How to get your prospects OFF the fence!

0:17 Welcome to the Impact Sales Podcast. I'm your host, Joe Beck, and we've got a great episode in store for you today. Today, I'm going to be talking about and unpacking exactly what to do when you're dealing with challenging or stubborn prospects. Prospects that just won't get off the fence, won't decide to move forward, won't make a decision no matter what direction. We're going to talk about that today as well as some other topics in today's episode. But before we get there, I want to just kind of cover some current events. Is what's going on you know right around the time of this podcast will be released, will be in the middle of December and wrapping up the year for many people.

1:01 Who is going to be the priority. So you know, no matter what it is that you're doing out there in sales, this time of year can be very challenging. Now, depending upon your industry, this might be your busy time of the year or it might be, as I said, one of the more challenging times of the year to be able to win new business. So a couple of things that you want to make sure that you do real quick to wrap up opportunities as best as you can for your year end is to make sure that you make a list and go back and follow up with every single prospect that you have before you wrap up the year. If nothing else, to check in with them, see where they are, see what the next step might be if they're not ready to move forward now. But you definitely want to finish the year strong. There's one thing that I've learned over many, many years of working with sales producers and all kinds of industries. How you finish up a year plays a major role in how you start the next year. So I'm a big believer in momentum, and sales momentum is a real thing. You can absolutely generate some excitement, some motivation, and some momentum by finishing the year strong and starting off the next year really with a running head start. So I want to make sure that I just shared that with everybody.

2:14 Do the very best that you can to wrap up this year strong, Finish strong, bring in whatever business that you can before the year ends, if for no other reason then to get yourself excited and motivated and pumped up for having a fast start to the next year. What you'll find is by putting that extra effort. At the end of the year, you're going to find that you lay the foundation for a fast January. Your calendar will be a little bit more full, you have a little bit more going on, and ideally you'll have some business, if it isn't already written and closed, will be right there ready for you to win in early January. So, as I said, we've got a great topic today talking about how to work with and get prospects moving forward that are kind of hung up or in pause mode.

2:59 So we're going to be diving into that in just a moment. We're gonna take a quick break and we'll be right back. I this is Joe Beck with his sales activists. Would you like to triple your sales results in six months or less? That's right, triple your sales results in six months or less, guarantee all without spending a single extra dollar on advertising. Well this sounds interesting to you. I would love to tell you more about it. For well over thirty years, and after tens of thousands of live sales interactions and hundreds of millions of dollars of closed transactions for companies that I've worked with and for I've developed a proprietary sales system, the ISM system, and this system will help you triple your sales results in six months or less. Guarantee to learn more. Just text the words sales to the number three two one four two one five two one three that sales to three two one four, two one five to one three.

4:00 Schedule a complimentary consultation to learn about our ISM system and exactly how we can get you on your way to triple your sales results in six months or less. This is Joe Beck with the Sales Activist. You don't have to settle for average sales results. We'll talk to you. And we're back with the Impact Sales Podcast. I'm your host, Joe Beck, and we're going to jump right in talking about our subject for today. So today I wanted to spend some time talking about how you deal with challenging prospects or prospects that maybe you are on the fence and won't move forward, won't kind of make a decision one way or the other. How you get them to move forward? How do you get them to take action in some regard. And this is one that comes up quite often with people, and it's one that I get asked a lot by different people, how do you handle prospects that just won't move forward or won't aside to make a decision as to what they're going to do.

5:03 So what I like to do is just start this by kind of breaking things down in a little different way compared to maybe other ways that you may have heard people handle this particular topic. So I'm a big believer that the sales process that you work with anybody, no matter what it is that you're selling, what product or service that you're offering, whatever it is that you're doing, the sales process actually starts right at the beginning when you first interact with them, the first visibility that they have of you and vice versa, the first degree of engagement. That's really when the sales process starts. And sometimes people create all kinds of fear and uncertainty and doubt in their prospects right at the early stage of the interaction.

