On the two year anniversary of the day that I was told I had Bowel cancer I have decided to write this article to let people know what happen and how I used my mind to fight the devastation of the disease to myself, my family and friends.  I hope this article can help others dealing with such events.

From the young age of 10 years old, I was introduced to the disease called “Cancer”.  This introduction was through my Father’s diagnosis, treatment and death from “Lung Cancer”.  As a child, seeing your father fight the disease and worst the treatments, had a very strong impact on me.  He died at 52 when I was only 12 years old.  The doctors claimed that the cancer was the result of his heavy smoking habit, so I vowed never to smoke cigarettes and that I would use my experience to help others quit.   My sister was next with her own battle of bowel cancer at the very young age of 29, then followed by mother with breast and bladder cancer.  As you can see there is a very strong history of cancer in my family.

Handling Questions and Objections

Of the many salespeople that I have trained, coached, mentored and managed, nearly all of them failed when handling questions and objections from a decision maker.  This results in salespeople leaving opportunities on the table for their competition to win.  

As this problem was so wide spread, I decided to develop a process that salespeople could easily use to handle questions and objections during a sales call.  This article outlines the process that I have been teaching salespeople for many years and has helped  them unblock and win many sales opportunities.

It is a fact that when selling, most of the time you will hear either “no” or a strong reason why a customer won’t buy when you ask for the order.   But it is also a fact that most of the time, the tough objections or even “no”, are intended to test your capability as a salesperson.

A Decision Maker may be thinking that it is easier to say “no” so not to change the status quo or take a risk.  Additionally, if the salesperson accepts the “no” then they can’t believe very strongly in the product or service they are selling.  If the salesperson is not enthusiastic enough to be willing to fight for the sale then they why should the decision maker buy from them.  

Common objections such as “We can’t afford it” or “We already deal with someone else” may sound like a “no”, but in fact it may be a question in disguise, intended to test you out and see how you can handle it.  Even a determined “NO” may be a subtle way of asking you to provide more reasons to support your offering.  

Some questions and objections can be easily handled especially when they relate to a strong feature of your product or service.  However when handling more difficult questions and objections I train salespeople to use the “SCORE” process.   

“SCORE” is a process consists of:
•    Search
•    Confirm
•    Observe
•    React
•    Exit

So what do each of these mean?