Saturday, March 22, 2008

The "Percentage Close"

I'm going to start writing articles about individual closing techniques. I recently wrote an article about how you should always ask for the sale but that isn't really a "closing technique" in the sense that you are getting someone from saying "no" and "closing" them so they say "yes."

OK--first in this series, the "percentage close"--sometimes called the "1 to 10 close"

Here's how it works. You ask someone to buy a car and they say, "I want to think about it."

This is what you say: "Mr. Customer--let me ask you a question. From a scale from one to ten where one is that you wouldn't take the car if it were free to ten where you would take it right now, where do you stand."

If they say...

1-5: you are on the wrong car.
10: get the paperwork started! You just sold a car.
6-9: (This is what most people will say) so you ask them back, "What would it take to get you to a ten?"

If they give you an answer, then you have a roadmap to follow to sell them a car.

So--lets roll play.

"From one to ten, where do you stand?"

"One."

"You know what, Mr. Customer? I think we're on the wrong car. What don't you like about this one?"

Lets try again.

"...where do you stand?"

"Ten."

"Great! Do you want to title it in one or both names?"

One more time...

"...where do you stand?"

"Seven."

"What would it take to get you to ten?"

"Give me another $2000 for my trade. My credit union told me it's worth $10,000."

Simply overcome the objection and hopefully sell the car.

Now, I know what some of you are saying. "Now they told me that their credit union said their car is worth $2000 more than it is! Now what am I going to do?"

Uh--if you're asking that question then you'll need to read one of my previous articles on how to overcome objections... Tell you what--I'll whip one out for you.

"Mr. Customer, who at your credit union told you that it was worth $10,000?"

"My loan officer. They have a little purple book that they go by."

"Oh yeah--I've seen those books. Matter of fact, our finance guy uses the same book when he gets people loans because it's a loan value book--it really has no bearing on what a car is worth--just what they will loan for a car."

"Yeah, but they told me that I should get $10,000 for my car. I saw one just like it on another lot and they were asking $15,000 for it!"

(Drop a little feel felt found on them) "Mr. Customer, I promise--I know exactly how you feel. I once had a trade in that was worth $8000 and I felt it was worth more but you know what I found out? I found out that our used car appraiser has been doing this a lot longer than me. All he does is trade for cars between dealerships and believe me--he is usually within a few hundred dollars of what a car is worth. When we trade for a car, we also have to do a safety inspection and fix whatever is wrong with it before we can put it on the lot and sometimes it costs a couple of thousand dollars to do that. Let me do this--let me get him to re-look at your car. Maybe I can get a couple of hundred dollars more and we can get the ball rolling so you can start enjoying your new car. Fair enough?"

I know it doesn't always work that way but that little speech is almost word for word for one that I have personally used dozens of times to sell a car and would you make some assumptions with me?

1) If you use the percentage close, will you not be closer to selling a car because you'll find out if you have them on the wrong car or you will find out an objection that you can hopefully overcome?

2) Don't you think the percentage close is a nice, easy close that you can remember?

3) Isn't it non-confrontational? It sure is--it's nice and easy to put it into the conversation to get information out of a customer.

Thanks for reading this blog! Also, if you are in the need of follow up software that will help you sell more cars then please check out my website www.CarSalesAssistant.com


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