10 idioms every salesperson should know
What is the key secret of successful sales? You targeting may be perfect, your developers may be the smartest guys in the world, your business cases may ideally match your prospect’s project… BUT, all these factors matter only when you are able to deliver the right message in the right way. The language you use to communicate with your clients will predetermine the outcome of your sales activities.
Sales managers are front liners of their companies. It means that all your potential clients will associate your language and messages you are delivering with your team. It means that the more convincing you sound, the more chances to get a project your team has.
That’s why our team likes and uses business English idioms that help us sound convincing and native-like when communicating with our clients.
Here is my list of 10 idioms every sales manager should know and use.
1. Ballpark figure
If you don’t’ know the exact cost of the project but your prospect would like to get at least some rough numbers, you can say:
“In order to provide you with the exact numbers, we have to know more about X. Based on the given information, we can share only ballpark figures.”
2. See eye to eye
When you would like to have a coffee meeting with your potential client, you can always say:
“I’ll be in the city next week, see each other and discuss your project eye to eye.”
3. Small talk
When you are at the conference or event and you would like to make a short meeting with someone, you can say:
“Let’s meet and have a small talk before smth. Would you like to?”
4. The big picture
Sometimes, you need not only a detailed description of the project but also some high-level, general information. In such a case, you can say:
“Thanks a lot for sharing your project details. Before we share the info with our tech team, we would like to arrange a Skype call and ask you some additional questions about the idea to see the big picture”.
5. On the same page
When you wish to clarify something and would like to make sure that you understand the idea of the project or some details well, you can say:
“I’d like to have a quick call with you and your tech lead to making sure that we are on the same page when it comes to X.”
6. Gray areas
If you have some questions about the project, which stops you from moving forward and brings some uncertainty to the project’s scope, you can say:
“There are still many gray areas, which do not allow us moving forward and providing you with the exact cost and timeline estimations. Here is the list of questions to deal with these areas…”
7. Think outside the box
If there is a project or task, which requires being creative, you can say, “That’s the task where we have to think outside the box as…”
You can also use this idiom when you describe some past cases, for instance:
“There are many cases where our team had to think outside the box. For instance, we had to do X in order to get Y.”
8. Go the extra mile
When your client would like to add some features that may seriously impact the project’s scope and require additional time and efforts to be implemented, you can say:
“We will have to go the extra mile to implement this feature and we have to make sure that adding it to the scope will keep us in time and budget.”
9. Back to square one
When you would like to persuade your prospect to do a business analysis first to avoid some fatal errors in the future project, you can urge him and say:
“The project requires business analysis and creating a strong and well-designed development roadmap. Surely, if we do not want to back to square one at some point in time.”
10. Cut corners
If your potential client wants to create smth in the cheapest and quickest way and you would like to offer a solution for this purpose, you can say:
“If you wish to cut the corners and to have an app developed as quickly as possible, we suggest using the following tech stack and limiting user stories to X.”
I hope, these idioms will help you to sound convincing and to get more exciting projects! Subscribe to our sales blog to be aware of the latest news and articles!
Best regards,
Max Sydorenko,
Head of sales at Novileads
https://novileads.com/
