Tips for Closing the Sale: When an Attorney Calls

Do you ever hesitate when it comes to closing the sale? Legal nurse consultants get phone calls from attorneys who ask them about cases and that is a sales opportunity. How do you structure the conversation so you can encourage the attorney to send the case?

Fear of Sales Affects Closing the Sale

Have you ever thought, “I’m not in sales?” or “Sales is all about just closing the deal, getting money in the door.” All sales are an opportunity to build a relationship and get somebody to take further action.

Create a mindset that says, “Look, I’m going in to approach how to deliver a solution. First I have to create an opportunity to ask more open-ended questions. That allows me to do some fact-finding to find out where those pain points are, where those points of benefits and rewards come in. Then how do I structure a dialog so I can provide a solution to the attorney?

Sales is a Conversation

Your conversation with the attorney is geared to give the attorney an opportunity to take the next level of action. This perspective enables you to start to dilute or get rid of some of that fear around how people generally look at sales. It’s just a relationship. It’s just a conversation that gets you to that next action.

Look at it as a stair-step opportunity to provide a solution for someone that’s going to help them manage their cases.

Find out the Attorney’s Pain Points

There are simple but critical questions to ask a prospect or customer that help in closing the sale. I just finished completing some market research that led me to ask

• What are your biggest challenges?
• What are your biggest fears?
• What are your biggest frustrations?

Pick a subject: medical records, medical issues, finding expert witnesses, understanding damages. I received great answers when I asked attorneys about their biggest fears, frustrations or challenges with medical records. They said,

• “Can’t read the medical records.”
• “Don’t know if the records are complete.”
• “Can’t decipher electronic medical records.”

Of course, you can help with these issues.

These questions about challenges, fears and frustrations start to peel back where that source of pain is. Listen to how an attorney responds. You may hear a quiver in her voice. If you watch her body language you will see the moment she starts to get uncomfortable.

What happens is most LNCs will change the subject. You might be tempted to back pedal, not wanting the attorney to be uncomfortable. Don’t.

Instead, this is the prime opportunity to say, “I’m going to pause because I just noticed you react to something I said. I think that’s an opportunity for us to explore that further. My guess is right there that’s the spot that’s keeping you up at night, so let’s talk about that.”

You are focusing indirectly on the return on investment of hiring you to help with that pain point. This focus helps you in closing the sale. You’ve made it an obvious choice to get your help. You’ll be able to the attorney peace of mind. Here’s where people have the biggest opportunity. When they resist, ask them, “What’s it costing you by you not taking action about this issue?”

That’s the point that most people hold their breath, their color drains from their face and they start squirming in their seat. That’s your opener to really show value in the fact that you’re there to help. You can take that pain point away from them.

Get more tips about closing the sale by listening to Candy Barone, one of the people I interviewed for Legal Nurse Podcast. Listen to her here.