Dealing with Rejection

A funny thing about being in sales: We get a lot more No's than Yeses - and that's no matter how good you are! I've certainly NEVER worked with anyone who receives more Yeses than No's - A few have gotten more Yeses than ME! - but certainly No is the most common result of a request to purchase and sometimes even when you are just closing for the next steps in the sales process.

The only thing I hate more than that 'No' is the end customer or prospect who is afraid to tell you no and drags things out making your deal die a slow and painful death! - I'm a true believer in qualifying a deal as quickly as possible so that your time and focus will be spent on opportunities that are much more likely to close. Some tricks and tips on the qualification phase will come in a future article - for today I'm going to focus on Dealing with that No with some Do's and Don'ts ---

I'm going to break this into two articles: One on the Don'ts and one on the Dos for dealing with rejection. I'm going to start with the Don'ts! I do this because some of these reactions to the 'No' from a customer and prospect are truly detrimental to you ever becoming the "Trusted Advisor" - The Don'ts are actually more important than the Do's when it comes to Dealing with the No's!

DON'TS: I've done and seen some crazy reactions when facing No's from customers over the years, but one of the most damaging that I've witnessed repeatedly is ARGUING WITH THE CUSTOMER! I've seen sales reps who are aghast that the Customer doesn't appreciate the value of the product or the magnitude of the deal they are offering who end up starting unnecessary conflict with the customer - challenging the customer and to paraphrase - essentially saying "You are a complete idiot to not want to deploy my solution or accept this deal". If you've been following my posts for some time, I'm sure you realize already that this isn't likely to end well, even if you win a single order with a reaction like this. (Sometimes you can actually win an order if you make the buyer feel bad enough, but how many times do you think that buyer will want to come back and work with someone who made them feel stupid?) -- Zero! - that's right! The bottom line is it's okay to challenge customers but it's not okay to create conflict or belittle them!

Another of my top don'ts is MAKING IT ABOUT YOU - This is another one that I've seen or heard about multiple times in my career: I can't believe how many times I've heard or seen Sales Representatives whine, pout, or beg about their monthly or quarterly quota. Let's be 100% clear: Your quota is your job and your customer or prospect really shouldn't and hopefully doesn't care about it! What value are you adding to the Prospects business by you making quota this month? -- Zero! that's right! - Bottom line - if you make a response it should be about reiterating how your solutions help solve a problem for the customer or prospect or reviewing the savings and our payback period - not how it's going to suck to be you when you miss plan this quarter! This advice goes for whether you are selling to a channel or selling direct to customers - You shouldn't rely on your relationship with a channel partner to stuff their business with Inventory! It's fine to seek a stock order, but it needs to benefit the channel partner - Faster delivery for their customers, protection from an impending or expected product shortage, and maybe even a volume discount for taking the inventory early! - It should NEVER be about your Quota --- again, it's not the concern of the Channel partner either!

The one I see the most often is what I call a ONE-WAY DISCOUNT - By this, I mean a situation where the salesperson gives a discount and gets nothing more than a commitment for the current order. For me, good business practices dictate that we always get something when we give something! So, providing a discount to get the order today or to entice a customer to order when you haven't sufficiently established your value is just lazy and bad salesmanship. I'll speak to more details when I post the Do's but essentially negotiating is when you get something for giving something, it's not just dropping your price to make a deal. So, for example, you could hit the desired price point if the customer is willing to make an annual purchase commitment or if they were willing to convert to product B rather than product A (where Product B is a lower cost, lower featured product).

The final Don't that I'll discuss is similar to the first but takes it to the extreme. I refer to this approach as LASHING OUT and this behavior goes way beyond simple arguing with the customer to reacting particularly emotionally and in many cases unprofessionally to the prospect. This can include threats of going above their head in their own organization, badmouthing on social media, 'black listing' their company in the industry, making personal attacks on the customer or prospect, or just about anything that crosses that professionalism line. Fortunately, this isn't one that I've seen often but this approach can obviously ruin relationships for the long term. In my forthcoming Do's article, I'll provide some recommendations on handling the 'No' professionally and building a bridge in case the chosen solution fails to deliver as promised or to at least be invited in to present when the prospect or customer next has a need for one of your solutions.

In the end: Building Bridges for long-term relationships is my recommendation and all of the Don'ts above tend to Burn Bridges in one way or another. If you keep these analogies in your mind and can control your reactions - you'll build relationships that get you additional chances and referrals, even when you lose!