Last Ditch Ideas to Close the End of Your Sales Funnel
Closing the sale should be the climax of the sales journey. After months of careful nurturing, you and your client are nearing the end of the conversation. However, sometimes it’s hard to get that final commitment—even if the sales representative and the buyer had a great rapport earlier on in the sales funnel. Suddenly, the client isn’t sure how to proceed, and that much-anticipated deal may fail to materialize.
Welcome to sales frustration. Even the best and most savvy salesperson gets to experience a lost sale every so often. In some cases, the buyer gets cold feet, or maybe the sales rep fails to address a major objection. Then again, there are instances when the situation changes, and the client suddenly no longer wants or needs the solution. But there are occasions where a timely recovery can end up saving the deal.
In many cases the sales representative might only have needed to retrace their steps in the sales funnel. Once they pinpoint where things started to go south, it becomes a lot easier to get back on track.
Stuck Leads—Why Do They Happen?
When the sale doesn’t happen, it’s time to revisit the sales funnel. Also known as the “sales pipeline,” the sales funnel breaks down a transaction into the beginning, middle and end stages. The first part deals with generating and qualifying leads, while the middle part concentrates on educating the customer on the merits of buying. Meanwhile, the final stages focus on the art of the close. This is where the sales rep makes the pitch, buyers throw objections and both parties negotiate. Ideally, the result should be a mutually satisfying close.
Unfortunately, leads can get stuck at specific points along the sales funnel. This doesn’t necessarily mean that the client stopped communicating—rather, one part of the funnel may not be moving at all. Soon, the entire funnel gets mired in non-action. With nothing to act on, salespeople lose momentum, miss out on closing opportunities and ultimately fail to hit their targets. But this isn’t a reason to panic. Identifying the cause of a stuck lead can often help you identify the right corrective action!
Too Many or Too Few Leads
Managing active leads in the sales funnel isn’t an exact science. What we do know is that when sales reps have too many or too few leads, it can affect their ability to close deals. With too many leads, a salesperson’s likely unable to devote enough time to each one. Conversely, too few leads mean risking valuable time and resources on the wrong type of buyers.
In Trying to Win the Battle, Don’t Lose the War
A deal that ends up being good for the buyer may not be good for the seller. Salespeople who insist on focusing on closing the “big one” instead of managing their time across multiple deals may be risking too much. They tend to make concessions that dilute the transaction’s value. This includes aggressive discounting, waiving commission or even cutting out partners.
Inability to Address Objections and Answer Questions
The urgency of closing a deal doesn’t always translate from the prospect to the sales team. Reps who take their time to return calls or address common questions shouldn’t be surprised when a red-hot lead suddenly turns cold.
Meanwhile, veteran buyers may also try to secure a final discount or get more freebies during the close. Other times, they might throw in a few objections and then wait for a resolution. Until they get a satisfactory reply, the deal will remain in limbo. If the sales rep or the manager spends too much time deliberating, the client might not wait around for an answer.
Strategies to Help Close the Deal
While it’s true that not every deal reaches a successful conclusion, the intrepid sales rep should still exhaust every available means to get them as far along the sales funnel as possible. Then, at the very least, they’ll have a fighting chance to close the deal.
Align Your Solutions With Your Customer’s Problems
First things first—selling is about giving customers solutions to their problems. If your solution has no relevance to a customer’s needs, don't waste your time arguing otherwise. You’ll be better off providing answers to customers who want and need your solutions.
Learn From a Buyer Persona
The “buyer persona” is an ideal personification of your target market. Here, marketing gets its cues from sales in creating fictional representations of the various markets your business services. These personas usually reflect your market’s profile, demographics and common challenges. Selling to your target market becomes easier if your sales team takes the time to learn about the market with the help of buyer personas.
Establish a Unique Selling Proposition (USP)
It’s rare for a company to have no competitors. More likely, you’re trying to get your voice gets heard above a crowded and competitive marketplace. When speaking to prospective buyers, do more than simply highlight the differences between you and your competitors. It’s more important to have a unique selling proposition that shows exactly why clients should buy your product instead of someone else’s.
Address the Decision-Maker in the Room
When talking to a group of clients, focus your efforts on the decision-maker in the room. You can usually identify this person by the way that others defer to them. If you can correctly identify and engage with a decision-maker during the pitch, you’ll have a better chance to bag a positive result. If nothing else, it shows that “game recognizes game.”
Always Make Answers to Common Questions Available
Clients value their time, so your closing pitch needs to be direct and to the point. One way to shorten your talking points is by providing answers to frequently asked questions in advance. Your product brochures, marketing materials, online resources and sales presentations should include these FAQs.
Seal Sales Deals with a Powerful Presentation
When using presentation software to close a deal, make sure you get the most out of today’s technologies. Instead of static slideshow presentations, modern interactive presentation software can help you seal the deal.
Ingage is cloud-based interactive presentation software that makes it easy for entire sales and marketing teams to produce quality presentations. With cloud-based saves, team members anywhere in the world can remotely collaborate on a single presentation. Optimized interactivity allows you to integrate images, videos and audio into your presentation. By simply clicking a button, you can expand a section to include additional information. This means your viewers can control the presentation and determine how fast or in-depth the slides are.
Furthermore, sending presentations won’t require large file transfers or bulky email attachments. Instead, Ingage will share a presentation link with your specific audiences. The software features built-in analytics to help measure engagement levels, tracking viewer attention spans and reporting which sections generated the most interest and which ones need improvement.
Learn more about how Ingage can help you tell a better story via interactive software. Leave us a note and we’ll be happy to arrange a free demo. Sign up now and see the difference for yourself!