How to build trust when your servce is free!

On last question from our Race to the Finish call series. This time from Anna:

“The service I provide is free to my clients so price is never an issue. The real struggle is getting the prospect to allow me to help them – build trust to allow us into their internal process. How do or can I increase trust building to close the deal? “

Thanks for your question Anna. It can be tricky to have a client open up their internal processes to allow you to help. They could be fearful that if you really can do their job for free you might replace them.  OR they could be concerned that if the service is free how could it really be any good? The best way to handle all the spoken and unspoken objections is through the use of testimonials. In fact – regardless of what you sell – using testimonials to handle objections is a million dollar sales technique!

Most sellers spend their time using Testimonials to provide proof to the outcome of our product or service. If it’s supposed to help you make money, our testimonials show how much money customers made. If  it’s supposed to help you lose weight, then the testimonials show how much weight customers have lost. In other words, it provides social proof for the benefit of using the product or service.

At the same time, we know very well that in any sales process, there are bound to be some hiccups along the way, even when the prospect believes the outcome that can be achieved. Even when you sell for “free” as with Anna above. These are objections!

And skilled sellers know their prospects well enough to know what those objections are and how to counter them. But what few do is actually use testimonials for objection handling. I think this is a great opportunity to enhance your relationship and build trust during the process.

That is your Million-Dollar Strategy.

Anna is right. At the end of the day, your job in selling your product and service is to have the prospect trust what you tell them. Trust that they can obtain the results you indicate. And if they have an objection, trust your explanation on why it shouldn’t be a roadblock. We already know that testimonials are the single most trusted source of information for prospects so using them for objections is the most important thing you can do for effective objection handling.

So here is what you need to do:

1. Sit down and write down your top three sales objections.
2. For each objection, review your testimonial pool to find one that specifically addresses that objection. If you don’t have one – go get one by identifying the customers who best demonstrate overcoming that objection and asking them for a testimonial (help them by drafting it for them).
3. Use those testimonials alongside your web content and in your marketing materials.

Let me know how it goes! I would love to document your success stories.

Colleen