The 5 Moments Where Most Sales Calls Go Wrong

00:00 Kanika Vasudeva: every coach I know can quote their most common objection word for word. "I need to think about it," or, "Now is not the right time," or, "Oh, it's just a bit more than I planned to spend right now."

But almost everyone does the same thing when they hear objections. They respond to the words. They defend the price, they re-explain the offer, and they wait for the objection to go away. Now, before I give you the real trick, I will give you a research.

Topaz Sales Consulting surveyed thousand sales professionals and found this, that 19% of them face objections in almost every single call, and 31% of them face objections very often. So that is half the industry, right? 19% plus 31%. Half the industry hits resistance constantly in their sales calls, and you have to wonder why.

The problem is never the objection. The problem is that most people are trained to respond to what was said, not what was happening underneath the objection. So today, I wanted to give you five mistakes in how we treat objections straight from research and how they keep costing the sale.

01:24 Kanika Vasudeva: Now, mistake one is treating every objection literally. So in that survey, 34% of the objections were about price, 26% were labeled budget restrictions, 21% were lack of urgency, 14% were skepticism about ROI. So you listen to all these labels and you think, "Well, these are different, different, different objections."

But no. Regardless of the label, if you have an objection, understand that they are not seeing the value. Because if they understood the value, if they understood that their problem needs to be solved right now and you are the right company or person to solve it for them, they would make room for what you've got to offer.

So don't start negotiating on the price because that's not the issue at all. Understand the underlying objection.

02:19 Kanika Vasudeva: Now, mistake two is defending instead of getting curious. So I saw this with a client of mine. Her calls were great. She had good rapport. She was pretty confident in her delivery, and even when she mentioned her price, she was pretty confident.

But then when the objection came, she'd go straight into just justifying the investment. She would give more value points. She would give more reasons why it was worth it. The prospect would go quiet, and they would just say something polite to get off the phone, like, "Let me think about it," or, "I need to talk to my spouse."

Defending a price is not gonna move your conversation forward. It actually just proves that you heard the objection but does nothing to really handle the objection. So really get curious behind that objection.

What is the real issue underlying the objection?

03:13 Kanika Vasudeva: Now, mistake three is believing that objections only show up at the end because objections are not waiting until the end of your call.

Your prospects are actually talking to you. Listen to them. They are actually showing you in the middle, in the beginning exactly how they're feeling. Listen to their words and how they are saying things. Don't get off guard when people tell you that, "Oh, but I'm too busy to do this now," because they were telling you all along how their week looks very busy.

those are objections, obstacles that you have to handle in the beginning of the call when they surface.

03:54 Kanika Vasudeva: Now, mistake four is not asking the questions that actually get to what's really going underneath the surface, because your objection has a surface level, but there are things below it. What is truly happening? In fact, only 25% of sales professionals say that they're very comfortable asking questions that uncover the real cause of an objection.

So your job is to ask the right questions. You can say something like, "When you say you need to think about it, what feels uncertain to you right now?" And let that pause sit Because you're wanting to uncover and understand while they're on a call with you that real objection.

04:41 Kanika Vasudeva: Now, mistake five is treating the objection as the real reason, and this is a little bit around mindset. Sometimes what you believe is what shows up in the prospect, and you just automatically believe it. Like they might say, "Oh, this is too expensive." And if you feel like that figure is too expensive, that just shows up and you don't even probe it further.

But your job as the salesperson is to understand what is the deeper reason behind it. Why are they saying that? It's not the stories in your head. Get out from that. But try and understand why is the prospect saying that they need to think about it. It's the belief that hasn't shifted for them yet.

So don't take it as a story because then you will lose. Instead, address the belief that is sitting underneath and then the whole conversation will change.

05:34 Kanika Vasudeva: Now, here's a thread running through all of these five mistakes, that every objection has a label, but there's a real reason that's sitting underneath it. And as the salesperson, your job is to uncover that real objection and then help them move forward from that objection.

People who actually close more ask more of these uncomfortable questions, the questions that sit underneath that objection. They let that real s- reason surface, and then bring clarity to the prospect, and then close the call.