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Have you ever been told I have to think about it by a prospect?
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Look, if you re in sales, then the answer is definitely yes.
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On this episode of Opinions vs. Reality, we got our friends from Gong to help us understand whether hearing, I have to think about it, is a nail in the sales coffin, or is it really something they need to think about?
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Check it out.
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Welcome, everybody, to the Event Selling Podcast, the longest-running sales training podcast in the planet, on the planet, among the planet.
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I m Bill Kaskin.
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Hey, Brian Neal here.
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And we have another special episode for you today.
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A couple episodes ago, we did an interview segment.
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We did with Devin Reed and Sheena Badani with Gong.
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And we did something that we ve had a lot of comments on, and we re going to do it again.
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This is actually the second of a four-part series, and it s called Goodbye Opinions, Hello Reality.
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And I want to introduce Devin and Sheena, and if you listened to the first episode, you might have heard a little bit of this, but for those that didn t, Devin or Sheena, could you give us a little bit of background on why Gong s tagline is Goodbye Opinions and Hello Reality, and then we ll get into today s show.
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Welcome.
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Thank you.
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Thanks so much for having us here.
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It s a real pleasure.
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Happy to give you a little background on what actually is all this opinions reality stuff.
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So if you think about sales and actually more broadly just how businesses have been operating since
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the start of time, it s really been based on what people think, how they feel, maybe some manual information that they typed into notes or into their CRM or whatever type of database that they re using.
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And when our founders started Gong, they realized there had to be a better way.
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Like, why are we just pointing fingers and playing this game of telephone?
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And that s really where revenue intelligence comes in, is how can we operate our businesses
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make our decisions, help drive our deals forward based on data and facts and what s truly happening in the market versus opinions.
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So that s why we say goodbye opinions and hello reality.
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And you and Devin also have a podcast we d like to plug.
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In fact, we re going to tell you a little bit more about how this works today.
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The podcast is called Reveal the Revenue Intelligence Podcast.
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You guys host it.
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You produce every week.
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And if you like what you hear from Devin and Sheena today, you will love the podcast.
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And we encourage all of our listeners to go and subscribe to that, too.
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So we re glad we re glad you re with us today, Brian.
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are very happy to do, which we ve done for 15 years.
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And it appears 750 episodes so far every Monday.
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And they will validate and fact check our opinions and say, is it right or wrong?
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The fun part, though, is that in the spirit of collaborating with other podcasts, we re going to give our opinions.
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They re going to give us a little teaser into what the reality is.
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But then we go listen to the real reality on Reveal, the Revenue Intelligence podcast, which is really fun.
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We re kind of like, you know.
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Ping pong and tennis, as I said last episode, with another podcast.
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This is kind of like the ultimate fact check.
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It really is.
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Because we have some fact checkers in our audience who fact check on bands and release dates of songs.
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But this is like you re fact checking our opinions, which is kind of scary.
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Which the other thing, and you probably don t know, one of our listeners, his name is Doug Drozen from Connecticut.
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And whenever Bill and I spew something that s like irrelevant trivia,
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We ll say, hey, fact checker, Doug, get on that.
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Like what year was grease released or something like that?
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Like, who cares?
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But he ll go look it up for us.
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We call him fact checker, Doug.
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He might be feeling a little squirmish, right?
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A little squirmish.
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All of our listeners know fact checker doesn t.
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I m getting, I m getting replaced by gong.
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Well, not maybe totally.
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I ll be honored if Doug fact checks me or Tina on ours.
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He s like, no, this is still wrong.
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This is great.
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So we did, and we should say, I like this, we got some damn good feedback on the last show.
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Get it?
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Get it?
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Huh?
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Where are we at?
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Who s paying attention, right?
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If you go to the last show we did on cursing, it was really, really great.
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So we re ready to do it again.
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We re ready with our opinions.
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We just need the topic.
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You two, tell us what s on your mind.
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What do you want to talk about?
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All right, so for this episode, we are looking at a very specific objection.
