Objection handling, Negotiation and Rapport

how to build rapport?
how to know that their objection is real?
negotiation skills
questioning techniques to know their needs and intentions.




Reply
Hi,
in terms of Rapport I've written this before here in a different post. The best way to build rapport is to first of all have the best interest of your prospect at heart and then use unconscious rapport building techniques. In other words do not try to consciously use social banter, like talking about golf or being a parent, to build rapport. Doing this makes it hard to maintain the rapport when you switch the conversation into a business context. The unconscious techniques could be summarised by the term Matching and Mirroring and I've covered them in my book Sales Rapport

In terms of knowing the real objection there is a technique for flushing out the real objections. Basically, you ask if that objection could be overcome would they buy your product and if they then say no you find another objection and repeat the process. You may have to do this 2 or 3 times to find the real objection.

Short course in negotiation. Never give without getting something in return. Generate a lot of options so that it does not become their idea versus yours. Start negotiating on the smaller points first to build up success at successfully negotiating with each other.

Questioning techniques to know their needs and intentions. We could get nto a whole debate about needs versus wants. The best question is to ask is "what are you after in an X" and when they answer make sure you prompt them to get their full list. You'll usually find you get things that they need, others that they want and some others that they'd like. And there is a significance in those terms needs, wants and likes (and there could be some other terms like those too). To read more about this see my free article Questions, Needs and Wants

Hope this helps, Greg