Should You "Go For No" In Sales & Prospecting

My buddy from Down Under, Sean Reynolds , asked,

What are your thoughts on the “Go for No” philosophy when it comes to sales and prospecting?"

I started to reply directly under my post and quickly hit the character limit, so here we go.

I love going for no.

There are two approaches to it, though.

I've had Andrea Waltz and Richard Fenton on The Sales Podcast several times over the last ten years, and I love their approach of going for no. (BTW, they have a book and training program by the same name, which you can find here !)

The idea is that once a customer says yes to something, offer them complementary products until they say no.

GoDaddy does it.

McDonald's does it.

I do it on webinars, for example, by taking people to a thank you page after they register and offering them a one-time-only good deal on something small, i.e., my book, The Sales Whisperer? Way , or my overcoming objections flashcards , etc.

Then I work them up into higher offerings until they say no.

Shifting gears a bit, I've always accepted that hearing no early is a win, i.e., I'd rather you tell me no today to what I'm selling than after I travel across the Pacific to meet with you in Australia and then have you tell me no to my face. (Assuming there never was a chance to earn your business.)

So in my prospecting, I flip the traditional script of the old school, hard closers who say,

"Never ask a question they can say no to. Ask open-ended questions. Get them nodding. Ask simple, obvious questions to get them used to saying yes to you. Those are trial closes that will get them to buy from you."

Jim Camp, a negotiation expert, literally tells you to start with no . (I have a podcast episode coming up on his book, so subscribe to The Sales Podcast to know when it goes live.)

When you understand the need to disqualify prospects instead of qualifying them, your whole mindset and approach changes, which increases your confidence, which is felt by the prospect, which puts them at ease faster and more thoroughly, which helps you both discover the truth, which may or may not result in a sale.

When you detach yourself from the close and only seek the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth, you'll sell more, faster, at higher margins, with less stress, more predictably, and have a lot more fun doing it.

Need some help with that?

Hit me up .

Market like you mean it.

Now go sell something.