Why Prospects Object!

Why Your Prospects are Objecting - and How You Can Solve That! 

As Forrest Gump might say, “Objections and Sales are like Peas and Carrots cause you always find them together”. You simply cannot be in the sales business without encountering objections !

The very word OBJECTIONS strikes fear into the heart of even the most seasoned salesperson and can cause people to freeze up, stress out, fall apart and look to get out of the meeting as soon as possible.

While I have no “Super Objection Overcomer!” or system that will entirely remove objections from our daily experience, I would like to suggest that there is HOPE … and I think it starts in our minds with our mindset! With the correct mindset, dealing with objections can and will become a lot easier, far less stressful and, I believe , lead to more sales!!

So many times, we set our meetings up with a “combative” attitude, that sets us and the prospect on a collision course to a confrontation which no one ever really wins. Too often we are so passionate about our product, so rehearsed and ready to deliver our pitch, so excited to “close the deal”, that any form of push back gets taken very personally and ends up wasting everyone’s time. It’s important to note that objections are the client’s tools to push back against a pitch or presentation that they feel is being forced on them.

Is it possible that the number of objections we get is directly related to a pitch that has offended, confused or bullied our client in some way?

Even the term “Overcoming Objections” has a confrontational sound to it. It’s almost as if we feel that we are somehow more intelligent than the client. We know better and have some right to overcome or change the client’s thoughts regarding the purchase or the product / service we represent.

It’s my conviction that objections are a clear sign that our prospect’s has not seen the value in what we are showing them or recommending they buy.

I’d advocate that a mindset change PRIOR to engaging with our client might be of some assistance here. A mindset that has the client’s best interest at heart. A mindset that is drenched in honor and respect for the prospect and their business or situation. I call it “Taking the fight out of the interaction!”.

Your sole purpose in engaging with the prospect is to find out as much as possible about them and their situation and then “co-labor” with them to get to their goals. You are there to help and assist the prospect to be better off than before they met you.

This mindset change, would dramatically impact the way you conducted the meeting in the first place and would massively impact your pitch (If you even do one – but that’s another blog for another time!!)

The best way for to serve the potential customer is to get to know them and their business better so that I can accurately recommend the way forward. I cannot think of a better way of doing this than by ASKING far more than TELLING! (Another swing at Pitching in case you mossed it!)

This mindset would have us respond with far more grace than heading straight for our list of objection rebuttals.

Honor the client, honor the objection!!

“Mr/Mrs client , thank you so much for that observation!”

“I value you bringing that to my attention”

My personal favorite because it’s the most natural to me and the way I normally speak to people, is

“Thank you Mr/Mrs client – that’s no problem at all!” and I immediately follow that up with … a question!!

“Would you be open to telling me a little more about your thinking here?” or “ Would you mind expanding a little more on your idea here?” This way I found out what is important to the client!!

Asking questions is, in my opinion the lost art of sales (and even business and life in general !) We are so keen to give our story and our opinion that we are often pitching blind – we have no idea what the client’s situation is and we could pitch our way out of a deal very quickly.

Please let’s remind ourselves that our customer is a human being and deserved to be treated as such!

Keep going and best of luck in dealing with those objections. (I do have other units on dealing with specific objections in another blog!)

Just some thoughts.

Go for it!

Coach Brad