There may be no issue more misunderstood than the sales objection. Teaching salespeople to “overcome” it is the most frequent training request I get from managers. Salespeople persistently seek advice that starts with the words, “But what do you do when your prospect says…?” It’s a moment of conflict that creates tension for salespeople and derails sales momentum.
I decided to look up the word “objection,” and found it is commonly defined with words such as disagreement, opposition, disapproval, and refusal. These definitions imply strident conflict from buyers that, in reality, might be nothing more than casual desires for more information. So, to the issue of sales “objections,” the right approach is not to overcome, but, instead, to understand.
It is the subject of a vital chapter in my book, The Sales Secret, in which I introduce the concept of Aikido selling. Aikido is the martial art where one uses the force of an adversary to gain a strategic advantage without doing harm to either party. If the adversary throws a punch, the Aikido expert dodges the blow and, moreover, pulls the punch in to reduce friction and gain a competitive advantage.
Understanding how to properly handle conflict and disagreement was a turning point in my sales career. I read all the books and listened to the recordings where most so-called experts advocated a linear, and guaranteed-to-be-effective, approach to handling objections. In the real world of human interaction, responses are not always predictable.
Sometimes an objection is nothing more than a causal statement. The more I observed the theories of the classroom, the more I realized they were not real-world solutions.
The first thing I concluded was that some objections are not meant to be fixed. A casual statement of desire—e.g. “I wish this could still be delivered by this afternoon.”—is possibly a buyer merely thinking aloud. A salesperson who simply nods and agrees—e.g. “Me too.
I wish. But we can’t.”—might soon discover that the issue is resolved, and the buyer accepts the limitations of the moment.
The second thing I concluded was that an objection could just be a request for more information—i.e. “Why is that so?” In other words, the buyer might be wishing for something different to happen, but willing to accept (again) the limitations of the moment.
Of course, the big elephant of objections is the ubiquitous “price objection.” To this, I turn to the adage that asserts your price is too high because your story may have been too short. The price objection may only indicate a buyer testing the waters. Or perhaps your price is too high, yet it’s not profitable for you to match the competitor.
Lots of things go wrong when the salesperson gives up a percentage point or two based on a casual request from a buyer. First, the precedent is set and the buyer figures that every price is negotiable. Second, the seller loses credibility because the first price offered was obviously not the best available, signaling to the buyer that it was a good thing they asked for a deal or else they would have been ripped off.
Besides the dramatic loss in profits created by price concessions, the psychological outcome for the buyer is the nagging feeling that perhaps a greater discount was to be had, and that money was left on the table.
In the end, perhaps we’re best to eliminate the term “objection,” and simply recognize that conflict is merely an expression of concern at worst and, at best, nothing more than a desire for clarity. Perhaps the best approach is to calm yourself in the face of conflict and become less reactive and more positively responsive. Maybe the solution is to sweat the details early in the process by listening carefully to buyers before making a presentation. When buyers sense they have been sincerely understood, there are fewer challenges, concerns, and objections to understand. It’s powerful advice to eliminate conflict.
Rick Davis, president of Building Leaders, is a premier sales trainer in the building materials industry. His latest book, Sales Economics: The Science of Selling, is now available at buildingleaders.com. Rick can be reached at rickdavis@buildingleaders.com
