Combatting Buyer Hesitation

JOLT: Combatting Buyer Hesitation

The Season of Hesitation

Sales has never been easy and all the leading indicators of today’s market show it’s not going to get any easier, anytime soon. Buyers are hesitant to commit to change and sellers are finding that the status quo is more persistent than ever.

But is that really what is happening?

A recent study of 2.5 million sales interactions, featured in the new book The JOLT Effect: How High Performers Overcome Customer Indecision, written by Matt Dixon, bestselling co-author of The Challenger Sale, and co-author Ted McKenna, found that Elite Sellers know something we don’t. It’s not all about beating the status quo; it’s about rising above “no decision”. Put differently, buyers hesitating on decisions.

More often than not buyers hesitate because they are afraid – afraid of making a choice, any choice. They aren’t choosing to stick to what they have been doing, rather they are not choosing.

Clear as mud? Let’s unpack it.

The Drivers of Inaction

Hesitation is toxic and fear of commitment is the ultimate deal killer.

It is a story as old as time, you have a deal that seems to be going well and, at the last minute, suddenly the buyer gets cold feet. They start pushing off meetings, they are non-committal, they backpedal.

Most of the time, what do we do?

We go back to the status quo and we hammer the message that what they have been doing won’t cut it, we drill into the pain, we paint them a picture of all the terrible things that could happen if they don’t commit.

This has been the play we have all been taught, that status quo is the enemy and we must destroy it to get our buyer on board, treating any hesitation as a problem – but Matt and Ted found something interesting…in today’s market this tactic is backfiring a whopping 84% of the time!

But what do we do in this season of hesitation? Today’s buyers are afraid to be the arbiters of any change – if they make the wrong choice suddenly it is their job on the line.

No one gets fired for maintaining the status quo but people do get fired for making the wrong choice so “no decision can” be really attractive.

But surely we are still selling against the status quo, right? Well, yes, and no. When a buyer chooses inaction there are 2 reasons.

  1. They actually prefer the status quo.

  2. They are indecisive about changing the status quo.

The first reason is what we have been trained for but, more often than not, it’s the second option, not the first, that trips us up, the buyer is too worried about messing up the decision to actually make a decision. 

In other words, when a buyer freezes at the deal desk and suddenly appears unsure, what they are really saying is either they don’t have what they need to be confident – they are afraid of the wrong choice – or (more nuanced), they are afraid of being blamed for a wrong choice. It’s fear.

It’s easy to blame this lack of surety by saying ‘I haven’t given them enough proof’ but it can just as easily be that you have given them too much: too many options, too much conflicting information, too many hard-to-believe proof points – they are spoiled by choice. Markets are noisy and buyers have been burned before, how could they feel confident?

Fear clouds judgment and rehashing and re-emphasizing the pain you uncovered during your sales cycle only deepens fear for an already scared buyer, pushing them further away from a decision.

So what is a seller to do?

The JOLT Effect

Many buyers are anxious about decision making and sellers must navigate that anxiety, harness it when it’s needed, but also soothe it.

The JOLT Effect details the need for sellers to operate two playbooks in tandem. They start with overcoming the status quo and then they switch to overcoming indecision, the key is to do this before the fear sets in. This is where the JOLT Effect methodology comes into play.

Judge the Level of Indecision

Offer a Recommendation

Limit Exploration

Take Risk of the Table

JOLT comes to us from the dynamic, myth-busting, duo of Matt Dixon and Ted McKenna and their new book, The Jolt Effect. 

The book is a deep dive into the latest research and analysis around the ever-growing problem of customer indecision, its root cause, and what we can do to combat it. It’s a good read that comes highly recommended.

Packed with robust data, counterintuitive insights, and practical guidance, The JOLT Effect is the playbook for any salesperson or sales leader who wants to close the gap between customer intent and action—and close more sales. – Good Reads

Ok, so the book is great and you should read it but not everything can be learned from a book, otherwise I would be a genius! Mastery takes practice and reinforcement, this is what ongoing skill development and SIA is all about.

Ongoing Skill Development For The Win

Most sales training programs suffer from a fatal flaw: they occur at a single point in time. You attend an event, maybe read the book, or take a class – rarely do we ever go back to reinforce the learning.

I know I always used to say, “well, the managers will just do the reinforcement!” But so often our managers are also over stretched and don’t, themselves, have the mastery to coach. It’s a coaching gap. As a result, salespeople quickly forget what they’ve learned, as well as the information, content and tools they’ve received.

That is why sales training must be continuous and ongoing. DCMi and SIA understand that, that is why we have partnered, they did the digging and wrote the book, we are offering reinforcement courses taught by the subject matter experts, Matt and Ted.

Matt and Ted are on the SIA board of coaches, providing live coaching and enablement sessions through SIA as well as partnering with us to serve up on-demand access to content and additional resources. Combat Buyer Hesitation starting for the first time on November 9, 2022. Enroll now, and take a look at our primer!