The Sales Training Series: Dealing With Sales Objections and Stalls

By:Duane Sparks

Most salespeople think of “stalls” and “objections” as synonyms. Wrong. Stalls and objections are both things you may hear after you have asked for commitment, but an objection is a specific reason not to buy. In a stall—“I need to think about it”—the customer offers no particular reason for hesitating.

Almost all salespeople buy in to the stall. Very few ever get the deal once they do.

What the stalling customer is really saying is this: “I’m not quite sold yet. Sell me some more.” Well then, by all means, do some more selling. But do it right. Here’s how:

Never challenge a stall. Since the customer offered no specific reason for hesitating, don’t force him to come up with one by saying something like, “What is it that you need to think about?” Challenging stalls creates conflict, not sales.

Don’t try to manipulate the customer. If you’ve learned any manipulative sales techniques, forget them. They do more harm than good. The old “feel, felt, found” method rarely worked even in its heyday, and it certainly doesn’t work today.

Identify a Universal Stall Breaker. The USB is a capability of your product or your company that minimizes the risk to the customer who buys. Every company has one. Yours might be a money-back guarantee, a no-hassle return policy, a try-and-buy arrangement, extended terms, or an unusually comprehensive warranty. Whatever this capability is, do not present it to the customer up front. Hold the USB in reserve, in case you hear a stall when you ask for commitment.

When you do hear a stall, follow this procedure:

Say, “I understand.”

Restate the product features the customer liked before the stall arose.

Present the USB.

Ask for commitment again.

It works like this: “I understand. You like ____, _____, and ____ about our product. With our _____ policy (the USB), you can try it with no risk at all. How does that sound? (Customer responds.) Would you like to go ahead with it then?”

Far too many salespeople fail to ask for commitment even once in a sales call. With this stall-breaking method, you are asking twice. And you have followed the customer’s lead by doing exactly what the stall really asked you to do: “Sell me some more.”

Believe it, you will make more sales!

In The Field:

Equity Residential is the largest apartment leasing company in the United States. In a tough economic climate, Equity decided to invest in developing the selling skills of its leasing consultants. Needless to say, these consultants often hear stalls such as, “Let me think about it and I’ll get back to you.”

Equity has a Service Promise Guarantee that minimizes the risk for customers who choose to rent. “But prior to the Action Selling Sales Training Program, we presented our Service Promise Guarantee as just another feature,” said Jonakan O’Steen, director of education and leadership development. With their eyes opened to a new way of looking at stalls, Equity’s consultants quickly identified the guarantee as their Universal Stall Breaker. That is now how they use it.

“It’s easy to get stalled when working with rentals,” O’Steen said. Or, rather, it used to be.

Digg del.icio.us Blink Stumble Spurl Reddit Netscape Furl

Article keywords: sales training, sales training program, selling skills, selling, sales techniques, sales strategy

Article Source: http://www.articles2k.com

Duane Sparks is chairman and founder of The Sales Board, a Minneapolis-based Sales Training company that has trained and certified more than 200,000 salespeople.

