The diminishing production numbers for salespeople starts with the inability to close the sale. You spend time prospecting, making cold calls, following up but continue to fail in the close. It’s discouraging and is why so many salespeople continue to do less and less over their career. In fact, did you know that top producers outperform the bottom producers 10-to-1? If you want more sales, you have to learn how to close more sales. If you want to close those extra sales, it won’t just come to you because you prospect more people or follow up again. You must learn to be a better closer. This is the harsh, cold, stark reality; when you don’t close, you lose. When you don’t close on your proposal, you end up giving up something and closing on someone else’s proposal. The cost of the no close is enormous to both your pocketbook and your morale. 
Here are 5 techniques you can do to become a master closer: 1. Commit to Greatness The first thing you must do to become great at sales is to commit to being great—not just average. Sales can be a painful profession for the average and bottom performers and massively rewarding for the greats! Those that live, eat, and breathe their profession become great. I have never met a GREAT closer that wasn’t all in all the time and completely consumed by his/her trade. All great success through history has been preceded by a commitment to being great, reinforced each day by the continuing commitment to being great. If you aren’t great you are average and I know you don’t want that. 2. Train Multiple and Creative Closes Easy sales go down easy, but the rest of them require extra effort and persistence. If you only have 3 or 4 closes to use on the resistant buyer, you cannot stay in the transaction long enough to close. Closing the customer is like taking a trip: you are limited by the amount of gas you have in the tank. A great closer will have more closes than the customer has objections, stalls and reasons not to close. That’s why I have over 100 closes in The Closer’s Survival Guide. 3. Persist Until You Close In the 20 Rules of Closing a Deal, I talk about always asking one more time. This is what separates the closers from the sellers. You must have an arsenal of closes to continue to ask, persist, and to figure out other ways to circle back after being told no. Being able to reposition yourself to ask again is ultimately what separates the greats from those who are average. This level of persistence is a social issue because we have all been made to believe it is bad, wrong, rude or unprofessional. The reality is that persistence is necessary and vital to getting the extra sales closed and removing time from the sales cycle. If you completely believe in your product, service, and your company you must be willing to persist to make extra sales and earn extra customers. If your purpose and mission are valuable you have an obligation to persist, and yes even pressure your buyer. I once had a customer ask, “Are you pressuring me?” To which I calmly replied, “No, but I am willing to go there, because I know this is the best solution for you—now let’s do this.” Some of my very best customers required a high amount of pressure and persistence to close! 4. Tie Financial Goals to Closing Did you know 76% of Americans are living paycheck to paycheck? The bottom line is being an average closer is a failing formula. If you’re struggling each month it’s because you haven’t closed yourself on what you want out of life. If you can’t close yourself you can’t close your customers and just getting by is painful and expensive—you need to knock it off. If you are struggling with the close you may need to review your financial goals. Financial goals are tied directly in with what you want out of life and when your financial needs are clear you will find yourself closing more sales. Make sure you’re not just making a sales call to make a sales call, instead make a sales call to close the deal. 5. Train to Become a Master Closer Great athletes know there is a difference between learning, practicing, performing and mastering. The greats master their craft before they bring their game to the field. It has been said that it takes 10,000 hours to master any skill. The close is where the salesperson gets paid. You don’t get paid to call people and sell; you get paid to close. The basketball player gets paid to make the show, not just show up to the game. Closing is a skill; it can be developed and crafted. I wrote a 50+ page eBook titled Secrets to Closing the Sale for professional salespeople that want to perfect their closing skills. I coupled that product with a 20 Rules of Closing eBook, 10 Mistakes Every Closer Must Know by Heart eBook, a Sales IQ Test, and 3 never before seen videos on closing as a part of my Secrets to Closing the Sale package. You can get all of that right now at http://secretstoclosingthesale.com/ Don’t believe that being a good salesperson takes little or no effort. For many years I was average and it was painful. The checks were too small and the failures too often. Being average takes more effort than being great. Learn to be a master at closing the sale and you will love sales more and more every time you ink the deal. Let me know in the comments how many closes you know, and how many objections your customers give. Be great, Grant Cardone
