Description: So you have worked very hard to sell your product or service to the representative of the clients company and either have known all along that there was a final decision maker or in the worst case have just found out there is a final decision maker and do not have access to them. Here’s how to successfully navigate through this and successfully obtain the sale in the end:
Complete the sale with your initial contact or representative of the prospective company:
a. It is a mistake to think that you can successfully bypass the initial contact or representative. In many cases this person will be responsible for taking delivery of your product or service and making sure that it is fully implemented and used in the company. They need to be 100% closed themselves or the sale will fail.
b. It is also important to understand that without the endorsement of the initial contact or representative, the final decision maker will not move forward with your product or service. Most of the time, the final decision maker relies on others to implement their decision and will not move forward without agreement from their team.
c. Never try to bypass the initial contact or representative.
Ensure the initial contact or representative is closed before working out how to close the final decision maker:
a. You can simply ask the contact a question like: “If the decision was completely up to you, would you sign the contract now?” You are of course looking for a solid “yes” answer.
b. Just asking the question above and getting a yes answer can be a trap though and while it is good, the professional knows it is not enough. A follow up question is the key: “What are the reasons that you would sign the contract now?”
c. You must verify that the contact/representative is truly closed by getting from them the reasons why they feel strongly about your product or service. This is going to tell you a lot of information and verify how well the initial contact really understands your product or service. The key here is to ask questions and get the contact/representative to give you their viewpoint without you interrupting or coaching them. You must determine their level of understanding and how strongly they will represent your products and services to others. This is an important point as it could literally mean the difference between the deal closing or not.
d. If the contact/representative is not fully closed, this will come up in the above process. You must then fully handle this so they are truly closed. Then re-verify using the same or similar questions above.
e. If the contact/representative is fully closed, validate and strengthen this by providing them with supporting and/or additional information. They will appreciate the support.
f. The ideal result here is that you now have a fully closed, initial contact/representative that strongly knows the value of your product or service for their company and can clearly represent this value to others.
Formulate your plan to close the final decision maker:
a. Now that your initial contact/representative is fully closed, you can proceed to create the best plan to close the final decision maker. You must do your homework/research before you create your plan.
b. First, research past projects that were approved or disapproved.
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- The first question for the initial contact is: “Have you had a similar situation in the past where you really wanted to move forward with a product or service like the one from my company?”
- If the answer is yes, then find out if there were times that they did get approval as well as any times they did not get approval.
- Note each of these down.
- Find out about the times that were successful by asking a question like: “What were the key reasons that particular project was approved?” It is likely that your initial contact/representative has never thought about this or if they have, it will be a while ago.
- Be patient and extract as much information as you can. The purpose of this is to get them to think about the reasons why they got approval and naturally they will start to compare those points with your product or service.
- Next you must find out about the times that were unsuccessful by asking a question like: “What were the key reasons those projects were not approved?” It is likely that your initial contact/representative has never thought about this either. The purpose of this is to get them to think about the reasons for the disapproval and naturally they will start to compare those points with your product or service.
c. Now that the information about past successes and failures is fresh for you and your initial contact/representative, you can start to plan out how to close the final decision maker. The obvious workout here is to come up with a strong presentation that shows all of the reasons why an approval is vital to the success of the company and aligns with past successful approvals. The presentation must create want in the decision maker by showing them that by moving forward they have made a sound decision that will support the future of the company. The next key is to ensure that the presentation will communicate and support the decision maker’s goals and specific likes.
d. After the plan is done, you must do a test run with the person who will be presenting your case to the final decision maker, based on the experience that the initial contact/representative has had with the final decision maker.
- First get from the initial contact/representative how they are going to present the plan.
- Ensure that they can and will strongly present the case to use your product or service, as you would to the final decision maker.
- Next coach them on any points missed that would support their presentation. Coach them to the point that they are strong and certain with the presentation.
- Now it is time for the test. Ask the initial contact/representative what they feel the decision maker will say about the presentation based on their past experience with similar products or services or projects like this. Make it safe enough for him to really tell you the truth.
- The point here is that you are trying to get the initial contact/representative to envision the result. If they bring up concerns about what the decision maker will say or how they will react, work out how the presentation can be changed or improved to handle this.
- You also may coach the initial contact/representative through the handling of objections and reactions the decision maker may come up with.
- You have two possible results from this process. Either the initial contact/representative will decide that it is better for you to do the presentation or they will be confident and certain enough to take care of it themselves.
- As a final point, ensure they know that you are available by phone in case they need any help before, during and after their presentation.
e. The above steps will dramatically increase your closing rate on these types of situations. You may also use the same process in the situation where a business partner or spouse has to be involved in the decision.
f. Note if you are the sales manager or business owner coaching your sales person, use the same process in this article to prepare them for any sales presentation. Just replace the words initial contact/representative with “sales person” and replace “you” with sales manager.
Summary
Most salespeople think it is much harder and takes longer to close a deal when you have to go through an initial contact first. While this can certainly be the case, if you know how to approach these types of deals correctly and get the initial contact fully on board, they can be an amazing asset to your entire sales process!
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