Romina Muhametaj is a marketing, sales, and negotiation expert who firmly believes in the power of building relationships to propel one’s career forward. Negotiating without a relationship will only get you so far.
She emphasizes that there are three types of sales: Apples, oranges, and coconuts. Which do you prefer?
Apples, oranges, or coconuts?
10% of the population are early adopters. They buy because something is new and shiny but usually regret the purchase. They are apples. You buy an apple, wash it, eat it, and move on with your life. You aren’t building long-term rapport or a way for them to refer clients to you.
10% of the population are coconuts. It’s difficult to crack a coconut. Once you do, the juice tends to spill out. It takes time and effort to get the juice out properly. This 10% are early adopters that are time-consuming, and the conversion rate often isn’t fruitful.
You want to focus on the 80%—oranges. You slowly peel an orange piece by piece. One piece might be overcoming an objection. One might be uncovering information. Maybe you peel a bit more and build rapport. When you peel the orange, you can eat it as a fruit or juice it. To reach the 80%, you have to master your tactics and build a relationship.
You can sell without building rapport, but those sales tend to just be lucky. That’s not a good way to maintain business. Secondly, when the only sales you’re getting don’t become long-term relationships that bear fruit (i.e. referrals), you start to become desperate.
Why you need to overcome your emotions
No one wants to deal with desperate people, especially when money is involved. You won’t convert a sale if you make someone feel bad for you. Unless you learn how to master your emotions, you won’t be successful.
Romina says to think of every single contact, every meeting, etc., as a new universe. You can either make a lot of money or never go back. And once you leave that meeting, you’re moving on to another universe. You can use similar tactics. But leave the emotions in their own universe.
Take a deep breath to clear your thoughts. It’s better to reschedule a call than to go in on negative emotions. If you walk into a meeting with negative emotions, you’re disrespecting someone else’s time as well as your own.
Don’t ruin your first impression and ruin the relationship. You have to consider the domino effect. You might be losing far more than one deal. And consider the time and effort that marketing and BDR put into this conversation. It’s about far more than just you.
If you focus on building a relationship, you’re making good use of the time that your entire team put into the process, you’re creating happy customers, and you’re building your business.
Learn more in episode #357 of the Negotiations Ninja podcast!