I would never get a tattoo however if I had to get one, I would get this fucking thing tatted on my forehead (a joke) because it is so true. If we could add to these statistics they would be:
- 99% want to close on the first contact
- 99% do not have the patience to play the long game
- 99% are nervous and suck at closing
Consistency is the key, and below I have a few quick stories on when consistency worked and when it failed, yet still worked if that makes any sense.
I was running an E com drop shipping site, all sales were done via social media, building rapport, (hey how are you doing, how are the kids, how was your last trip, do any shopping? What did you get? What was your favorite restaurant? etc)
So on and so forth. Now, this guy was a fucking Whale, he would drop $30k in the club and I was trying to get him to buy from me. I played the long game and listened to how he just spent $30k at LIV or $50k on a rug he didn't need. I prospected this guy for 2+ years, I knew his kids names, the sports they played, his ex wife's name, everything you could imagine.
It wasn't faked either, dude was a cool guy, but a cheap fuck. He would want something then flake, and flake, and flake. Eventually 700 days later, I got him for guess how much? A whopping $200 order, 700 days of prospecting for a measly $200? What a fucking waste right?
Wrong, dead wrong. Most would say I wasted so much time for so little in return. And yes this is true, however the funny thing is time will happen regardless of if I'm talking to whales or sitting on the couch with my dick in my hand (seriously do people do that nowadays?). Time still happened, it simply took that long to get the first order, just like the first time you sleep with someone new. It might take a while to get it the first time then it tends to come more naturally afterward (if you were good).
There was another prospect, a minnow, little guy, same story as above, took over a year of building rapport before he ordered for another tiny amount ($79 to be exact), however that same day I continued to hit up my pipeline and came across a new prospect and he was a whale who was ready to spend. I closed the little guy, stumbled upon a whale and closed a $2,000 order in all of 10 minutes. The only reason I stumbled upon the whale was because the prior sale was done and I was back to prospecting.
The key takeaway is that there are going to be whales who spent like minnows and minnows that spend like whales. However if you’re not out there castling your line in the water you’re not going to catch shit. You have to be out there talking to people and testing the waters, trust me you will be surprised at what you catch if you play long enough.
Now the interesting part of that E Com site was that initially I was pushing, what I mean by pushing was that I was on the hunt to close (if you are not selling $100,000 worth of product you will have to push). Sure I built rapport, and honestly cared about the people I did business with, however I was always trying to close. With anything in life, this type of added pressure tends to work against us instead of for us (in most cases). I eventually closed down the site to focus on something I was more passionate about (TE) and here, the magic of building all those long term relationships came back to pay huge dividends.
The business slowly started to come to me (pulling) now that I wasn't on the hunt anymore, I didn't have to fight for price against the imaginary competitor that I felt I was fighting against. They saw the value I provided and as a result I increased my prices by 200-300% and had to deal with less issues. I have virtually zero returns and more money in my pocket AFTER I closed down the business and the site. I spent 2+ years watering a bunch of seeds and they started to bloom well after the harvest and those same customers will be with me as long as I continue to provide value to them by providing them a service that saves them time and a lot of money. As I am editing this program now on May 12 on a Saturday at 6:34pm, I sold $2000+ worth of products to 3 customers all of which took me a few minutes, one order was for $348, the other was an $798 order, and the other was for $1100. This was a business that I shut down well over 2 years ago formally, however all that matters are that my clients continue to come back.
Do you have balls?
In the Group Chat share a time when you closed a prospect the first time you spoke with him or her (not too many of those stories right?). Might be easier to share a story when you actually build rapport first and what you learned from it.