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 . . .

If you like my blog, you’ll love my book, Click Send and Sell! Three Unconventional Emails with Extraordinary Sales Results.

If you have ever had a prospect “go dark” this book is for you. It has proven email techniques to “wake up” your prospect. While unconventional, these emails are authentic and professional, and almost always work. And , for only $3.99 you can put them to work for you today.

Also included are email techniques for following up on leads (these emails typically get a 20% response rate!) and for planning your next prospect meeting. Proven through years of use and honed for you, these emails will help you stand apart from the crowd.

The book is available at just about every electronic outlet, including Amazon, Barnes and Noble, Sony, and Kobo. It’s also available for your iPad at the iTunes store.

No eReader? No problem! Click HERE to download and print the book in any format you want.

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.

(PUTDP) Pick Up the Damn Phone!

I love email. I love it so much that I even wrote a book about three go-to emails that have had a dramatic impact on my personal production. The problem is we tend to rely too much on email and over time it has become a crutch.

Several years ago I was an inside sales rep at a small software company. One day I was commiserating with a colleague who also happened to be the company’s top rep. My frustration de jour regarded a prospect who would not return my emails. I don’t remember the exact conversation, but I do recall telling him that I had sent them yet another email. He asked me when I had spoken to them last. I told him that we had been communicating via email over the last couple of weeks and it had been at least that long since we had last spoken. He was a little surprised that it had been so long and frankly, he didn’t get it. His style was all about building personal relationships over the phone. Email was not his primary mode of communicating with his prospects and his advice was to PUTDP. I followed his advice and got the sale very soon after that.

Blog continued below . . .

If you like my blog, you’ll love my book, Click Send and Sell! Three Unconventional Emails with Extraordinary Sales Results.

If you have ever had a prospect “go dark” this book is for you. It has proven email techniques to “wake up” your prospect. While unconventional, these emails are authentic and professional, and almost always work. And , for only $3.99 you can put them to work for you today.

Also included are email techniques for following up on leads (these emails typically get a 20% response rate!) and for planning your next prospect meeting. Proven through years of use and honed for you, these emails will help you stand apart from the crowd.

The book is available at just about every electronic outlet, including Amazon, Barnes and Noble, Sony, and Kobo. It’s also available for your iPad at the iTunes store.

No eReader? No problem! Click HERE to download and print the book in any format you want.

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

That was a very valuable lesson that often surfaces when I find myself coaching sellers about the prudent use of email. I’ve become very sensitive when I see an over reliance on email. Email is a poor substitute for the phone and in-person meetings when it comes to building relationships. It’s not a bad thing to send emails, but it is a bad thing if it is your primary mode of communicating with prospects. Why?

• It lacks your innate ability to charm the prospect.
• Too often emails can “tailspin” because of an incorrect reading of tone and mood.
• It can’t laugh.
  
• It is absolutely unforgiving when it comes to your ability to write effectively.
• Rarely can you pull off creating real emphasis with email like you can in a live conversation.
  
• They are permanent and can be used against you.
  
• And on and on.

Even if email is your prospect/customer’s preferred method of communicating, pitfalls still await. I was an executive working with a very large customer and our project manager was assigned to the account full-time. Unfortunately, a problematic issue arose that required our president’s involvement. I showed her an email thread that demonstrated the escalation of the problem and how were handling it. Since the project manager had become very comfortable with her contact at the customer, her emails had become very informal, almost like text messages. When the president looked at the email thread, where do you think her immediate response was centered? On the problem? Nope, she lost her temper on the unprofessional and casual approach our project manager had been using with this very important customer. It was a very costly mistake.

The other issue with email is the typos and misspellings that curse an otherwise great message. Many of you wonderful sellers are horrible writers and your grammar is atrocious. Think I’m kidding? Here are some real gems from actual emails that are in my Inbox:

“I hope you took the Jeffery’s advice…”

“We could focus on the roll play…”

“…move forward with gather info on what…”

“…currently using a company that is allow them to…”

What a mess! As I typed this blog entry in MS Word, I noticed that it only caught the last example. Most email editors aren’t nearly as powerful, so don’t trust them. And spell-check has its own limitations. How is your grammar when it comes to the correct usage of your/you’re and their/there/they’re? Do you know the rules around who/whom? What about the correct use of which/that? When it comes to an important discussion with a prospect, why leave it to chance? PUTDP and have a conversation.

