Another problem in sales is that we can’t always have all of the decision makers present at our sales calls and when this is the case, our prospect naturally wants to speak with that other person before moving forward.
Of course we want to do everything we can to avoid setting appointments where all the decision makers can’t be present, but sometimes the situation is unavoidable. When this is the case, the simple solution to the problem is to uncover who the other decision maker is and ask questions of your prospect such as:
How do you think (name) would feel about this idea?
Why do you think that is?
Why would they say yes? Why would they say no?
The first thing you will learn from asking these questions is whether or not you can proceed – and you might be surprised at how often these simple questions will put your prospect’s concerns to rest and allow them to move forward!
The second thing you will gain is useful information about the best solution to propose.
- Let’s say you are speaking with a prospect and they say “my attorney told that I should only buy a life insurance policy with a long-term care benefit attached to it”
- Or maybe your prospect says, well, I know that my husband will insist on paying for this annually.
I’d say that’s some pretty valuable information! Now you can expect the other person to be much more open when you incorporate their ideas into your recommendation!
So remember – let’s avoid 1 legged appointments, but if we can’t we need to be absolutely certain to ask plenty of probing questions about their anticipated response so that we know exactly how to move forward!
Also keep in mind that if you do need to set up another appointment, make sure that you wait until then to propose your solution. We always want to hold that information back until all decision makers can be present.
In closing, selling to missing decision makers is always a tricky situation and it’s important for us to adjust our approach depending upon who the missing decision maker is. Is it a spouse, child, business partner, attorney. We also need to determine whether or not the person is real – meaning are they truly an involved decision maker or are they merely being presented as a stall tactic from a prospect that we have failed to sufficiently motivate.
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