Closing is no substitute for negotiating skills

In the English-speaking world, people like to talk about the legendary closing. Many colleagues regard closing as a master discipline that particularly distinguishes the management or sales personality. I only partially agree with this, as in my view the closing is largely predetermined by skillful preparation and execution of the negotiation. Therefore, allow me to comment that great closers may like to lack diligence in negotiation, which is almost always “expensive” and risky as a result. I therefore recommend training to become a first-class negotiator instead of developing into a closer. Christian Wirrwitz presents sound basic knowledge in his book “Negotiation techniques for dummies”. Matthias Schranner and his Schranner Negotiation Institute offer courses that convey both theoretical understanding and practical skills.

Closing from a different perspective

In this article, however, I would like to approach the topic of closing from a different angle and use a guiding principle: “Don’t exaggerate, don’t exert unnecessary pressure, but also don’t let a day, hour, minute or second go by in which competition or doubt can still creep in.”

Decision without internal consensus

At the end of a long and tough decision-making process, a company is often tired, weary of the topic or even internally divided. Camps with different favorites have formed, which must now be reconciled. The system is under pressure and wants to resolve this situation with a final decision. The system, i.e. the company, is in a fragile state. In most cases, internal purchasing helps with mitigating measures. The providers are declared to be of equal value and only the best price can persuade the company and management to make a final decision. The game is well-known and has already been performed on stage millions of times. The focus is now on the price negotiation and all other dissonances move into the background, but are not dealt with and certainly not resolved! It continues to ferment underground! And many employees perceive, at least subliminally, that the decision is not yet ripe, that the foundations for a decision are not yet in place and that all employees cannot be reconciled.

This is a critical time!

The customer is susceptible to new, often meaningless ideas that usually have little to do with the original basis for the decision. In addition, the tense “customer” system reacts sensitively or even allergically to additional pressure. Experts in thermodynamics or machine dynamics could certainly describe this connection in an interesting way from their specialist disciplines. The system can start to oscillate unexpectedly and then become uncontrollable. The end of the story is then a non-decision or a total surprise as far as the final reasons for the decision are concerned. Have you ever experienced it?

Do not exert unnecessary pressure

Now back to the guiding principle above. If a customer is in such a state, the variables of pressure and time are of great importance. If you push your customer too hard, he will show a counter-reaction that is predominantly repulsive rather than unifying. Your customer relationship is very likely to be discredited. So be careful with your own impatience, which you transfer to your customer through inappropriate pressure.

A lack of sensitivity means a high risk of loss

Now it gets really unfair: on the other hand, it is extremely risky to let time pass when you are in pole position. Your situation will not improve over time and therefore the best thing that can happen to you is to sign a contract promptly. However, a certain amount of impetus is required to finalize the decision. Pressure and time are in conflict and handling this situation requires a great deal of sensitivity. This is why the typical closer is out of place in this phase. Too often he acts with a lack of sensitivity for building up pressure and acting patiently. He just wants to close and preferably right now. This behavior is paid for with a high risk of loss or high discounts (concessions) and discredits the years of work by the project team.

Competition and doubt

On the other hand, no day, hour, minute or second should pass unnecessarily. That’s right, because the customer is now susceptible to doubts that come from their own company or from the competition. Therefore, doubt and competition are synonymous at this moment. The competition will intervene with doubts and try to delay the decision. In 99% of cases, the competition then operates with a delay strategy, which you can only underestimate. The flip side: If you are at a disadvantage, you can gain an advantage by raising doubts, implement a delaying strategy and use the extra time to strengthen your position.

The skillful negotiator therefore only has the choice of closing the bag with an appropriate push without losing time! And that’s closing with class!