Recently I teamed up with a sales manager to coach one of his salespeople, who we’ll call George. Our goal that day was to coach George towards overcoming his yielding tendency. Just to give you a little background information, yielding occurs when a salesperson fears that he or she will come across as too pushy. This fear causes the salesperson to yield their position of strength to the customer. Prior to our coaching session, George had already taken our assessment test, which determined that he had a high yielding tendency – he often hands control over to the customer. Our next step was to conduct our post-test coaching session with him, in which we get him to buy into the results and the underlying reasons behind them, and help him to chart a plan for his improvement.

After asking several questions to build a foundation of trust between us, I decided to ask George to describe his sales process to me. His response revealed that yielding to a customer costs a company more than sales.

Jason Forrest: “Describe your sales process to me.”

George: “Well, I start off by trying to see if they’re interested in being left alone, or having me tour the homes with them. If they don’t want me to go with them, then I stand in a central location, trying to warm up to them as they move from room to room.”

Jason Forrest: “How do you know if they don’t want you to give them a tour?”

George: “You can tell by their body language. If their body language shows me that they’re not interested in a sales presentation, then I leave them alone.”

Jason Forrest: “How many people do you see per month?”

George: “Forty.”

Jason Forrest: “Of those 40, how many of those customers give you body language that tells you they want to be left alone?”

George: “Twenty.”

I went on to give him some advice on how to overcome his yielding tendency, but that is not the point that I am trying to make in this article. I want to show you one of the repercussions that his yielding has had upon the company. During the month I coached George, his company had spent $5200 on marketing and advertising to bring in those 40 people. So, each prospect he met was worth $130. He left 20 of those customers alone, and 20 times $130 is $2600. That’s a total of $2600 in marketing costs that were completely wasted. George allowed $2600 to walk right out the door because he didn’t want to come across as pushy.

The purpose of marketing and advertising is to generate prospects who will come in and spend time with a salesperson in order to determine if there is a home and community that meets their admitted needs. The problem is, if you’re not spending time with the customer, then you’re not finding out what their needs are, and you’re not showing them how your home and community could fulfill those needs. So, here is the message, and it is an important one: The next time you spend money to bring in more prospects, you must ensure that you are executing the other side of the equation, which is to execute the sale and provide a solid sales experience for those prospects. If this doesn’t happen, it’s like throwing your money away.

Yielding is not the only thing that will prevent a salesperson from winning a sale, but it is a major culprit. If you are wondering if your salespeople have yielding tendencies, please contact me  for information on our testing to determine if your marketing dollars are not being maximized. Salespeople with a high tendency to yield are not beyond help. Proper coaching can transform them into confident salespeople who serve their customers to the best of their ability, and who turn your marketing dollars into sales.

This article appeared first in the Shore Select Sales Strategy Journal. Click here to subscribe.