Why “Closing the Sale” won’t work for your Heart-Centred Business

A few years ago I ran a poll in advance webinar I was running on the topic of “heart-centred sales”. To my surprise over half of the respondents answered that their biggest sales challenge was “Closing the Sale”.

For some reason this response was not what I expected, and for me it marked one of those big “Aha!” moments that helped me understand my clients on an even deeper level.  It gave me a really important insight into why so many values led business owners struggle so much with sales.

This might surprise you – in my “Get More Clients Saying Yes!” programme I teach a proven system for having authentic and comfortable sales conversations that guide your client to a decision to work with you.  But I don’t teach traditional “Closing Techniques”.  Yes, you read that right.  A sales process without closing techniques.

So when I saw those responses to the poll I thought:

“Wow!,  it’s no wonder these heart-centred business owners are struggling with sales if they are making the aim of the conversation “closing the sale”.  What a lot of pressure they must be putting themselves under – and what a lot of pressure that is to be putting the client under too!”

It really didn’t sound like fun at all.

In fact, for me there has always been something inherently, well – arrogant – about the concept of closing the sale. It feels a bit like saying “Right Mr or Ms Potential Client, I’m out to sell you something here, and you are going to say yes whether you like it or not because I’ve decided that’s what suits my agenda today ”.

“Closing” just isn’t very heart-centred is it?

Now, this is not to say that “Closing Techniques” don’t work. There is a reason that they have been part of the arsenal of professional sales people for over 100 years.  It’s because they do work and if used well and skilfully they can increase the numbers of clients saying “Yes”, without a doubt.

The problem is that they won’t work so well for your heart-centred, service based business

And here’s why not:

1.  It creates an “icky” energy

Most heart-centred business owners are simply not comfortable using “icky” (that’s a technical term) sales techniques on their clients. I could teach you all the closing techniques in the world, but if you are not comfortable using them then your sales conversations will feel awkward and out of flow for you. Not only that, but your discomfort will be picked up on by your potential client who will decide not to work with you. Consciously they won’t even know why, but something will just feel “off” for them.

2.  You Won’t Use them

However, what is even more likely is that you simply won’t use these techniques in the first place. To show you what I mean, here are just 2 examples of the type of closing techniques you would be taught in a “traditional” sales training course:

The Yes Set Close – Ask a series of questions that are all designed to elicit a Yes and because they have just answered Yes to you a few times in a row, the client will then be subconsciously programmed to automatically answer Yes when you ask them to buy.

The Assumptive Close – Ask “How do you want to pay, credit card or bank transfer?” (asked before the client has told you of their decision to go ahead). The idea is that the client will have to choose one, and neither of them gives the option to say no.

I don’t know about you but this sort of manipulative approach gives me a knot in my stomach. In fact I clearly remember my years working in corporate sales when I used to be sent off for training in these sorts of techniques. I would come back to the office and stubbornly refuse to use them – it’s just not the way I like to treat my fellow human beings.

(Luckily I got away with it because I was the top salesperson in the office – which I guess proves my point).

3.  It’s not a good Foundation for an effective Relationship

In a service-based business when your client says “Yes please!” they don’t just pick up a “thing” and walk out of the shop, or get in the car and drive it off the forecourt never to be seen again. Instead, they are usually saying Yes to entering into an even more intimate and ongoing relationship with you. One where, over the coming weeks or months, they will be working closely with you and opening up vulnerably about their relationships, health, emotions, finances or business. If their “Yes” is based on manipulation, disrespect and distrust then you may find you are unable to rebuild the sort of trust that needs to be in place for you to do your best work.

4.  It sets you up for Buyers Remorse

People who make sales because of a skilful use of closing techniques have a much higher level of refund requests in the days following the transaction. This is because the potential client wasn’t fully emotionally committed, and instead said Yes because they’d been manipulated into a corner. I know that I would far rather have one really excited client who is 100% committed to our work together because they have come to their own decision than “close” 5 clients who all change their mind the next day, or don’t achieve the results because they aren’t fully committed.

5.  It’s bad for Business

If your relationship with your client is based on manipulation and lack of trust and you struggle to develop the trust that you need in order to deliver the full service or transformation to the client, then it follows that you are going to be less effective at helping them get results. And not getting results leads to less happy clients and therefore fewer referrals (and when you’ve nailed this, a flow of regular referrals is by far the easiest form of marketing). And of course, when you are not getting results your confidence also starts to decrease, and you soon end up in a downward spiral.  Which further impacts on your confidence when talking about and selling your service.

So, no “Closing” then?

Yup. Absolutely no closing. At least not in my world. Rather than spend time teaching you traditional Closing Techniques I far prefer to teach you how to guide a potential client through a carefully structured sales conversation, designed to lead the client effortlessly to a decision to work with you because they can clearly see that it is the best thing for them, not because you backed them into a corner. If you’d like to learn the structure that I teach to do that — in an authentic and respectful way — you can sign up to my 7 Steps to Yes! video training.

And the really great thing?  

The really great thing is that when you learn to do this REALLY well you will never need to learn a “closing technique” again.  Because when you take your client through the sales conversation effectively, and if your service is in fact right for them,  because your client will be making up their own mind that they want to work with you – no forcing your agenda on them required.  Now isn’t that a relief?

Heart-Centred Sales Masterclass

The Summer Special for my Get More Clients Saying Yes! course closed for enrolment yesterday, but I’ve just re-opened the Masterclass recording for people who didn’t manage to make time at the weekend – after all, what was I thinking, setting a deadline on a weekend day in summer?
Click here to watch the Masterclass
The Masterclass will be available until the end of Friday 3rd July – so you’ll be done and dusted before the weekend!