Make it easy for the other person to say “Yes.”
Ways to Prevent “No”
Whenever the other person says “No,” you have a mountain to overcome. You have his pride as a hidden objection. You have to unfold his “crossed arms.”
In making a “call-back” on a prospect, it is often easy to begin by saying, “Have you changed your mind about my proposition?”
No man wants to have anybody, especially a salesman, change his mind. He likes to “stick by his guns.” Oh, yes, some men will change their minds, but they like to think they changed them of their own free will.
If you start an interview with a question the prospect can say “No” to, you are unnecessarily handicapping yourself. It is better to say, “Last time I talked with you, your problem was one of price, isn‟t that so, Mr. Jones?”
He must say “Yes,” because you put his own major objection to him. You reworded his objection and “fed” it back to him. Then you can say, “I have been thinking about the price, and I wonder if we shouldn‟t look at it from this angle …” You tell him your new sales story. His interest is up. You haven‟t a “No” to surmount.
Men Like to Say “No”
The well-trained Bickley butter-and-egg salesman, as you have read, never greets a Philadelphia grocery prospect with a question like this:
“Need any butter or eggs today?”
He does not give the prospect a chance to say “No.” He keeps his man in a “yessing”
mood by such statements as this one:
“How‟d you like to sell more butter and eggs this week, Jim?”
Of course Jim must say “Yes.”
Men like to say “No.” It is easier to say “No” than “Yes” – because the word “Yes,” according to many people, seems to weaken their will, and they like to pride themselves on having a strong will.
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