Common Words That Kill Your Sales Process

For those who know me, in additional to my online marketing stuff, I’m also doing offline consulting and sales.

This job requires me to meet a lot of people, prospects and customers offline.

What I realized is that offline and online selling can be quite different.

Because this time round, you get to meet someone face to face.

Whether you can form a rapport and establish a mutual understand will depend a lot on what you do…AND SAY!

It’s about saying the rights things…as well…as not saying the WRONG things!

Do you know you may be unwittingly saying words that may be sabotaging your sales prospects?

Well…I certainly said such words before. And quite often too. The worst thing is that sometimes you yourself will not even know you are making such mistakes.

And because of this, I’ve put in a superb article by Jacques Werth, the founder of High Probability Selling on this topic for your benefit.

Read it. And reflect on it. It will have an impact on you just like it had on me. Here goes:

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We live in a cynical world.  Salespeople have helped create that world, by using words and phrases in ways that trigger suspicion, create mistrust and sabotage sales.

Many of these words and phrases are part of traditional and popular sales techniques that are intended to create trust and "build rapport” but actually do the opposite.

You may not even realize that you are using these words and phrases in a way that negatively affects your communication and your business.

Here are four of the most common ones:

“Interested”

Interested is the word that salespeople use when they don’t want to hear "No."  Interested is the word that prospects use when they don’t want to say "Yes." There is no commitment associated with interest.

Interested people are gathering information.  Interested people are not ready to buy.  Selling to them when they are merely interested is usually a frustrating waste of your time and energy.  Also, experience shows that it virtually guarantees that when they are ready to buy, they won’t buy from you.

Interested indicates an opportunity for marketing, not sales.

"Honestly" or "To Tell the Truth"

People pay more attention to what you do than what you say.  They have learned that when a salesperson says they are going to be honest, they are likely to do the opposite.

When it comes to honesty, don’t say it.  Be it.

“Just” or “Only”

"I just wanted to let you know…" or "Just fifteen minutes of your time."  What does the word "just" imply in sales situations?  It communicates that you seem to be trivializing your communication in order to disarm the prospect. You’re minimizing the importance of your products and services, and your own time.  If someone is a real prospect for your product or service, it’s an important priority.

“Thank You”

While gratitude in a business situation is often warranted, "Thank You" is one of the most over-used and abused phrases spoken by salespeople.

There is no need to thank prospects for their time and attention.  Repeatedly thanking prospects and customers implies a subservient, begging, position, which will cause a loss of respect for you.

If you say thank you when no real value is received, then you will be seen as being insincere and phony.  That impression will sabotage your credibility, mutual respect and lose business.

In High Probability Selling, we have a list of more than 30 of these words and phrases. We train salespeople to become aware of, and then either eliminate them or radically change how they use them.

People want to do business with people they can trust and respect.  They will try to avoid doing business with anyone who arouses suspicion.  The words you choose and the way you use them make all the difference.

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What do you think?

I want to hear your thoughts on this…

All success,

[tags]E-MoneyMarketing, sales process, sales, salesmanship, prospects, customers[/tags]

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Pretty nice information there!

I agree a lot with the thing about ‘Just’, because if people came up to me and say that, it just irritates me more than anything :/

I agree with “Honestly” Because People Punching is salesperson honestly it just intersting to anything

http://www.marblehost.com

Nothing makes me cringe more than to hear someone say “honestly” or “to tell you the truth”. If I didn’t want the truth, I wouldn’t asked to begin with.

Another overused, useless word is ‘frankly’. Still, a corny sales script probably scores better than no sales script at all.

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First of all it is really interesting article. I am too agree with marble host. It is really good article. I enjoyed it. The people whose connect with sales field should read this article.

This should be a nice push for everyone out there. Thanks for the great contribution.

@To all:

I think many of us use some of these words much more
than we should.

Good timely article I thought will help all of us.

Definitely me as well!

Cheers,
Jag

yar. all seller should know these things. thanks for your article. your comments really make sense.

To tell you the truth I thought..hehe j/k. It was a good article. Salesmanship is not easy and I think the more you believe in the product the more natural you can appear and not thanking people excessively.

Very interesting points you have mentioned. Love to know this as a business person.

Nice article – ‘honestly’ and ‘to tell you the truth’ are the words to be most avoided. As soon as I read them I instantly question whether what I’m reading is true.

Great post, nice information!

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Sales is a psychological career, and words greatly affect what people think. I especially agree with the fact that you can’t thank people too much, because that “just” creates awkwardness.

Even though I have taken several courses I am still falling into the trap (well I guess it is more of a bad habit) of saying/typing “honestly” when I am disagreeing with someone and trying not to come on too strong.

In my native language I find myself repeatedly using the word “frankly” way too often and it is so true that the message you’re trying to communicate is weakened greatly by doing it. It’s a hard habit to break out of :)

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Yup… You’re right!

Your article must be read by every sales person. It makes sense! :-)

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Ya i also agree with that thing marketing is the most powerful factor in the business.

Agree that the words mention above are words that are a big nono when it comes to sales line.This words are overly abused that some might feel annoyed by hearing it.

Thanks for featuring my article above. Here are a few more things NOT to say.

1. Do not repeatedly use the prospect’s name. Only salespeople speak that way. It creates instant sales resistance.

2. Do not discuss what the prospect’s “needs.” Use the word “want” instead. People buy what they want, not necessarily what they need.

3. “Solution” is an overused term that has so many meanings that it confuses most prospects.

In any type of the marketing some people come with a great idea time from time. And this great idea works well, the results are increasing, managers are happy when seeing the results. So far everything is ok.

The problem is born in the moment when many other marketers start to use the same tactic — because it works. But when using the same tactic many times by many marketers the effect become opposite.

The mistakes you mentioned in your article are great example of overused marketing tactic. People who want to be successful must simply find some new, original ways how to talk to the client.

Bedrich