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So what we wanted to do was peel back the onion, as they say, and see what s the true impact, positive, negative, neutral, of when buyers say, I need to think about it.
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So we ve all heard it, if you ve been in sales, a buyer has said it.
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I ve even said it as a buyer after writing this and I felt terrible just because I know how awful it can feel to hear it.
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But maybe we ll start with like the feelings, right?
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Because I think when it comes to objections, they can be kind of emotionally charged with the way that they re said, the way that they re received from the seller side, right?
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So Bill and Brian, what is just your, I guess like knee jerk reaction when a buyer says, I need to think about it and you re selling to them?
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Yeah.
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I ll give you my first internal reaction.
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It s just like deflating.
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And it s deflating on two sides.
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One, there s an edgy part of me that goes, are you serious?
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Like, we try to run a really tight sales process.
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And usually, we do some things that can just strip this thing out.
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But it s not perfect.
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People are like, still need to think about it.
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And I understand part of that, but part of it
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You know, I m in the deciding business.
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Like, let s go.
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Let s do it.
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Or let s don t.
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Let s don t meander the process along.
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So I get a little frustrated about that first.
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Then internally, this is the really bad part, I start to feel like I did something wrong.
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Like, what did I do or not do?
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Or what did I say or not say that caused them to have to sit and think about it?
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Why wasn t it good enough?
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Now I m getting into my own like, you know, like a child trauma therapy stuff.
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Why wasn t it good enough the first time through?
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I m serious, starts to pop up for me.
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I have to be really conscious of that.
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It could be really debilitating.
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So I feel deflated, a little mad.
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I was going to say pissed after the cursing episode.
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I guess I can, right?
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That ups the ante.
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And then I feel a little bad about myself.
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So I think it s really bad collectively.
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Bill?
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Yeah, I m I echo that.
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I think if we knew that I need to think if we believe that I need to think about it would be followed by them thinking about it and then buying, I think we d be okay with it.
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We say, Oh, I don t blame you.
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But we all we all know if we ve been in sales longer than three days, we all know that s typically a blow off.
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Or it ends up being
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They don t think about it.
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Four days go by.
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Then they can t remember they had the conversation or what their problems were.
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So I would echo that.
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I would say I don t think it s a good sign when they say that.
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And the context probably means something here, how they say it.
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If they scream it and curse while they re saying it, it might be different than if they softly utter the words.
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We have competing data.
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In a nice fashion.
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Yeah.
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So I would say it s not good.
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Yeah.
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I would agree with that.
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Sheena, you ve got both sides.
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You can say as the seller side when you re doing partnerships, or maybe as the buyer, if you re like, hey, when I say I need to think about it, what s going on in your head?
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Really good.
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Yeah, I ll give the buyer s perspective because that s what I m most often in.
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When I say I need to think about it, it means like there s something that s, there s like a really big decision being made here.
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And there is something that I am grappling with.
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And I really do need to think about it.
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And it may be that I need to have a conversation with someone or I need to digest all this information that I was just presented or this.
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conversation that we just had.
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So for me, I say it in a truly authentic manner that like, I need to think about this and I need a few days or a couple weeks.
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I need that time to get everything together and then come back to you.
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If I m really kind of like trying to,
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push something off or I m not interested, I ll probably say it in a different way, or just be pretty straightforward and honest about it.
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I could see that others may not.
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But for me, it s really true.
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This is a big thing.
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This is budget from the company that I m going to be utilizing, budget for my team that I m going to be using.
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So I want to think about it before I just jump in.
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That s great perspective, Sheena.
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And Sheena, from a sales standpoint, because you are in a buying mode probably more than you are a selling mode, when salespeople try to push you then and sell through that, does your feeling start to change toward that salesperson or that process?
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Good question.
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I don t think so.
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I think the best is when the salesperson is trying to be helpful through those moments.
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So if they can, you know, like what part of, you know, if they ask me more about like, hey, what part of it is like, are you struggling with?
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Or what part could I be helping you with?
