Use trial close questions to test whether the buyer is ready, without asking for the final decision.
A common way to lose a sale is to save the only real question for the end. Suppose you present for forty minutes. You cover the buyer's problems, the options and the price, and then you ask, "Would you like to go ahead?" The buyer hesitates and raises a couple of concerns you never knew about. You didn't know about them because you never checked how anything was landing.
Most sellers treat the decision as one question asked at the end. It works better to check where the buyer stands all the way through the presentation. Then, by the time you ask for the decision, you already have a fair idea of the answer.
A trial close is a question that asks the buyer for their opinion on part of what you have shown, without asking them to commit to anything. It tests how ready they are, and the decision itself can wait.
The two kinds of question get different answers. A commitment question such as "Shall we go ahead?" can only be answered yes, no or not yet, and most buyers will not say yes until they are sure. An opinion question such as "How does that compare with what you expected?" is easy to answer honestly because nothing is at stake.
Good trial closes are open, short and about the buyer's view. These work in most situations:
"How does that compare with what you do today?" "Is that the kind of thing you had in mind?" "How would that work for your team?" "If we went with this, what would worry you most?" "Which of the two options feels closer to what you need?"
You have seen this before. In lesson 1.3, Run a demo around the buyer's working day, Hafiz paused after each scene of his demo to ask Rachel how it compared with her month-end. He was using trial closes before he had a name for them.
There are two places to ask a trial close: after each part of the presentation, and after you answer an objection.
Within the presentation, ask one after the situation playback, after each problem and its solution, after the options and after the price. Each one gives you a reading at the moment the buyer has just heard something.
After an objection, a trial close is similar to the confirm step from lesson 4.2, Listen, clarify, respond, confirm, but it goes one step further. The confirm step checks whether your answer to the objection worked, with a question like "Does that answer it?" The trial close then checks where that leaves the buyer on the decision as a whole: "With that sorted, how are you feeling about option two?" Ask the confirm question first, then the trial close.
A trial close is only useful if you act on the answer. Broadly, answers come in two kinds.
Positive answers mean you keep moving toward the decision. They sound like "That's exactly what we need," "That would save us a lot of time" or "Option two looks right." Several positive answers in a row mean the buyer is getting ready to decide. At that point, move to asking for the decision, which lesson 6.2, Ask for the decision directly, covers.
Hesitant answers mean you slow down and dig. They sound like "I suppose so," "Maybe" or "It looks good, but..." A pause before answering and a change of subject are also hesitant signals. Any of these means something is still unresolved. Don't push past it. Ask about it gently, for example: "You paused there. What's on your mind?" Thank the buyer for raising the concern, handle it with listen, clarify, respond, confirm, and then ask another trial close to see where things stand now.
A hesitant answer can feel like a setback. The trial close did not create the problem, though. The problem was already there, and the question brought it into the open while you are in the room and can deal with it. If you don't ask, the concern stays hidden, the buyer says they need to think about it, and you never learn what went wrong. Treat every concern a trial close reveals as a small win.
Priya is walking Joel and Lin through a proposal to handle the books for their cafes. After presenting the weekly till report, she asks Lin, "Is that the kind of view of the numbers you'd want?"
Later Lin asks a question about control. Priya answers it, then asks them both, "With the Monday report in place, how are you both feeling about handing over the books?"
Lin's answer is hesitant. She says the report looks fine, but she is worried about the cash float at the second outlet. Priya asks what she means. Lin explains that the second cafe keeps a cash float for small purchases. She tops it up by hand, so it never appears in the till figures. Nobody mentioned this in discovery, and Priya would not have found it without asking.
Priya explains that the float can be counted and logged in the same weekly check, and asks whether that would cover it. Lin says it would.
Without that trial close, the float would have come up after the meeting, in a conversation between Joel and Lin, as a reason to wait. Some concerns, like Lin's cash float, never come out unless you ask.
Before you start the activity, look at your presentation outline and mark the four or five points where you would want to know what the buyer is thinking.
Write five trial close questions you can ask at different points in your presentation.
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