The issue of over relying on email is especially true when corresponding internally. “I sent her three emails yesterday and two today and she still has not responded!” says an exasperated seller. “Without her getting involved, my customer…” he continues. While his issue is valid – it is common courtesy to respond to emails – his approach leaves much to be desired. PUTDP I tell him. And you know what? It almost always works. As an effective sales professional, one of your most endearing gifts of is your ability to charm people and get your way. How effective are you doing that in email? Not nearly as effective as you could be on the phone. If your colleagues are not responding to your onslaught of urgent emails, PUTDP. It is amazing how far you can get and how quickly you can get there.

Don’t get me wrong. Tomorrow, Outlook is the first application that I’ll open and it will be the last one standing when I shut down my computer. That’s the way we work. But ask yourself if you’ve come to rely on email too much. If so, PUTDP!

How to Start Every Prospect/Customer Meeting

Whether you meet your prospects in person or on the phone, there are a couple of things you should say when you kick-off every meeting.

The first is, “Thank you for taking time to meet with me.” Every meeting, no matter what, should start with a quick thank you. It’s just common courtesy.

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Pardon the interruption, but I wanted you to know that my new book, Common Sense Sales, is now available at Amazon.com.  You can click HERE to find it.  There is more information on the right hand side of the screen regarding it and my first book, Click “Send” and Sell.  Be sure to check them out.
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Next, say something like, “Before we get started, I want to make sure that we make the best use of your time. I realize that I asked for this meeting, but is there anything that you specifically wanted to take-away from our time together?" This question can yield some incredibly valuable results. The prospect probably has a specific need that your product or service can address, and their response to your question will help you target your message accordingly. Or you’ll find that a new person has shown up for the meeting and you have no idea who they are or why they are attending. So be sure to ask each person what they hope to accomplish. I mean literally go around the table and make sure that every person tells you what they hope to gain from the meeting. If you fail to ask this question and move forward with your show-up-and-throw-up pitch, you will run the risk of missing the mark entirely and losing the sale. When you do ask the question and get their feedback, you can emphasize things in your presentation that you may have otherwise glossed-over. And you’ll find that you can skip through several of your usual talking points.

Try not to be thrown off by a large audience. I’ve seen situations where a dozen people showed up for a meeting. After thanking everyone for attending we asked the “what do you want to get out of the session?” question, and went around the table and heard from every attendee. It can take a while, but the feedback is totally worth it. You’ll be sure to get “I work for Mike and need to hear the same thing.” But you’ll also get some brand-new perspectives on why the team is meeting with you.

Another potentially challenging situation is pitching to a group over the phone. Here you don’t have the benefit of the warm handshake, smiles, and the all-important body language. As always, begin the call with an authentic “Thank you.”, and then start gathering feedback on what they hope to accomplish on the call – just like you would in person. It can be a little more challenging since you can’t go around the table, so you’ll probably need to call on people. If you haven’t done this before it can be a little intimidating, but grind through it and get the feedback so that you can craft your message accordingly. It’s also a great way to make sure that you’ve gotten everyone’s name and title in case you missed it when they initially joined the call.

It is important to take good notes when they’re telling you what they hope to accomplish, because you will end the meeting in much the same way, going around the table and making sure everyone got what they wanted. But there is a bit of a twist when doing this over the phone. And this is a good tip to consider any time you are selling over the phone: you should avoid asking yes/no questions. Don’t, for example, ask “Does everyone understand that benefit?" In almost every case you’ll hear a pregnant pause until someone finally chimes in with a weak “Yeah, I think we all get that.” That’s if you’re lucky. Often times you’ll hear nothing but silence. Instead, ask a specific person an open-ended question like, “Karen, you mentioned the need for an all-in-one marketing plan. As we explained it, how would our solution meet that need?" Now you’ve got a better chance for some really good feedback.

Once you’ve validated whether or not you’ve met their expectations it becomes much easier to transition in to the “next steps” conversation. And, it’s not always a bad thing if you don’t cover a topic that an attendee is interested in – it gives you a built-in reason to follow up.

These conversations are very simple to pull off, but I’m continually surprised to see sellers fail to execute on them. If you haven’t tried the “What do you expect to get out of today?” question before, it may feel a little uncomfortable at first, but trust me, it is worth it. Start off your next call with a heartfelt thank you, and then ask the attendees what they hope to gain from the meeting. You’ll be pleased with the results.

(Note: I dedicate a chapter of my book, Click and Sell. Three Unconventional Emails with Extraordinary Sales Results, to an email that you should send before every important meeting that can also help with understanding your prospect’s goals for meeting with you.)