5:46 So before we get to what you know or how we deal with prospects, let's first check our own house. Let's first make sure that we're taking care of things that need to be taken care of the right way. So at the time top of the list, what you have to focus on is making sure before you ever deal with a prospect who might be challenging or not being willing to make a decision, is make sure that you haven't contributed to that feeling in them, that you haven't made them feel that way or done something, said something, or reacted in a way that would make them feel that they weren't in a place to make a good decision or couldn't make a decision related to what it is that you offer. And this is really an important point because sometimes people blindly just plow ahead with their sales process and they start talking to people, and they start pitching their product, they start putting all this stuff out there, and they don't even realize that they may be contributing to any negativity or pushback or hesitance that their prospects give them later in the process. So the first rule, the first number one rule at the top of the list, if you're going to be dealing with a prospect that might be challenging or not willing to make a decision, is you have to put them at ease.

7:01 And you put them at ease by making sure that you don't create, even if it's just artificially, that you don't create a situation that makes them hesitant or makes them uncomfortable or nervous. Like everybody is familiar with the concept that people do business with those that they know, like and trust. Well, it's really hard for somebody to get to know you and like you and trust you if you do something in the early stages of your sales interaction that rubs them the wrong way, that turns them off or makes them a little hesitant. So the first rule at the top of the list to handle prospects that might be a little bit more challenging would be, don't do any harm to that process. Make sure that nothing that you're saying is upsetting them or worrying them.

7:44 Make sure that you're positioning things in a very professional way, but also be sure that you're reading any signs, you're picking up on any cues that they may be giving you, because the sooner you pick up on those things, the sooner you recognize that you may have a challenge to overcome, the easier it is for you to prepare and start working yourself back to the place that you need to be with them, where they're comfortable, that they're open, they're listening to what you're saying. There's good engagement and they don't feel any of this hesitancy. So at the top of the list, make sure, no matter what, that you're not the problem. Okay, make sure that you're not. Make sure that you're not doing anything that makes them feel that way. So assuming that you're not, and we're not going to dig into the entire sales process, but assuming that you're not the problem, that you're not the reason that they're feeling some degree of hesitancy, Well, let's go back to the things that you really need to uncover to start getting them comfortable. See, and it really lies in this sentence that I just said a minute ago about people wanting to do business with those that they know, like and trust. If you've earned the right to ask for their business, if you've done things in your sales process that have earned you the right to ask for their business and have positioned you the right way, you will find it a lot easier to deal with hesitancy that they may have. It may never even pop up because they are very, very comfortable with you, and that's

9:17 a great thing, right, But if it does come up, how do you deal with it? How do you handle that? Well, let's break it down. Let's break down exactly what you need to do and how you need to overcome that. Now, for me, there's a lot of different ways of tackling this problem, but I believe, quite honestly that most of these things, when they come up later in the process, are usually a function of a couple of things. At the top of the list, we're going to put something that a lot of people don't like to talk about because they have to own things that maybe they didn't do well enough that nobody likes to admit when they were wrong. Nobody likes to admit when they screwed something up or made a mistake. But at the top of the list, and this just happens to be one of the ones that happens quite often, and successful people, successful salespeople especially correct this in the way they operate, but many people don't. And that topic is this at the top of the list. Perhaps this person isn't your ideal prospect.

10:21 Maybe you're selling to somebody who is just a suspect. Maybe there's somebody that you know. They may have an interest in what you do, but they're not your ideal client avatar. They don't fit the exact model of how you generate the best results. They're just kind of somebody who may have an interest and you're trying to convince them and sell them on the idea of working with you. So at the top of the list is are they or not they a prospect for you? Are they a legitimate prospect or are they just a suspect. Many people fail in selling and they certainly fail in turning around challenging prospects when they're talking to somebody who really isn't a prospect in the first place, meaning they just aren't qualified.

11:03 Either they're not the decision maker, or they don't have the budget, or they don't have a legitimate need. There's a variety of different checklist items that would need to qualify them as a prospect. Well, you can't turn somebody around if deep down there is a blatant deficiency in them as a prospect, if they are not qualified for what it is that you do, or they do not have the money available, they're not financially qualified, or they don't have the decision making authority. No amount of extra effort on your part, no amount of sales technique or strategy, no amount of anything that you're going to do is going to turn that prospect around. The reason is they're not even really a prospect. They're just a suspect or somebody that you're talking to. Maybe you're hoping you can do some business with them. So at the top of the list, make sure that you are literally dealing with a prospect. Assuming that you are, what else can you do to help move that prospect along? That prospect is nervous or anxious, or unwilling to make a decision, not really willing to take the next step forward. And I believe that a lot of times people find themselves in this exact situation because they didn't set the right expectations at the beginning of the sales interaction. They didn't set the expectation as to what this process was going to look like, how it was going to be handled, what the steps were going to be, and what everybody's role was going to be. So I believe setting the right

