How to Close More Sales More Often

By Jim Klein

I'm going to share two sales closing tips that will help you close more sales. One will show you how to eliminate the fear of closing sales. The other, how allowing your fear to prevent you from closing is costing you sales.

Sales Closing Tip #1: Write Down and Practice What You're Going to Say

Much of the fear salespeople experience closing sales could be reduced or eliminated by proper preparation. Preparing for the situations that may arise and having a prepared and practiced response will decrease the fear when it comes time to close a sale.

A large majority of supposed sales professionals have no idea what they're going to say. Use this sales closing tip to eliminate your fear.

One main theme you will hear me teach over and over is preparation and practice. Preparing what you're going to say and practicing it until it becomes automatic are sales techniques used by all the top 10 percent of salespeople.

If you haven't thought out and written down what you're planning to say in every possible sales closing situation and then practiced how you will say it, over and over until it becomes second nature, you're probably part of the 90 percent. The time to practice is on the practice field, not on game day.

Professionals in all walks of life practice their craft on a daily basis. Professional Athletes practice every day, hitting buckets of golf balls, catching passes, spending time in the batting cage. Ten times as many hours are spent practicing than actual game time.

Sales Closing Tip #2: Keep Closing Until They Buy or Ask You to Leave

"I'm here to tell you, if you can't learn to close the sale, you better get out of sales, cause "timid salespeople have skinny kids".

I've been with sales people on appointments and watched the beads of sweat form on their foreheads. I've seen the lumps in their throats, witnessed their mouths turning to cotton, all a result of having to close a sale.

How feared is sales closing? Research shows that 63 percent of all sales interviews end with the salesperson not specifically asking for the order.

Further, research from Dr. Herb True of Notre Dame reveals that 46 percent of the salespeople he interviewed ask for the order once and then quit: 24 percent ask for the order twice before giving up: 14 percent ask the third time: and 12 percent "hang in there" to make four attempts before quitting.

That's a total of 96 percent who quit after four closing attempts, and yet the same research shows that 60 percent of all sales are made after the fifth closing attempt. Since the percentage of salespeople not asking for the sale the necessary five times equals 96 percent, it's obvious that 4 percent are making 60 percent of the sales.

In sales you don't get paid for getting leads or making appointments. You get paid for closing the sale. So getting over the fear of asking for the sale is paramount to earning money in sales.