Being a successful salesperson is a two-part process. To sell a product, you need to engage your customer and get them emotionally attached to your product. Selling the features of a product is not the same as closing a deal to generate a sale. Closing is arguably the most important part of the sales process, as it generates income and profit. Here are four reasons you may not be closing.
You’re a poor communicator
Establishing clear, concise and confident communication with your customers is a key component in the art of successful closing. Address your customers clearly and confidently. Don’t falter, hesitate or ramble, and always maintain eye contact. Pay full attention to your client and practice active listening. Customers will be extremely frustrated if they get the impression nobody is listening or fully addressing their wants and needs. Paying customers deserve attention.
Being an effective communicator involves strong listening skills and operating well in a reciprocal process of sharing information. If necessary, practice what you want to say. You may want to record yourself and play it back to recognize what you’re doing well and what areas of your delivery needs improvement.
You're not investing in building relationships
Put yourself in the shoes of your customer. Would you prefer to do business with someone you have been building rapport with and trust or someone you barely know? Every potential customer is a person with interests, hobbies, family and future goals, which can likely relate to your business, service, or products. Getting to know your client on a personal level is a critical part of building a relationship and developing trust.
You’re not selling a solution
Sometimes it’s hard to remember you’re not selling a product or service, you’re selling a solution to your clients' problems, wants or needs. Forbes even describes it as providing a solution for a customer’s “pain point.” For instance, your lawn is out of control and you don’t have time to maintain it. Hiring a lawn service solves your problem. How can your product or service solve your client’s problem?
Better yet, are there multiple problems you can solve for your client? For instance, will your state-of-the-art HVAC system solve your customer’s heating and cooling needs, conserve energy and help your client reduce energy bills? The more solutions you can offer a customer, the more reasons they will have to do business with you.
You bad mouth your competition
You should never speak negatively about your competitors' products and services. Refrain from resorting to low-blow kinds of tactics, which customers generally see through. Often it can backfire and essentially make you the bad guy in your clients' eyes.
If you’ve followed the previous suggestions to communicate clearly, build a relationship with your client and sell solutions, then customers should be motivated to do business with you and buy your products and services. You won’t need to cut down your competition in an attempt to sway your customer to work with you instead.