THIS may be killing your sales and you don’t even know it.

Today, I want to discuss the topic I refer to as the “elephant in the room.” It handles objections, as you may know. It’s actually dealing with what I call the deal killers, or possible deal killers, and handling the things you don’t really want to deal with, not handling objections in the old-fashioned traditional sales manner. It involves talking about the topics that are most likely on your candidates’ minds. 

You hope that these topics never come up at all or, if they do, that they do so quickly so that you can deal with them and move on. You also hope that since these topics are taboo, they will never come up again. It can be an issue with your company’s reputation or a problem with one of your products, but your prospect is undoubtedly thinking about it. You pray it never does, you know.

We are going to discuss a strategy for dealing with the fact that sales are not everything today because, as you may know, I have been in sales for so long that I’m not even going to guess how long. And thus, as you may recall, it was referred to as the “old-fashioned traditional technique of sales.” And during sales training, we referred to them as objections. But I’m bringing up something that, in my opinion, is quite particular to franchise sales.

And that is something that truly kills the transaction, is a real roadblock, and is a serious issue. Most individuals will attempt to avoid franchise development, hoping it never arises, and hope the applicant never discovers it. However, most salesmen promptly address it if they do identify it before attempting to move on.

So, these problems affect us all. All of us face these difficulties and roadblocks. But I’ll tell you that because you dealt with it once, your candidates still think about it. You can apply what I’m going to teach you today to any issue or subject; it doesn’t just have to be about dealing with the elephants in the room, though that’s what I’m advising you to do. That is today’s main topic. 

The habits, approaches, and advice I’m about to share with you today may therefore be applied anywhere; wherever you notice that a listener isn’t fully understanding or grasping what you’ve said, you can apply what I’m going to share with you. However, I’m advising you to do this if you know it’s the one thing that could cause your deal to fall through. So let’s discuss that right away.

In the end, you deal with it head-on; you’re not so much acknowledging that it’s a challenge or a problem. While you can certainly do that, it’s not always done that way. However, you are implying that you are not averse to discussing anything with your applicants. Once more, this is the reason I sort of refer to it as the “elephant in the room,” since it’s the topic that salespeople prefer not to broach in case it never does.

And if it happens, they strive to resolve it swiftly before moving on. What I’m trying to say is that your candidates aren’t getting over this; they continue to think about it. They might not bring it up again, or it might, but they might not. However, whether it was a difficulty, a challenge, or a source of uncertainty regarding your model or brand, I can assure you that it is still on their minds. And if you don’t deal with it head-on, well, let’s be honest, it’s just going to stay around and probably kill your sales.

Therefore, I discovered that dealing with these circumstances head-on has a huge influence. And I’ll show you how to develop a habit right away. I’ll also show you how to incorporate a scripting technique that will help you deal with the elephant in the room. So here we are after each call. You want to make a note of it to yourself at the end of the call, so that when you get on the next call, as you are outlining what you’re going to talk about today, and I hope you do that, you’re letting your candidates know the purpose of the call and what you’re going to discuss today. One of the things I instruct in my courses is this. And I’ve always advised franchise sales representatives to set up the call by explaining what will be addressed and what the aim of the call is before they join it.

Therefore, when you’re doing that, what you want to say is to ask them if they want to discuss anything from the previous call again before moving on to your material and agenda. Sally’s or any other important phrase from our previous conversation that you’d like to review again is a real key phrase, then. So that’s the first point. The second point is that I always ask because I feel like you might need additional knowledge about XYZ or because I sense that we might not have covered that issue or that portion of our model to your satisfaction. 

Have I understood that correctly? Did I perceive or perceive that correctly? If so, I would love to discuss it right now. help make it clearer, offer you more details, you know, maybe you’ve given it some thought between then and now? And perhaps there is another way to phrase it in your queries and worries. But why don’t we discuss it first before moving on to the other topics we’ve covered or that are on the schedule for today.

So once more, deal with it head-on. Those are non-confrontational words, but you can infer what they are thinking about from the last conversation. And it is crucial, crucial, crucial when it comes to these, again, these elephants in the room. I will repeat it on the following call regarding the same topic because you want to secure their commitment. 

You want them to say “No, Don, I’m fine with that” out loud. Or perhaps after this final discussion, they mention it again and exclaim, “Oh, God, you know, that was really, really fantastic.” I believe I finally get it, and I appreciate you bringing it up once more. So do it on the same topic, do it a couple of times on the same topic, until you hear from them that they’re over it, they’re okay with it, they now get what you were trying to explain or they now get that point that is part of your model and part of your brand. 

What happens if they say they’re not truly at ease with it? The sooner you can bring up the issues that will effectively kill the sale for them, the better, because, as we’ve already mentioned, having the right amount of time and being available to engage with the applicants who are most interested in your brand will be crucial for franchise sales. 

The sooner these deal-killing elephant in the room issues are addressed and discussed openly or dealt with, the better. For example, “Hey, If this is going to be a deal killer, then maybe now’s the time we should end the conversations because this isn’t something we’re going to change or this isn’t something I can really deal with.”

Consequently, that will afford you some time to negotiate with other applicants. It is therefore acceptable to disclose some of these deal-killing issues because, let’s face it, what sense would it make to continue working with two candidates who obviously have issues and deal-killing issues in their minds that they are unable to overcome for another three, four, five, or six weeks only to learn that something killed the deal and that something was probably that thing?

In order to free up time to engage with the applicants who are most interested and likely to buy, you want to address these elephants in the room as soon as possible.

Let me simply sum up the session by saying that it was about addressing the issues that are often the “elephant in the room,” such as how to deal with them early on and feeling comfortable bringing them up with applicants. Don’t disregard them, then. They bother you. They can be considered objections. They act as obstacles or stumbling impediments. Now that we’re done, don’t ignore them.

Don’t assume they are over something just because you dealt with it once; instead, include it in your writing with a friendly, non-confrontational wording that will allow you to bring it up and deal with it. I hope you can better explain them now. And maybe it won’t become a problem in the future. However, if it becomes a problem over time, you’ll be able to move on from that candidate sooner rather than spending months with them only to discover that the issue that arose early on was the real reason they aren’t buying. So incorporate this into your routines and call scripts.

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