I would love to tell you the deceitful, manipulative, lie-to-close-a-deal image most people have of salespeople is totally unjustified. But the undeniable truth is that far too many salespeople use underhanded, unethical and sometimes illegal tactics to set appointments and close sales. So it's no wonder prospects treat salespeople the way they do.
I would love to tell you these unscrupulous tactics don't work. But the truth is, people don't buy from people they like or people they trust, they buy from people they believe. And many unscrupulous salespeople are so adept at deceit their prospects can't tell whom to believe. (You have no idea how much I wish this weren't true.)
I would love to tell you there are tons of honest sales training approaches from which to choose, but my own research has proven otherwise. Yes, there are many who claim to deliver a "radically honest" approach, but let's not forget the "adept at deceit" point above.
On My Soapbox
Pardon me for a moment while I vent. (It's related to my last point.)
Last Friday, a colleague asked me to give him feedback on a cold-calling training program he was evaluating. On this trainer's website it states the system is a "radically honest" approach.
In his very first sample lesson, there are two times when he advises salespeople to tell outright lies.
Lie In Your Opening: His advice regarding your opening statement is to say "I'm just giving you a call to see if you folks are grappling with any issues around ..."
Give Me A Break: If this statement were true, even when the prospect replied with "Yes, we've been grappling with those issues for years and would love to hire someone to help us overcome them" your only viable action would be to thank the prospect for giving you exactly what you said you wanted and then hang up the phone.
Second Lie: His advice for how you should handle the "We already have a vendor" objection is to say: "That's not a problem. I'm not calling to replace who you currently have. I'm just calling to see if you'd be open to ..."
Give Me A Break: If you aren't calling to replace the current vendor -- in whole or in part -- then you better not be calling while on your employer's dime. Is there a human being on the planet who thinks this is true, let alone radically honest? (If his rationalization is that you aren't trying to replace the vendor at this very moment on this specific call, I'll cry bullshit right now.)
Honesty, Please: There are totally honest approaches to both cold-call opening statements and the handling of every objection on the planet. All you have to do is either decide to use them and invent them yourself, or learn them from someone else.
I would love to tell you the leaders of great companies -- companies you can normally count on for honest, ethical decisions -- do not allow the use of manipulative sales techniques. But countless hours working with sales teams, discussing sales at networking functions, interviewing and observing executives, evaluating sales training programs, and mystery shopping companies of all sizes have proved that even the most honest company executives often ignore what goes on in the sales department -- at least until someone gets caught.
I would love to tell you that behind closed doors manipulation and deceit do not permeate our profession, but the truth demonstrates the opposite.
What I am happy to tell you, however, is why sales manipulation will eventually die:
Most salespeople are basically honest people who simply haven't learned the honest way to sell. However, once they do, they will never go back.
Decisions in the corporate world are always driven by money. And in the long haul, honesty is far cheaper and far more effective when it comes to finding opportunities and closing deals. (The hard part is educating all those executives to the point where they'll give total honesty a try.)
Salespeople would rather behave ethically, plus a positive impact to the bottom line. Sounds like a match made in heaven, so instead of wasting time ...
Let's Talk Facts And Figures
To prove to the world's decision-makers that honesty is more cost effective than manipulation, let's first do a preliminary calculation of the Cost of Manipulation, shall we?
Fact: All dishonest tactics eventually stop working, because prospects get wise to the bullshit. (That's why companies must constantly retrain their salespeople.)
Figures: Into how many different sales training programs has your company invested, only to have the tactics cease working after a while? Calculate the cost of all these training programs and list it under "Failed Training Cost."
Fact: Most people are basically honest, and when you train honest people in dishonest tactics, they suffer immensely. (For example, people aren't generally reluctant to cold-call, but they are reluctant to manipulate prospects over the phone. Think about that for a minute and you'll begin to grasp why honesty solves major sales problems.) As a result of this suffering, salespeople either use the tactics they've been taught and hate themselves for doing so, or don't use them at all. Either way, their effectiveness at selling drops, and most either bail out of the profession completely or remain delegated to the bad half of the 80/20 group for their entire professional lives.
