In this article I want to talk about that one statement, that one comment which customers make at the end of any sales presentation that many sales people hate to hear and the words are:
“Let me think about it.”
Oh! Don’t you just hate that? When you do a presentation and you think you’ve done everything right, you’ve done so much to close a sale and then the customer says “let me think about it”. So what’s going on here? Why does the customer say let me think about it?
Well, there are several reasons the customer may want to say ‘let me think about it’ and when sales people hear that, they usually give a knee-jerk reaction by saying something like this:
“Ok Mr. Customer I know you need to think about it, when would be a good time to get back to you? Or when would be a good time for us to meet again?”
Keep one thing in mind that once a customer walks out of the door, the chances of him or her buying from you have gone dramatically down and I am emphasizing the words “dramatically down”. If a customer walks out of the room, the chance for you to close that deal have just gone down. We don’t want the customer to walk out of the room because when they say ‘let me think about it’, then do you think they really going to think about it? Hmm… I don’t think so.
Only very few people, maybe a small percentage will think about your offer again, however, the majority of customers will not give it a much thought. Given today’s busy schedule, everybody’s going to be running around and as soon as they walk out of their busy schedule, just like a goldfish with 8 seconds of memory, they’re going to be on to something else and totally forget about what you just said. You and your offer will going to become a low priority for them.
According to an interesting memory curve study by Ebbinghaus, within 24 hours most people will forget 75% of what you just said. This means if your customer says “get back to me tomorrow” then by the 24 hour mark, they’ve already forgotten 75% of what you’ve told them. Even worse, Ebbinghaus also concluded that within 30 days, customers will forget 90% of what you’ve said. And the 10% they might be able to recall, 50% of that will be incorrect. So in essence, they will only retain 5% of the information accurately that you delivered.
So when somebody walks out of the room after telling you that they will going to think about it, guess what! They are not going to think about it that much and they’re going to move on to something else. So if you let the customer walk out, then you can almost kiss that sale goodbye because they are not going to really think about it. And most of the time when sales people hear this from the customer they try to say something like “when can I get back to you?” or they try to reschedule the meeting. However, we already know that the more time these sales people take to reschedule the meeting, for instance, after a week, the more chances will going to increase for the customers to forget what they told them in the first meeting. So trying to reschedule a meeting will going to be a nightmare. By the way, keep in mind that you should always try to reschedule the next meeting at the end of the first meeting as early as possible.
However, putting that aside, I want you to close the deal in the first meeting because, again, your chances of closing a sale will dramatically go down if you don’t close it at that moment. So instead of saying “Mr. Customer let’s get back together again, let’s have another meeting cause I understand that you have to think about it”, don’t say any of that. Here’s what I want you to say and record it in your head. You can always use your own words, but I’m going to give you my words. So when the customer says “let me think about it”, I want you to say in the nicest way but still very firmly and aggressively:
“Mr. Customer when someone tells me that they need to think about it, it either means one of the two things. It either means that they’re not interested or they’re interested but not sure. So which one is it?”
Oh! Isn’t that good??
Now I have given the customer an option, because now they’ll have to tell me that are they interested and if they are not then they will have to let me know. Notice in this sentence I said “which one is it?” I am forcing the customer to give me an answer and in most cases the customer is going to say “No Hassaan, I’m interested but I’m just not sure”. Moreover, if the customer says “he is not interested”, then guess what? You’re done. The only thing that you can do there is ask the customer why he or she is not interested, but essentially the deal is done. You’re not gonna get it…
However, most people will always say that “I’m interested, but I’m not sure”, which means that you miss something in the presentation. You didn’t answer concerns or you didn’t block an objection and that’s why the customer is not sure and they need to think about it.
So as soon as the customer says that “I’m interested, but I’m not sure”, you’re going to say the following and if you want you can write this down:
“Mr. Customer when somebody tells me that they’re interested, but they’re not sure, then this means that they’re not sure for one of three reasons. Either it’s not a fit, or the functionality is not there or the problem is related to finance.”
Ask the customer in a very gentle way that “Mr. Customer, is this product a fit? Does it meet your needs?” Then the customer probably going to say “Yeah, it does fit my needs Hassaan”. So when you know the product does fit the needs, ask about functionality like the features or the software. Say something like:
“Does it have all the features Mr. Customer?” and maybe right there is when the customer says “You know Hassaan, I like your feature set and the functionality, but there are couple of things that are missing”. Ask the customer, what are those things which are missing and then you could have another reengaging conversation. Moreover, if there’s something missing that the customer want and you know that you can develop it and deliver it, then you can easily block that objection.
Let’s assume for a moment that the customer says “No, your product has the right features and functionalities and has everything we want Hassaan”. Then I am going to say:
“Mr. Customer, if the problem is not related to fit or the functions of the product, then it has to be related to finance.” And the customer might probably going to say “You know Hassaan, it is more than we expected to pay”.
Okay great! Now we know that it’s the money. If the problem is related to the price, then that’s when you as a sales person can introduce maybe a net 30, net 60 or net 90. In other words, they can pay for the product in 30 days, in 60 days, or in 90 days. Or maybe you have a payment plan set up.
See most people don’t like to admit that they don’t have the money because they feel bad, they feel somewhat embarrassed also, but by asking it in a clever way that I’ve just told you, you can get the exact reason behind why they need to think about it. Basically, I have funneled the customer into making a decision. And through this way, you will be able to find out whether the customer really wants to buy your product or not, however you’re going to remove every excuse for not buying and that’s what you need to do instead of making the customer leave the room after saying “let me think about it”. So try to close the deal there using these techniques because that’s your best chance of making the sale happen.
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The Known Unknowns by Hassaan Elahi 