Negotiating the details of a deal can leave any seller feeling emotionally exhausted. As a seller, you gear up for your negotiation. You arm yourself with information and energy to guide your prospect over the finish line. But to understand how to sell with confidence, you must excel at more than negotiating.

Confidence in Sales

Long before you reach the negotiating stage with a prospect, you need confidence in sales. This confidence comes from knowing what you’re talking about. There’s no substitute for understanding the details of a prospect’s business.

You don’t have to spend hours on this task. A platform such as SalesCred, backed by real-​time research and AI-​generated tips, gives you industry-​specific information. It also provides you with information on a prospect’s business.

With this information, you can develop the best solution to the prospect’s business problem. And then you can lead them to the negotiating phase of the sale. And it’s at this stage that how to sell with confidence matters.

Will The Prospect Change Their Mind?

In a B2B sales situation, sellers worry about what will happen after a successful negotiation with the prospect. Will the prospect get cold feet the next day and not sign the contract? Will they begin to slow-​roll the deal and insist a few other decision-​makers must be included in their process. Or will they try to negotiate better terms?

You probably have seen all of these scenarios play out. And you may have developed your own strategies for dealing with them.

Historically, the sales profession developed a bad reputation for pressuring consumers into purchasing products they didn’t want. Many states now have a law that allows consumers to cancel a contract within three days of signing. Though some exclusions apply to the “cooling-​off” law.

The bottom line is you don’t want to get into this situation to begin with.

Which Details Matter?

In her article on how to sell with confidence, Lydia Fenet shares strategies about how to reduce the chances of a prospect wanting to change their mind. She describes the necessary details that charity auctioneers must attend to after an exciting in-​person event. Specifically, she recommends that sellers “front foot the follow-up.”

In Fenet’s example, sellers need to immediately capture the buyer’s credit card information and signature indicating they will pay for the item they purchased.

In a B2B negotiating situation, you should remind the prospect of what they’ve agreed to. Why? They may not have been paying attention during the entire session. Or they may have heard what they wanted to hear. It’s always a good idea to be sure everyone is on the same page before a negotiating session ends.

How to Review The Deal

Doing so requires you to keep your eye on the time. If you believe you’ve all agreed to the details of a deal, use the last five minutes of the meeting for review.

You may remember these details well. But the purpose of this exercise is to remind the prospect of what you think they’ve agreed to.

This can be a nerve-​wracking process, especially if you’re dealing with a prospect who frequently changes their mind. But if you want to know how to sell with confidence, this step is necessary.

Using either an old-​school notebook or tablet, Fenet encourages sales pros to review every negotiated line item. It may help to read the details aloud. Then ask every participant who represents the prospect whether they agree.

If they don’t agree, set another meeting. If they hesitate because they don’t have the authority to make the decision, learn the name of the right person. Yes, you’ll have to meet again. But you want to be sure the prospect sees the value in the negotiated deal.

At the next meeting, you may need to offer additional services or products to increase the value to the prospect. Try not to think of these concessions as a hit to your profit.

Your goal should be to start a long-​term relationship with a new client. We all know that it can be expensive and difficult to attract a new client. But once they are on board, you can continue to nurture them.

Final Steps

The details of how to sell with confidence are many. You can conquer each step of the sales process, especially negotiating, by being intentional and detail oriented. When you keep the prospect’s goals in mind, you will both benefit from the signed deal.

Photo by Photo by Brian Ngali on Pexels.