Overcoming doubt when selling

What to do at those critical moments of doubt

Every salesperson at any moment can run into a wall of doubt on any sales call.  Even the most experienced have moments of doubt.  Don’t let bravado or stoic expressions fool you.  We all have it.

Confidence does not necessarily eliminate doubt.  Confidence can mean that you know your products.  You know how to recommend them or sell them.  You know your market and your customers.  So, you may feel confident at any stage of your sales career.  Yet, doubt is always just a moment or thought away.  Why?  More importantly, how do I reduce those moments of doubt when selling?

It’s like riding a bike.  Most of us are fairly confident at riding a bike.  I’m on my bike for four or more hours a week.  Confidence in my ability to ride is very high.  Yet, I take turns in the rain and remember all the times I fell in the rain on slick roads.  I remember a deer jumping out of a tree line and just barely missing it at 20 mph. (FYI, that feels fast on a bike).  I remember getting a flat on a particular road and hitting the ground.  And too often, I remember cars that drive too close or fail to yield at an intersection – realizing that right or wrong, I lose every interaction with a car or train.

So, yes, you might have confidence in you, your products, and your ability to sell them, but here are a few moments of sales doubt:

Doubt on a sales call:

• Are they ready for me to ask a closing question?
  • Ask anyway.  If you have this doubt, it probably means you think they are ready.  So, just ask.
  • Use a trial close to test the waters.
• Did I get enough information to make a good product recommendation?
  • Keep digging and asking for more information until you are confident you are solving a problem for the customer. 
  • If you did a good job of asking questions and feel like you are ready to make your recommendation, then do it.  If new information comes out, that’s great.  Go back into your discovery phase of the selling process.
• Am I being too pushy?  Nobody likes a pushy salesperson.  If I do, they may never let me back on the farm again.
  • Understand that most salespeople, especially in Ag, will err on the non-pushy or too soft on closing side.  We are very aware that farmers do not like pushy salespeople (nobody really does).  So, we err on the side of not closing soon or strongly enough. 
  • If you find yourself ever apologizing for making a sales call on a customer or telling them, “Sorry to bother you” or “I don’t mean to be a pain”, you need an abrupt attitude change.  You are a professional salesperson who advises customers on a critical product line in their business or farm.  You don’t bother anyone.  You help them grow, save time/money, or remain in business.  Stop viewing your job as a nuisance to customers.
• Am I not pushing hard enough?  The last time I didn’t ask for the sale, they bought from my competitor.  I should have pushed just a little harder.
  • This is the opposite of the previous doubt. And my answer is, “Yes, you are not pushing hard enough!”  Truth is, I dislike pushy salespeople as well.  But worse is a salesperson who won’t get to the point and ask for the sale.
  • Pushing becomes annoying when they just keep asking with no new information or new recommendations.   
• They asked for a price reduction. What do I do?  If I don’t, will they just buy from my competition?  If I do give a price discount, did I give in but didn’t need to?
  • If you feel this way, you didn’t gather enough information yet.  You don’t know how your products and services compare to your competition.  The value you bring is established in the discovery phase of the selling process.
  • You need to ask more questions around their buying cycle.  How they make decisions on your products and why they chose the products they chose? 

Doubt when managing your territory:

• Am I spending my time wisely?  Should I be prospecting more?  Or calling on current accounts more?
  • There are too many factors that go into deciding how to answer this question.  The most important aspect is that you are asking yourself this question.  You are challenging yourself to determine where you spend your most valuable resource – your time.  Most salespeople don’t think about it and just react to the day by spending time where they are comfortable or fighting fires all day.  Typically, this results in slower growth, stressed salespeople who lack focus, and a stagnant prospect funnel.
• Which market segment or geography should I focus on?
  • Sort customers by the standard A, B, C format.  Review with your sales manager and maybe product managers, depending on your company.  What are your peers doing?  Compare their territory to yours to see if you are in line or not. 
• Is my territory in a 90-10% situation, and I have too much of my sales concentrated with too few customers?  Making me at risk of one decision maker?
  • Review your yearly sales results ranked by volume or dollars (whichever you are evaluated on).  Draw a line a horizontal line at the 50% point.  Now draw another line at the top 25% line.  If the top tier is only a few customers, then you might be in a 90-10 scenario.  Make a plan to begin growing outside of these one or two customers to reduce the risk of losing them.
• Am I spread too thin across several markets and failing to become an expert or trusted advisor anywhere?
  • This is the opposite of the previous question.  Too thin, and you are not known for being an expert in a market.  It’s safer as it would take more than one or two customers to cause a major territory decrease.  However, you are vulnerable to competition focusing on market niches and losing those customers.
• Is this shift in customer economics a trend or just a blip on the radar?  In other words, do I shift my focus away from my current customers and focus on what I think is the customer of the future?
  • This doubt will remain present in almost every industry, and agribusiness is no exception.  We aren’t going to quit eating, but there will be major changes in how our food gets to the consumer’s table.  Look at any animal production segment over the last 30 years (about the length of a person’s career). 
  • Maintain the main and dabble in the new.  These are my thoughts on how to stay at least as ready and relevant in your territory as possible.  The key is to maintain the main segment of your territory, which is providing the main part of your sales.  While doing that, my recommendation is to dabble in the new or niche markets.   It’s kind of like your own research department.  Again, the key is to not abandon your current strength area every time the industry claims that a market shift, AI, or precision will make us irrelevant.  I remember hearing for 20 years that the small dairy was leaving Wisconsin.  Yet, they remained a solid market segment for many years.  On the other hand, the retail feed business was a niche market that we began by dabbling in.  Then focused on it until it was a very valuable part of my area.

Final thoughts on the doubt/confidence balance:

1. Rehearse.  Yes, I want you to practice what you will preach.  Doing so will not make you sound rehearsed.  You will actually be more confident in what you say and will stop worrying about where you are taking the sales call.
2. Phone a friend.  Most likely, your peers are facing the same doubt issues that you are.  They are your resources to help you overcome doubt. 
3. Phone your manager or other company resources.  This might include product managers, logistics/production managers, etc.  They see more territories and salespeople than you do.  That should give them a wider view of your doubts.
4. Admitting doubts to your customer.  This one is a bit scary, but it does show your honesty.  I don’t recommend doing this too often, as customers expect us to be confident in helping them.  However, gray areas in your business are gray for a reason.  Pointing these areas out as unknowns is a way to build trust.

Good luck and enjoy the doubtful moments as they make the confident moments even better.