling a problem.  They might learn things like…:

            Why does the buyer feel that way?

            What do they think should happen to resolve it?

            When did these feelings start?

            What have they tried so far?

            And much, much more.

By simply changing their self-talk to eliminate objections, an effective salesperson can help a qualified buyer transform their opinions into a new, better future and buying vision.

If you decide to try these simple solutions, I’d love to hear from you about your results…

Continued Success,

Joe

Copyright ©   Joe Zente  2018.   All Rights Reserved.