Things were Great...Right Up Until They Said Said "yes."

The hidden psychology behind why confident buying decisions unravel —and what great salespeople do differently.

I was at a party the other day, and one of my friend’s sons (who had just graduated from college) asked me for some advice for him in his sales career.  Other than telling him to get out of it and go into plumbing or some such, I said “don’t expect to not get a few “no’s” in any deal.” Everyone get’s obsessed with “yes”, but the reality is getting to “yes” means having to go through a few “no’s.”

But that's not the whole story is it? There's a fallacy to the “yes” response these days - maybe there always was!

Every experienced salesperson has lived it. Things have gone great, from the start. Meetings go brilliantly, the prospect is enthusiastic, they tell you they're excited. They even say things like: "This is exactly what we've been looking for." "I think we're going to move forward." "Leave this with me—I just need to run it past the team."

They may even tell you when they’re going to sign off on the contract or SOW. Then...? Nothing. Silence. You don’t hear anything back. The day of their “signing” comes and goes. You leave it a day or two, drop them a text or email that also gets no response. Nothing. Nada.

You second guess yourself, you fight off your boss’s insistence that you “check in” with them. A week later you hear: "We've decided to delay,” or "We've decided to wait until next year," or “we (or “the team”) just need to check a couple of things.”

Most sales methodologies explain this as poor stakeholder management. I don't think that's the real reason. The real reason is that enthusiasm isn’t the same as decision confidence.

Deep down all good sellers know that hearing nothing but “yes’s” is as bad as one of the junior members of the team exuding how the prospect “loves us…we’re definitely going to win this.” They’re both the kiss of death. But still most sellers don’t do anything about this nagging doubt, because sellers have been conditioned to do what when they hear “yes?” That’s right…”shut up.” Well maybe that used to be the way, but it isn’t anymore. On the way to the final “yes” you’re going to hear an assortment of “no’s” AND “yes’s.”  We need to pre-empt them.

This is how we help the prospect confront risk and build confidence. The quality of a decision is measured not by the enthusiasm in the meeting, but by its ability to withstand the meetings that follow. In other words, we need to equip the buyer to convince everyone else – there’s more “selling” to be done.

The Myth of the Final "Yes"

Most people think a buying decision is complete when someone says yes. It isn't. It has only reached its first test. Every important business decision has another meeting or more. The ones you're not invited to. The ones where the decision is challenged.

The Meeting You'll Never Attend

There’s a whole list of internal conversations, some more formal, some less formal. Finance asks about cost. Operations questions implementation. IT raises integration and resourcing concerns. A board member remembers a previous failed initiative. A less informed investor recently read something and suggests alternatives.  Nothing about your solution has changed. Only the confidence surrounding the decision is being assaulted by doubts (some real, some imagined, and some purely theater.)

Here's the Truth Most Executives Learn the Hard Way

Decision makers and executives can delegate for and seek advice  But what you can’t delegate is accountability. Everyone will have an opinion. Everyone will influence the discussion. But once the outcome is known, nobody says: "Finance made that decision." "The board made me do it." "Operations talked me out of it."

The responsibility always comes back to the person who owned the decision, whether it flies or falls. Declaring you were talked out of that one into this one won’t suffice.

The Stories that stay with you

We were on a two-week training course in Woodstock, Connecticut. Nice place, but a bit “middle of nowhere” to us young sellers keen to see Beantown and The Big Apple. We were in a simulated sales pursuit – the culmination of which was that we’d convinced the “buyer”, and he’d admitted to our solution’s superiority, but he was getting downward pressure to go with an existing vendor. Their solution was inferior and he lacked confidence that it would succeed, but what was he to do? So, we told him – “if you think ours is the best solution, then go with it. And the reason to do that (other than the obvious) is if you go with the alternative (which you think will fail) and it does fail, do you think all these other people will shoulder the burden of that failure? Of course not – it was your decision, and you’ll own it. The closest they’ll get to accepting any blame, will be admitting to making “a few suggestions.  Some alternatives to be considered.”   

The Dangerous Illusion

Many decision makers believe that changing direction because others disagree somehow reduces their personal accountability. It doesn't. If the revised decision fails......they still own it. Influence can be shared. Accountability cannot.

This Is Why Confidence Matters

Let’s understand something here. Confidence isn't about becoming stubborn. It's about reaching a conclusion that has been properly tested. Listening to advice. Welcoming and expecting challenge. Exploring alternatives. Then making the decision you genuinely believe is right. That is executive leadership. And as sellers we must help this leadership explore the trade-offs, compromises, alternatives and likely challenges they will face.

The days of avoiding those are over.

The Seller's Job Isn't to Win the Meeting

This is where Decision Selling differs from traditional sales methodologies. Your objective isn't simply to persuade the buyer. It's to prepare the buyer for the conversations that happen after you've left. Can they explain the business case? Can they defend the investment? Can they answer objections? Can they justify the timing? Can they explain why doing nothing is the greater risk?

If they can't...The deal is still vulnerable.

Every Decision Must Survive Its Next Conversation

Great sellers don't create excitement. They create durable confidence. Because the real test of a buying decision isn't whether someone says “yes.” It's whether that yes survives every conversation that follows, and in this era of “managing by consensus” there’s  a lot of these “conversations.”

Final Thought

I know this stuff makes sellers uncomfortable. Why? Because I’m telling you to actively encourage your prospect to consider the alternatives, consider doing nothing, and walk through the likely “opinions” and challenges they will face. We’ve been taught and conditioned over the years to “not” behave this way. This is why most sellers fail. The injustice of that is that most are doing exactly what they’ve been trained to do.

You’ve got to divorce the decision from the prospect and treat the decision as it’s own entity. The strongest buying decisions aren't the ones made without challenge. They're the ones that remain intact after challenge. That's what Decision Selling is about. Not helping buyers make decisions. Helping them make decisions that can withstand scrutiny. Decisions they can confidently defend.