I watched Barack Obama's acceptance speech at the Democratic National Convention last night, being a bit of a politics junkie. Whether you admire or despise Obama, I think you'd have to agree that he skilfully utilized a concept of effective sales presentations: anticipate objections and address them directly during your presentation.
The "presentation" phase of the selling process is the time for the salesperson to "be on stage" and to be the center of attention, unlike the "Warm up" and the "Needs and Desires Investigation." The presentation is when the salesperson has the opportunity draw a direct connection between his product's benefits and the specific needs and desires of the prospect.
If you can anticipate your prospect's objections, it's an excellent sales strategy to preemptively address them during the presentation rather than wait until you hear the objection from the prospect's mouth after you've asked the prospect to buy. The advantage of being proactive is that some of the energy of the objection is decreased simply by being the one to address it first. In our sales training, we teach strategies for proactive handling of objections.
Senator Obama utilized this technique in his speech last night (transcript here). He attempted to address the following "objections" in his speech in an effort to disarm his critics:
- Potential Objection... "Obama is merely a celebrity rock star, not a viable presidential candidate":
"Now, I don't know what kind of lives John McCain thinks that
celebrities lead, but this has been mine. These are my heroes. Theirs
are the stories that shaped my life. And it is on behalf of them that I
intend to win this election and keep our promise alive as president of
the United States."
- Potential Objection... "Obama's pro-choice stance scares me":
"We may not agree on abortion, but surely we can agree on reducing the number of unwanted pregnancies in this country."
- Potential Objection... "Obama is against gun rights and he might take away my guns":
"The reality of gun ownership may be different for hunters in rural Ohio
than they are for those plagued by gang-violence in Cleveland, but
don't tell me we can't uphold the Second Amendment while keeping AK-47s
out of the hands of criminals."
We don't know if Obama succeeded in silencing any of the objections that segments of the electorate may be having about his candidacy; but it's clear that he handled potential arguments against his candidacy in a direct and compelling manner, which is exactly how sales professionals should handle their prospects' objections. I predict that some of the negative energy that has surrounded Senator Obama's stance on gun rights, abortion rights, and being "merely a celebrity" (a la Britney Spears) will have been silenced somewhat because of how he addressed these issues.
Silencing an objection during a sales call is a good thing, too.
Flickr photo by shirishbendre.
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Skip Anderson is the Founder and President of Selling to Consumers, a B2C sales training and consulting company. Subscribe to the free Selling to Consumers Sales Tips Newsletter.
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