You can have the best product to sell and still miss that close. But what does it take to ace that pitch? Join Darren CdeBaca as he shares six gems to closing the sale – from talking with the client and gaining their trust to the closing questions to seal the deal. Tune in and get good examples to close that sale every time.
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Six Gems To Closing The Sale
Thank you for tuning in. If you're chilling out on a couch and you're not able to take notes, don't be afraid to come on back. You can read any part of this to get those meaningful thoughts, notes, and/or suggestions back into your day or vision as you see fit about our topic, which is called The Six Gems to Closing the Sale. Before I start, let me share the phrase that best defines our work at DCB Strategies, which captures the result of achieving bold goals with a plan of accountability and real purpose, whether in the professional, personal or athletic world. The phrase is, "Being the best and average have nothing in common." Repeat it once or twice to yourself. How does that resonate with you?
When you say that, your brain wants to draw a line in the sand and say, "Am I my best or my average?" At DCB Strategies, we're not here to judge. We're here to share with you the tools that the best utilize and incorporate in making their habits to rise above. That's what we're going to do here. The best take time to learn and incorporate these top-level skills for their professional craft, whether it's sports, personal or professional. That's what we're going to talk about, which is The Six Gems to Closing the Sale.
How did this topic come about as the show's element? After the last few years, sales leadership teams who manage sales desks or sales individual teams nationally or what we call wholesalers in the financial industry have realized that a lot of these wonderful people have been working remotely out of the privilege of their own homes or remote offices. They haven't been around the water cooler atmosphere to sharpen up their skills and hear what's working.
At times and more times than not, these wonderful sales individuals, which we're all a part of, have doled out their craft of elevating the skills that are required to build trust and close a sale. Don't get me wrong, it's not the sales that have gone south. In some firms, they haven't gone as well. Some firms they've done okay and have some excel because of the product. When you have salespeople incorporating new skills at a top level, the genuine way to extrapolate and get big numbers on sales is going to be in front of them.
I can't wait to unravel the six gems to close the sale. Let's set this up properly. I do want to keep in mind that there's a lot of work to get to the sale. Let me remind you of the five elements that get us to the step of sales. 1) The work of prospecting. 2) The work of lead qualification. 3) The actual sales call and being prepared to make that call. 4) The proposal time. That's where the rubber meets the road. You're making the proposal to the end-user, the client or the advisor in the financial industry, then 5) The time of the sale to ask for the close.
If you're at your best and you are selling and closing, you then position yourself for number six, which is the post-purchase activity but that will be another show down the road. I'm looking forward to that one. Let's talk about the sale itself when you get to the fifth step. The sale itself is part of our craft as salespeople. This is where lies the work that you put in front of yourself and ahead of the sales call. That's about building trust with the client and/or advisor. The only way you do that is to learn what the skills are, practice them to where they become a new habit and incorporate them into your daily sales closing discussions.
You will notice an immediate improvement in the closing ratios. Therefore, the positive discussions we had with those sales teams in the last few years about having these sales skills and practicing them had benefited them tremendously with their closing ratio as a result of sharpening their craft in a spot that is the fifth step in the sales process, which is the actual sale. I hope you enjoy our discussion, so here we go.
I'm going to review these briefly and then get into each one of them. 1) Talk with the client or advisor and we summarize that by saying, "Adjust is a must." 2) Listen or learn or as some younger people say LOL. 3) Open-ended questions. The summary of that is to gain their trust. 4) The unforgettable storyboard. That's the benefit of when you educate you obligate. You will see how that comes together. 5) Provide attributes of urgency. Why the time is now? 6) Handful of sampling of closing questions to make the close which is summarized as, "How about now?"
Talk With The Client
Let's get into number one, talk with the client and/or advisor. As humans, we all learn from the three elements around us, but we have the highest degree of favoritism towards one of the three elements. As a person who is making a sale to a client or an advisor, you need to activate your listening and observational skills to understand what the client prefers. Here are the three elements humans are attracted to, the visual side of a sale, the vocal side of a sale, or the feeling side of a sale.
