Why Closing The Sale Doesn't Work

by Scott Bywater

More Business Skills Articles

Published on this site: January 22nd, 2010 - See more articles from this month

I was training a lady the other day on telemarketing skills for a service based industry.

And she had all of the skills... great rapport building... awesome approach to guiding people through the phone call and she was a real people's person.

But there was one problem: when it came to the close she flustered it and the customers disappeared from sight.

There's no doubt about it: this sort of thing can cost a company big money and in some instances, closing is critical to the sales process.

But "closing the sale" is not all it's cracked up to be in many industries.

For instance, I'm reading this book at the moment called "Spin Selling" which I'm taking particular notice of because it's based on real research from over 35,000 sales calls.

And it's talking about the fact in larger sales... sales where it may take longer than one meeting to close the sale...and sales which are more complex...

CLOSING THE SALE ACTUALLY WORKS AGAINST YOU

Now that's an interesting thought, isn't it?

It's also interesting that when the author - Neil Rackham - was actually writing this book, everyone thought closing the sale was the most important aspect in the entire process...which is something I've always personally had a problem with because in my experience it's simply not true.

In fact, I was reading this book last night when he was saying the success rate of high close calls (average of 5.8 closing behaviours per call) was between 30 and 40% whereas the success rate of low close calls (average of 1.4 closing behaviours per call) was sitting at over 70%.

I'll say this before and I'll say it again: people are more sophisticated these days and you should not rely on your closing ability to make things happen.

Because it's what's done before the close which is most important.

Focus on prospecting... focus on getting the right people to call you... focus on nurturing relationships and building trust through the customer generating skills you'll learn at http://www.morecustomersmadeeasy.com/ and the close will take
care of itself.

Scott Bywater is an income boosting, results focused direct response copywriter and the author of Cashflow Advertising and More Customers Made Easy. His popular ebook "7 ways to get more customers" has been downloaded by over 8,247 business owners over the past five years. You can get your hands on it by heading on over to http://www.copywritingthatsells.com.au/.