I have to agree with Gary Layo, listening is one of THE most important skills when it comes to selling. I know this completely contradicts what most people think about sales. People who aren’t very good at selling think the more you talk the more you’ll sell. The reality is the more you talk the more likely you are to talk yourself out of a sale.
When it comes to listening some of the most important listening you’ll ever do doesn’t happen with your ears. Quite often the most important listening comes from your eyes and your gut feelings. The better job you do tapping into the unspoken messages you receive the easier it is to actually sell something.
Here’s why this is true. All humans are innately frail. These human frailties, though they exist, are rarely spoken about openly. Nope, we keep them locked inside because we think if we never speak of them no one will realize we have them. These human frailties create objections to taking action and buying. If you don’t recognize and respect these hidden objections you will sell far less than you could.
These are the 5 hidden objections based on our human frailty:
- Resistance to change
- Lack of focus
- Selective listening
- Assumptions
- Negative attitudes
You must always acknowledge and respect the fact that even though your potential buyer is not voicing these objections they exist. That means you must bring them to the surface so you can work with the potential buyer to overcome them.
Before you do that though you need to acknowledge and respect these objections in yourself.
Why are you resisting making the changes you know you need to make to change your results?
How would it impact you if you focused on just one thing until you could succeed with that one thing?
What aren’t you hearing that if you did would change everything for you?
How are your assumptions preventing you from getting the very things you want?
What negative attitudes are keeping you from doing what you need to do to get what you want?
Coach Cheryl
photo credit: perpetualplum