They will tilt their favoritism towards one of the three, but it's our job as sales professionals to activate our sales skills and listening observation techniques to see which one favors them. Let me share with you a couple of hints. If they're visual, they will say things like, "I see what you mean. Now, I see what you're talking about." If they're vocal, they will say, "I hear what you're saying. Can you tell me more about that? Discuss how this is important to my portfolio or my future?" That's an example of a vocal-oriented person. Someone who acts on feelings may say, "I have a good feeling about this. This does not feel right so far. This feels good for our future."
Listen Or Learn
The three elements humans are attracted to: the visual, vocal, and feeling side of a sale.
This is a small skill that can accentuate trust so much faster. Listening to how the conversation goes to identify whether they favor visual, vocal or feeling, and then you will have accomplished how adjusting is a must. When you adjust to their level playing field, the trust starts to happen. That's talking with, not talking at. It's talking with a client or an advisor.
Listen Or Learn
Number two, listen or learn. I want to generalize a little bit in this example. For those who are financial advisors in the financial industry and wholesaler professionals, you will get what I'm saying on this. Tier one private wealth advisors want to be listened to. The tier 2 to tier 4 level advisors want to be able to be led to an idea or learn about something that will generate a better accelerator for their practice.
Let me turn it around. High net worth clients want to be listened to because their situation is in pretty good gear. They want to be listened to about what matters to them, and then lower-level net worth clients who are looking to garner more wealth in a much more hurried fashion want to learn faster. They want to be led to something, so those coincide.
Knowing your audience, as a financial sales professional, when you have the lead qualification of prospecting and you know who you're talking with, you will know whether or not you are talking with a group that wants to be listened to more, or you're talking to a group that wants to be led or learn more about the solution to their needs.
Be aware of that because you can over-talk and over-question yourself and get out of their league, whether they want to be listened to or they want to learn. Listen or learn. We call that LOL. It's very key in high-level sales with high net worth clients and lower net worth types of clients. High net worth advisors and lower net worth advisors have different cues on what's more meaningful for them.
Open-Ended Questions
1) Talk with advisors. Adjusting is a must. 2) Listen or learn, LOL. 3) Open-ended questions, which allow you to gain their trust. Open-ended questions require far more detail and invite the client or advisor that's responding to provide more information about how they feel and what they think about the subject matter. Isn't that the key? Once they start talking more, you start gaining their trust. That's what open-ended questions do.
Start your questions with these words, why, how, what, describe, tell me about, or what do you think about. Let me give you some examples, "Why do you say that? How does that fit into your portfolio or your way of thinking? What does that mean to you and the future of the portfolio you’re building? Describe a little bit more to me about what you're saying. Tell me more about that. What do you think about this going forward?" Those are some open-ended questions.
Let me share with you some actual ones that are fun and work like gems, especially when you're asking an advisor or private wealth team to open up a conversation piece with trust. "Share with me what you and your team are most enthused about in the global capital markets in the next 2 to 4 months. Share with me what your team is most concerned about in the global capital markets in the next 2 to 4 months. All of a sudden, they start talking. You’re inviting their thoughts. You may have an opportunity to say, "Tell me more about that. Why do you say that?" As you see an opening to get into a more precise way of providing a solution.
It's a lot easier to gain their trust when you ask those open-ended questions as opposed to data dumping. You're not fulfilling their needs and have them be invited to tell you about what's on their mind. What that does is 1) Adjusting becomes a must. 2) Listen and learn. Understand your client. 3) You're gaining their trust.
Build An Unforgettable Storyboard
Let's go to the fourth gem which is building an unforgettable storyboard. When you build an unforgettable storyboard, you are educating to obligate. When you educate to obligate, you become a powerful salesperson in that client or advisor's mind. They want to hear from you again. The craft of a sales storyboard takes some work, but the best put in the work to make sure their storyboard is bulletproof.
It's a lot easier to gain people’s trust when you ask open-ended questions as opposed to data dumping.
I will share five bullet points on a storyboard that are key. They should be repeatable once they're shared with that client or advisor. What do I mean by repeatable? Your client or advisor gets the bullet points and they're able to repeat at least 80% of them. I will tell you what they're not able to repeat is a data dump. "Let me share with you what's going on with this and this, and why you should own it." You just lost it. That’s a data dump.
