How to Cope with Customer Refusals Articles | Sales

By: Darren Williger

As a marketer we have to learn to see quite a few refusals and rejections coming our way. But if you think hard, there is a lot of learning from a ‘no’ when it comes as a feedback. If you can learn to tackle a ‘no’, it could bring you fresh sales.

During my work life as a salesmaker, without a ‘celebrity’ status to boast of, I have had my due share of refusals. Here is how I coped with them:

Everyone has his own opinion: Whenever we hear someone tell us that whatever we are doing is wrong, or impossible to achieve, we tend to believe him. Over the years I have learned to believe that this is nothing but someone’s personal views. I never think good or bad of it. It is just another feedback coming my way. The only thing I take seriously is that I look upon it as a comment from which I could learn something, like change my approach, or do whatever I am doing in a better way.

The whole idea is never to get bogged down or de-motivated by a ‘no’ from a customer and stop believing in your product, idea, book or even your capability. Just stick to your guns and go ahead and resell it all over again.

Getting defensive is not the answer:  It is perfectly natural to feel dejected when you hear a refusal. But do not let that sense of dejection make you launch a counter-attack on the customer to prove him wrong. Instead, stay calm and take the refusal as a free opportunity given to you to rethink about or redo what you did, perhaps in an improved manner. 

Let your action and not words tell the customer that he was wrong and you were right. Instead of getting argumentative take it up as a challenge to prove your customer wrong by improving on what you did.

Believe in yourself: One of the important things to remember in marketing is that not all ideas get accepted or applauded. There might be ideas which arrive before its time or ideas which people take a long time to understand. Remember when Bell invented ways to improve communication between people who are physically located miles apart – most people rejected the idea as an impossible dream. Today history speaks for itself. From this piece of history, you could understand that there are enough people out there who would first laugh at your idea and say a bold ‘no’ to it.       

There was a time when a ‘no’ would make me extremely disappointed and would make me doubt my own capabilities. Today I love rejections as I feel these are opportunities in disguise. I take every ‘no’ as another feedback and look for any teaching which this ‘no’ contains. Every time I take a ‘no’ for an answer, I look within to find ways to do things better. I am sure it would work in the same with you too, if only you handle every customer refusal maturely and positively.