In the dozens of sales workshops I lead every year I can't help but get hung up on the words.
Specifically, all of the non-sales language that erstwhile sellers get stuck on. While they might never actually come out and say Please don't buy anything from me today, these anti-selling clichés may be the next best thing.
We just hope you'll keep us top of mind. This is the perfect ending to a sales meeting with no purpose and no agenda. Like Brigadoon or Shangri-La, Top of mind is a beautiful but non-existent place. Buyers today are stretched thin: if you don't have an urgent sales agenda, they sure won't either.
This is just an introductory call. You've just told me that you can do me absolutely no good in the important half hour you're about to subtract from my life. You're either immediately useful to me or you're irrelevant. And you've just chosen irrelevance.
Can we talk about next steps? This is what we say when we don't want to directly ask the customer to buy from us or commit to anything. In spite of what may have been a very good and persuasive call, this is the kind of question that lays on the table like a dead fish and tells the client you're not all that sure about, or committed to, your product.
Let's touch base in the next few weeks. There's just so much wrong here. It's the verbal equivalent of awkwardly backing out of the room. You're telling the customer I know you're not interested and I'm going to save embarrassment for both of us.
Let me send you more information. Great plan! If we're not talking about me buying something from you today then perhaps your ninja writing skills will do the trick. Because we all know how much customers love to pour over documentation and product description.
Today's buyers have more ways to keep us away than ever before. If you've been lucky enough or diligent enough (or if your product is good enough) to have earned an in-person meeting or a scheduled phone appointment, it probably means you've got some kind of shot. Why waste it with lazy, ineffective language that lets the air out of the room?
Real sales is about persuasion, and the language of sales is the language of commitment. Practice asking questions that contain verbs like recommend, approve and budget. Then ask even more questions that either advance the sale or tell you why it's not happening. To do anything less is to cheat your employer, your customer and yourself.
I originally posted this a few years ago and felt it deserved another airing. I hope you agree.
