Compliment Your Competitor

How many times have you called someone you know works with a competitor? Lot's right? Well, how many times have you slammed that competitor in your initial conversation with the prospect? That's what I thought! If you wonder why you don't close many of them its because you didn't follow a golden rule for second graders: if you don't have something nice to say, don't say anything at all.

Imagine someone calling you and saying the car you own is a piece of junk. The salesperson could be right. You could be rolling in a 1985 Toyota Corolla with faded paint and no headliner like I used to. Sure, it was a total bucket, but if someone confronted me with that fact, like most people I would get a little defensive. Think I would want to buy a new car if you put me on the defensive?  Nope.

But what if you said something like, "Corolla wow, great car, good gas mileage. It will run till it explodes! How's it holding up for you?" Flattered, I would reply the salesman was correct that it won't die, but that doesn't mean the powder blue bomb doesn't have broken A/C and makes a strange squeaking noise!

When you call up and start ragging on a prospect for buying from a competitor, what they hear is "you are so stupid! What did you do that for?" And that doesn't make friends, Champ. One of my colleagues Dave, told me he trained salespeople to compliment a competitor no matter what. Instead of saying something like "man that's the worst software ever!" say: "I can see why you chose them, they really had some good features."

Now that you have made your prospect feel good about themselves--made them feel smart, you can start asking intelligent questions to make them understand another smart decision would be considering your product.  Start out the conversation by telling them they are stupid and they will question all decisions, like talking to you.

Beyond making a prospect feel dumb, ragging on their current vendor makes you seem like a typical slimy salesperson. What else is an average salesperson going to say? Since you aren't average, and kick butt in sales, start out by complimenting your competitor. If you don't have something nice to say, don't say it at all. By doing so, you will separate yourself from the pack and indicate your prospect makes good decisions, like considering a better option from you.

Comments

[Dave McMinn]

Absolutely! And the more specific the praise, the more credible you become. For example: "That's great" is pretty generic. What's better is: "That's pretty savvy of you to choose software that works on both Macs and PCs, plus on your smartphone."

[t dunne]

Chad,

Spot on and said with energy.

I wrote a short post on the same topic. You've said it less cautiously than I did. Well done.

http://sellingwithcreativity.com/2010/07/26/downplaying-the-competition/

Best!

Tim

[You Sell Like a Second Grader]

Thanks Tim! Yeah, not sugar coating has been a double/edge sword in my career for sure. Look forward to reading your post.