“I need to think about it”
“I wanna think it over”
“Let me sleep on it”
Probably the most annoying phrases to land on your eardrums since the evolution of ‘cray cray’ and ‘let me take a selfie’.
You’ve just spent the best part of an hour on an amazing presentation of your skills and services, you cracked a few jokes, you found some common ground, and you’re pretty certain you’re on your way to gaining a new happy client and they hit you with it: “Sounds good, I need to think about it.”
Cue jaw drop, awkward silence and a fumble of, “Em… sure, here’s my card,” and you’re left wondering where it all went wrong and what to do next. Was it your lack of conviction or their incessant indecisiveness?
Not wanting to take responsibility for any time I lose out on something (I’m a bit competitive, okay?), I blame the prospect. However, it’s not their lack of decision making skills I blame.
1) They’re not your ideal client.
I’m an avid believer that ‘every opportunity is an opportunity’, but I’m a bigger believer in ‘your time is a precious commodity’.
It’s only natural that when an opportunity arises to meet with someone interested in paying you for your services, you jump at the chance. But have you pre-qualified this person?
The last thing you want is to spend your time and energy with someone only to find out at the end they’re only in town for a few days, or they were looking for a particular service you don’t actually provide.
Use these pre-qualifying questions before you set an appointment to make sure you and the prospect are a potential match:
- What’s your experience been working with _____ in the past?
- What happened that you stopped going?
- What’s made you decide to start now?
- What’s important for you when choosing ______?
2) They’re scared!
You might be the most pleasant person in the world, but for most prospects, you are full of knowledge they don’t have and are ready to judge them. Although I’m sure this is far from the truth, the unknown is scary and judgmental for most people.
Think about the last time you had to venture into the unknown and ask someone with all the knowledge you don’t have for help. It’s scary and there’s a big fear of being not only judged, but being ripped off too. Been to the mechanic lately? I was less terrified watching The Exorcist.
For a lot of would be clients, this is a new environment, and potentially the first time they are addressing their health concerns with actionable steps. So everything is a bit, well, scary!
The best way to quash this for your client is to let them know beforehand what’s going to happen. Keep things simple, and step by step. Tell them exactly what’s going to happen from the moment they arrive:
“John, when you get to the front desk, tell reception you have an appointment to see me.
Then what I’m going to do is have a chat with you about your health and your goals and that way we can see if I’m the right person to help you.
Then I’ll show you around, go over the options available and you can ask me any questions you have and then you can let me know if you’d like to work with me.”
Even when you’re with them, keep reminding them what’s going to happen next (“…after I show you around, we’re going to take a seat at the table and I’m going to go over all the options with you.”), so they can stop the guess work and really listen to what you’re saying.
3) They don’t see the value in what you’re charging.
Yes, you might have the best education in the world or the most beautiful facility which, logically, makes sense for your client to pay over the odds for.
But people don’t buy on logic. They buy on emotion.
If you continue to focus on the value of the ‘product’ you’re selling and not on the results they’ll get from using your services, the perceived value will always be too expensive, i.e.,“I need to think about it”.
Whether your services cost $10 an hour or $1000 an hour, if the perceived value isn’t there for your customer, they’ll always need to “think about it”.
Start asking emotional based questions targeted toward the results they will get to eliminate any doubt about whether you’re worth the price tag.
- What’s the number one reason you’re here today?
- Why is that so important to you?
- What’s the risk if you don’t do this now?
- What have you tried in the past to help you with this?
- What’s going to be different this time?
4) They’re overwhelmed by all the options.
What happened last time you went to get ice-cream and there was 72 different flavours? Cone or cup? Chocolate sprinkles or nuts?
You had to think about it. In fact, you probably had choice paralysis.
According to psychologist Professor Iyengar, who ran a famous jam study in 2000, “In reality, people find more and more choice to actually be debilitating.”
The same thing happens when you give your customer too many options. Make it simple for them.
“John, there’s three different options for you to choose from (small, medium, large) however, based on what you told me, I would recommend this one. Which one of those do you think works best for you?”
There’s actually three different things happening here.
The first thing is you’re making it a simple decision with three options, instead of 72.
The second is you have the law of contrast with the small, medium and large choice. If the small package is $100, the medium is $200 and the large is $300, paying $200 seems achievable. Compare that the only offer on the table being either $100 or $300 — there’s a huge contrast between the two, which often leads to “I need to think about it”.
The third thing happening here is you’re asking for the decision.
“Which one of those works best for you?” warrants an answer from the choices you’ve given. Compared to “do you want to work with me?” which gives the option of responding with, “I’m not sure, I need to think about it.”
An important note to make is that, as with most objections, when it comes to “I need to think about it”, prevention is better than cure.
Yes, I still stand by the fact that the prospect is at fault, but have you noticed how all these reasons they need to think about it starts with them, but ends with you turning it around?
Claire Garrigan is a fitness sales coach dedicated to helping fitness professionals close more sales, make more money and have happier clients all while keeping integrity front of mind. Known as the ‘girl with all the right questions’ that has the ability to uncover the motives for why people buy and to overcome objections before they become objections, she has continually found herself in the top 3% of sales people in the fitness industry nationwide.
