The Secret to Overcoming Objections (without being a jerk)

The Secret to Overcoming Objections (without being a jerk)

I’ve made an interesting observation that might help on your sales conversations: The objections you find the most difficult to overcome are the ones that you share with your customers - the ones you actually agree with!

It doesn’t even matter what you say to respond to the objection, because 90% of communication is non-verbal. If you agree with the objection, you will communicate that louder than the words you speak. 


For example - Let’s say your client says at the end of the call, “I have to think about it,” or, “I never make decisions on the spot.” You might feel deep down that’s a valid reason to not make a decision. 

You may have said something like that to a salesperson yourself because you were afraid of making an impulse decision. So, most likely, you will say something like, “Ok, let’s set up a follow-up call for tomorrow/next week, etc.” And just like that, the client falls into the “fatal follow-up funnel.” Not that you can’t make sales in the follow-up stage, but your chances decline dramatically compared to being able to make a decision on the spot. 


Or, perhaps you don’t agree with them right away and say something like, “Hmm.. What do you have to think about? Maybe I can help?” Even with the “right” words, you’ll still communicate, somehow, someway, that you don’t really believe what you’re saying (it’s actually very difficult to lie). So you’ll be saying that, but your “subtext” is, “I’m going to force myself to ask this question but I know it’s not going to work because it’s reasonable that you should not make decisions impulsively.” This will come across in other ways like clearing your throat, itching your head, leaning in too far, darting your eyes, swallowing your words, slowing down your pace, lowering your volume… there are LOTS of ways the clients can tell you’re lying, so it doesn’t help just to force saying the “right” thing. 


What you’ll need to do is convince YOURSELF first that making decisions on the spot is not a bad thing, in fact, it’s a good thing! You’ll want to prove yourself wrong, first, and for that, you’ll need to do some research or ask someone for help. Your beliefs can change and if you find one is holding you back from where you want to be, you can replace it with a new belief. 


So for this example, I could show you how, psychologically, we actually ALWAYS make decisions immediately on an emotional level in the cerebral cortex before we turn to examine the logic in the frontal lobe. But the logic that we gather to make our decision will subconsciously support the decision we already made emotionally - without ever being aware of it! 


I like to compare it to dating - ever been with someone who was logically not a good match for you, but emotionally you were very attached? You can make a pros/cons list to see if you should break up with the person, but somehow you come with so many more pros! Or you have more cons but still decide to stay - because you’ve already made a decision. The exercise is futile. 


Knowing this, you’ll see the importance of understanding that the customer is really saying, “no,” so that you can get to the real objection and actually overcome it rather than having them ghost you later. 


There is another factor at play that a person actually NEEDS that emotional feeling to make a decision. And since emotions are temporary, if they wanted to say yes today, but forced themselves to think about it, they’re emotional connection will dissipate and it will be difficult to find the logic to move forward. So, if it’s something that I believe can truly help the customer, I need to be able to help them to make a decision now.


Lastly, I’ll add that one of the companies I sell for markets to CEOs of MidMarket Companies ($100M - $3B in Revenue). I am not exaggerating when I say they make $30k decisions in less than 10 minutes. There is a yes or a no. There is never an “I have to think about it.” One of the traits of highly successful people is their ability to make decisions quickly. In fact, some of their most critical decisions have to be made almost instantaneously - you don’t have time to think about it or get a second opinion.  


So it’s certainly not a good trait that someone has to think about something, especially when it’s a small investment. And if you’re in the habit of not trusting your OWN intuition and confidence to make quick decisions, it’s certainly something you can work on, too, so that when a customer says they have to think about it, you won’t let them go so easily - again, only when you both agree it’s a good fit. 


Now, once you’ve convinced yourself of another way of thinking (also known as “overcoming limiting beliefs”) then you can work through all the objections you get: Price, timing, features, etc. 


I say all this assuming you really care about your customers and aren’t scamming them - because they’re going to sense that and none of this would apply to you. But if you truly want to help your customers, you need to understand how they make decisions and what’s REALLY holding them back so you can help them move forward. 


xoxo

P.S. Make sure you grab my free high-converting sales script! It's a step-by-step framework to close more sales that generated over $100M for our sales team! freescript.jpmpartners.com





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