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I ve had reps that have like followed up with,
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additional documentation, information, like based on whatever that conversation or the point in the sales process that we re at, that really I go in and I look at all of that and I ll share what needs to be shared with others.
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So being a person who can be helpful in that moment, I think is the most valuable.
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That s great.
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I m sitting here thinking,
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Maybe we should do this.
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Maybe as the seller, if I m selling to Sheena, I d say, okay, so we re at the end of the process, we re ready to go, but here s what I m gonna suggest.
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I m gonna suggest you think about this.
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I suggest you take a week, and I m gonna feed you a couple documents to process through, because this is a big deal for you.
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And then let s look out a week ahead, and that ll give you some space and time, and me too, just to make sure we are where we think we are.
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That s an interesting take, isn t it?
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It s kind of like a reverse sell, in a way.
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A little bit, yeah.
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With good intention, though.
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With good intention to know that you do need to process, you know?
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Yeah, and we always talk about how we want to meet the customer where they are.
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We want to give them a good experience.
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That s exactly what you re doing there.
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Especially if it feels like the decision is rushed.
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Like if it s one call, and you re asking for a decision, it s like, wait a minute.
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We ve got to have some breathing room here.
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So I like that.
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Also, I think whenever I hear I need to think about it, I go to myself and say, you know, I didn t help them.
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There s something I missed here.
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I did not help them think through this so that we didn t get to this time where they say I got to think through it.
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Well, I should have been helping them do that all the way through the process.
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So that s the opinion, Devin.
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What s the reality, man?
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Here we go.
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Brian, I had the exact same response when I heard, I need to think about it.
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I cursed under my breath.
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If I wasn t on video, I d be like.
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And it s the same thing as, what did I miss?
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Or if you re at a place in a sales cycle, you d be like, what the hell do you need to think about?
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What did you miss?
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Have you not been paying attention?
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So I had the same thought.
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This is a terrible objection to hear.
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You really don t like it.
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And it kind of sticks with you because if you re working a deal and you ve got it committed or even forecasted,
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That s not something you want to hear.
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And I ll tell you what, I m not exaggerating, this was the most surprising outcome of any Gong Labs because I was really shocked at the results.
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So before I give it all away, there s something else we looked at, which is when this objection occurs.
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When does this objection occur?
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And it actually happens in two stages, in two parts of the sales cycle.
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So I ll go around the horn and see what you think here.
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OK, just to make it kind of simple here.
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Early, your discovery call.
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First couple calls.
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Mid, demo presentations type calls.
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Third, closing calls, we ll call it.
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I m being very general here, but you get the idea.
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Kind of like awareness, evaluation, decision.
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It happens in two of those, one more than the other.
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Do you want to take any guess, Bill and Brian?
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I m going to vote 1 and 3.
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I m going to vote 2 and 3.
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So very early or very late?
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Yep.
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Okay, I m gonna vote two and three.
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That s the obvious, but yeah.
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Does she need to get the vote?
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Yeah, she needs to get the vote.
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I m with Brian on a one and three.
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All right.
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So we looked it up and Bill s nonchalance is absolutely earned here because he s right.
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It s two and three and in that order.
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So it happens the most during evaluation, during presentations and demos.
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Does not really occur at all in the opening of sales processes.
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And then it has a second spike in the closing cycle.
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So if we go back to Sheena s opinion,
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Makes a lot of sense.
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There s a lot of times during that where you need to think about things.
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Think about, does this really work for me?
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Or think about, is this something I m actually going to move forward with?
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Yeah.
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Very good.
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That s good.
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Very good.
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So Devin, I trust that when all of our listeners go over to your podcast, Reveal the Revenue Intelligence Podcast.
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That s Reveal the Revenue Intelligence Podcast.
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Devin, you re going to give us the actual hard data.
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And this is a surprise, you said, right?
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Huge surprise.
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So we can t wait.
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So yeah, all the advanced podcast listeners for this answer, go over to listen to the reveal podcast, revenue intelligence podcast.
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And I can t wait to do the same thing.
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So we ll see you over there.
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See you over there.
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Bye.
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Bye.