Not Closing

A few years ago I visited a car company's branch in Herzliya as part of a one-on-one coaching program I was running for the chain. Contrary to the usual practice (and to what you'd want), I found myself facing two brand-new salespeople who hadn't attended my workshop.

After I'd explained to them what the coaching was about and how it works, I stood well back, as I always do, so as not to make them self-conscious. A few minutes later, a retired couple walked past me, headed for one of the salespeople's desks and sat down. It wasn't hard to sense that they'd arrived completely ready to close and actually intended to place an order (in such an obvious case you don't even need buying signals to reach that conclusion)...

In the middle of the conversation, the man asked the salesman, "And will my car also have that nice felt lining in the trunk, like the one on display?" (an atomic buying signal!) And the salesman answers enthusiastically, "Absolutely. And I can show you, too..." At this point, to my amazement, he gets the couple up out of their seats and leads them back into the showroom to that particular car. He opens the trunk and shows them: "Like this." "And did you know you can take the felt out and clean it?" he asks, demonstrating how to remove it... "You can also order new felt from a carpet store whenever you like," he adds... and he keeps babbling on with unnecessary details that could reopen the whole deal.

Well, even a coach's patience has its limits. Even though it goes completely against all the rules, I hurried over to the salesman, leaned in behind his back and let out a thunderous whisper: "Close. Close already, for crying out loud!"

So he closed... the trunk.