Real Selling Starts When the Customer Says "No"

This week I got the biggest NO of my entire sales career. It was delivered not from the official channels but through some personal relations, although from the “right people”. Question is what do I do now?

Before I share with you some thoughts on the subject, let me tell you what I did last time I got the BIG NO and see what we can learn from that experience. That case looked bad from start; we came in barely at #3 after a well know competitor, who was in the lead. Being a bit of an eagle salesman (at least when it comes to preparing…) I went to the customer and posted all the tools of Solution Selling on the presentation wall and walked them through the process. This impressed them very much. Then somehow we lost pace and precision in our proposition, so the deal was lost to this well know competitor, “company A”. Part of the reason for this was that “company A” had insiders who were top performers within the customer’s company, so the support for us was weak and limited to one person only. Despite the loss, as the weeks passed I started to call this customer again, just to check in and wish them well (maybe learn a bit or two). I was thinking also about how to reengineer their vision and create “FUD” (fear, uncertainly and doubt) in their minds. At the same time the customer was trying to close the deal with “company A”, but ended up in a long negotiation process, which stalled the deal. Finally one Friday, I went to meet my sponsor with a value proposition - by the book - and managed to turn the case around. We (my power sponsor and me) worked through the weekend and on Monday he went to his management team and “put his balls on stake for Solution Selling” (quote). We ended up winning one of the largest deals of my life at that point.

So back to the burning question; What do we (and certainly myself in this case) do when we get the BIG NO? Everybody loves a winner and everybody hates a bad looser. So my plan is to be the best looser they ever seen. I will still try to see all the members in the management team and discuss ideas. Now we are not a threat, we already lost. But what we can bring is fresh ideas, just to share. And maybe, just maybe, we can start reengineering the vision.

In conclusion; Sometimes you lose because you have not made the best sales effort, sometimes your product or price (or both) were inferior, and sometimes you were not with power. But as long as you have had the best intentions with the customer you can always comeback. Like one of my prospects put it: “Jens you never give up, do you?” 

Written by and posted with the permission of:
Jens Edgren, Lindgren Partners Solution Selling
+ 46 8 651 25 00
www.lindgren-partners.se