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How to Deal Effectively with Objections

An objection can be looked upon as sales resistance, and without it you cannot expect to make a sale just as in electricity, you cannot expect to have current flowing from one end of a conducter to the other without resistance.

Making a sale is like driving a car from A to B, where you accelerate and decelerate according to the road conditions. If the car were lifted, the wheels would not touch the ground, it would not have resistance, and without friction you won’t be able to move forward, no matter how fast the wheels are spinning.

Objections can arise from the buyer wanting:

• Doubts clarified
• Further information
• Reassurance on certain points

They may be:

• Openly expressed
• Implied
• Hidden

And if they are hidden, it is the salesperson’s job to smoke them out, for an objection that is not discovered and dealt with is a lost sale.

Objections can be rational or irrational. In face-to-face selling, most objections come from the buyer ñ but an inexperienced salesperson could provoke some objections himself if he or she is not vigilant.

Dealing with Objections:

Either: Pre-empt the objection and kill it off before the buyer thinks of it,

Or: Answer it immediately

If you tell the buyer you will deal with the objection later, then forget about it, or worse,ignore it, you will risk the buyer thinking you are either hedging or ignorant of the answers. In either case the sale could be threatened then or later.

Unprofessional or inexperienced salespeople do not know how to recognize an objection and deal with it, and disregard what the buyer has said. They carry on regardless and hence lose the sale. Salespeople who do a wishy-washy job when selling, by not confronting objections and dealing with them in the right manner will always come out with sob stories to defend their poor selling abilities. Their excuse for losing the sale will be that the buyer gave them a tough time and complained about the product, service or idea. This is not so. What the buyer is telling the seller is that, based on their perceptions of the product, service or idea being offered and what the seller has told them during the sales presentation is that the buyer could not make a decision.

Objection handling to the seller therefore takes place as a prelude to closing and it is in that context that objections must be viewed rather than suspecting the buyer of throwing in a red herring in order to escape giving the seller a decision, or put him or her off course.

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