Whenever we are working with other human beings we will sometimes disagree. In a sales conversation that disagreement can take the form of objections. Sometimes in the heat of negotiations, emotion seeps into this conversation. At that point, we can find ourselves in full-blown conflict!
Typically, conflict enters into our conversation when we don’t handle the objections properly and respectfully enough. So, how can we address disagreement in a respectful manner that will move the sales conversation forward?
Before we discuss the methods to handle objections, let’s look at the one thing we should never do when an objection is thrown our way.
Don’t immediately make your case. Why not? If our customer’s perception is incorrect, mistaken, or simply incomplete, why can’t we just clear this up nice and quick by explaining that? Then the objection will just magically disappear, right? Well if you’ve ever been in this situation, you know that’s not how it works.
When we immediately make our case, at best we sound defensive. At worst, we find ourselves in a debate with our customer. This is not a position we want to be in.
Immediately making our case actually puts our customer on the defensive. We did not show respect and interest in their position, so now an objection can move into conflict.
What could we do instead?
Prepare. Preparation and planning is the key to success in almost any endeavor. Before any customer encounter, hether it will be in person, on the telephone, or in email, we should do a short preparation drill. Part of that drill should always be to anticipate what possible objections the customer may have to anything we are going to say, do, or offer.
2. Agree with the objection. Wha-at?! That’s right. Find some element somewhere in what the customer says that you can agree with. Take a brief pause if you need to think this through. Silence is OK.
Again, when a customer shares an objection with us, the most important first response is to show respect for and an interest in what they have to say. Doing this first paves the way for the other steps to help us work through the objection. This technique, therefore, is a very important phase, and the most often skipped step.
So, what does this look like? Certainly, we don’t want to agree with the negative things the customer says about our company, our product, or our proposal. Let’s say that a customer says, “Your pricing is ridiculous!” We don’t want to simply agree with that! We can, however, find an element within that statement that we can agree to. What is the customer really saying? The customer is really telling us in no uncertain terms that our price is surprising to him. Perhaps it is much higher than other competitive bids. Now how can we agree?
Since we’ve done our preparation in step one, we already know that the customer is sensitive to price and that we are likely to be the highest bid. How about just agreeing with one or both of those facts? We could say something like, “Budget is always an important consideration.” Or, “I’m not surprised our bid is more than that of our competitors.”
Please note: We don’t agree and then say, “…but”. If we do that we are simply moving right to making our case. In this step, we want to respect and show interest in their position.
Second note: We want to “agree,” not simply “acknowledge.” Stay away from phrases such as “I understand how you could feel that way,” or “I can see why you might think that.” Statements like these are usually followed by an explanation of why the customer’s perception is incorrect. These statements can also be taken as condescending “pats on the head” and therefore actually heighten the emotion and conflict the exact opposite of what we want to achieve.
When we learn to agree with some element of a customer’s objection, we also learn to preempt or short-circuit the process of emotion negatively impacting our conversation and therefore our relationship.
3. Clarify. Now that we have sent a strong signal to our customer that we are interested and wanting to listen, let’s get them talking. We do this by asking a lot of clarifying questions. Why is this important to the customer? What is the cost to the customer if this is not resolved? How has this impacted them in the past?
Do not shy away from the tough questions! This is where you will get important information about how strong this objection actually is. You may also begin to get hints of possible solutions.
Caution: Do you not ask closed-ended questions during this phase. Your goal is to get the customer talking freely. Open-ended questions are the best tool for this. In addition, closed-ended questions can feel like the customer is being interrogated, or like we are simply trying to box them into our way of thinking. In this phase, we are instead practicing our active listening skills.
Clarifying a customer’s objection benefits us in all sorts of ways. By listening, we continue to show respect and lower the emotion in the room. By learning, we can begin the process of thinking about options to resolve the objection. By taking the time, we are buying ourselves time to think about next steps.
4. Brainstorm or make a list. If we have done the preceding steps properly, we should now be able to carry the customer with us to a place of working together to resolve the objection. As a prelude to this step, we might briefly explain to the customer some of the reasons and limitations we have on simply removing the source of their objection. For instance, we might share with the customer why we are unable to ship by their target date. Then we would follow up by saying that we may, however, be able to help them meet their manufacturing goal in another way. We then engage the customer in a brainstorming session to discover how we can help.
The magic of this phase lies in the power of brainstorming. It is imperative that we have covered the preceding phases properly before we ask the customer to engage with us in a brainstorming session. They simply will not be active in the session if we have not removed emotion and actively listened to them and respected their position. But if we can successfully get the customer to work with us on a creative solution, we are in the best position we can possibly be in. Sometimes a creative brainstorming session results in a solution the customer is even happier with than if the initial objection had simply been removed!
5. Negotiate. We have now worked the customer through or around emotion, and we both have information we can use to start to make some firm offers. Now it is simply a negotiation process. As is the case in any negotiation, we will probably need to make some concessions.
Don’t forget the cardinal rule: if you make a concession, always get something in return!
Using the shipment date objection that we referenced above, perhaps we can offer to the customer our original shipment date (that the customer did not like), but we are shipping higher-end materials that will cut time off of their manufacturing process. This will also explain our higher price that they have probably also objected to! Or maybe we simply offer expedited shipping in return for a higher volume order or promise of future orders.
Whatever this final negotiation phase looks like, you will be much better positioned for it if you have been thoughtful with the preceding phases of handling objections.
