Are you someone who always wants to have the right answer? When the customer says, “You’re right,” do you feel like that’s a good thing? After all, in school we were graded on the number of right answers we had. The truth is, in sales, it’s not about being the one who has all the answers. It’s about being the one who can work with the current or future customer to discover the right answer that fits their goals. You’ll know this has happened when the customer tells you, “That’s right.”
I first heard the concept of “You’re right,” vs. “That’s right” from a book called, “Never Split the Difference,” by Chris Voss. Chris Voss was a hostage negotiator and the sale he was trying to make was saving lives. Obviously, most of our worlds aren’t life or death, but there is a lot we can learn from him and how he did it.
According to Voss, “That’s right is what we say when we feel completely heard, and there’s a chemical change that takes place in our brain—it is a subtle epiphany.” Conversely, Voss says, “When somebody says, ‘You’re right, what they’re really saying to you is, ‘Please, shut up. Stop talking. I can’t take it anymore. Go away.’”
In the book, a few techniques Voss describes to get to “That’s right,” are below and you will see they have a lot of applications in sales, marketing, leadership and parenting!:
1. Listen. Be empathetic and understand their world view.
2. Tactical Empathy – Put yourself in the customer’s shoes. If you were them, would you work with us?
3. Accusation Audit – Imagine the worst things your counterpart might think or say about you. Label these negatives in your opening line and be preemptive with empathy. In the sales world, that is just being pro-active and getting ahead of objections.
4. Use how and what questions instead of why questions? Instead of “why did you pick my competitor,” ask, “How did you make that decision?” or “what factors went into that decision?”
The next time you meet with the customer, ask yourself if you would want to work with you. If you would say yes, then make sure to show tactical empathy in your presentations. There are several summaries of the book online which can be found here.