Top Sales Articles
1). Why Use Lead Management Software? By : Halstatt Pires Having a popular website, or popular company of any type, is entirely dependant on sales. Effective sales at that. Maintaining a healthy profit is key to the long-term survival of your web site or business and this means knowing the difference between your effective sales leads and your ineffective sales leads. Small Business Owner Lead management software is perfect for the small business owner or webmaster of a website.
2). Power Words By : Wendy Weiss I conducted a teleconference a few weeks ago with people who were new in sales and new to prospecting. The focus of the call was to help participants get beyond fear and understand their prospecting process. One of the participants on the call told me that she had been given the telephone prospecting script that her team leader uses to set appointments.
3). Secrets to Getting Paid for Your Creative Ideas and Proposals By : Kirstin Carey Many creative professionals such as event planners, interior designers, and decorative painters are frustrated when potential clients steal their ideas and take them to cheaper companies. They present their ideas in a proposal or presentation and later find that they didn’t get the client and their designs are being used by someone else. PROTECT YOUR IDEAS In order to protect your ideas and still get the client, you have to change how you deliver your concepts and specifically what you present.
4). The Sales Training Series: Dealing With Sales Objections and Stalls By : Duane Sparks Most salespeople think of “stalls” and “objections” as synonyms. Wrong. Stalls and objections are both things you may hear after you have asked for commitment, but an objection is a specific reason not to buy. In a stall—“I need to think about it”—the customer offers no particular reason for hesitating.
5). What’s the Objective of Your 1st Sales Appointment? By : Jeff Hardesty Have you defined what you want to happen at the conclusion of your 1st appointment? Only then can you actually set up a proficient sales methodology to achieve the defined objective more times than not. And with a pre-defined objective to your 1st appointment you can (1) set a realistic benchmark of success and (2) measure the outcome. It becomes part of your sales performance scorecard.
6). Stop Cold Calling and Double Your Sales in 30 Days By : Hartley Pinn Everyone knows what “cold calling” is, but how about “warm calling”? That’s easy, warm calling involves contacting your former clients and people you have already identified as prospects. These are the people you had made previous contact with and are listed in your database or on your Rolodex. If appropriate for your industry, I recommend spending one hour a day calling your database.
7). Restaurant Supply a Lifesaver for Caterer By : Kingston Amadan A few years ago, I was working as a catering manager of a local historic hotel. The hotel had been in terrible condition for many years until a group of investors purchased it and began the long arduous process of renovation. They were able to get the majority of it renovated before the funding started to run out, at which time they opened for business to offset some of the costs of ownership.
8). Employers Keep Screening Out Great Sales Candidates By : Robert Cameron Companies hiring sales reps stick to the same old hiring practices, and hire low performers that turn over, while screening out some of the best candidates. Robert Cameron examines two hiring myths and shows you how to easily select sales people who can sell.
9). The Five Cardinal Sins Salespeople Commit By : Bill Brooks We have very candid conversations with the sales professionals who come to our seminars and through those discussions we’ve discovered five critical errors that most salespeople make. Of course, we help them correct those mistakes, but it’s somewhat surprising as to how common they are. Here are the mistakes, see if you commit them in your own sales career.
10). The Downlow on Buying and Selling Concert Tickets Online By : Jared Lock Buying concert tickets online isn’t scary. In fact, it’s as easy as visiting Google and typing in the event you are looking for and follow with the word “tickets”. However, a couple of questions may come to mind when browsing for sports or concert tickets. 1. Why are tickets so expensive on the internet? On Ticketmaster the tickets are so much cheaper.

New Sales Articles
1). How To Get Return Customers By : David Gass Explains to to build customer loyalty and get customers to come back and buy more.
2). 7 Strategies for Loan Officers to Guarantee an Awesome 2006 By : Joe Pahl With the coming high interest rate market, loan officers who follow these seven strategies will guarantee having a successful 2006. The stratgies include new technology, proper planning, business referral groups, and maximizing your "geese that lays golden eggs" among others.
3). 7 Reasons Why Loan Officers SHOULD NOT Market to REALTORS By : Joe Pahl This article expresses why marketing to real estate agents is not always the best option and explores seven other ways to generate purchase business.
4). Staying Warm in a Cooling Market By : Bob Corcoran As the National Real Estate market changes there are five key items an agent can embrace to make the most of this market shift
5). Dealing with the RIGHT Decision Maker By : Tim Hagen Dealing with different decision making styles and decision makers appropriately is a big part of being successful in sales. This article will provide background to the different types of personalities that can be encountered in the sales process.
6). Get Ahead By Using Affiliates By : David Gass Describes what affiliates are and how to benefit from them.
7). How to Make an Unsuccessful Sale a Good Learning Experience By : Tim Hagen Losing a deal can be difficult, however learning from the experience can reap huge rewards. Successfully using what you did incorrectly can change future outcomes if addressed correctly.
8). Closing A Sale: Promise and Deliver! By : Hartley Pinn One of the chief complaints from customers about the way business is conducted these days centers on customer service. Either the service aspect is completely lacking or what has been promised to the customer hasn’t been kept. Dealing with the latter category, it is easy to see why customers are disappointed: sales people routinely over promise and then fail to deliver.
9). Sales Secrets for Entrepreneurs: Increase Profits in 12 Months Flat Through Consumer Education Programs! By : Chet Holmes You can attract far more prospects to look at your offer by providing an education than you'll ever get by simply offering your products or services. For example: Let's say you sell telephone systems, like Company X. Before discovering this concept, Company X would call hundreds of companies per day and ask if they were interested in talking about a new telephone system (product offer).
10). Sell Services Online By : Eggbilly Is it possible to take a normal offline service business like a legal practice, private medical practitioner or even a real estate business and make money with it from the Internet? As someone who’s been doing this since 1996, I say the answer is a resounding “YES”. If you are a business owner, or even an affiliate marketer, you know how hard it is to make a living online.