If you study our Sales and Marketing (QCF) course, you’ll learn about effectively negotiating with customers, a very important aspect of building a successful career within sales and marketing.
A negotiation is an attempt to reach an agreement. In order to negotiate, you’ll need to be able to focus on the customer and find out what it is they want. Negotiating with customers is also really important in order to succeed in marketing. The reason being that you can close the deal by including extra services and products.
Also, you’ll need to focus on matching the product or service tailored to the individual requirements of each customer.
Successfully negotiating with customers is very important in order to ensure the efficient running of any company or business. This is because it’s important to make sure the customer is getting the best deal. It also takes a certain set of skills in order to be able to negotiate.
These are just a couple of key aspects of negotiating with customers:
Handling Objections
Another thing that’s necessary in effectively negotiating with customers is being prepared to handle objections. Objections are when the customer chooses not buy and then dealing with their reasons.
Closing a Sale
When negotiating with customers, the best ways to close a sale is to is to avoid being too pushy and recognise buying signals.
Steps to Negotiating with Customers
Be prepared
One of the things to remember when negotiating with customers is to make sure that you’ve effectively prepared. You need to have a thorough, in-depth understanding of your product, the customer and the unique selling points that are likely to give you the edge over the competition.
It’s important to make sure that you’ve fully researched your competitors in order to determine why customers should buy from you.
Create value for the product and/or service that you’re selling
Make sure that the customers are getting value for their money. Prepare to explain why your product and/or service is a great option in as much detail as possible. What makes your product and/or service stand out from the rest of the competition? How can what you offer make a difference to others?
Think about the pricing
Make sure that you and your customer are able to agree on a price that’s fair to both of you. Not too high and not too low. Be realistic and have a clear idea of what it is that you both want.
Avoid pushing too hard
Don’t come across as aggressive or abrasive. Be assertive and confident and don’t make you customers feel pressured or manipulated. Show your willingness to negotiate and ensure you’ve given them some control over the process by hearing what they have to say and valuing their opinion.
Learn to effectively handle rejection – rejection is often inevitable and this is especially the case in sales and marketing. The key is not to take it too personally. In order to be successful in negotiating with customers, you have to be able to handle objections.
What would be your top tips for negotiating with customers? Does a career in sales and marketing appeal to you? Please let us know below…
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