Avoid Confrontation – Lose Sales

I am not talking about an arrogant confrontational communication style that many people use quite naturally. I am talking about salespeople who avoid confrontation of all types at all times. Salespeople who are always totally agreeable come across as weak and more importantly waste a lot of time with unqualified prospects. Here are two occasions when you need to confront a prospect:

1. When the prospect contradicts himself subtly as follows: “Our operations department is losing money.” … Five minutes later, “We are happy with the way things are.” This example is rather blatant and it is obvious that you need to confront the prospect by saying “… I guess I don’t understand how you can be happy when you are losing money.” Blatant as the example is, salespeople let the prospects slide with contradictions like this every day.

2. When the prospect says something mildly positive about your product or service; such as “What you have looks very interesting.” If you take that and keep moving, you will soon find yourself writing a quote for an unqualified prospect. The optimal salesperson pushes back with “really, … why?”.

Both of these examples are mild forms of confrontation and yet they will change the nature of the conversation, yield prospects that are more qualified or eliminate them before you have a chance to waste any time or money on them. This 1-minute video will show you how a healthy dose of skepticism is invaluable.