Closing Sales Deals

Most AEs lose deals because they can't build urgency. They find pain. They demo features. They quote price. But they never answer the million-dollar question: "What happens if we do nothing?" Here's how to build the cost of inaction (and close more deals): 1. Find a metric that's suffering. Pain without numbers is just complaining. You need something measurable: • Revenue lost per month • Time wasted per week • Customers churning per quarter If they can't give you a number? Ask who can. 2. Reverse-engineer the cost of waiting. I once had a VP of Sales want $10K off a $50K deal. He said: "We'll wait until January when hiring ramps up." So I asked: "How many reps are you hiring in January?" "10 reps." "How long to ramp them?" "4 months." "What's each rep worth when ramped?" "$40K ARR." 3. Do the math out loud. "So if you're one month late on those 10 hires... That's 10 reps × $40K = $400K knocked off your annual plan. You want $10K off. But waiting costs you $400K. Which sounds more expensive?" He signed at full price. 4. Make the invisible visible. Customers aren't thinking about compound costs. Your job? Bring the horse to water and make them drink. Show them what "doing nothing" actually costs. 5. Use this exact question: "What metric is suffering as a result of that problem?" If they can't answer, ask: "Who would know that number?" Now you're opening doors to power. The cost of inaction drives your timeline. Not discounts. Not "budget cycles." The fear of losing $400K while trying to save $10K. 💡 What's the biggest "cost of inaction" you've ever built? P.S. These 7 strategies will help you CLOSE more deals in a GTM crisis: https://lnkd.in/d_DkYTSH

If you want to hire reps who can “close,” head's up. Closing isn’t a skill. It’s an outcome. It's the byproduct of a rep who: 1/ Finds and frames a high-cost, high-priority problem. 2/ Builds consensus across a team on the right way to solve it. 3/ Gains exec-level attention and buy-in by painting a bold vision. 4/ Builds a case for investment & change w/ a compelling narrative. 5/ Maintains genuine urgency and follow-through with a joint plan. 6/ Gracefully navigates blockers that come up along the way. 1 + 2 + 3 + 4 + 5 + 6 = “Closing.” It’s an outcome with a'lotta inputs. It’s not a standalone skill. Lol @ hiring “closers.”

The average sales deck is 37 slides. Your champion shows 6 to their team. The average sales email has 9 paragraphs. Your champion forwards 2 sentences. The average demo covers 14 features. Your champion remembers 3. The average ROI model has 25 inputs. Your champion focuses on 1 number. This is why your deals die. Not because your product isn't good. Not because your pricing isn't right. Not because your competitor is better. But because your champion can't sell for you effectively. Think about it: You spend weeks perfecting your pitch. You create beautiful presentations. You write detailed proposals. You build complex ROI models. Then you hand it all to someone who: • Isn't a sales professional • Doesn't know your product as well as you • Is juggling 50 other priorities • Has never been trained to handle objections And you expect them to close the deal? This is sales malpractice. Your champion isn't failing you. You're failing your champion. Last month, I completely changed our approach: Instead of arming champions with OUR sales materials... We built them spaces where THEY could be the hero: • Interactive content they could customize for their colleagues • Simple visuals that made their recommendation look smart • Engagement tracking so they could see who needed more convincing • Anonymous Q&A where objections could surface safely The results? Deal cycles shortened 20%. Win rates increased 12%. Champions started calling US when deals progressed. Stop thinking like a salesperson who needs to close. Start thinking like a champion who needs to convince. Every piece of content you create should be designed not for prospects... But for champions to use WITHOUT YOU. That's how modern deals actually close.