You've been there and done that. We've all done that. Avoid the data dump and provide an unforgettable storyboard, which is made up of five bullet points. 1) Have an open-ended intro. "How does it feel to build a stability bucket for your clients in a volatile global capital market?" Let them talk. That's an open-ended intro. 2) Have a concept word, "Mr. Client or Advisor, I want you to write this word down, stability. We're going to center around it."
If it's a different product of some sort, you can use concept words such as access like access to private equity, inefficiencies, emerging debt, high yield debt, international growth or valuation, etc. You get the drift. Have a concept word and have them write it down. Number three, provide the asset class 3 to 5 pros to remind that client or advisor of the pros of that asset class. Not general pros that everybody knows, but actual pros that they may not know. You have to dig a little deeper and work a little harder with your product specialist.
Number four, provide why your product or your asset manager enhances their work with those pros on behalf of the client. We call that a product enhancer. Number five, asks for the commitment. You gave them an open-ended intro. You gave them a concept word. You gave them 3 to 5 asset class pros. You shared with them product enhancers or variables that enhance those asset class pros, and ask for commitment, "How does this sound to you so far relative to a solution you're trying to fix or trying to have?"
When you educate you obligate. You're educating in this five-step process and you're obligating them to listen to you next time because you're not wasting their time on a repeatable product or a repeatable storyboard.
Provide Attributes Of Urgency
Number five, provide attributes of urgency. Urgency gives your client and/or advisor a reason to move forward. People don't move forward unless they have some type of urgency. There must be a why now or why this solution or product. Those come in the form of timing and/or time advantage. The timing of us doing this or the advantage of us doing this now over the next three months is time or time advantage.
Number two, the potential of this ownership going forward and what it means to you in terms of the growth you're trying to experience in this asset class and part of the global capital markets or this product that you're going to buy for your scenario. Number three, you're creating scarcity. Create one of a kind conversation. This is one of a kind without lying. You don't want to lie. Make sure you work hard to share with you the one-of-a-kind attribute this brings to the table.
You may want to share with a client or advisor that others in your situation are utilizing this product and solution because they have the same concern and/or trying to solve that global capital markets or portfolio scenario. It gives them a sense of comfort that this isn't the first one on the chart for them. Have powerful statements and or subject lines when you talk to them to remind them of the urgency, which is the time is now.
Either the powerful subject line or email or powerful PS in your email at the end, or have something when they don't answer the phone. You leave them a voicemail or at the end of the conversation, you say, "The time is now. Thanks for the opportunity for me to share the story." Have something like that. That's number five, provide attributes of urgency, which sets it up as the time is now.
Closing Questions
Number six is closing questions. How do you ask questions to close the sale? Remember the 4/5 of the way and now we're at the sale. You've built trust along the way by talking with them, listening or learning, and asking open-ended questions. You provide an unforgettable storyboard. You provide attributes of urgency.
When you educate to obligate, you become a powerful salesperson in the client or advisor's mind.
Now, you're going to have a sample of closing questions. You can provide your own, "From our initial conversation, this seems to meet your interest, is that correct? How does this solution fit into your current work and/or portfolio work? How do you usually take on an initial position in an attractive idea like this? What would you need to know before initiating a position with XYZ? Clients and advisors with your size and mindset are starting with a 5% ownership in this position and re-evaluating every month to add more or not. Does this point of entry work for you?"
Those are some genuine questions that encapsulate and bring all the trusts you've built up in the five previous steps to a wonderful way of closing the sale. Ladies and gentlemen, I hope you've recognized that these six gems to making the sale are gems that you need to learn, practice, and incorporate to make habits. Once you do, you are going to join the best in what we do in this business. Remember, the best and average have nothing in common.
This has been an enjoyable discussion with you and I appreciate your time. Hopefully, you've taken some great notes. If you haven't got it all and you want to chat more with me, send me an email at Podcast@DCBStrategies.com or contact our website DCBStrategies.com and let us know what you need. We're here for you. As we always say, stay healthy, stay passionate and have a great day.
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