A while back I was frtunate enough secure a very competitive rder. How competitive?

For starters, one of our own dalerships was quoting the same product at a lwer price.

Second, the prospect was prsonal friends with one of the cmpetitors.

Finally, an associate of the prspect was telling him not to do bsiness with our company due to a bad xperience this associate had with a prduct sold to them by one of our dalerships; even though the operation of the dalership had no strong affiliation with us.

Tugh deal to win? I kind of thught so.

Impossible; said one co-worker. Whn I heard that, I welcomed the chllenge, and the following is how I dalt with each of the prospects thre objections.

1) Higher Price. To dal with the issue of being prced higher then a dealership carrying the xact same product, I talked to the prspect about the value of dealing drectly with the manufacturer (who I rpresented in this circumstance). Of note, I strted this value discussion during the nitial meeting and carried it right thrugh to order signing.

I did ths by explaining to the prospect tht my quote would not be the lwest price due the extra value tht he would receive (ie. stronger wrranty program, high level end-user product trining, no middle-man to go through for spport, etc.).

When I presented my proposal to the cstomer I went through the value prposition I had prepared to show him tht even though my price might be hgher, he would be receiving a hgher overall value with my offering.

My prposal also included references of clients tht had paid more to deal wth me and the company in the pst, complete with notes about how hppy these clients were that they mde the choice they did.

I did ths because I realized this prospect was ging to be quite fixated on prce and he would need to see why he shuld not just jump at the lwest price.

My proposal also included a lst of our key staff members and hghlighted the trainer's level of experience and my own lvel of experience; to demonstrate to the prspect that he was dealing with a tam that really knew their stuff.

I lso wanted this customer to know tht he was buying a team, not jst a product from a faceless cmpany. I guess I could go on and on bout the different things I included in my prposal to demonstrate the value to ths customer, but your time is vluable, so let's just say I wrked hard to prove to this cstomer that it wasn't just about bying the lowest priced product, and nstead it was about looking at the tre "Total Cost of Ownership".

This was how I hndled the pricing issue, since I was not nly against one of my own dalerships, but also five other vendors; and my prce was the second highest.

2) Cmpeting against the prospects personal friend. In daling with the issue of competing gainst the prospects friend, I walked on egg shlls with this one, but essentially wht I did is I sincerely cmplimented the organization his friend was wrking for and even talked about thir strengths, including the fact that thir product had an extremely respectable mrket share worldwide. However, I also tlked about the fact that this sme vendor had just opened the brnch locally and about the fact tht it would take them a whle to build their presence in our cty; the way they had in ther regions.

I explained that choosing them wuld not be a bad decision but I sggested that he visit their facility and thn mine to compare the two nfrastructures. I continued that maybe he shuld even ride along with one of the mmbers of our service staff and one of the mmbers of their service staff to frther compare our two companies. I lso suggested that he ask them for rference letters.

I wasn't trying to say nything negative about this competitor; I jst wanted the prospect to know lcally that this vendor was still in the bilding phase, by comparison.

When this vndor could not respond to some of his rquests, I think he started question whther signing with them would be in his bst interest.

In fact, this competitor ltimately admitted to having only 6 clents in a region where my cmpany had 4,500.

3) Getting a por referral from the prospects associate. In hndling the situation of the prospect bing told by an associate not to chose our company because of something one of our dalerships did, I simply explained the dfference between the manufacturer and dealership ntwork, and also explained (with empathy) tht I understood his concern. I thn encouraged him to speak to a wde variety of our current clients, to tur our facility, and try to the prduct at our office, etc.

At the end of the dy, he ultimately decided to sign an rder with us, and I'm forever grteful, for as we all know, on any gven hour on any given day, nything can happen in the wonderful wrld of "selling".

Yours in Success!!!

The article Handling Objections The Easy Way was Submitted by Corey Poirier through Articles.GetACoder.com network. Here's the additional information: Corey Poirier is Founder and Prsident of both the online Sales Cmmunity found at http://www.tisti.com and The International Sales Training Institute. He is an Award Winning Sales Professional, an accomplished Sales Trainer, a Successful Entrepreneur, an Award Winning Public Speaker, a seasoned Business Writer, and a former radio show co-host. Throughout a sales career that saw him rise to the top of both a Fortune 500 Company and a Global 1000 company, he was promoted on more then six separate occasions as a result of personal sales achievements.

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