BRX Pro Tip: Sales Tip – Restate Objections
Stone Payton: [00:00:00] Welcome back to Business RadioX Pro Tips. Stone Payton and Lee Kantor here with you. Lee, we’re all going to get concerns, questions, objections when we’re in the sales process. And you’re suggesting that one good strategy, discipline, best practice when you get an objection is, before you do anything, first, restate the objection. Can you speak to that a little bit?
Lee Kantor: [00:00:27] Sure. When a prospect has an objection, just take a second and then restate it back to them or paraphrase it. That way, you can isolate that objection and get agreement that that’s really their objection. It might be something they just kind of impulsively said and they really don’t mean it, and that’s really not the objection.
Lee Kantor: [00:00:49] So, if you can just kind of pause the conversation and go, “Hey, you said that this is stopping you from working with me? Is that true? Like, what about this?” And start discussing it and see if there’s a way to resolve it. Because if you can resolve it, then you have a path to move forward.
Lee Kantor: [00:01:10] And, Stone, this is something that you do a great job of. And this is something that is an important part of your kind of sales background. Could you talk about how you do this? Or what are some of the language you use to kind of isolate an objection?
Stone Payton: [00:01:26] Well, and that’s the key to me is to isolate it. Otherwise, I think sometimes you can find yourself making an assumption. I think, I love the idea of restating the objection because that way you’re not making an assumption of what they said, or based on what they said, or how they said it, or even why they might have said it. But, regardless, once you’ve done that, you’ve restated it.
Stone Payton: [00:01:49] Now, to really make sure that that is the barrier, the roadblock, what’s standing between where you are now and where you want to take the conversation in the deal, is – and I learned this from a mentor by the name of Steve Brown with the Fortune Group. It was part of a great training course. But one very specific piece of language that I’ve learned that has served me so well over the years – if someone has an objection and you’ve restated, you know, “If I understand you completely, what I think I hear you saying is that you feel like the fee may just be too high at this point for you. Is that accurate?” And they say yes.
Stone Payton: [00:02:32] Then, the next thing I say is, I ask a question, “If you weren’t concerned”. So, if you weren’t concerned about the fee, then in your opinion, do you feel you would buy the show or do the thing? And if they come back and say yes, then at least you know what you’re dealing with. And then, you can create a different product, you can change the fee. Or you can say, you know, “Do whatever you want. Hey, maybe I’m too early or too late to be a real service to you.”
Stone Payton: [00:02:58] But what will happen if that’s not real and it’s just a smokescreen? And sometimes people will give you a smokescreen because they’re nice. They don’t tell you no. But if it’s a smoke screen, they’ll get kind of cagey, they’ll hem and haw “Well, no. Also, my mother-in-law is staying in town, she won’t be gone. So, we’re probably looking at October anyway.” If they’re at all cagey about when you say, if you weren’t concerned, if they come up with a different concern, that’ll help you, it will keep you from chasing red herrings.
