How To Handle Face To Face Appointments - Leveraging Questions For Pitching And Closing More Easily!

Very helpful and informative post, John. Thanks!

I wish I read this before my first appointment. It went really bad. haha I'm starting to get better, and your sharing has opened my eyes even more!

You said "There is the occasional unresponsive prospect who doesnt get moved on ANYTHING". I've had something like this happen before. Being new to this, it made me really uncomfortable and I nicely ended our meeting. 2 weeks later he calls me, and he's ready to get his website. How should someone like this be handled? Just move on to the next prospect?

These questions can be used over the phone as well, right?

Great presentation, John.

When you understand the top reasons someone objects doing business with you today, and you prepare your questions thoughtfully to knock out future objections, you are on your way to sales success.

John, how much emphasis do you put on initial rapport building? Some believe in it, some don't.

Epic post. Thank you, John!

He's baaaaack !!

I like your take on rapport. Good stuff

My definition of closing is "a commitment to the sale." So, to "always be closing" means to me to continually and progressively seek that commitment.

I wouldn't call those tie downs, necessarily. And I'll tell you why.

For the most part, the prospect's committing to a choice of what he wants, sure enough. But not a choice that irrefutably ties him down to doing that business with YOU.

So a tie down that would do more of that kind of thing would be this:

YOU: "did you have a logo already that you want us to use on your site, or will be needing us to create one for you"?

PROSPECT: "I already have the logo designed."

YOU: "So we're using your logo then for this, is that right?" (tie down)

PROSPECT: "That's right."

OR

YOU: "did you have a logo already that you want us to use on your site, or will be needing us to create one for you"?

PROSPECT: "I need to have the logo designed."

YOU: "So we're designing your logo for this, is that right?" (tie down)

PROSPECT: "That's right."

It's like a confirming question after the prospect states a choice. That's what ties him down. Just gives it a leeeeetle bit more oomph getting an agreement in this way.

At the risk of sounding like Emeril, we're gonna take this up a notch. "What we are going to do for you" becomes "Let's do this..." because now it's not you pitching what we're going to do, but instead, now the two of you are a team. And you're speaking as if you're a team. It's a joint cooperative project, you're both on board. That's what the language "let's do this..." infers.

Bam.

See now, I wouldn't say that because I wouldn't want the prospect to think there's this sort of grace period between now and later when I finally process his order, in which maybe he feels he can cancel because the order hasn't been officially processed? I want him to feel I'm on the job right now.

My father -- who consistently for 20 years sold millions in the chemical business through himself and via his sales force -- told me all sales is is answering objections.

All these tie-downs, leading the prospect with yes-answers, etc., are just sales tactics. They are the 20% of being successful in sales.

What accounts for the 80%? Timing... asking thoughtful questions (much like John has asked), and continuous, never-ending prospecting (even when you're pipeline is full and you're booked solid for weeks in advance).

If I was training a new salesperson, my number one focus would be on him pounding the phone or walking in dead cold hundreds of times a week, sifting through suspects to find the few golden nuggets that are ready to close TODAY, and to begin building the pipeline of prospects that will turn hot over the next year.

Additionally, I would have him learn his product inside-out. I'd have him understand why people buy my company's product, why they don't, and teach him how to ask pointed, open-ended questions, and teach my new sales person to talk about 20% of the time, and listen 80% of the time.

All the tactics that most sales trainers like to focus on? That'd come later... AFTER the fundamentals are honed.

Aprreciate that Claude. You are very welcome. I hope it helps some people.

I believe with all of my heart that learning to separate the two in your mind can really ease a lot of pressure. Much like “T.O’s” do.

I learned in songwriting that its best to separate the “writer” from the “editor”. In other words, let yourself express freely for five pages… and don’t stop letting it flow, stopping and nit picking along the way.

Let the “writer” get it all out without interruption. Then, let the “editor” take over at a different juncture, and nit pick the meter of all the lines, pilfer through the ones it likes, intellectualize what fits or doesn’t…and edit the writers five pages down to one page, 3 minute and twenty second song.

Never let the two into the same room at the same time, for best results.

Otherwise you get nowhere in the creative process, always being interrupted by the editor, and you stop the creative flow up to much, and lose inspiration, and think too hard during the creative process.

There is a time for creating, and there is a time for editing. Writing a song has two separate processes, and so does sales.

Kick the editor out of the room while the writer is expressing. Let him come in later, when its his turn.
I think prospecting and selling works the same way. You have to separate the two processes in your mind, or you lose prospecting time and get hung up a lot, lose inspiration, energy, and miss a lot of potentially good “lines” or “opportunities”.

I think there are different operating systems that can work and this isn’t the only one by far. Usually when they talk about their last purchase, they were burned and it wasn’t a good experience.

In my own mind you want to find out what that experience was that caused them to give up on having a website, and figure out how you can become the exact opposite in their mind of the person who burned them.

However, you can lose weight by cutting our meat, and you can also lose it by cutting out everything BUT meat, so I think there are different operating systems , and yours would be just as effective.

Yeah that’s why I noted “Don’t go too far or you will appear insincere”. I also agree above that most of rapport building happens throughout the pitch. I don’t generally have trouble finding something to comment on that I find interesting. Heck, Im fascinated by the smallest of things personally, if they are unique!

You certainly cant fabricate interest , people are smarter than that, and toio many times we see techniques that insult the prospects intelligence, which they are onto believe me (as we stated, they are naturally suspicious and trying to read between your lines)…but if you can find something that actually is worth comment, or that genuinely inspires your interest to any degree, it’s a good way to engage the prospect by asking about it.

