looking at recreational vehicles. “Some customers don’t trust sales- people,” she says. “They don’t want to open up. I’m trying to find out what they’re interested in and what they’re looking for, so I know what I should be showing them.” While she’s ask- ing questions, though, the customer often is deliberately giving uninforma- tive answers.
At this point in the process, she says, customers don’t give many physical cues to their lack of open- ness. “It’s more just the way they answer,” she says. “These customers come off with short or smart answers, like ‘When I see it, I’ll know it.’” To encourage the prospects to be
more open, she takes them onto the lot and starts showing them some RVs – while continuing to ask ques- tions. “I try to find some kind of familiarity with the customer,” she says. “I may ask where they’re from or what they do. Then, once you break down those barriers, custom- ers become more honest and more giving of information.” Kelly says customers are less than open when they’re trying to compare features, benefits, and prices be- tween two manufacturers or distribu- tors. “They won’t just say, ‘Hey, I have another distributor I’m looking at,’” Kelly says. “They just go off on a tangent. When customers do that, they often are very uncomfortable. They tend to lean back and forth in the chair, and they’re occupied doing something else.” According to the salesperson, the other time she sees a customer be less than open is when she gets down to the actual transaction. “It’s when you start giving numbers and negotiating,” she says. “Then the customer may say, ‘So-and-so down the street told me I could buy that for less.’ Well, that could have hap- pened, but chances are it didn’t and the customer is just trying to see what he can get out of you.” When customers react in this way, she says, they often stop making eye contact with her. “A lot of times,
they’ll look down and fiddle with something they have in their hands,” she says. Other customers may cross their arms across their bodies in a defensive posture – particularly if they’re standing up. When Lou Kelly, national sales manager for the Scan Corporation in Voorhees, NJ, observes customers whose body language says they’re not being open, he spends time trying to make the clients more comfortable. “I give them lots of outs,” he says. “I say things like, ‘If there’s another product you want to try, just tell me so we don’t waste both our time.’” When he’s talking to the clients, Kelly also asks questions and listens more than he talks. “I really want to know their total application for the product,” Kelly says. “I want to know why they’re buying this equipment and what their mindset is. Sometimes they want something that’s more than they need, and then I try to talk them out of it.”
Sometimes, Kelly says, he just can’t
get around the client’s lack of open- ness. “When that happens, it’s time to move on and go to something else where it’s more profitable to spend my time,” he says. “There are cus- tomers that we just don’t fit with, for whatever reason.”
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If the wind will not serve, take to the oars. – LATIN PROVERB
Her solution is also to give the customer an out. “I may touch the person’s hand or pat them on the back or on the shoulder,” she says. “I say, ‘I’m sorry we couldn’t earn your business this time, but, if anything changes, come back and see me.’ I let them know that there are no hard feelings. If they really are lying to me about having seen a better deal somewhere else, I don’t want them to be too embarrassed to come back.” Getting to honest communication, she says, is all about how you react to the customer. “If you get defen- sive with them, you’ll lose everything you’ve built up with the customer,” she says. But, by giving the custom- er room to change his mind without embarrassment, you’ve left the door open to completing the sale on another day.
THE SALES SCRIPT BOOK ANTHONY IANNARINO: HOW TO BE MORE COMPELLING
SELLING POWER MAY 2016 | 7 © 2016 SELLING POWER. CALL 1-800-752-7355 FOR REPRINT PERMISSION.
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