Training Tuesdays: The Secret To Handling Price Objections

Even sales reps who are great at handling objections have trouble with price objections. No matter how experienced they are, price-sensitive prospects can throw off their whole game.

If you've ever gotten stuck while discussing price, don't worry! Overcoming price objections is easy if you know the secret.

In this guide, I'll show you how you can overcome this key objection. You’ll walk away from your meeting with the deal in your pocket, without discounting your price or losing the deal because you didn't have an answer when your customer said: “This is too expensive for me.”

The key skills that we’re going to cover today are:

• How to avoid price objections
• What are the steps to anticipate a price objection
• How to deal with competitor-based objections

You probably already know that mastering price discussions is important, but did you know that almost 6 in 10 buyers want to discuss pricing on the first call? When price enters the conversation, there will almost always be price objections.

At some point the prospect is going to ask the inevitable: “How much does this cost?”

A key thing that a buyer considers while evaluating your offering is the price to benefit trade-off. That being said, the least effective course of action you can take as a salesperson is to dive right in and answer the question. Tattling off figures, options and discounts is not a recipe for success.

The best way to overcome price objections is by not overcoming them. 

I know that sounds like something Yoda would say if he was a sales manager, but what I mean is that if you anticipate the price objection and cover it during the sales call, you won't have to work to overcome it.

This is a general takeaway about how to be a better salesperson: Don't wait for your prospects to raise objections, raise them first and deal with them. That way you own the objection and it will be easier to overcome.

In a sales meeting, one thing that you're really doing is lowering the prospect’s resistance to your message by addressing their objections and concerns throughout the whole meeting. You increase your credibility by bringing things up proactively. It shows that you understand your prospect. The prospect is saying in their minds: “He understands! I was going to raise this objection anyway. I was concerned about the price and he just brought it up!”

But keep in mind, that once a prospect has taken a stand and made an objection, it's an uphill battle to make them change their stance. This is because you're already in an argumentative frame of mind in your interaction.

Also, if they raised the objection first, you come across as being on the defensive. You end up giving explanations, and you're not in the driver's seat anymore. You've lost control of the interaction.

So, what are the steps to anticipate and handle the objection before it's been brought up?

Here's how I would handle this at Badger Maps:

• First, I would bring up the objection and empathize: “Ms. Prospect, a lot of people ask about price, and that's always an important thing to talk about.” I just bring that up during the call at the appropriate time.
• Then, I let them know that I can resolve the objection by focusing on the value of the product. I'd say: “Once the sales team is using this, the value is really clear. But, until it's up and running, there are always a lot of questions.”
• Next, you demonstrate why the price is appropriate. If you know through your pre-call that the customer has decided to buy something, but are deciding between you and your competitors, then you will play this part differently than if they're trying to decide to buy your product or nothing at all.

If you find yourself in a situation where you're up against a low-cost competitor (it feels like everybody has a low-cost competitor these days), then maybe your response is: “Well, Mr. Customer, although our price is initially higher, our product costs less over time because it does more. It works better and it integrates into your other systems. If you look at the two products next to each other, and try them both out, it's pretty clear why the total cost over time is lower and what you get out of our product is worth a lot more.

On the other hand, if your prospect is overcome with inertia than you're fighting the status quo - aka your greatest enemy.

The only way to overcome inertia is to show how much your customer will lose without your product.

Remember, you always want to position things as a loss as opposed to a potential gain. This is because studies show that people hate losing things. But they aren't as bothered by giving up potential gains.

Anyway, if you're up against “do nothing,” you need to show the return in cash that they will lose if they don't buy your product. Show them on a dollar value what exactly they'll be losing if they don't use your product.

If the money they’re losing every month by not using your product is far greater than your product’s cost, then you’ve made your point.

Say, “Ms. Prospect does it sound right given this analysis that your organization is losing $2,000 a month by not having the solution in place?” If she's nodding her head and your service costs $2,000 a month,then you've got a sale.

Afterwards, verify that the objection has been overcome and make sure you get the nod that the price is appropriate.

Now that we've covered how you can successfully anticipate an objection, it’s a great time to write down how you will get ahead of this objection. Write a script with what you'll say, and then practice that in front of the mirror.

Stopping the price objection can be planned out beforehand.

Thanks for reading and happy selling!