One of my favourite former clients called me and her partners to a meeting to get my opinion this week. They had a hot new product related to covid safety on their hands and were dying to close the many leads in the pipelines. But the political climate was proving too difficult to allow them to close.
Waiting it Out
Some of the partners in the business expressed their willingness to wait out the uncertainty in the market that interested customers had expressed. Not one to ever want to wait it out, I suggested a bunch of options. In case your new product or service is also in buyer’s limbo and it’s taking an eon to close the sale with seemingly interested buyers, here are a few of my suggestions.
Concept Test It
Talk to a few other decision makers in the industries who have shown interest and see if they’re in the same boat. Is there genuine interest or is the delay just a soft ‘no’?
Is There A Bigger Appetite Elsewhere
My favourite saying about sales is that ‘if there’s no pain, there’s no sale’. So why not talk to decision makers in a few other industries to see if their pain exceeds that of the current stalled buyers’. When the cost of the pain is persistent, consistent and high, then the customer will buy. No matter the economy, the circumstance or the industry.
Check Your Messaging and Positioning
One of the biggest hurdles to a sale is if that a product or service is not positioned properly in the market. If it’s not positioned well, it’s not messaged properly. When you try to pitch it to customers, they’re confused about the clear value or why it’s different than existing solutions. If that’s the case, they will almost always defer the buy. Hence the waiting game.
Last Resort
Once you’ve checked all these above factors, and the lights are still green on your concept, then you can keep the buyers engaged by continually appearing on their radar as the clear solution to their problem. Put your articles, videos, speeches, blogs, emails and ads right in front of their eyes. Hit them with your relevant messaging over and over again in their world. Directly and indirectly through the traditional and social media they consume and through the visibility channels of the industry that they belong to. Sooner or later when the obstacles clear, you will be their first call!
Want to reposition your messaging to grow your leads? Follow me on Twitter, friend me on Facebook, watch my Podcast on YouTube or connect with me on LinkedIn –and let’s talk.
