How should you coach your salespeople on how to respond to rate reduction requests from clients? Share this article or the information you've learned from it with them. These three immutable truths will help guide them to the best response. 

There are three immutable truths about rate reduction requests.

#1: It doesn’t cost a client anything to ask for a better deal. The worst thing that can happen to the prospect is that somebody will tell them no. It doesn’t cost anything to ask. In fact, you’ve probably been trained as a consumer to ask.

#2: Your attitude and your response to the request that your prospects and clients are making will have everything to do with setting the tone for future negotiations.

#3: Probably the most important of the three immutable truths; If you don’t move the conversation away from rate towards value, you will always be negotiating on rate for the rest of your relationship with that client.

Here’s the truth: What you win them with, is what you win them to. If you've used a very aggressive pricing model to win the business, then you have won them to that. And you have also created the expectation that is what the relationship is going to look like. You have created the reality for yourself that you’ll have them for a customer up until the point that somebody comes behind you that is just a little bit more aggressive. And they cut the rate. I mean, stop and think about that. The reality is what you win them with, how you win the business, is exactly what you’re winning them to.

So you have a decision to make on the front end, and you have a decision to make on the back end when they come and ask about these different requests. If you want to be good at responding, you need to be assertive. Why not use the word aggressive? It’s a fight to grow business. Don’t we need to be aggressive?

No, I want you to be assertive. The difference between an assertive and aggressive is emotion. Assertive people are under emotional control. Aggressive people are not, their emotions are in control of them. We want you to be assertive, standing up for what you believe is right. Asking all of the right questions, but with your emotions under control.

Number two is no surprise. You need to be skilled at asking questions and listening. We believe at Anthony Cole Training Group that the two most important attributes for a salesperson is that they are:

• Great at asking questions
• Great listeners

Let’s talk about listening for just a moment. Here’s the problem today. Most people (and particularly sales people) do not listen with the intent to understand. They listen with the intention or desire to interrupt.

Great sales people are great listeners.

Number three, you have to be able to sell value.  You must believe that your offering has value, that you have value, that your institution has value. You must believe it. You have to be willing to walk away if the prospect doesn’t believe it.

 

I am an admirer of all the brave men and women who serve in the armed forces. Their service and their sacrifice make them the best our nation has to offer. Lately, I have had the extreme honor to meet a few Navy Seals. Those meetings have propelled me to learn as much as I can about how they think and how they build the discipline that is necessary to do what they do.

While physical strength and endurance are obviously key requirements to become a Seal, it turns out what really makes them unique is their mental strength, specifically their ability to process information quickly and under extremely adverse circumstances. They build an incredibly strong and resilient mindset – and that term is defined as how they see and process the world around them. 

One of things I have discovered really resonated with me.  I have always known that “Hell Week” is one of the times that cause many in the training program to quit. The attrition rate for Navy Seal training is about 80%. The training is designed to make you quit…to sort those people out and to sort them out early. What I find fascinating is that many of the trainees quit on day 1 over a fairly simply running exercise. 

Think about it for just a minute. If you go to Seal training, you are certainly in excellent physical condition, so running should not be much of a challenge. But here is the catch – the instructors don’t tell the trainees how far they are running, nor do they tell them how long they will be running. Not knowing those answers causes many to quit. They can’t deal with that uncertainty. And one more thing – the run is not timed. You don’t have to run fast…you just can’t quit running.

This makes me think of the incredible challenges that bankers have had to deal with in recent months. It has been far from easy. And your mindset has been tested like perhaps no other time in recent years. This applies to selling as well. Selling is a tough lonely road to travel.  Selling is a process and if you fall in love with the process, (making calls, asking for referrals, attending networking events) the process will always love you back. But the challenge is you don’t know when it will love you back. And that uncertainty, just like the uncertainty of an indefinite run, can cause great discouragement. Some even quit.

My encouragement to you today is simple – just keep running. Maybe even keep walking. Skip if you want or crawl if you must.  Just keep moving because the process (if loved) will eventually love you back.

It will not be easy.  But as the Seals say…the only easy day was yesterday.

 

There are four critical things that separate high-performing banks from others in the industry in terms of their sales and revenue growth.

We know that there are four things that separate high-performing banks from their peers in terms of their sales and revenue growth.  Banks who embrace these four things will almost always outperform their peers. These activities are validated by the Objective Management Group's 30-year stats history of sales assessments across the country. 

First, top-performing banks assess the skills sets of the existing lenders and relationship managers. They do this because it is really hard to change that which you cannot see. There are a set of specific 21 core sales competencies that drive success in selling, and CEOs across the country are accessing this information to understand and improve the skills of their current teams as well as hire new high-performing lenders and relationship managers.

