7 Keys to Handling the “This is Too Expensive” Objection

Have you ever had a prospect where everything seemed good, it was all on track, and then after you reveal your price, the prospect says something like, "This is too expensive. " What is your approach next? In this video, I'm going to show you the seven keys to handling the, "This is too expensive," objection.

Check it out. Number One: Determine how you got here. It's so important to not just accept that if your prospects are consistently saying this is too expensive, that it's not actually something that you were doing early on in the conversation.

If you're finding that you're getting this objection a lot, it's time to start to think about your entire sales process and what led you to this point. Because a lot of times prospects say this is too expensive as a cover for the fact that, you know what, they're really not that interested, or they're not seeing the value in what you're offering. Because if a prospect doesn't see value in your offer, they're naturally going to think that your offer is too expensive.

And so we really want to reassess our entire sales process and make sure that we're creating enough value that the prospect is likely to really see the value in our offering and is willing to pay the price that we are ultimately charging. Number Two: Own your high price up front. I'm going to take a wild guess that it doesn't make sense for you to be the Walmart of your industry.

It's almost never the right strategy to try to be the lowest price person in any industry, because let's face it, the companies that are charging at the higher prices within their industry are making the most money. So as a salesperson, it always makes sense to be proud of the fact that you are higher priced than your competitors. The more you can proudly own your high price up front, the more congruent you're going to seem when ultimately your offer is more expensive, inevitably, than some of your competitors.

You do not want to be haggling around price. You do not want to be competing with the low-cost competitors that are in your industry. Own your high price.

This is a mindset shift just as much as it is a tactical shift. Be confident in the fact that you are at the top of the price scheme within your industry. Number Three: Remember that 20% must be DQ'd.

So this is a really powerful concept that I think takes a lot of pressure off of salespeople. I always break down prospects into three buckets. On one bucket are the prospects that absolutely want to buy on value.

They're willing to pay the highest prices. They want the most value. Those prospects are awesome.

We love those people. Those are the people that are just consistently looking for the highest priced solution to a problem that they're really facing. Those are your tier A prospects.

Then the next bucket, which is the biggest bucket, which is about 60% of prospects out there, are kind of in the middle. They are willing to pay for value, but they also have to see that it's really there in order to justify the higher prices. That is the vast majority of prospects out there.

Those are your kind of good prospects. You've really got to take them through a sales process to get them to see the value, but they're willing and able to see it. The final bucket is the bottom 20% of prospects out there that simply want the best price.

These are the prospects that you must immediately disqualify as quickly as possible. You need to run away from those bottom 20% hagglers. You're never going to get them to see the value in investing more to solve the problem.

So just recognize when you come across a prospect that just wants the best price, that is not going to be your prospect. Just disqualify and move on. Number Four: Slow it down.

This is where we start to really get into the tactics of how to deal with the objection that this is too expensive. The first thing we want to do is simply slow down the conversation as soon as we hear this objection, because most salespeople, as soon as they hear that objection, immediately go into a seven-minute tirade about, you know, how their offering is the best and that they can't get a better value anywhere else, and all this silly stuff that your prospect absolutely doesn't care about. So what we want to do is always, anytime we get an objection, slow down the conversation.

Take a pause. So prospect says, "This is too expensive. " Pause.

A four count in your head, 1, 2, 3, 4. This just gives some time, A, for you to just collect yourself, and B, to really just demonstrate that you're taking in what they're saying. Slow it down.

Number Five: Ask, "What prompts you to say that? " The first thing we did is we heard the objection and then we slowed it down. Now it's time to turn it back onto them.

We don't have time to get into, like, the entire process of handling any objection, but we want to come back with some version of, "What prompts you to say that? " So we're not responding with a specific discount or some justification or a price. Instead, we might say something like, "You know, I really appreciate you're saying that.

What prompts you to say that? " And what we want to do is listen. We want to hear why they believe what we're offering is too expensive.

And the more you can get them talking during the point of an objection, the more control you have in the conversation. So the first actual response to any objection is always a question, a question to get them to at least unpack why they believe something is the case, because we don't know, right? They may think that it's too expensive because they've already talked to seven other people and we are, like, the single most expensive.

Or they may just say, "You know what? I don't have enough budget, but if there were a way to cut it out, I could do this. " Or maybe they're just responding to that reflexively, right?

We don't know. So we want to understand exactly what prompts them to say that in the first place. Number Six: Dig, dig, dig.

It is so important that we understand exactly why they have a particular concern. Again, this is true of any objection. The best salespeople, the data shows time and time again, are digging when they're getting objections.

They're responding with a question, and they're really listening to the prospect, trying to understand what's going on. And what you find is that the better you get at digging into the prospect's objection, the more you'll find that the prospect actually, after they kind of talk it out, they realize that, you know what, actually I do see why there's value here, or I do see why the fee is what it is. The more you dig, the less likely you are to actually have to ultimately really even respond to the objection in the first place.

But even if you do have to respond to the objection, now you are armed with a real understanding of why they feel the way they do about what it was that they just said. Number Seven: Can I throw some ideas at you? This is one of the most powerful transitions when it comes to handling an objection, where you are getting permission from them to share some ideas that could potentially solve this issue for them.

And so it's again, really important during the digging phase to understand, is this a condition that actually has to be solved, or was this just some kind of a cover for the fact that they didn't see value, or was this something that is just really, they almost felt like they just had to kind of get it off their chest? You don't know until you dig, but once you start to understand what it is, maybe it's an issue of payment plans. Maybe it's an issue that they didn't see enough value in the offering, and maybe there's something else that you could offer to kind of sweeten the pot.

Maybe it's dead in the water, right? But what you want to do is you want to start with getting permission of, can I throw some ideas at you? And now we're in the position of thinking creatively about some ideas that might help solve that issue.

And so what we're doing is we're not kind of fully committing to whatever it is we're saying, we're just kind of throwing some ideas and it's making it a collective conversation. When you do that, now you're kind of getting permission to come up with a couple of ideas that might actually solve this and get you to a closed sale. So there are seven keys (calm music) to handling the, "This is too expensive," objection.

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