As a salesperson, you have had the encounter with a sales prospect or a client where wishy-washy words come into the mix. Things like, ‘Maybe’, or ‘I’ll think about it’, or even ‘That’s interesting’. These are common words that will send any salesperson a confusing message.
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Bob: Welcome back to Velocity Selling TV. My name’s Bob Urichuck, founder of the Velocity Selling System, and today I have Matthew Whyatt, the CEO, down in the Gold Coast with us today. How are you this week Matthew?
Matthew: Very well Bob, how are you?
Bob: Excellent. Now Matthew, let me ask you a question: How many weeks are there in a year?
Matthew: 52.
Bob: There’s 52 weeks in a year and this is episode 52. That means we’ve been doing this for a year?
Matthew: Absolutely. It does look like that doesn’t it?
Bob: Congratulations!
Matthew: Well thank you Bob. If you go back to probably episode one I probably got more hair. So that’s they uh, same shirt,
Bob: Now you’re not pulling out your hair are you?
Matthew: Pardon?
Bob: You’re not pulling out your hair are you?
Matthew: I’m having to cut it off it’s the wonders of being a male in my family.
Bob: There you go. Anyways, Matthew let’s get on with it. I always found that in communications there’s always a good understanding but we came up with this phrase ‘How to Deal with Wishy-Washy Words.’ Why don’t you walk us through because you know yourself at Velocity Selling we have to have good clear communications and that’s what helps us shorten the sales cycle because it’s clear.
Matthew: Yeah.
Bob: And it’s not being offensive. It’s being polite, it’s being good, it’s being ready for it. So Matthew, how can people understand how to deal with wishy-washy words?
Matthew: Well look you know, throughout the sale process sales people are often, and business owners are often trying to interpret the customer’s wishy-washy words as a clear buying signal. And if you remember back we’ve wanted to see if we can get them to clarify their position. So an example of wishy-washy words, Maybe, I’ll get back to you, that’s interesting, and just those sort of filler words the client says that you as a salesperson might go, Oh, good they’re in. And so what we want to do is we want to go ahead and trigger something in us that reminds us and gives the customer more time to go ahead and speak. So for example, client says maybe, and so I’ll say: so what do you mean by that? And I’m not being disrespectful, I’m just getting them to clarify. I’ll get back to you- great, when would that be? So we want to get that clarity. I’m interested – how do you mean?
Bob: Yeah.
Matthew: And all we’re doing is we’re remembering back to the 70/30 rule, we’re remembering back to the strip line, we’re remembering that we actually don’t have a commitment until we’ve got a commitment.
Bob: You got it.
Matthew: And I’ll think about it, I’ll talk to you next week is not a commitment.
Bob: Alright, so I’ll get back to you next week Matthew.
Matthew: Oh, thanks, I’m looking forward to that.
Bob: Yeah, now how are you going to deal with it?
Matthew: Of course, if this was a sales situation, I would say ‘When?’
Bob: You got it. And if I don’t hear from you then, is it ok if I follow up with you?
Matthew: It sure is.
Bob: And what is it you would like me to say? And that’s all part of what we’re talking about earlier with the Let’s Pretend technique so that’s excellent. These have been a number of great episodes here Matthew on questioning techniques, really good. And I think it’s also a good time for us to maybe to take a look at handling objections because as you know, at Velocity Selling we’re doing 70% of the listening, 30% asking questions which is 100% of our time, we’re not talking there’s no room to take objections. But should an objection come up, we’ll share with you in the next episode on how to handle it. Thanks for another great episode Matthew, looking forward to speaking with you the next week on handling objections.
Matthew: Thanks Bob, bye for now.