Figures: Calculate the cost of turnover of your sales team. How many people have you trained and lost? What did it cost to hire, train, support and replace them? What was the lost-opportunity cost of having a bad salesperson on the team for X months or years? Total these numbers and call them "Turnover Cost."
Fact: Sales resistance is not a natural part of the buy-sell process. It exists only when the salesperson's actions create it.
Figures: How many deals do your salespeople lose because they used even a slightly manipulative tactic and it created the sales resistance that killed the deal? Total the amount and let's call this "Sales Resistance Cost."
Fact: Prospects who see through your crap will gladly lie to your face. (Typically, this results in their stringing you along while they gather all the free education they can get you to give.)
Figures: How much time do your salespeople spend chasing non-buyers? How many deals could they close if that lost time was spent selling to prospects who will gladly tell them the truth, who want what you sell right now and who will write a check if your solution actually meets their needs? Add the cost of lost time and lost opportunities together and call it "Lying Prospects Cost."
Fact: When you attempt to manipulate a prospect and fail, you create and adversary, not an ally.
Figures: There is simply no way to put an objective number on the impact of bad word-of-mouth. But you can quantify the value of good word-of-mouth and assume bad press cost you at least that much. My top 23 referrals (meaning total dollar value of project closed off a referral) came from prospects who never hired me in the first place. (They referred me anyway, because I didn't use manipulative bullshit to convince them to hire me when it actually did not make sense.) So for the sake of quantifying bad word-of-mouth, let's determine the dollar value of your biggest referral ever and assume that dishonesty cost you at least one referral that size. Call this one "Lost Referral Cost."
Totals: Failed Training Cost + Turnover Cost + Sales Resistance Cost + Lying Prospects Cost + Lost Referral Cost = Cost of Manipulation
Fact: Honesty never stops working, because, well, there's no trickery to finally see through. So a single investment in training and mentoring of each sales manager and salesperson will work forever. (Not a total recovery of Failed Training Cost, but definitely a huge savings.)
Fact: Most salespeople love using honesty in sales. It fits them like a warm blanket and energizes them instead of beating them down. Some will still quit your company, either because they really aren't suited to sales at all, or because they're the naturally dishonest few, but it will be far less turnover than what most companies experience today. (To be fair, let's say an 80 percent recovery of Turnover Cost.)
Fact: Honesty eliminates sales resistance and turns an otherwise adversarial buy-sell process into a collaborate exploration. So you will never again lose a sale because of resistance that your actions create. (You'll still lose some that manipulation might have closed. So to be fair, let's guess at a 75 percent recovery of your Sales Resistance Cost number.)
Fact: The 96 percent of the buying population who are basically honest stop lying to salespeople who aren't trying to trick them into buying no mater what. (Four percent of the population is dishonest, so at best, you'll recover only 96 percent of your Lying Prospects Cost.)
Fact: If you sell honestly, even when you don't close a deal you'll create a friend, and, quite frequently, produce referrals. (I guarantee you'll get back more than your Lost Referral Cost number.)
Final Fact: I can't call it Honest Selling without pointing out that for most companies, switching to honesty in sales can be painful and arduous -- actually increasing turnover and decreasing results during the transition. But I've never seen a company make the switch and fail to drastically improve its long-term bottom line. So while you probably won't realize the bottom-line impact in the first year or so, you will realize it forever after you complete the transformation.
Hard, bottom-line numbers married to an internal desire for honesty from both salesperson and prospect. That's why sales manipulation is doomed to a slow, miserable death.
Gill E. Wagner, Sage of Selling
President of Honest Selling
Founder of the Yellow-Tie International Business Development Association
P.S. I reposted this article, because I believe FeedBlitz failed to deliver it the first time. Sorry if it came to you twice.
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