Hey, guys, this is Steli with Close.io.
Today I want to teach you a question that’s very powerful in sales and is the best question
to end a positive conversation with a prospect with, especially in a moment when they give
you verbal commitment and they say the deal is basically done.
The question is very simple, it’s this:
Dear Prospect, is there anything that could happen that you can think of, that would stop
this deal from happening?
Is there anything you can think of that would make you change your mind?
Take back your word?
Can you think of anything that would stop this deal from happening?
You know when I discovered this question?
I was watching an old school kind of boiler room pressure sales guru on YouTube having
a cold call or having a sales call with somebody that one of his salespeople couldn’t quite
get to the close and then the big sales guru steps in, chats with the prospect kind of
on loudspeakers and uses a lot of real pressure tactics to push the prospect to the decision
of buying.
So he pushes him and pushes them and uses a lot of rhetoric, uses a lot of trickery,
and eventually gets the prospect to go, “Oh, all right, okay, yes, we have a deal, I’m
buying.”
Up to that point, I have to admit that I was thinking, oh, this guy is good, but this deal
will not happen because what’s going to happen is the prospect was so pressured into
saying yes, that the moment he hangs up, he’s going to have buyer’s remorse and he’s
going to change his mind.
Then that sales guru, although his tactics were not necessarily what I would use to close
a deal, did something brilliant.
He asked this very specific question, once he pushed and pressured the buyer and the
prospect into the yes, the guy said, “All right, all right, I’ll do it,” he asked
this question: “Hey, before I let you go, is there anything that you can think of that
would make you take back your word, change your mind?”
Wow, when I saw that, I thought, all right, this is pretty good shit, this is powerful
stuff.
The guy on the other side of the phone went, “No way!
I’m a man of my word, I’ve made up my mind, I’m going to do it.”
He’s like, “All right, that sounds great, let’s move forward,” and the call ends.
That question is really powerful because it does a multitude of things.
Number one, it kind of makes the prospect kind of reaffirm and reconfirm to himself
and to you that he is not a person to change his mind.
He said, “I’m not going to take my word back, I’m a man of my word, I’m not changing
my mind when I’ve made a decision.”
Once you’ve come out with that strong of a statement, it’s really hard for you to
change your mind afterwards without looking like an idiot or like somebody that doesn’t
keep his word, that’s not an honorable person.
It kind of tricks the person into hardening the deal for themselves and really sell themselves
one more time that, “Yes, now that I’ve made up my mind, I’m not going to second
guess is later on.”
The other thing that it does is that potentially—in this case it didn’t—but it potentially
would bring up some things that the person can think of, would change the deal.
This is the way that I would use the question.
I’m not in the pressure sales kind of world, push, push, push people into a decision and
then trick them into a way where they can’t get out of the decision.
Although I’m not the type of person that would use these tactics, when I saw somebody
do it and they do it well, I appreciated it.
In this case I thought that the question was powerful and if used for good, could do a
lot of good in sales and in business, so I wanted to share that question with you.
Here’s how I think you should use it:
No matter what your sales tactics and strategies are and I’m a big advocate of being friendly
and strong versus hostile and strong in the sales negotiation, at the end, once you get
somebody to say, “Yes, I think we’re going to buy this,” or “Yes, it’s a done deal,
we’re going to purchase this, we’re going to sign this contract or agreement,” or
whatever they tell you, ask them this question—and I wouldn’t say it that would make you go
back on your word, I think that’s too tricky, I don’t think that’s the right way to
say it.
I would ask the question:
“Hey, this sounds exciting, I’m excited to get you guys on board, get this deal done.
Let me ask you, anything you can think of that would change this deal?
Anything you could think of that could come up that would threaten our partnership from
happening or this contract being signed?
Anything you can think of that would make a change or make a difference or change anything
moving forward in the next few days?”
I think that’s a powerful question because it’s going to empower and allow the person
to think through all kinds of scenarios and tell you if there is one, because you want
to know, you don’t want to be surprised after the fact, you want to be proactive and
know of all the little details that could come up and derail your deal.
They might go, “You know what?
I’m pretty sure that we’re going to do it, but I still haven’t talked to the CEO.
It’s unlikely that the CEO would change his mind about this, but I don’t know, I
still have to ask him.”
Boom!
Now you know there’s this new factor you weren’t aware of before, now that you are
aware of it, you have influence over it, you can change it or manage it.
You could ask the person, “Hey, is there any chance I could be part of the discussion
with the CEO to be able to answer all his questions, be a resource to you in the negotiation
with the CEO?
What can I do to help you get this deal done with that person?”
Maybe they’ll say, “You know what?
No, I don’t think so, there’s nothing that could change this and by the end of this
week this deal is done and I’ve talked to everybody, I’ve got everybody’s agreement,
like there’s no reason that this isn’t going to happen.”
If that’s the case and they are not closing right now, ask them why and say, “Hey, if
there’s nothing else that can happen, let’s close this deal right now, let’s sign this
contract right now since I’ve still got you on the phone.”
Maybe you’re able to nudge them to make it happen today versus in a few days down
the line if there’s no real good reason for that.
Either way it ends the call on a really important note, which is making sure one more time that
there’s nothing you forgot, that there’s no unknown factors in this deal and if there
are, it gives you the power to challenge or change or manage them and if they aren’t,
it kind of reconfirms, it closes up the call on a really strong note, where the prospect
is telling you, “No, Steli, there’s no way and nothing that could change this deal
from happening.”
That’s a pretty good way to end the call, right?
You go, “All right, well, that’s a strong statement, I’m excited about that.
I’ll talk to you tomorrow when we have this contract signed.
I’m really honored and excited we start working with you even closer.”
You end the call on that kind of note, that’s the type of manager you want to have at the
end of a sales call, right?
Next time you are in a sales negotiation and things are going well but the deal is not
done, ask the question, “Is there anything that could stop this deal from happening?
Is there anything you can think of that would make you change your mind?”
See if some gold nuggets come up and if not, notice if the energy of your prospect changes
and kind of gets more excited, more committed and more determined to make this deal happen,
which is exactly what you want them to think of.
All right, I hope this was useful and helpful.
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All right, this is it from me.
Go out there today and crush it!