12:35 expectations in understanding this process can be a very powerful thing, just like not setting expectations and leaving it open ended can be a very challenging thing because sometimes people get to that end stage and without any expectations, without any clear understanding of exactly what their role is and what they need to do, just like what you need to do, without any expectations, kind of nothing happens. It just hangs there, open ended, and this happens to a lot of sales interactions. They kind of just go on this endless, endless parade or ongoing parade of nobody making a decision, nothing changing, nothing moving forward, kind of just status quo. And I just believe that that's one of the most dangerous places that you can leave a sales interaction. You know, it's on the outside looking in. The best place that you could leave any sales interaction is that there's a clear understanding of what the next steps are, what will happen next, who will do what, And a lot of times people make that step much more challenging because right at the beginning, even if they are talking to a prospect, they don't set the right expectations. Now, we're not going to be to unpack everything that would happen inside of a sales interaction during this podcast, but we are going to be able to really touch on some highlights, some things that are are critical to turn around prospects if they aren't quite there now. In this example. Of course, you know,

14:07 we don't know where they were at the beginning or end of the process up until this point. We just know that they're not moving forward. So I'm going to say that the easiest way of turning these people around is to get back to the point that you're engaging them about things that really mean the most to them. Now here's what I mean by that. A lot of times people in selling environments lose sight of what the prospect tells them means the most to them. Maybe they didn't do a good enough job on covering that, maybe they didn't do a good enough job exploring that in their interactions with their prospects. But somewhere along the way, they didn't get enough information about what was really important to their prospect. And the reason why that is so so important and such a big mistake in the sales process is this exact situation that we're talking about. Now.

15:05 If you don't know enough about what really makes your prospect tick and what's important to them and what means the most to them, it is much more likely that they are going to be comfortable or settle for leaving things in this kind of limbo stage where they don't make a decision because it didn't really resonate enough with them. There wasn't something that was meaningful enough that made them think they have to do something about this. Now, how do we avoid that, or, better yet, how do we fix that if we've missed that opportunity in the sales process. Well, I'm going to tell you the way you fix it is you go back to talking to your prospect about things that mean the most to them, perhaps things that your product, your service, or offering can do for them.

15:55 But don't talk about it from the standpoint of your product your service. Talk about it from the standpoint of the impact that your prospect or client would receive. And I use a lot of different analogies and a lot of different situations when I teach this, but it's so so important that you understand that it is not about you. It is not about your product, your company, your offering, whatever it is that you do, it's not about you. The only thing that your prospects and clients are interested in is how what you do may benefit them, how what you do will impact them and what their life, their business, their finances, whatever, what those things will look like as a result of working with you. You are the least important part of that process. It's all about the impact that they receive. It's all about the value they get and the impact that they get from what you do. And too many times people will spend all their time and energy talking about how great they are, what they do, what they're offering, does all the bells and whistles, and they want to make sure that somebody understands it all from A to Z, every little thing that they do, and then they don't spend time talking about how that prospect feels about it. Then they don't spend time talking about what this would do for that prospect, and more importantly, getting that prospect to describe it back

17:26 to them. So, if you've got an offering, and you've made this offer to your prospect and they're not making a decision to move forward, go back to the point that you were talking about what was important to them based upon your offer. If you're saving them money, talk about what would they do with that money? Ask them to describe it. Explain to you, if I save you X amount of money in your business each year, tell me what would you do with the money. What would you invest in in your business? Where would you make improvements and then let them talk. Get them focused emotionally on something that they are receiving and not thinking about what it is that you're offering. Talk about the impact and not the product, the service, or the offering. Okay, and this is a huge differentiator for anybody that truly understands successful selling. You'll understand that emotionally, people buy on emotion and they move forward with their decisions based on logic.

18:24 Something may make complete logical sense to people, but they won't make a buying decision because they emotionally aren't vested or aren't committed to it. It hasn't resonated with them deep down, it hasn't hit in their gut is something that they need to do. Logically, it may make sense, but they won't make a decision to move forward. So, if you've got a prospect that's hanging on the fence and they're not making a decision and they're in this limbo state that I'm describing, get back and start talking to them about what things mean to them as it relates to your product, your service, are offering and the most important part of that process. And this is what I really want to make sure I underline and emphasize.

