Sales Management Closing the sale

There may be different issues of the sale process: for example, after answering the prospect some leading questions he/she agrees to purchase offered product or service and consequently place the order, or vice versa potential client doesn’t say “Yes” and his/her objections can be considered and overcome again. In order to increase the probability of the first case and minimize the second one, there must be a well-organized system of preparing for the sale close; otherwise sales company can face some problems, such as following.

Sales man can’t turn from the product presentation to sale close

In order to be able to close a deal, it’s necessary to create preliminary scenario of the meeting with the prospect. Without it the seller will not know how to turn from the product presentation to sale close.

Closing method is selected without taking into consideration customer’s specifics

This scenario should be worked up by taking into account the information about the potential customer, his/her needs and character. Each client requires individual approach. Among the great variety of closing techniques not all methods are applicable to each prospect. For example, for one prospect the seller can first apply ‘1-2-3 Close’ method and tell that the product is cheaper, faster and more reliable than others. With other client this method may be not applicable and may work other one, for example the ‘Assumptive Close’ technique, i.e. right away he or she can be asked when the product should be delivered to required place. These prospect’s characteristics should be taken into account while developing the scenario of sale close.

Sales man is not ready for handling new objections

While asking the prospects some trial questions during the closing stage the prospect may raise new objections. A task of sales manager is to be ready to overcome them.

The customers of different categories may have objections peculiar to their specific. So, before going to the interview with potential client there is a sense to look over possible objections of this specific client group and think over different ways of their solutions. In such case the presence of easy-to-track archive of prospect objections and their possible solutions, statistic of their successful or less successful use is completely necessary.

Besides that the prospects’ objections depend on the group of product they are offered to purchase. For example, the customers of family cars can certainly have such objections as lack of safety or spaciousness, etc. So, the seller should look into the archive of objections that this particular product group can cause and prepare the most appropriate solution to persuade the client.

Sales man is not ready for customer’s additional requirements

It is also possible that the prospect already agrees to purchase the product, but he or she requires product sample. Or the client may say that he or she will buy the product when the order supposedly will be prepared. The logical way to avoid such kind of objections is to have everything prepared for deal arrangement on hand in advance. As the seller can’t keep everything in his/her mind, it’s necessary to have a clear checklist of required documents that must be on the sales person in case the positive sales issue. Lack of mentioned checklist may cause the absence of definite document or item and can give the prospect time to avoid the deal.

Besides that, it’s necessary to record the customer’s answers, as they can be of use later on. First, tracking the questions and replies can help to learn if there were any mistakes from the side of manager in the case of failure and avoid them in the future. Second, customer may need some time to consider carefully that the product is really important for his/her needs and obtained answers will be helpful during the next meeting.

So, if the seller doesn’t have a centralized database of questions and answers, he/she will need to keep all information in mind and can forget something important.

Moreover, without a database of prospects’ objections and their possible solutions that are grouped by prospect and product category or by any other category, it will be difficult for the seller to prepare to the ‘fight’ and to win it.

Overdue sale realization

So, finally the prospect is agree and says “Yes”. It’s time for him/her to place the order. As for the customer the order serves the guarantor that he/she will get exactly that product which is required. But for the sales company the order is a signal to make all preparations to safely deliver the product to the customer. Appropriate manager should be timely informed and reminded that the order is placed and the operation should be realized by exact due date. Otherwise, if the manager is notified about a new order later, there is a risk to exceed sales due date.

Missed recurrent sale

If the customer is constantly worked with, there is no sense to ask him/her any trial question or work out any special tactics while approaching the client each time. All is needed to do in such case is to estimate how often this particular customer needs the product, approach to him/her directly before this time and remind to continue the purchase. If neglecting to do it and hoping that the buyer will ask for the next consignment of goods by him/herself, there is a risk to miss the recurring deal.  

 Non-profit deal closing

Let’s suppose that after a long-term persuasions a deal is nevertheless arranged. But are the time and energy that were spent on its conclusion worth its returns? Or was it possible to sale more products to some other client and do it faster and easier? If this is so indeed then such sale can’t be accepted as profitable deal. Multiplying the time and energy that the sales person put into the work with non-profitable client, the company gets great material and moral loses. While the sales department doesn’t make proper conclusions of such situations and continues to conclude such non-lucrative bargains, the company will suffer damages.

For each deal there should be estimated ratio between the time spent on this sale and the profit that was made by this sale. If the ratio is not defensible, it should be taken into account in the future in order to refrain from the repetition of similar deal. Lack of centralized system for taking stock of each client profitability leads to company’s benefits’ decrease and even failure.

How to avoid the problems

The best solution that can help to avoid all problems described above is specific database sales software that is designed to store and track the information that can make for deal close.

Such sales software is VIP Task Manager. It is the best tool that has all required features to help you control and manage the sales process.

VIP Task Manager allows the seller to create a scenario for switching from product presentation to sale close. The information about the client, his/her needs and requirements can also be stored in VIP Task Manager and tracked whenever necessary. On a basis of this information, the seller can select the most appropriate closing technique for this particular prospect.

Moreover, VIP Task Manager allows to create and track an archive of objections and their solutions that are raised by the prospects of different categories or may be caused by the customers of different product groups.

A checklist of items that are needed to be on hand while closing the sale can be created in VIP Task Manager and tracked before the meeting with prospect.

The seller can also create a list of trial questions and then enter and store obtained answers.

Finally, when the order is placed, a new task can be created and assigned to the appropriate manager. He or she will receive notification that a deal is arranged and the product should be delivered by exact date. The manager can even set a reminder to avoid overdue delivery.

VIP Task Manager allows to fix the time interval when the profitable client needs to repeat the purchase and set a reminder to approach him/her next time and offer to continue the deal.

After a deal is arranged its status can be changed to “Approved”, the seller can also enter deal actual time, create task custom field that will describe the profitability of this deal.

As you can see from described above VIP Task Manager is designed to help you organize sales process and increase your productivity and effectiveness in sale close.

How to use VIP Task Manager in closing the sale

• Start VIP Task Manager
• Create a new task group “Sales”
• Create new custom fields, for example “Prospect characteristics”, “Prospect’s answer”, “Operation profitability”, etc
• Create subgroup “Prospect 1” and enter his/her characteristics into task group custom fields
• Track the archive of objections that particular prospects may have against certain product
• Create the tasks describing the scenario and trial questions to the client, e.g. “Do you prefer Camry or Corolla? “, “What color do you want?”, etc
• Create a checklist of items that are necessary to have on hand during the close
• As the prospect answers the questions, enter his/her replies into “Prospect’s answer” custom field
• Track the questions and answers and analyze if there were no mistakes during the conversation
• Enter new objections, if they are, and overcome them for future
• When the order is placed, create a new task and assign it to appropriate sales person, enter delivery date and set reminder, if necessary
• If the sale is recurring, set a reminder to pop-up in the required period and approach the client again
• When the deal is arranged fill task “Actual time” field and evaluate the ratio between deal actual time and its profit
• If the deal is worth the efforts that were spent on it, change its “Operation profitability” field to “Profitable”

Go to the next stage of Sales Management Process - Follow-up