Week 20 and it’s finally time to talk about Sales ‘Closing’ strategies.

But before I share my closing advice, I must firstaddress my feelings and experiences around what most salespeople are taughtabout how to close deals.

That final part of the sales process is where the moneyis made. But is slick, salesy, persuading (and verging on manipulative) closinglines the best way to go?

Episode 96 – Transcript

Hey there,welcome to the sales experience podcast. So glad that you’re here. My nameagain is Jason Cutter. This is episode 96 – this is week 20 of the show and Iam going to talk about closing topics. So this is one thing that I’ve beenrequested a bunch. Well I’m putting these shows together as I’m heading towardsa hundred episodes people have asked, and in my regular consulting world whereI’m dealing with sales reps, everyone’s asking about closing strategies,closing techniques. There’s literally maybe thousands of books out there. Iknow there’s tons of podcasts, audio websites, YouTube videos, everythingfocused on how to get you to close.

What kindof closing lines should you use? I mean, I have a book on my shelf fromresearching for some project that I’m working on that has, it’s like 300 andsomething closing techniques for timeshare, which they don’t call it timeshooting, where they call it vacation ownership.

It’sliterally hundreds of pages of closing techniques, closing lines, strategies,persuasion slash maybe manipulation and things to do for that. Yeah. This weekis all about closing topics. For this episode, what I wanted to cover was whatis it that you need to do and do you really need a closing strategy? Is thatsomething that’s important to you? Do you need one? And here’s my stance on it.

Andsometimes this can be controversial with salespeople, especially hardcore oldschool salespeople and sales managers who want to have all these closing techniquesand strategies and lines they use and things. They come at people, you know, ifI can help you find a way to do this, is this something you’re going to buytoday? You know, those kinds of lines I think are important and you can workinto the conversation, but they shouldn’t be the main focus.

Like that’sthe kind of stuff that it could work, but there’s a large percentage of thepopulation it won’t work on and they’ll feel like they’re being sold to insteadof being allowed to buy. And that’s the whole point of what I wanted to covertoday. Is that right? If it’s done right when you approach sales correctly andyou’re building the value, doing everything.

Like if youwere to listen to the previous 95 episodes and where I’ve been going on thisjourney with the show and talking about sales and the sales experience, ifyou’re building that sales experience correctly from rapport all the waythrough this point, right where you need the clothes, air quotes, if you couldsee me clothes and you need a strategy for that, right? If you’ve doneeverything right to that point in the conversation, there is no clothes, thereis no need to really ask for the business.

They shouldbe asking you to purchase. They should be asking, how do I buy this? Thissounds great. What you’ve presented to me solves the problem that I have that Ieither no, that I had when I came to you or you came to meet or it solves aproblem I didn’t know I have. But thanks to your questions, thanks to yourdiscovery in your poking and prodding and trying to dig deep. You uncoveredthis problem I didn’t know I have and here we are and I’d you to solve it, oryour product or service is helping me achieve a goal that I’ve got that I hadthat I knew about or maybe I didn’t even know about.

And here weare. And so when done right, when your sales presentation, when yourconversations are done correctly, whether it’s a one call close or a threemonths sales cycle, doesn’t matter when it’s done right, they should be comingto you asking to buy more than you’re needing to do closing techniques.

Now for therest of the episodes this week, I have it planned out. I know I’m going to talkabout, I’m talking about different closes, which might seem counter intuitiveto what I just said, hypocritical to the point I’m making, which is you don’tneed a closing strategy. However, there are some things that you could do andshould do in order to get to where you want to go more effectively in sales. Somake sure to check out those episodes throughout this week.

But in general,my main philosophy is if you’re having to twist arms, if you’re having tomanipulate, if you’re having to use hardcore closing tactics, then what you’regoing to produce is a sale that’s questionable, in my opinion, a sale that’sbuilt on sandy ground, right on shaky foundation that could end up in acancellation, a complaint, an issue after the fact. It’ll probably result insome buyer’s remorse.

Will theywake up at two in the morning and regret or worry about what they bought fromyou because you pushed them too hard with your closing strategies? Ideally, youwant somebody who sees the value in what you’re offering, thanks to yourprofessionalism and yes, your techniques throughout the whole process are, I’mnot saying you shouldn’t have any techniques and you shouldn’t be trying tomove towards the sale. I’m just saying that be careful with needing orrequiring sales closes.

If you’relistening to this and you’re new to sales, a lot of times new salespeople areso worried about what they’re going to say, how they’re going to close, whattechniques should I use? How do I do this? How do I do that? What do I say? Howdo I push them into this? Focus on the fundamentals. Focus on everything fromrapport and empathy, trust, hope, urgency, all of those things I covered earlyon in the show.

Focused onyour personality and the other person’s personality and their behavior typesand how do you give them what they need when you meet them, where they’re at,instead of trying to pull somebody to where you’re at, you go to where they’reat and meet their needs, solve their problems, help them get to a goal thatthey have. When you do that, your prospects, we’ll be wanting what you have,asking you for it, and then also thanking you.

You knowyou’ve done the sales process, right, and I know I’ve covered this in the past.You know you’ve done it right. When your prospects turn into customers andthey’re thanking you for what you did right, they’re thanking you for givingthem the opportunity to buy in the way that they wanted to buy. When you dothat correctly, it’s generally not with hardcore sales techniques.

It’s notwith hardcore closes. It’s not with pushing somebody into it. It’s giving themthe space. You too. Bye and that’s super important. You want to make sure youfocus on that, and again, I’m going to say it because I’m sure I’m going to getsome comments or some feedback and people complaining, especially hardcoresalespeople, there are closes that have a time and a place and that areeffective and it’s good for probing test closes.

Like Isaid, if I can help you with this, is this something you’d like to do today?You know, those kinds of test closes are important but not always necessary andshouldn’t be the foundation of what you’re doing at the abandoning everythingelse in an actual conversation that could lead to the sale where they’reexcited to buy. I know this might not have been the episode you thought youwere going to get regarding closing and strategies, but I think there’s animportant to set this foundation, especially on top of everything else I’vebeen covering for 90 something episodes is that it’s all about the salesexperience in the sales process and when done right, it’s so smooth andeffortless.

I just wantto make that point known because this comes up so much and that’s it for thisepisode. Thank you so much for listening. I appreciate everyone who has gonethrough this journey. Make sure to subscribe to the show, iTunes, Stitcher,Spotify. It’s also on Soundcloud, Google play music, CutterConsultingGroup.comwebsite. You can go on there, you can find me on LinkedIn. If you’re in sales,sales management, anything like that, please send me a message. Find me on LinkedInor the CutterConsultingGroup.com website. Hit me up and I’d love to talk sales.I enjoy talking about sales, sales strategies, anything I can do to help. Let’sjump on a call. Let’s talk, not for me to try to sell you anything, but justsee how I can help give you some value, help you or your team out with sales.And that’s it.

And again,always remember that everything in life is sales, right? And people rememberthe experience you gave them.