So what should you do when your prospect says, “I want a better deal - take it or leave it?”
 |
“Negotiating is the most highly paid work you will ever do. You are generally making more per hour when you negotiate than anything else you’ll ever do!”" Wayne Berry |
This situation is NOT the negotiation. It’s the end result of the negotiation. It’s the symptom, NOT the cause of the sales person’s dilemma.However it’s not all over for the sales person if they possess some good negotiating skills.
It’s not too late to salvage the situation.
A better strategy would have been to avoid getting into this situation in the first place.
The problem is most sales people do not understand that negotiating is a process, not an event.
I hear sales people say things like, “It was all going well for 2 hours until the end, and then the prospect wanted to negotiate.â€
I’m sorry but I’ve got some bad news for you if you’ve ever felt this way.
The negotiation did NOT occur at the end of the 2 hours.
It began at the beginning of the interaction with the prospect, and if the prospect is a good negotiator, it actually began long before the prospect started talking with you.
Too many sales people fail to understand this, and end up with an event called “being pressured for a discountâ€. They think that this is the negotiation. It’s not. They been negotiating for 2 hours and just didn’t realise it!
So what can you do to avoid ending up as “Shark Bait�
How do you avoid being forced into an unprofitable deal, or even losing the deal altogether?
Here are a few quick thoughts.
1. Learn about negotiating.
It doesn’t come naturally in our culture. It’s a skill that you should develop if you are serious about your career in sales. Not having these skills is costing you big time in lost sales, lost profits, lost commissions and lots of stress.
By the way, many of your prospects ARE developing these skills – ON PURPOSE. They are not just playing it by ear. That’s for amateurs.
The next important thing to do is…
2. Understand what’s happening
There are 6 stages in every negotiation. They are;
a. Preparation.
b. Rapport.
c. Gathering Information
d. Exploring Options
e. Trading Concessions
f. Nailing Down The Deal
We don’t have the space here for a full explanation of each of these phases, however realise that all negotiations involve these phases. They can take seconds, hours, days or months depending on the negotiation. Learn about them and understand what happens in each phase.
3. Know that you have more power than you think in every negotiation
The problem is most sales people think that their prospect has all of the power. That’s simply not true. There are more than 20 sources of power in most negotiations. Problem is if you don’t know what they are, you will feel helpless. Find out about them.
Next…
4. Beware of the ploys, gambits and dirty tricks
Negotiating is game. However it’s a game where a sales person can get hurt if they don’t understands the moves, the ploys, the gambits and the dirty tricks that people use. I teach sales people how to spot and counter more than 30 “popular†ones. If you don’t understand them, learn about them.
Sales people who understand negotiating don’t become “Shark Baitâ€. They write profitable business and enjoy success.
I received an email about a month ago from one of our clients in London…
John King is a graduate of one of my negotiating workshops and his company sells large scale manufacturing equipment in the UK and Europe.
John wrote in his email…
“Wayne we were getting murdered in deals where we were up against cheaper competitors. My sales people were slashing prices and our margins were suffering badly. We were going backwards fast. I remembered that negotiating game we played in your workshop and thought that’s the answer. You probably didn’t even know about it but I ordered a copy of your audio programme, “Get the best deal every timeâ€. I wanted my sales people to learn the lesson that I learned that night.
Well I thought you might be interested to know that this decision has added more than $5 million good old Aussie dollars to our GP over this last 12 months. I sat my guys down and we went through each CD one at a time at our sales meetings and also they listened every day in their cars and at home. We developed some new strategies and used that 15 page check list of yours. Well you’re right, negotiating skills make all the difference. When I think of all the dollars we gave away before my guys got “Top Gunned”, I could cry. Thanks mate. I owe you a big beer.”
I love getting emails like John’s and his story will shortly join our collection of Inspiring Success Stories and Testimonials at our Web Site. You’ll read another one there too from Michael Giuliano who tells how developing his selling skills through Top Gun has added more than $2 million to his earnings over the last 10 years.
The lesson is - get those negotiating skills!
Stumble it!
Email This Post
| Print this page | Posted in Leadership, Negotiation, People!, The Board Room, The Sales Dept
