The one thing all business owners hope for is success. A large part of finding that success is making sales, which can be difficult, especially for flooring companies.
Flooring is a significant investment, and it can take a lot to convert an interested consumer into a customer.
Knowing how to convince a client to pay for your services is essential. You can use many tactics to make a successful sale; but there is also a lot you want to avoid.
Here are seven mistakes to avoid when trying to get a sale for your flooring company.
7 Common Sales Mistakes
1. Talking More Than Listening
When you’re passionate about your business, it can be easy to get lost in sharing all the possibilities with a client. Talking too much without listening to a potential customer can make them look elsewhere for their flooring needs. Clients want to know that you hear them and are willing to listen to their concerns, answer any questions, and walk them through the process. The more time you spend listening to and understanding them, the more likely they will choose your company for their flooring job.
2. Speaking Poorly About the Competition
While competition is expected between businesses, speaking badly about your competition will not endear you to potential customers. Ideally, you should avoid mentioning your competitors when making a sale, but if the potential customer mentions them, choose your words carefully. Instead of focusing on what the competitor does wrong, explain what makes your company different. If your prices are higher, explain why choosing your services is worth the extra costs.
3. Not Being Ready for Objections
In some scenarios, a prospective customer may have objections about working with your company. If you aren’t prepared for these complaints, you can lose your chance to convince them that their objections are unfounded.
While you may not know their objections, you can still prepare for any possibility. Consider all the reasons why someone may object to doing business with you, and work on your counterarguments. You should be calm and logical with your responses so that the potential customer is willing to listen to your reasoning and reconsider.
4. Don’t Make Promises You Can’t Keep
It can take a lot to close a deal with a potential customer. One thing you never want to do is make grand promises that you can’t keep. If you make promises and even put them in the contract but don’t follow through, the customer can potentially sue you. Even if it isn’t in the contract, promising something and not providing it can result in an angry, dissatisfied customer who will leave a bad review––which can hurt you going forward with other clients.
5. Not Asking for the Sale
After taking the time to meet with a prospective customer, your next biggest mistake would be not asking for the sale. Once you’ve presented the offer and answered all of the customer’s questions and concerns, explain the next steps that would be involved in working with you.
While offering them time to consider your contract may seem like a good idea, it can also lose you the sale. Instead of making an offer, see what you can do to make the prospective customer more comfortable accepting your contract. If that isn’t enough, you may want to push a little, but be careful about pushing too much; otherwise, you could push them away and lose the sale, regardless.
6. Failing to Follow-Up
Sometimes, no matter what you do, you don’t get the sale on your first try. Even if this happens, don’t make the mistake of letting a potential customer go without following up and trying again. Reach out to them by phone or email and remind them about your proposed contract. Take that moment to ask if there are any new concerns you can help them with to put them at ease with signing. You can even offer a discount on the flooring job as a way of helping to convince them to say yes to hiring you.
7. Not Creating a Sense of Urgency
There is a strong possibility that as you meet with potential customers and try to make sales, you will come across some that are more difficult than others. They will compare various companies and consider every angle before making their final decision. It’s possible that the longer they take, the less likely they will choose your company, especially if you don’t create any sense of urgency to make a decision.
By pointing out why they shouldn’t wait to do their flooring and any potential consequences of waiting, you will create a sense of urgency and spur them into making a decision.
Correcting Your Sales Mistakes
Making sales, in some ways, is something of an art form. You have to know what to do and say to make a potential customer want to say yes. You also have to know everything to avoid, which could lose the customer.
The seven things on this list are things to avoid if you plan on successfully getting a sale. Once you stop doing these things, you will start to have more success and win more sales for your company.
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