19:04 You know during today's podcast, is you need them to describe it back to you. Don't ask very very simple yes and no answered questions to your prospects. Ask them questions related to the impact that it will have, and then ask them to describe it. Ask them to tell you what it would do. Describe the feeling that they would have. Describe how it would impact their employees, their business, their family life, their emotional wellbeing, their physical wellbeing. Get them talking about it with you. Get them making an emotional commitment by describing back to you what it would mean. See, those are the things that actually resonate with people. Those are the things that they feel viscerally in their body.

19:53 They feel those things. If you don't get them talking that way about your the impact of what your product, service, or offering does, you will forever find yourself in a place where you're compared and pitted against other solutions, other providers. You haven't separated yourself from anybody else. But if you're having that conversation with that difficult or challenging prospect, that won't make a decision, and you're talking to them and getting them to open up emotionally about what these things would do for them, what impact it would have, what things would look like, and you get them to describe it to you. I promise you you are immediately the exception and not the rule. You become something that's special as a sales professional. You're becoming that trusted advisor. You're forming a bond or relationship with that prospect, even if it's just short term in the form of a single call or interaction. You're starting to do things that other people don't do. You're digging deeper. You're getting to know things that other people don't know. It's so critical to your success when you're dealing with a challenging prospect that you help them re engage with emotional reasons why they should move forward. Now, along with those emotional reasons for moving forward, you also need to get them to make a commitment to you. You need to get them to make some type of a commitment to you. And I find that when you develop this emotional connection to people

21:24 because you've asked these deeper, impact focused questions and you've gotten them to talk and tell you about them and share with you specifically about the power of those things and the impact that would have on them, their business, their employees, their family. When they start talking about those things, you are now resonating in a deeper level with them, and it becomes much easier for you to ask them to make a commitment. And that commitment can be as simple as just giving you an answer either way. You know, I like to use the phrase yes is preferred, no is acceptable. I'm fine with you saying no or not right now. What I can't take is a maybe. I can't take this in between place because there's a lot of people that i'd like to help, just like i'd like to help you, And rather than bothering you incessantly about where we stand, I'd rather have you tell me either yes or no now. When you ask that type of a question that way, it's particularly powerful when you do it on the heels of an impact focused questioning session, talking about the emotional impact that these things have on them, and they start visualizing for themselves having those things. See why do we want them talking about it as it relates to getting them to take action or do something, Because the more they talk about it, the more they verbalize it and share it and think about it, the more it's becoming part of their conscious reality. The more they want those things to be in their life, they

22:55 want the impact that they're describing. So it's so powerful to get them to talk about it because it turns them around back into a place where emotionally, now they've made a commitment to wanting those things happen to happen. The more they talk about them, the more likely emotionally they're going to want to have them as part of their reality. They're going to want those things more than ever before because they're going to be thinking about it, they're going to be talking about it, they're going to be verbalizing it. It's going to mean something to them. So when you tack in or tack on the additional statement of asking them to just make a commitment a decision, yes is preferred, No is acceptable, But I can't just leave things in this maybe place. What you're really doing is coming to an understanding, coming to an agreement as to what's next, where do we go? And a lot of times people fail because not only do they not set those expectations, as I said a couple of minutes ago, that there's going to be an ultimate decision, but they don't dig deep enough and they don't ask those impact driven questions. So the prospect kind of feels it's okay to be in this limbo place. They haven't felt like they were part of it. They haven't felt like they were given direction that they needed to kind of make a decision. They kind of felt like being in limbo was okay. So the number one thing that you need to do is make sure that you start correcting that

24:26 in the way you communicate with people. It's not impossible to go back and turn around a prospect that is not in that place, but you're gonna need to dig deep and get emotional with them. You're gonna need to uncover and untap what means the most to them about what it is that you're offering. Now, keep in mind, as you talk about these things, it is not what you do that makes the difference. It's the impact that what you do has on them that makes the difference. And that's the side of the equation that you need to spend your time talking about. You need to spend your time talking about what I call things on the other side of the impact line. When you start getting your prospects, your client's talking to you about the impact that things have on them, what it would mean for them, what they would do with it, what life would look like with it or after it. That's where they start making a true emotional commitment to doing something about it.

