The LAST Conversation to Have with a Prospect

Getting ghosted by a prospect happens. It happens less often if we are focused on qualifying instead of closing and on our prospect instead of on how awesome we are.

When we finally reconnect with that prospect, whether that’s weeks, months or years later, the LAST conversation we have, to determine if there’s still a real opportunity goes like this.

• Listen – to our prospect’s tonality when they respond to us, which gives us more information about the truth of the situation than their words. A prospect who says in a flat, disinterested tone, “yeah, it’s been a while. We’re still interested.” Is unlikely to become a client despite their hopium laced words.
• Accept – whatever your prospect says. Like in improv where we take a suggestion from our partner(s) like “would you like a cup of coffee” and use “yes, and” to build a scene by accepting whatever our prospect says, which is real to them, we put our prospect at ease and create rapport.
• Seek – to get to the truth with our prospect. Specifically, if this opportunity is dead or not. As the Sandler Rule goes “they can’t argue with their own data,” so reminding our prospect of the reasons they shared for wanting our product/service in our first conversations then ending with something like, “but it feels like things have changed,” gives our prospect the opportunity to rediscover their pain or gives them a gentle opening to say, “yeah, things have changed. We’re not going to move forward on that.”
• Transition – to next steps. If this opportunity is dead that doesn’t mean it’s dead forever. In that case we get a clear next step in our calendar and our prospect’s calendar to reconnect in a period of time. If the opportunity is still viable we lay out our next steps in our process for our prospect, confirm they are comfortable with those next steps and continue to move this opportunity forward.

A successful LAST conversation starts with being emotionally unattached from the outcome of the conversation. If we start a LAST call with the expectation that we’re going to close the sale on the phone we’re unlikely to listen, accept, seek or transition and instead end up disappointed.

Until next time… go sell something.