If you're closing less than 30% of your deals, you have gaps. I don't care how good you think you are. I don't care how many years you've been selling. 30% is the minimum for competent salespeople. Anything less means you're leaving thousands in commissions on the table every month. Here's what's actually killing your close rate: You're talking too much about your company instead of their problems. You're pitching features instead of asking questions. You're showing everything in your demo instead of what matters to them. You're trying to close deals that were never qualified properly. The truth about closing: Closing techniques don't work anymore. Your close rate is determined in discovery, not at the end. If you have to "overcome objections" to close a deal, you failed in discovery. If they're asking for discounts, you failed to build value. If they're going dark after your proposal, you failed to create urgency. Here's how elite sellers actually close deals: They follow the 90/10 rule … prospects talk 90% of the time. They dive deep into pain until the prospect feels the cost of inaction. They understand the true business impact at multiple levels. They demo only what's relevant to the prospect's specific situation. They help prospects build their own business case internally. They eliminate objections before they become objections. They gain micro-commitments throughout the entire process. They set clear next steps with defined outcomes Most importantly: They disqualify fast when deals aren't real. They'd rather lose a bad deal quickly than waste months on false hope. They know that chasing unqualified opportunities is what separates average reps from elite ones. The real difference between 30% close rates and 60% close rates? Elite sellers spend more time qualifying and less time hoping. They ask harder questions upfront to avoid wasted time later. They understand that "no" early is better than "maybe" forever. Stop trying to close every deal. Start qualifying better deals. Your close rate will fix itself. — Sales Leaders! DM me if you're ready to audit your revenue engine instead of just training your team. Most VPs skip the diagnosis and wonder why training doesn't stick.

Here's why most sales reps (and I'll even say most managers) struggle to close deals. It's because their sales process doesn't match the buyer's process. So the deal stalls out... How most sales calls go: 1. Rep does a 30 min discovery call that's just a bunch of questions 2. Buyer gets frustrated because they don't see any value 3. Rep suggests next steps, but doesn't really guide the buyer 4. Deal stalls out and never gets to a "no" (or a "yes") 5. Rep wonders what went wrong Sound familiar? Here's the thing - buyers don't want to be interrogated, they want to be helped! We sell these products all day long. That's our job. But for the buyer, it's a one-time thing. They need us to be their guide. To show them the path forward. So how do we do that? 1. Align your sales process to their buying process 2. Focus on providing value, not just asking questions - remember for it to be valuable they have to be able to use the information. 3. Suggest concrete next steps and provide resources - 'Here's what most companies do next... lets...' 4. Use frameworks like MEDDICC or SPICED to truly understand their situation 5. Be flexible - buying isn't a linear process 6. Make it easy for the to buy - Provide checklists, FAQs, References, proactively, not reactively, and much sooner than you think you should. 7. Focus on Problems and Impacts more. Unsell the status quo and your solution becomes the thing to fix it. But here's the key - you have to go deep on each of these. It's not enough to just check the boxes. You need to really understand their pain, their decision criteria, their process. That's how you become a true trusted advisor. That's how you help them buy. And when you do that, not only do your deals stop stalling... But you start closing a whole lot more of them!

If your end-of-quarter pipeline is stuck, focus on two levers you control: buyer self-confidence and legitimate urgency. 1️⃣ Build buyer self-confidence 💡 Clarify “good enough.” Replace vague success criteria with 3–5 measurable outcomes and a simple before/after. 💡 Reduce perceived change risk. Offer a short pilot, phased rollout, or opt-out clause. Name the risks and show how you mitigate each. 💡 Make the path visible. Share a one-page mutual action plan with owners, dates, and dependencies. Progress breeds belief. 💡 Simplify choices. Present two configurations: recommended and minimal. Fewer forks, faster decisions. 💡 Transfer proof, not hype. Use a brief customer clip or metric that mirrors their context (same industry, same system, same constraint). 2️⃣ Create ethical urgency 💡 Quantify the cost of delay. Put hard numbers on what 30/60/90 days of status quo means—missed revenue, wasted hours, compliance exposure. 💡 Anchor to their calendar, not yours. Tie milestones to their launches, renewals, or budget windows. 💡 Time-bound enablement. Offer executive alignment, implementation slots, or data migration support that truly is capacity-limited. 💡 Default the next step. End every call with a scheduled working session, not “we’ll follow up.” 💡 Surface trade-offs transparently. “If we slip past Oct 28, integration pushes into holiday freeze—okay to proceed knowing that?” Bonus: Coach your champion. Give them a “decision kit” (problem, impact now vs. later, options, risk plan, ROI, timeline). You’re not closing them—you’re equipping them to close internally.