25:28 If they don't ever talk about it, if they don't emotionally connect to what it is that you're offering, no amount of like trust and believing in you is going to make them want to do business with you. Okay, they can know like you, trust you. All of those things won't matter if what you're explaining to them doesn't resonate and it has nothing to do with what it is you do. It has everything to do with the impact that it has on your products, on your clients. So when you're dealing with these challenging prospects, keep in mind it's not you. You're not going to be able to turn them around with a complicated, more descriptive version of what it is that you offer. It's not going to happen that way. But you will be able to get them on track and moving in the right direction if you spend that time, that energy, that focus on talking about the impact that what you do will have on them, talking about the impact on their business, their finances, whatever it is that you do get them talking and they will tell you everything that you need to know to wrap up that deal, to move that business forward. But if you don't get them talking, if you don't get them verbalizing exactly what the impact is to them and what it means, you're fighting an uphill battle. You're fighting the never ending battle that salespeople have been fighting since the beginning of time, which is, how do you get

27:00 prospect to move forward if they really aren't interested or if they're not in this place where it's the right thing. Now, even if people are the ideal prospect for you, there are so many options out there and so many variables on things out there. I mean, heck, people can grab a smartphone and find two thousand of anything nowadays. There's so much information and so many options that you aren't standing out. So if you want to differentiate yourself and you want to put yourself at the top of the line, and you want to get your challenging prospects to make a decision one way or the other, well you need to get back to talking to them truly about the impact of what it is that you do and what it will do for them. Get them exploring it, sharing it with you, earning their trust as their trusted advisor because you're the person that asked them to describe that.

27:55 You're the person that is taking them on that little emotional journey. You're the one that's got them through that whole process, every step of the way. And then finally you wrap that up with just in agreement that we're going to come to a decision, whether it's yes as you know the decision, or no is the decision as I said, yes is preferred, No is acceptable. What we can have is this maybe situation, this indefinite holding pattern that's just not going to work for anybody. It's not good for them, it's not good for you. So for those of you that have challenging prospects that are sitting out there that you're trying to wrap up and you haven't been able to move them forward, I know you go back and you re listen to this episode and really absorb what I'm sharing with you about exploring impact.

28:41 You're going to get everything that you need to move these prospects forward. Get back with them, start talking about the impact that what you do has on them, and get them talking, get them describing it, explaining it to you in their own words, because the more they talk, the more you win. The more they talk, the more they emotionally want what it is that they're talking about. So as we wrap up today, I just want to share with you the importance of understanding that whether they are somebody that's on the fence or somebody that you're just meeting first time and you're trying to earn their business, develop a relationship with them that's deep enough and emotional enough that they share with you the impact, and you will always find yourself in a better place. You'll find yourself able to turn around these challenging prospects, and more importantly, you'll develop a trusted advisor relationship with more of your prospects even faster. So I want to thank y'all for taking the time to join me today on this show.

29:50 Continue to support the Impact Sales Podcast. Follow us on YouTube, make sure that you download previous episodes. There's a lot of great content in there for myself as well as from the guests that I have on the show. You don't want to miss the opportunity to tap into those resources. This material is actionable and you could put it to work on your behalf, just by listening to the content and going out there practicing and doing what we talk about. So this is Joe Beck with the Sales Activist, and we like to wrap up every episode by saying, sell better and impact the world. We'll talk to you sin Hi. This is Joe Beck with the Sales Activist. Are you a coach, consultant or entrepreneur that's struggling to fill your sales calendar? I mean, when you look at your calendar, is it a barren wasteland with no prospects, no opportunities, and practically nothing hitting your sales pipeline. Well, if this sounds like you, I'd like to help. For well over thirty years and after tens of thousands of live sales interactions and hundreds of millions of dollars have produced sales revenues for companies that I've worked with and for, I've developed proprietary sales system, the ISM System, and I would love to talk with you more about that system and exactly how it can get your calendar filled up and more importantly, how it can generate new sales for you. You can schedule a complementary strategy session with me to learn all about ISM. Like texting the word sales to the number four oh nine five oh nine seven three five five.

31:22 That's sales to four oh nine five oh nine seven three five five. You'll connect with our digital assistant and you'll be able to schedule your complementary strategy session. Don't miss this opportunity to learn exactly what ISM can do to help you your calendar and your sales results. This is Joe Beck and I look forward to speaking with