Closing Confidently

 This is Mick Holly and welcome to this week's show, which is called closing is a service. Okay. So we're on the sell the sizzle podcast. So let's just step back for a second. And just ask ourselves the question, what exactly is selling. selling is an exchange. It's an exchange of value. So both the buyer and the seller get something out of it.

That's called the winner's exchange. We're both winners in the sales process. And this podcast is all for people who are, get very worried about the close. They feel that it's the worst part of selling that it's too much pressure. And if you just do your selling job, Closing should just be a natural outcome of a well navigated sales process.

And I used to think that too. I used to think that if I did , my sales process, well, then people would buy from me. But no, you need to close them. Let's just talk a little, about this exchange of value. Let's say that you had written a book. And the book is maybe $50, right? Would you buy the book?

Well, you would buy the book if you thought that it was worth more than $50. If you thought that what you would learn in that book, and if you applied it, might help you. Let's say You know, I've written a sales book and that book is $50. If it helped you close one more transaction and your transaction value was a hundred thousand dollars, then that $50 book turned into a hundred dollars worth of value.

You would be very, very happy. But hold on, it's not quite that simple. wHat you really want in order for you to get the value out of my book. You've actually got to apply the principles in the book. You've actually got to use what is in the book in order to make that effective close, in order to get those skills, use those techniques to make that happen.

So as the seller in order for that Winners exchange to take place, you have to take responsibility for getting your prospect to recognize all of the value and to act on all of that value. So you want to make sure that you encourage them, that you follow up. If you just sell something, a product or a service, and people don't misuse your product or don't use your product, mistreat your product and don't get the value, they'll be very, very unhappy.

And they won't feel that they've got the value out of that transaction. Now, as I mentioned at the beginning, right, we're going to be talking about closing.

Closing is not the same as selling. They are two distinct things. The close sits inside the overall sales process, but the close comes right at the end.

There may be some small transactional closes during the sales process, but

the close it's called the close because you close the door on that transaction.

You seal the deal. It's an act of closure. You are finishing the transaction and if you don't finish the transaction, you don't get paid.

The close is singularly the most important element of the overall sales process. So you want the customer to take action. you want them to sign, you want them to do this. You want them to agree. You want them to take delivery of your product or your service and you want them to use it.

 I know many salespeople, and for me also closing. I used to get a little apprehensive and uncertain about that particular point in time. You know, great delivery. I'm a good presenter. I like talking about my product. I like talking about my service. I like the probing and the discovery and the asking questions.

All those things that you do in that sales process. But you remember the steps in the sales process.

You greet,

you qualify. In other words, you try and find out what their problems are through probing questions.

You present your, product, how it will solve those , problems,

 then you close them and

ultimately you follow up, you know, if necessary, in order to finally get that transaction inked.

But that closing part, people start to get a little Concerned. And when I've been sat with them in sales training, I noticed they get a little fidgety., they, they don't look the prospect in the eye. They get a little bit uncertain their language becomes a little disjointed. They mumble and they stumble.

And that creates a degree of unease with the With the prospective buyer. So why is it that this most important and vital step, which is a natural consequence, a natural step in the sales process? People get worried about it, and it's largely because they don't feel comfortable. Whenever you don't feel competent about something, you feel a little bit uncomfortable when you do something the first time.

Remember when you tried to ride a bike the first time, you didn't know how to do it, you were falling off. And you were very apprehensive. The first time you try anything new, or you're not expert at it, you're a little bit at sea. This is what happens with sales people. They feel uncomfortable because they don't feel they're not in control.

Because they haven't trained. They're not masters of the close. , I do want to draw your attention. Episode 16 in the podcast, sell the sizzle. we talk about how to be a born closer and what you can do to increase your closing skills.