Secondly, top-performing banks don’t make the mistake of hiring new lenders without assessing them using a sales skills assessment that is both sales-specific and also predictively valid. Sure, there are plenty of assessments out there but the vast majority are personality-based and do not uncover if a salesperson can and will sell for your bank. When looking at sales skills assessments, make sure that it comes with a proven history of working as well as a recommendation to hire or not hire.

Third, top-performing banks adopt a sales process that is both stage-based and milestone-centric. Then they hold their lenders and relationship managers accountable to following that process.  On average, this step alone generates a 15% increase in loan production. This focus on stage-based allows a leader and sales coach to see where in the sales process a lender may need help and targeted coaching. It is a fact that “elite salespeople”, those in the top 7% of all salespeople, follow a consistent sales process.

Fourth and finally, top-performing banks make an investment in sales leader and sales management training before they even think about training their salesperson.  They equip their leaders with skills in setting standards and accountability, coaching, recruiting, and motivation. These are the top four skills that sales managers should be spending 85% of their time doing. Since most sales managers typically are promoted up through their specialty area in banking, the sales management skills assessment consistently shows that sales leaders do not have the skills or a process needed to drive consistent sales growth with their teams.

In this blog post, we present a question that may force you to look yourself in the mirror and ask, "What can I do better as a salesperson to increase my sales in 2023 and beyond?" 

This question, although difficult to admit and analyze, is necessary in your evolution as a salesperson.  

I've got a fill-in-the blank for you.  Are you ready?

"I Would Sell More If Only I Would __________"

What comes after would? We had the chance to ask that question around the country with a variety of companies both large and small, and it's interesting to hear how salespeople respond when you ask them to fill in this particular blank.

Sometimes, you'll hear excuses.

Sometimes, you'll hear valid reasons for why they're not selling as much as they would like — or their manager would like. When we hear these valid reasons, we immediately think about the core steps in the sales process.  

First, you have to call on your prospects.  Then, you have to go see them.  You must set meetings, you must qualify prospects, deliver presentations, and of course, you have to win your fair share. 

If you're not where you want to be in 2023, ask yourself,

1. Why are you there?
2. How long have you been there?
3. Are you fully committed to getting back on track?
4. What's going to be required to get back on track?
5. Do you have to get there?
6. What happens if you don't?
7. What is the problem costing you?
8. Do you have to fix it?

If you know anything about our organization, you know that is how we encourage the unveiling of the sales process. 

Asking your prospects questions like:

• What is going on?
• What do you have to fix this problem?
• How long has it been a problem?
• What have you done to try and fix it?
• Do you have to fix it?
• What happens if you don't fix it?
• What's this problem costing you? 

All of that fits into one of two categories: Excuses or reasons. 

Just remember as you answer the question, "I could sell more if only I could ____."  If your answer is an excuse...

"Excuses are the nails used to build houses of failure."

Now go out there and get it done!

To learn more about our organization and services, click the link below: 

Has thou been answering the un-asked question? Find out why you should never, ever answer the un-asked question in the final commandment of the 10 Commandments of Sales Success. 

Watch all 10 Commandments Here!

Transcript:

Hi, this is Mark Trinkle, Chief Growth Officer for Anthony Cole Training Group. And believe it or not, we have made it all the way to the final commandment in our series that we've titled "The 10 Commandments for Sales Success."

Commandment number 10 is Thou Shalt Never, Ever Answer the Un-Asked Question. It's fascinating to me that so many salespeople have a tendency to do that sometimes, to the point where they even sell past the yes. Never, ever answer the unasked question. If your prospect isn't asking you about scheduling, don't answer or ask a question about it. If your prospect isn't asking you about the rest of the team, and I'm not saying they're not important, then don't answer or ask a question about it. It's as simple as that. See, we believe at Anthony Cole Training Group that questions well, there's an art part to it, there's an artistic part to it, a little bit of artistic flair, and there's a science part.

By science part we mean that open-ended questions are better than close-ended questions. Think about this. How good are you as a salesperson at getting your prospects to the point where they can't stop thinking about the conversations or the discussions that you're having with them? And the reason that's important, is because people can ignore you, right? They can ignore your email, they can ignore your voicemail, they can ignore you. But the one thing, prospects can't ignore their own thoughts. They cannot escape their own thoughts, hopefully, about the meeting that you've just had with them.

You need to ask the right question, the right way, at the right time. You certainly should be asking questions that you can reasonably predict or know the answers to. And lastly, don't answer questions that your prospect isn't asking. Remember, don't sell past the yes. Thanks for listening. Have a great day.