Selling Empathetically: Slow Down Discovery to Speed Up Your Close

Selling Empathetically: ?Slow Down Discovery to Speed Up Your Close

Empathy is a powerful yet often underutilized tool in the world of sales. While the focus in sales is often on closing deals and meeting quotas, empathy allows salespeople to connect with prospects and customers on a deeper level, creating trust and fostering long-term relationships.

However, in high-pressure sales environments, where the emphasis is often on pushing products, shortening sales cycles, and meeting targets, salespeople and their managers often feel they don’t have time to engage empathetically with customers. This also happens when inexperienced salespeople succumb to pressure from busy prospects to simply pitch and present. My advice:? slow down your discovery process to speed up your close.

In working with my clients, I think and talk about empathy a lot. Which is why I read with interest an article in Scientific American called Being Empathetic Is Easier when Everyone’s Doing It by Elizabeth Svoboda. In the article, Svoboda provides valuable insights into the challenges and benefits of empathy which are directly applicable to sales. By understanding the cognitive effort behind empathy and embedding it in sales culture, professionals can enhance their effectiveness, improve customer relationships, and drive better outcomes.

To understand empathy better let’s first define it. According to the Merriam-Webster Dictionary empathy is “the action of understanding, being aware of, being sensitive to, and vicariously experiencing the feelings, thoughts, and experience of another.” To effectively employ empathy in sales, I would modify this definition by saying empathy is understanding and being sensitive to the thoughts, feelings, and emotions of your prospects and customers without experiencing those emotions yourself. This is an important distinction for two reasons. First, in sales it’s important not to become emotionally vested in any deal. Emotional boundaries are critical for guarding against burnout that can come from dealing with rejection every day. Therefore, effective salespeople learn how to encourage prospects to enter an emotional state of mind – which is key to making buying decisions – by sharing their frustrations, concerns, disappointment, or anger about their challenges while the salesperson empathizes yet remains emotionally objective. Second, as Svoboda points out, being empathetic is cognitively demanding; understanding another person’s emotions and perspectives activates multiple brain regions responsible for processing emotions and assessing mental states. This means salespeople must invest energy to do more than just surface-level listening—it demands a genuine effort to understand the customer’s feelings, concerns, and pain points. Yet, the payoff is worth it. By asking follow-up questions and showing a genuine interest in their customer’s unique challenges, salespeople can shift the conversation from a product-centric to a customer-centric discussion. This allows for more personalized solutions, which are far more likely to resonate with the customer and result in a successful sale.

While practicing empathy may be demanding, the rewards are well worth the effort. Customers who feel genuinely understood are more likely to engage positively, leading to more successful sales and long-term relationships. In a world where connection and trust are key to business success, empathy is an indispensable tool for every salesperson’s toolkit.

In addition to being cognitively demanding, there is a common misconception about empathy that prevents many salespeople from improving their effectiveness. Namely, many people view empathy as an innate emotion. They believe that individuals naturally possess either a high or low degree of empathy based on their natural disposition. This perception frames empathy as something one either "has" or "doesn't have." Those who have it are inherently more sensitive and attuned to others' feelings.

However, researchers and psychologists believe that empathy is not a fixed trait but a skill that can be learned and developed. By practicing active listening, perspective-taking, and emotional understanding, individuals can strengthen their empathetic abilities, regardless of their natural inclinations. This shift in understanding moves empathy from being seen solely as a personality characteristic to a critical, trainable skill that even those who don’t “have it” can use to improve their personal and professional relationships. Having said that, salespeople must be intentional about and encouraged to invest the time, effort, and practice to improve this important skill.

A third key takeaway from Svoboda’s article is that empathy is easier to practice when it’s embedded in the culture around you. In sales, creating a culture that prioritizes empathy can transform the way sales teams interact with clients. When empathy becomes a core value in an organization, it naturally encourages salespeople to prioritize understanding their clients' pain points and concerns.

As such, sales leaders play a crucial role in modeling empathetic behavior. By demonstrating empathy toward both customers and team members, they set an example that encourages others to follow suit. Much like the empathy training programs highlighted in Svoboda’s article, sales organizations can implement empathy-focused training sessions to train their teams how to listen actively, ask thoughtful questions, and approach sales from a problem-solving perspective rather than a purely transactional one.

Establishing a culture of empathy creates a positive feedback loop – when team members see empathy being rewarded and practiced by their peers, they are more likely to adopt empathetic behaviors themselves. As Svoboda notes, people are more inclined to practice empathy when it becomes a social norm. In sales, this means that the more empathy is emphasized, the more it will become second nature for sales professionals.

Although empathy can be emotionally taxing, balancing emotional boundaries with empathetic listening enables salespeople to stay engaged without burnout. The rewards of empathy in sales are clear: clients who feel heard and understood are more likely to trust the salesperson, remain loyal, and engage in long-term business relationships. Ultimately, empathy is a powerful tool that leads to better outcomes in sales, fostering trust, loyalty, and deeper connections with clients.