The Power of Silence and the Pregnant Pause

I had a big scare at the Houston airport last week. But it had nothing to do with travel. I was there with one of my sales reps and he walked up to me with a big grin and said, “I just did a Sam.”

Having been in sales management for a while, I’m a big proponent of “Do as I say, not as I do”, so I was very nervous as to where this was going. So I took the bait and asked him what he was talking about. He told me he used the “pregnant pause” with a prospect and it worked like a charm. He reminded me of a few instances when I had used the technique successfully and he was waiting for the right time to try it himself. I was anxious to hear about his experience.

Blog continued below . . .

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What are you waiting for? Those deals won’t wake up on their own!

Here’s the background of the deal before I share his conversation with you. There was an active opportunity with this fully engaged prospect in late 2010. The seller, a very reliable forecaster, had put this in his pipeline to close in Q4. They had gone back and forth on a number of issues, including price, and had settled on ten-cents. Then, as these things often do, the customer went dark and didn’t resurface until last week, several months after their last conversation.

Here’s a rough cut of what was said after the usual pleasantries:

Prospect: “We’re ready to get this thing going again.”

Seller: “That’s really great to hear. We’re ready when you are.”

Prospect: “We had agreed to a price of ten cents last year, but I’m really going to need you to work with me on this. The best I can do is nine cents.”

Seller: “Jerry, the price is fifteen cents now.”

And then he said nothing else.

Total silence on the line.

And more silence.

It started to get a little uncomfortable.

And more silence.

Until finally the prospect said, “But Seller, my budget is built around a ten cent price. That’s where we ended up last year. I was just sure we could get it done for that this year! What if I give you a minimum commitment? What if I can guarantee a specific quantity? Is there any way we can get ten cents?”

My how things changed, and quickly. The prospect went from being in the negotiating driver’s seat to practically begging the seller to do business with him. All because the seller did the exact opposite of what most sellers would do in that situation – he didn’t say anything.

It takes some intestinal fortitude to use the pregnant pause. It is a very uncomfortable feeling. But it is also very effective when used at the right time.

Think about how that conversation could have gone.

Prospect: “We’re ready to get this thing going again.”

Seller: “That’s really great to hear. We’re ready when you are.”

Prospect: “We had agreed to a price of ten cents last year, but I’m really going to need you to work with me on this. The best I can do is nine-cents.”

Seller: “Sounds fair to me! Let me see what I can get done.”

Most sellers are so anxious to get an order that they will jump on the very first buying signal and will often leave money on the table. Or, yammer on and on about why they can’t do nine cents. Sometimes, all you really need to do is just be quiet.

As I contemplated the events at the airport, I recalled a very similar situation from a few years ago. Our company had done a large programming job for a Fortune 500 retailer and they needed more work done that they thought should be free. We had already done work outside of the original specifications – for large customers it is not uncommon to do some additional “goodwill” programming for scenarios that are in the grey zone. This request however, was different. It was fairly large and clearly outside of the original scope of work. So it was time to sit down for a conference call and come to a resolution. Joining me was our project manager who absolutely hated this kind of conversation. He wouldn’t be saying much, but I needed him in case they brought up some of the finer points of the project. Even then, he didn’t want anything to do with the call. He was a great project manager but not much of a seller or negotiator. He had tried a couple of times without success to get the deal done and finally asked me to step in.

The meat of the call went something like this:

Retailer: “As we’ve stated, we believe that this functionality should have been in the original release and we are not going to pay for the development work. We like the specifications and the timing but we won’t pay a dime.”

Me: “I appreciate your position, but we don’t agree. If you look at the original specifications, this capability is clearly not included. So we’ll need to charge you the $25,000 that is on the document that you have.”

Then I hit the “Mute” button on the phone.

And then the silence started . . .

It seemed like an eternity.

Finally they chimed in, “We won’t pay for the development work. It should have been included in the original deliverable.”

To which I responded, “I understand your position, but ours has not changed. We cannot do the work for free, so the best I can do is the $25,000 figure you have.”

Then I hit “Mute” again. The project manager was visibly uncomfortable with all of this, literally squirming in his chair. The silence was deafening. It must have lasted for two minutes. Finally they came back with “Okay, if that’s the best you can do.” And we moved forward with the project. We completed the project as planned, the customer was thrilled, and we went on to do more work with them. The negotiation did not damage the relationship. If anything it let them know that we were serious people who would not be pushed around by a large customer.

Most sales professionals aren’t wired to be completely quiet. It’s just not who we are. But I would suggest that the pregnant-pause could be a very effective weapon in your sales arsenal. And I suspect that as you read this some situations are coming to mind where you could have used the pregnant pause effectively – or it has been used effectively against you.

Warning: As effective as the pregnant pause can be in negotiating, you had better be able to back it up. In both of the above examples, the seller was in a very strong negotiating position. As such, I would suggest using the pregnant-pause in selling situations judiciously. Make sure that you are absolutely right and that your position is 100% defensible – or that you are willing to walk away from the deal. It is a very strong tactic that requires nothing less.