7 Words to Avoid Saying to Sales Leaders

7 Words to Avoid Saying to Sales Leaders

(Think outside the box instead)

"There is nothing else we can do." These seven words we should avoid no matter who we report to – the CEO, Chief Revenue Officer, VP of Sales, or frontline sales manager.

The initial question from our manager usually centers around top deals that have stalled. Yes, opportunities in the final stages have verbal confirmation, but as the saying goes – "time kills all deals."

The best closers know there's always more we can do.

Once our deals reach the final stages, expect them to stall. Here are twelve ideas, grouped by theme, to keep the momentum going:

Have others do the outreach

When a deal stalls, a new person who reaches out signals to the prospect something is different and might need their attention. Identify leaders in and out of sales to assist.

1. Ask our manager or head of sales to call, email, connect, and message on LinkedIn with our prospect's top decision-makers.
2. Go above our point of contact to the "power." This tactic works best when our top sales leader does the outreach and our primary POC has been unresponsive.
3. Ask our CEO to reach out to the prospect's CEO on our behalf.
4. Recruit a top customer to proactively reach out to our prospect; dependent on deal size :)

Instead of a discount, position financial incentives differently

The best sellers know how to reposition discount requests. Try these three below. If the prospect still wants a straight-line discount, we have leverage. Ask for a multi-year deal in exchange for a lower annual price.

1. Prepare a "cancel anytime" 30-day trial.
2. Offer 13 months for the price of 12.
3. Sweeten the deal with a time-bound offer for an additional product or service.

Recruit help from the business

Make sure we task our marketing, product, and professional services teams with a custom deliverable if it could close the deal. And ask a leader to fly co-pilot with us.

1. Send something attention-grabbing like an ROI model or quantifiable business case.
2. Cross-pollinate and find an internal executive who shares the same role and title as our prospect to join a closing call.

Make potential customers feel special

This batch of ideas works best with higher value prospects. Make our prospects feel part of the team if they offer valuable feedback for our business.

1. Offer a seat on our customer advisory board (if it's a good fit).
2. Give them a sneak peek of the three-year product roadmap with our head of product leading the call.
3. Monitor those Google Alerts, press releases, and your prospect's blog to connect "breaking news" to your proposed solution. Better yet, update the proposal based on the latest happenings.  

With just over 20 selling days left in 2021, rank-order our top deals and connect one of these tactics to each opportunity. Let's finish the year strong.