Break It Down To Close The Sale By Ciaran Ryan

Most sales people I’ve known throughout my career continually highlight the importance of ‘the close.’ “You’ve gotta perfect the close,” they’d say like it was a quote from Solomon. Personally I’ve always felt that effective prospecting and more specifically qualification and getting referrals were the keys to success in sales. When you have a fully qualified lead in front of you I’ve often found that they close themselves once you don’t talk too much and mess it up.

However, for the qualified prospects you meet who despite seeing the benefits of your product are still undecided on whether to order from you use this tactic to close them whatever their objection. I like to call it ‘breaking it down’ and I also find it very useful in other general negotiation situations.

Generally the best way to begin is with a natural phrase encouraging the prospect to help you outline their situation such as “Let’s just break this down for a second.”

From there I like to use my pen and pad if we’re sitting down; I try to sit beside the prospect, now facing opposite him, and I make sure I position the pad in between the two of us and show him whatever I write.

I then proceed to ask the prospect to list for you any objections he has regarding the purchase. From there you simply break them down as follows. If the objection is the price it’s easier because you can simply ask “how much too much” the prospect considers it (as this is the smaller figure) and when he gives you a figure break it down further by either translating it into the extra cost per day or comparing how much extra per day it is with the extra benefits the prospect will receive by owning your product.

If the objections are not price orientated you will have to find another way to break them down and the best way to do this without ‘stepping in it’ is to ask careful open questions to find out how important the objection is to them and help them to identify a possible way around it. Remember though; number orientated objections such as price and delivery time are easier to breakdown for the prospect.

Essentially you need to help the prospect see that their objection is silly (although be careful not to tell them so merely help them discover it with questions). You do this by breaking down their objection until it seems very tiny in comparison with all the benefits they will receive from ownership of your product.

Ciaran Ryan is an entrepreneur, motivational speaker, professional salesperson and the founder of http://www.irishsalesprofessional.com a website devoted to the sole purpose of educating sales people to increase their income. The website produces a free newsletter full of useful selling advice. Learn more to earn more.