The Art of Selling:How To Close The Deal

Here is an excerpt from my brand new Streetsmart Negotiation Course. In this program I share my tips, tricks and secrets for successful negotiation. 

Brandon: You're giving because you can, and because you'll have some joy out of that. You know the other person is gonna be appreciative of it and it's something that will help them.

This is another good point. You know, we talked about give to give but then there's also a give to close. And, to me, a lot of times when people are negotiating, especially when they don't negotiate often, they become this moving target. So they don't even know what they want.

I have a lot of people that will come to my office and they want a raise. They don't even know how much they are looking for. They didn't even know what they want. They didn't even know what it's gonna take to make them better. They come in, they want an automobile, they come into our restaurant, they're hungry. They don't even know what it is that's gonna make them happy. So they become this moving target, they're all over the place.

So at some point as you start to sense that because, you know, being a great negotiator is about controlling the situation. But you don't wanna tell people what to do. You don't want to force people.

Brandon: No one wants to be told what to do, ever. Not sometimes, not never, but ever. But what I would say is you can give to close. So sometimes when things are starting to kind of add up and you, like, you've basically had enough, there's nothing left to give, a lot of times I'll say, 

"Listen, I can only see giving you this if you're ready to close the deal, and that's it. If that's your last point, I'll give you this. I don't wanna give you this, but if it means closing the deal, I'll give it to you." And that's, again, semantics,  another way of closing. The give to close close.

Steve: People wanna be led. People wanna feel confident and they wanna be led down the aisle...

Brandon: Yeah, there's no question. 

Steve: ...so everybody feels good about it. 

Brandon: There's no question. I mean, I think people don't wanna be told what to do but they wanna be shown. Options. I think options are a wealth in decision-making. And that's what you really want from being sold and negotiated with, is options so you're not forcing me into one way or another. You give me a couple different ways to do it. And I think that the give-to-close is a phenomenal technique and tool when you have somebody particularly that's a little bit all over the place.

Steve: I know you wanted X but if we agree to that, can we sign today?

Brandon: Yeah. And that's the give-to-close and also sometimes just a matter of calling, saying, "Listen, it seemed like X was important. Y was important. Z was important. I think we got you... My feeling is, and I could be wrong. But my sense is that we've kind of got what you needed. If so, is that true? It is true. But I think we're probably ready to pay for this. We should probably close and call it a day," because while you're ahead and I'm feeling like I'm good, maybe we just all quit while we're ahead. And that's kind of taking control of a situation. Because control is a very, very strong ingredient in closing. 

So at some point, regardless of your personality, you have to go figure how to get control of that conversation to get it to close. And there's a lot of ways to do it. And sometimes you gotta look at the person and say, "Listen, I have nothing else to give. So we can sit here and keep talking about nothing or we can close." I mean, you know, people have to understand that there is nothing left in his tank to give and that you were extremely interested in what they needed and you're extremely interested in getting what they want.

But if there was other things they may want, it's not gonna happen here. And I've had people, "You know, Brandon," because I tend to push the envelope, no question. 

But there are times when people say, "Brandon, there is nothing left to push for. I can't afford to give you anything else." And that's when you take a pause because if you wanna say, because this could be the give to get the close. So if someone says, "I'm done. I have nothing else to give you," that could be a timeout and a pause because you could go back to that person and say, "If you can give me this one last thing, I'm ready to close." So you can flip it, and you can do it to get to close. And then, you know, if it's something that's nominal, not too crazy, that can work, too. I mean, so a lot of people have time sensitivity that you may or may not be aware of and that's a phenomenal technique to see how sensitive that person is to closing. Those, two great techniques, by the way, to use. 

Steve: Those are great variations. "Okay, I'll give you what you want, but then you need to buy this and this." 

Brandon: It's a give-to-give, to give to get, or get-to-give. 

Steve: Give-to-close.

Brandon: Yeah, yeah, all about closing.

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