Most businesses think they have a pricing problem. What they actually have is a value leakage problem. The price you set and the price you pocket are rarely the same number. That needs to change. Finance has the data, the mandate, and the cross-functional view to lead the pricing agenda. Here are 10 signs your pricing is leaving money on the table, and what Finance should do about each one: 1️⃣ Your gross-to-net price is invisible during negotiation Problem: Sales reps agree deals without seeing what the business actually pockets. Solution: Build a gross-to-net waterfall and make it visible in every commercial review. 2️⃣ You discount to close almost every deal Problem: Your opening position isn't credible, and your margin isn't managed. Solution: Analyse discount patterns by rep, customer, and segment. Show the marginal cost of every concession. 3️⃣ You price based on cost, not value Problem: Cost-plus tells you what you need, not what the outcome is worth. Solution: Model value-based scenarios and push the team to justify pricing on outcomes, not costs. 4️⃣ Your best customers pay the same as your worst Problem: Your highest-value relationships are almost certainly underpriced. Solution: Run a customer profitability analysis and make the case for differentiated pricing. 5️⃣ Sales owns pricing without Finance in the room Problem: Discounts feel free when there's no margin visibility. Solution: Establish a pricing governance structure with Finance as a standing member, not a reviewer after the fact. 6️⃣ Contract renewals happen without automatic price-ups Problem: Prices agreed years ago silently hold. Solution: Own the renewal calendar and flag every contract where price hasn't kept pace with inflation or scope growth. 7️⃣ Your pricing varies wildly across the sales team Problem: Two reps, same deal, different price, that's a governance problem. Solution: Set and enforce price floors. No discount beyond a defined threshold without Finance sign-off. 8️⃣ You compete on price because you can't articulate value Problem: Racing to the bottom is a symptom. Solution: Quantify the value delivered to existing customers and arm the sales team with the numbers to defend the price. 9️⃣ New products launch at the same margin as old ones Problem: You're funding R&D without capturing the return. Solution: Set minimum margin thresholds for new launches and gate approval on pricing strategy, not just cost structure. 🔟 Nobody owns pricing as a strategic capability Problem: Pricing sits between sales, finance, and marketing, so it belongs to no one. Solution: Finance should step into that gap. The best CFOs don't just report on margin. They protect it. Which of these is your biggest pricing leak right now? ♻️ Like, comment, and repost to help more finance teams ---------- 🧑🏼💼 I am a Partner at Implement Consulting Group 🗣️ Reach out to talk about how finance can drive value

In the high-stakes arena of #B2BSales, particularly when engaging the C-suite and Boards, "back of napkin math" is more than just a display of acumen – it's a potent catalyst for building #trust. Imagine a conversation where a senior leader articulates a critical business challenge, perhaps around CAC payback or share of wallet. The seller who can immediately and fluently grasp the underlying financial equation and articulate the potential impact of their solution, without missing a beat, speaks a language that resonates deeply. This isn't about complex modeling done offline; it's the agility to understand core drivers of their success and perform quick, insightful calculations within the flow of the conversation. For instance, if a Chief Revenue Officer (#CRO) mentions a goal of reducing customer churn, a seller with this skill can instantly frame the value of their solution in terms of retained revenue and lifetime customer value, demonstrating a tangible understanding of the CRO's priorities. This competence signals the seller not only listened - but also deeply comprehends which levers to use to solve the client problem. Why is this so crucial for building trust? Because it showcases several key elements that senior leaders value: Deep Understanding: The ability to perform this kind of rapid analysis demonstrates you've done your homework and truly understand their business model, challenges, and objectives. It moves you beyond being a mere vendor to a knowledge partner. #CustomerUnderstanding Intellectual Horsepower: It signals a sharp mind and the capacity to think strategically about their business. This builds confidence in your ability to deliver real value. #StrategicThinking Efficiency and Respect for Time: Senior executives are time-constrained. A seller who quickly gets to the heart of the financial implications respects this constraint and demonstrates a focus on outcomes. #TimeEfficiency Transparency: By engaging in these on-the-spot calculations, you reveal your underlying assumptions and logic, fostering a more transparent discussion. #TransparentCommunication Credibility: It elevates your status from a product peddler to a trusted advisor who speaks the language of business results. #TrustedAdvisor Think about it: when a seller can seamlessly weave in relevant financial implications – the potential ROI, payback period, impact on key KPIs – it’s not just data; it demonstrates commitment to the customer's success. It shows you're thinking beyond the product/service features and instead - are focusing on their strategic outcomes. To be clear - "Back of napkin math" isn't about being precisely accurate in real-time. It's about demonstrating a strong intuitive grasp of financial levers that matter to the customer and the ability to articulate value in their terms, instantly. This fluency builds a bridge of trust, making conversations more meaningful and impactful. #Gartner

