Sales leaders often look at pipelines and see lots of deals in the late stages of their sales process either “stuck” or close dates repeatedly pushed out to the future and conclude they have a “closing problem”. Their corollary problem is win rates are well below an acceptable level. So they seek coaching and training to improve their teams’ closing skills.
But almost inevitably, after analyzing their sales teams and how they are coached by their managers, it becomes clear these sales leaders are concerned with the wrong end of the sales process. As I told one senior sales executive, “You don’t have a closing problem, you have an opening problem”.
Why do I say that? Because closing need not be the main event. Yes, it’s the culmination of the process and sellers must be adept at asking for this final commitment. It is certainly critical; no ask, no sale. But too often these stagnant and lost deals are not caused by an inability to ask for the order. They are caused by insufficient, ineffective, or even non-existent discovery earlier in the sales process.
When executed well, the Discovery stage is where sellers:
- Have the opportunity to influence the prospect’s thinking and their buying process;
- Gain agreement on the commitments they need from the prospect throughout the process, not just at the end (control the process); [“The Lost Art of Closing” by Anthony Iannarino is a great book on this topic.]
- Gain a deep understanding of the prospect’s goals, problems and needs to determine if there is a strong enough fit with their ability to address them effectively;
- Understand how the prospect will make a decision, who is involved, the timing, their alternatives and how they will pay for it;
- Seriously consider disqualifying the opportunity if they cannot gain these insights and commitments.
So when deals flounder, the reality often is they really aren’t viable deals to begin with. But inadequate discovery leaves them in the pipeline where they languish, evaporate or are eventually lost to other options. Closing skills don’t solve these problems.
