If you sell a product or service, closing more sales equates to making more money which opens the door to myriad opportunities both good and bad. The good is the additional income allows you with more money to buy the things you 
need and want. Maybe it’s an avenue for that special trip you’ve dreamed about. Maybe it’s a car you’ve had your eye on, or perhaps it’s a way to start an IRA. The bad is more income equates for more opportunities to go in debt by over extending yourself financially. However that’s a whole other topic so let’s assume that you’re a good money manager, but your primary goal is to make more money by increasing your closing percentage.
When it comes to closing sales there are bestselling authors that have written thousands of books on “How to close the sale” by mastering several of the closes that they teach in their books and tape programs. Anybody heard of the Ben Franklin Close? How about the “Reduce to Ridiculous” close? Or the “Cost vs. Price” close? Those are 3 that come to mind, but there are hundreds more I could list. The next question is…do they work? My answer…in a word *YES! Notice the asterisk before “yes.” They will work if you know them and you can effectively execute them in a confident compelling manor. The only way to do that is to learn them backwards and forewords, and then practice them until you know them like the back of your hand. Nothing wrong with that except it involves that four letter word that most people don’t like…Work. Most people don’t want to work as taking the path of least resistance seems like the “The Road Most Traveled.”
So with all that being the case, what’s the path of least resistance that will pay the biggest dividend in terms of attaining a higher closing ratio? Or to put it another way, what can you do that won’t take hours to learn and you won’t have to memorize in order to execute? In a word, “Rapport.” Rapport and the ability to create a high level of rapport will close more deals than any close you’ll learn in any sales closing book. Why is this true, and how do I know this is a fact? Let’s say that you have a closing ratio of 20% meaning that for every 10 prospects you speak with you close 2 deals. In the automobile business that’s pretty much “spot on.” If you’re really good maybe you can up that to 3 out of 10, but from people walking in the door that you meet for the first time 20-25% is about average.
Now let me ask you this…If everybody that you got in front of to sell your product or service was a friend, relative, or a neighbor what do you think your closing ratio would be? Ever heard of the 80/20 rule? Suffice to say, those people would probably close at a much higher rate; 80% certainly wouldn’t be out of the ordinary. So now the rhetorical question is why? Why, because they like you and trust you AKA as already having a high level of rapport.
A friend, relative, or a neighbor won’t put up much resistance when it comes to price for instance. If they come up with a price objection and all you should have to say is something like, “Hey Man, I’m gonna take care of you. You know that.” Assuming that you have a high level of rapport that should be all you have to say. What close would that fall under? Just remember this when it comes to closing. “The more objections you get from your customers, the more stalls you’re getting from your customers, and the more hoops your customers are making you jump through simply means the less trust you’ve built with your customer.” Trust and rapport go hand in hand, and you can’t have one without the other.
The best salesperson I’ve ever worked with had about an 80% closing ratio on first time customers. How did he do it? Why was he so good? In a word…Rapport. He was the best at building rapport with his customers. He was able to build such a high level of rapport that people wanted to buy from him. People would go out of their way to buy from him. In a short period of time his customers perceived him as a close friend, neighbor or relative.
So if you want to close more sales, you don’t have to learn more closes. Build a higher level of rapport with your customers, and your closing ratio will rise in direct proportion. So now the question is how do you build that exceptional level of rapport to the point your customers will perceive you as a friend, relative, or neighbor? Stay tuned…