But for now, let's talk about the fact that you're just not feeling competent because, you we fear, we fear being pushy. Look. , I used to think if I did my selling job well, if I did my presentation well, I wouldn't have to, you know, assert myself at the end in order to get the close

it would just happen naturally. Well, it doesn't, you do have to push. You're just not going to get anywhere unless you push. You've really got to assert your, and, and the customer gets emotional. Everybody gets emotional when it comes to making decisions and your job is to help the customer make a decision.

So what I want you to think about is that,

closing is actually a service.

I want you to disarm that angst, right? Because it is, you're providing a service. The customer doesn't know how to buy your product or your service, your house, your complex product. They don't know how to do it. It's, it's a difficult process.

Decision making is something that they're not probably good at. They're not practiced at. So you have to school them. You have to help them through that emotional journey. They're probably going to get a little, , red in the face and, and, and anxious. You just need to stay calm because you're the master, you're the master of the clothes and you're delivering immense value.

You're providing a service. You're putting that sale on a silver platter, making it very easy for them to say, yes, let's do this. Let's get started. When can we get it installed tomorrow or Friday? And it just ease them into that close and that service delivering that service allows them them to get the value out of your product or service.

And then you need to follow up that service follow up, you know, going forward, so that they use your product and they get all of the value out of your product and your service. Now, how do we, how do you learn? How do you learn that? I talked about the fact that people, salespeople find it very uncomfortable doing the clothes because they're not really, they don't have all of the tools.

They don't have all the experience. Well, you know, there are two ways to become a great. Closer and salesperson and one is through the school of hard knocks through trial and error, which is 95 percent of the people go down this route, right? They get their head beaten up against a wall until they say, you know, that's not probably not working.

And they tend to look around a little bit, kind of do it a little differently. And they, and they trial and error over time, they probably don't have the most elegant way of doing it. They just hang in a little bit longer. , but it's not replicable if you've got salespeople in your organization and one guy's knocking it out of the park.

It's probably because she or he has been there 20 years and they've been through that hard knock process. You can't afford to wait 20 years for somebody to be productive or even you. As a salesperson, you, you can't afford not to make income, , for a few years while you learn this tradecraft. You want to learn it more quickly.

So, so don't do it through the hard knocks method. What is another way of doing it? Well, another way of doing it is to, is to create the right kind of experiences so that you can learn your craft. That would be through role play. It would be through. Watching yourself on video, it would be looking at some sales methodologies and training and getting some coaching on that.

So people can show you how to go through those steps and give you the closing techniques and the closing tools that you need and the objection handling skills you need to be able to negotiate and finally get the close. I would point out episode 11. Of sell the sizzle. We talked about the secret to overcoming sales objections.

You want to build those techniques of overcoming objections. You want to look at how to become a born closer and look at those skills and start to role play, those , skills, you know, within your portfolio. So remember, just Relax when it comes to the close, it, if somebody says you're pressuring me, you're pressuring me, you're selling me too hard.

It, what that means is that you've done a very, very good job of presenting, but you've done a very minimalistic job in closing. You haven't actually done enough closing. You've done a lot of selling, a lot of questions, a lot of presenting, a lot of negotiating, but you didn't close the transaction. The close is to close that door.

It is to complete that transaction. It is to get your customer to take action and put ink on the paper. So don't be afraid of the close. The close is where you make money. It is also the point at which value can be exchanged because if there is no close. There is no value exchange and you've just taken up a lot of time with the prospect and they haven't taken any action, which is much, much worse.

They feel they've wasted their time. They didn't get the outcome. You didn't help. You didn't deliver the service of helping them close the service of showing how great your product, your service is. Didn't do them a service of showing what value that would create in them individually and in their enterprise.

So remember in that close, you are delivering a service, embrace it, feel happy, get elated, smile when you're doing the clothes because you're delivering immense value. So never ever be concerned or worry. That you're not good enough to close, learn some closing techniques, learn some objection handling techniques, and then shift that mindset so that you know that when you ask for that order, you are delivering value and you're going to change the trajectory of your prospect and their company's business by doing so.

Hope you enjoyed this week's episode and we'll see you. Next week.

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