No, you can’t go on break right now. No, you can’t take off for Fourth of July. No you didn’t get approved for the loan.

No, no, and no!

All through our lives we’ve heard that pesky two letter word that holds more power than the General Electric Power Plant. We’ve mastered the art of saying “no” to everyone else BUT when it comes to potential customers, we just don’t know how to say no to clients.

But we are going to change that today because our business and our sanity depends on it. When you can master the art of saying no to clients, you’ll open doors to better clients and save yourself the headache.

What do I mean? If you’ve been in business for some time now, you can probably relate to this email from one of my one on one coaching clients.

Tony writes:

“How are you doing Ashley? I’ve been kicking ass this week with your lead technique but I am in a dilemma. I have this potential customer who emailed me asking if I can guarantee that her car gets picked up by Wednesday. I’m sure I will because there’s a lot of cars on the load board, but I’m worried if I tell her no, she won’t choose me. What do you suggest I do?

Thanks so much Ash. You’ve been a great help.

Tony”

Our good friend Tony here has a short case of say-no-itis or in simpler terms, “I’m afraid to say “no” to a client.” Sorry Tony.

Like many of us, Tony is afraid to say no to clients for fear he will lose them to the big guns of the industry. You know, the auto transport brokers who lie just to close the deal?

But you’re freaking better than that and how do I know? Well I’m not Ms. Cleo but you, being here, says a lot.

So I’m going to teach both you and Tony an easy to use script on how to say no to clients without feeling intimidated or worried about losing them.

Ready?

Let’s say your client wants you to guarantee something that you just can’t guarantee. You can say:

“I’d love to {insert what they want}, but unfortunately I can’t because {insert valid reason that the client can understand and relate to.}

In Tony case, it would look something like this:

“I’d love to guarantee that your car will get picked up by Wednesday, but unfortunately I can’t. The Carriers start to look for vehicles to haul 1 to 2 days before they actually plan to pick up and even if they did book this far in advance, anything can happen that can cause your pickup not to happen and then you’d be mad at me for lying to you.”

Now using that same script, let’s say your client wants to know if they can place things in their car. You can say:

“I’d love to say yes you can put things in your car, but unfortunately I can’t because the law says that auto carriers can only haul vehicles, not household goods. The last thing we would want is for the carrier to get stopped by law enforcement, get fined, and have your vehicle delayed indefinitely. So, I have to warn against it- besides, it’s not covered by their insurance if it gets lost or stolen.”

See how simple that was? Let’s try it one more time.

Let’s say you have a client that thinks your price is too high and wants you to lower it to an unreasonable number- a number you know won’t get the vehicle picked up. You can say:

“I’d love to have your car moved for $500 across country, but unfortunately I can’t because then it wouldn’t move. I don’t care how much the carriers like me, and they do like me- your car will be sitting for weeks. That’s the last thing I want to happen for you. My job is to get your car moved at the cheapest rate possible without compromising the safety and security of your vehicle and your sanity.”

See how easy that was? That is the exact script I use every time I need to say no to a client.

It’s not rocket science.

Once you master the art of how to say no to clients, you will start feeling better about yourself and your business.

It’s time to get your game face on:

In the comments below, I want to hear your way of saying no to clients. If you’re new to the business, let me know how you think saying no using this script will impact your business.

As always thanks for reading, commenting and sharing.