Inc.writer Geoffrey James has news for sales managers: some of your reps lie to you.
If your reps are spinning any of these stories, they either can’t or won’t do their jobs well, James says.
“Budget is not an issue with this customer.” It’s wishful thinking. More likely is the rep has not bothered to discover where your offering fits the customer’s priorities.
“We lost that deal because we didn’t have [feature XYZ].” Trotted out whenever a competitor convinces the customer that a feature is all important. In fact, the sales rep was simply outsold.
“We lost the sale because our price is too high.” The rep probably got caught in a price war with the competitor and failed to make the financial case for purchasing your product.