For example, walking in my old bosses office and seeing a 5 foot statue of a bull next to his desk is really something you want to comment on, or ask about, and it would open him up like crazy because he was so proud of it. He would instantly like you for bein interested, now your job is to “not blow the rapport”. lol

Thanks Claude. I think when I first started talking about telemarketing I got so much “crud”, that I had to establish my authority on the subject in order to open people up to listen, and maybe went overboard with that. Im trying these days to find better wys to communicate on the subject, and not so much to try and establish my authority talking about all the amazing experience along the way. I hope that is coming across, and is more helpful.

Nice. Perfect actually.

I was just skimming the subject and you are right, the tie downs exemplified in the OP should have been a lot stronger I agree. You expanded on them with excellence. This was really good. You actually inspired me to start a whole other thread on that subject specifically. Thanks for this.

Someone else in the other thread is calling them “trial closes” or “Milestone commitments, which even gives it MORE meaning. So I think we have opened up a topic here that is really worthwhile, and I appreciate you expounding on it in a most excellent way.

Using the term “Milestone Commitments” , as opposed to “Tie Downs” (Thanks Liz) really exemplifies the meaning of “Always Be Closing” to me. It means that in every phase of your pitch you are consciously thinking of the close and deliberately moving things in that direction.

It took me years of selling to really understand what ABC meant. I hope these ideas help speed up the process of others getting a natural understanding of what that means in practice.

Go for it Emeril!

Yes, you did take it up a notch! Let’s take it even further and make it a tie down “Let’s do this! Sound good to you Bob?”

People don’t like ideas forced on them, and people are more committed to ideas that they feel they are co creators of. So I agree, you took it up a notch here!

Both ways will work, but some ways are more optimal. I like your approach here. It makes sense on many different levels.

Again, I am basically going off the cuff to present a general idea, and others are adding more specificity, this is what I would do in a sales situation, because I do these things from habit and don’t intellectualize a lot. For me its about “flow”… and it works, however I appreciate your thoughts here.

Thanks for your contributions. Yes I do think you took my OP up a notch, most definitely. I am only honored to have introduced the ideas on this thread, for guys like yourself to come and expound upon. Please fell free to add more.

That’s the idea! To help people and bring awareness.

It could be more perfect, but overall I think the thread will have great value to anyone wanting to develop as a sales person and take it up a notch for themselves!

In fact I think in general, the evolution of telemarketing dialogue on WF is taking a more advanced turn.
This may be the single most valuable nugget here.

There is one easy way to not feel or come off desperate in your appointments… By having 5 more lined up back to back, so that your whole world doesn’t hang on this sale going through.

People used to ask me how to not look desperate in their meetings. My answer is always. “don’t BE desperate”. Have enough meetings booked at all times, that you can be casual in each one and REALLY take on the disposition of not needing the sale.

Why don’t you need this sale to close that bad? Because you have five more people waiting to talk to you…

Pipeline. Keep it stuffed. The number one issue people have is that they don’t have enough appointments booked to even get any momentum to learn how to sell. Keeping yourself booked with appointments, through prospecting is the number one, single most important thing you can do, and it must ALWAYS be that way. Always keep the pipeline stuffed before anything else.

Much like “Being a web designer” isn’t a business in itself unless you have “SALES” going on.

Business isn’t about the product, its about sales… and sales is about having plenty of prospects lined up at all times.

Good thought Reardon. Thanks! Keep that pipline stuffed.

Here’s some Zig on the subject: (Sooo Important).


Thanks guys!

This is a great thread for advanced thinking on developing as a closer! Al;l the experienced guys here chiming in who knopw how to do it in the real world have so much valuable knowledge to share.

While everones input is valuable, and all the contributors here are valuable team members, I want to particularly say again that its good to see the prodigal son David Miller back! I encourage newbies to read every post he makes as well as posts from all the other contributors on this thread, we have a real concentrated group of real world sales pro's here.

Not just copy writers. These guys have paid the dues, pounded the pacvement, arent talking theory, and can really tell you what really happens in a real live sales situation.

There isnt any guile in this thread, which is rare. I am honored at these sales pro's participation.

-John

John,

Once again, you've made a great thread with great value. I think all of us here would be wishing we could extract your knowledge and make some sort of an Offline Marketing bible with it, haha. A chapter a day and I'd be off to marketing nirvana.

Great input, thank you !

Threads like this remind me of some of the things I forgot when I was a newbie.

When I first started my personal training business 6 years ago, I started pre-qualifying warm leads I generated through my advertisements before seeing them in person, before I even knew what "pre-qualifying" meant.

And I remember being extremely concerned about what I was doing, whether or not I was scaring away prospects by giving information, or if I was doing something wrong, as I was breaking the appointment-setting rules given to me by a personal trainer sales coach.

I would give a price range and ask if they were comfortable with that in their budget before setting the appointment.

Back then I probably had a 95% appointment show rate (where they actually came to my office -- compared to the 70% to 80% show rate I have now going to people's homes to sell life insurance).

My close rate was around 75% to 80% of all appointments, over that 5 year period I sold personal training. Compared to 25% to 30% of all appointments for selling life insurance nowadays.

Nice Post..Appointment setting is one of the ways i built my offline business.Most people are fearful of making cold calls but it's one of the fastest ways to get new clients!