Every single sales team I’ve evaluated has one thing in common Their lowest score is on the closing competency. Most teams lose the deal long before they ever talk numbers. If your sales reps can’t clearly articulate the client’s pain, connect it to a specific solution, and build a narrative that positions your offer as the only logical next step. They’re not closing. They’re just quoting. ❌ Combining discovery and proposal into one call short-circuits the sales cycle and kills momentum. ❌ Leading with company-centric messaging instead of client pain points loses buyer interest early. ❌ Generic, uncustomized pitch decks fail to engage and don’t advance the deal. When I coach leaders through this, their close rates go up because the conversation shifts from "here’s what we do" to “here’s how we help you.” Here’s how I coach teams to flip the switch: Customize the proposal based on THEIR stated needs and pain points Start with their top 3-5 challenges (from discovery) Confirm you captured them correctly, it builds buy-in Connect ONLY the relevant solutions to each challenge Limit your company’s slides to 2- 3 slides with clear value proposition, this isn’t about you Share a relevant testimonial right before presenting pricing THEN present pricing once they see the value. If your team is stuck in the present and pray proposal cycle, let’s talk. It’s time to teach your sellers how to connect, position, and close with purpose.

Pricing Psychology in Luxury: Shaping Perception, Creating Desire In the luxury market, price is far more than a number. It is a signal that shapes how consumers interpret value, exclusivity, status, and brand stature. For any brand aiming to operate at the top of the market, understanding the psychology of pricing is essential to protect equity and elevate the customer experience. Below are four key psychological strategies that influence perception and drive purchasing behavior in luxury: 1. Anchoring When consumers assess a luxury product, they instinctively rely on a reference point. Presenting a higher priced item first creates a benchmark that makes other options feel more attainable while still premium. This simple sequence reinforces the brand’s prestige and clarifies the hierarchy within the collection. 2. Premium Bundling Curating products or services into a single premium bundle can increase perceived indulgence and sophistication. In luxury, bundling is not about offering a deal. It is about crafting a narrative that highlights craftsmanship, experience, heritage, and emotional value. A bundle should feel like an elevated universe rather than a financial incentive. 3. Rounded Pricing for Prestige Strategies such as $99.99 belong to the mass market. Luxury clients expect clarity and confidence. Rounded pricing like $500, $5,000 or $12,000 supports the perception of mastery, control, and quality. It signals that the brand is not seeking volume but rather communicating authority and enduring worth. 4. Scarcity and Exclusivity Limited editions, controlled production, appointment only access, and one-of-a-kind creations amplify desire by signaling rarity and privilege. When scarcity is authentic and price is positioned accordingly, clients feel they are entering a protected circle. Exclusivity becomes an active part of the value proposition. Why This Matters In luxury, pricing is not a competitive tool. It is a positioning tool. A coherent pricing strategy strengthens perceived value, deepens emotional engagement, and builds long term loyalty. A weak or inconsistent strategy, on the other hand, erodes trust and diminishes brand stature. If you plan to refine your pricing architecture and align it with the psychology of today’s discerning luxury consumer, I would be glad to help. I support luxury brands in shaping pricing strategy, elevating perceived value, and building product and service ecosystems that resonate with high net worth and ultra-high net worth clients worldwide. Let’s connect and explore how thoughtful pricing can strengthen your brand. #LuxuryBrandStrategy #PricingPsychology #LuxuryPositioning #ExclusivityMatters #Consulting