Conrey is for Closers

A phrase that I heard repeatedly when I was selling cars was “Conrey, you need to slow down to speed up.” In my excitement to close a deal I would often make small mistakes - sometimes several of them - which would cause me untold problems down the road. I ended up spending more time solving these issues than if I had just slowed down a little bit and done it right the first time (yes - echos of my dad telling me to do it right the first time as well).

It is easy to let your excitement run a little bit when you’re in the closing stage of any deal. Hell if you’re not excited about closing, you probably should rethink your sales position. But even when you’re not closing you need to be aware of your pace.

• Slow down when you leave voicemail messages - especially when leaving your phone number. There is nothing worse than a voicemail message I have to listen to twice to get a call back number.
• Slow down when prospecting, make sure you’re not missing easy referrals from past clients, or from leads that have emailed or called you. Return every phone call and email - no matter how busy you may be. The next one you return may be the one that makes a deal for you.
• Slow down when the client is telling you about their problem - don’t be preparing your pitch while they are speaking, you need to be sure that you are listening so that you can accurately diagnose and solve their pain.
• Slow down when giving your pitch - watch for the body language cues to see if they are buying in to how you are selling to them or if you need to change tactics. Don’t rush through it, make sure they don’t miss any of the parts that will be important to them.
• Slow down when closing - get a firm commitment from the client and make sure that they know that you are the right one to sell them whatever it is they are buying. Don’t take maybes and assumptions as a real close.
• Slow down when doing the paperwork or contracts to finalize the deal - a missed zero or address error can make a difference in their perception of your quality, professionalism and sets a bad expectation for their future contact with you in post-sale life. Don’t let them think that you are so eager to finish with them and move on to the next sale.

Speed kils your momentum if you can’t react to the right stimuli as they arise. Take a deep breath and slow down before you hurt yourself.

It happened to me over the last week or so. For all of us in sales it has happened before, it will happen again - a client isn’t happy. The details are really irrelevant - it doesn’t matter whose fault it is, what went wrong, or what exactly set them down this path - what matters is what you do once you realize that they are upset.

The first thing you should do is listen - hear out their problem. Find out exactly what their pain is with your product or service. Don’t say anything at all at first except to ask questions to clarify their pain. Show that you do care.

The next thing you should do is apologize - sincerely. Understand that they have problems with your product or service and that they are coming to you to fix them. Apologize, say that you understand their problem and want to make an effort to solve it.

The third thing you should do is apologize again. And make sure that you really do mean it.

From here you need to calm their fears. If you are a service provider, they are likely worried that you either aren’t going to be able to continue providing the service they need, or not provide it at the quality level they need. If this isn’t the case you need to tell them that, but more importantly show them that. Show them your commitment to making them happy.

You should explain to them what you are going to do to solve their problem. If there is nothing you can do, be very careful in how you tell them that there is nothing you can do. Don’t appear to be passing the buck or the problem off. If it is a third party problem, offer to conference call with that person so that you can be sure to hammer everything out.

You should never yell or swear. I know that seems like common sense but when a customer is carpet bombing you with F-bombs and calling you every name under the sun it can be difficult to remember. Those of you who have met me in real life know that I’m fond of the occasional expletive - it is a vicious challenge to bite them back when being attacked for something that is not my fault - but escalating their anger isn’t going to get you anywhere. Take whatever they can give you - let it roll off and be gone - at least until you hang up the phone.

Most important of all things is to own the mistakes that are your fault. If you screwed the pooch - be honest and take responsibility for it. If your team didn’t produce the way you sold it - take the responsibility for it and find out how to make it better. Be honest in this and own the problem. The client has a relationship with you above all else and it is your job to manage that and keep it in the right attitude.

Finally you need to remember that there are going to be times where you can’t win. You won’t be able to make them happy. You won’t be able to deliver as promised. You won’t be able to soothe their fears. You may even burn them as a client forever. These should be a minority of your cases, but they will happen. Learn from them. Learn what you did wrong whether it was directly (you actually did something) or indirectly (you didn’t see the signs from 3rd parties or the client themselves). Learn what word tracks and phrases either helped or harmed your situation. Learn that though this client may leave, there will be others - if you can learn from your mistakes.

Remembering the important details of your clients is an underrated way to endear yourself to them and earn repeat business and loyalty.

Remember their kids names, and ages, and how many there are.
Remember where they work, what they do, how long they’ve been there.
Remember their likes and dislikes about food, politics, music, sports, etc
Remember why they did or didn’t buy from you
Remember what times they are usually in the office so you’re not calling while they are at lunch or in a regular meeting.

And here’s the best part - there’s no reason why you can’t write all of these things down so that you can have them ready when you talk to them next - because you never know when they’ll come back to you.

No I’m not going to rehash the old line “If you fail to plan you plan to fail” or its derivatives. That would be too easy. We all know that you have to have a plan to guide you in some manner. You don’t have to be an anal retentive OCD person and plan everything every day, but you have to have a goal or target you are aiming for and a plan on how to achieve that.

Just having a plan though isn’t good enough. I personally have made many plans, most of which never got past the first step. I’m sure you have as well. Implementing the plan is the real important bit. It is super easy to get caught up in making the perfect plan and never actually start doing things. Besides as the great philosopher Mike Tyson said: “Everyone has a plan until they get punched in the face”

This is one of the things that I love about the Agile Software movement and the way that we build software at Integrum. Agile believers believe that the best way to build software is to get the requirements at the last responsible moment. This way rather than doing the old school 800 page spec document for two years, you just start building the first part.

In sales it is easy to get caught up in making sure that you have the perfect product presentation or have the perfect close ready to throw at any objection. But if you don’t pick up the phone and set the appointment first, none of that matters.

“I want to stand as close to the edge as I can without going over. Out on the edge you see all the kinds of things you can’t see from the center.” - Kurt Vonnegut

The edge is a scary place. Things operate on a very low tolerance before you fail. Sometimes you can fail spectacularly and fall right off the edge. Sometimes you get overwhelmed by how close to the edge you are and become paralyzed with fear.

Most people like to get close to the edge but only when they know that they have a safety net to catch them, or when they know that the fall isn’t very far at all. If you only go to the edge when you have someone else to blame if you fail, or you have a low risk, or the failure doesn’t hurt, then you aren’t on the edge. Standing on the curb isn’t standing on the edge at all.

The vast minority is liberated by the view beyond the guard rails. They hang their big toes off into the gap, knowing that if the edge crumbles out from beneath them that it is going to hurt. But they also know that it is the only way you can see the really cool stuff that no one else can see. They get to see things before anyone else and have a chance to react to them. The risk is great but so is the reward.

Are you standing close enough to the edge to see the cool stuff? Or are you sitting back comfortably behind the guard rail?