[8 Steps To A Live Presentation That Sells Series] Article #12 ~ Set Yourself Up for a Prosperous Close: Know Your Numbers

When it comes to negotiating with promoters, it literally pays to know your numbers.
By that, I mean, your closing percentage: the percentage of the room that buys what you sell after your presentations.
If you have a high closing percentage, youโve got clout with promoters.
Think about it. Since the promoters generally receive 50% of your sales, it stands to reason that the more sales you make, the more valuable you are to them, and the more likely you are to get what you want.
How to Correctly Calculate Your Closing Percentage
A common mistake that speakers make when calculating their closing percentage is to use the head count, rather than the buying units. The head count is everyone in the audience. A buying unit is a person, couple or group that can make a purchase.
For instance, if youโre speaking to a room with 1,000 people, but, because of the topic, theyโre all couples, you donโt have 1,000 buying units. You have 500, because, typically, a husband and wife are only going to buy one of your programs. Also counted as one buying unit could be a boss and his or her assistant or a small group from the same office.
To calculate your closing percentage, just divide the number of people who bought your product or service by the number of buying units in the room. So if you sold 100 copies of your program, and there were 400 buying units, you had a closing percentage of 25%.
Now, letโs say the head count of that room was 800. If you mistakenly used that figure, youโd get a sales ratio of only 12.5%.
Obviously, thereโs a big difference in how a promoter is going to view you if you do 25% in sales versus 12.5%.
Even more important, that ratio wouldnโt accurately reflect your skill and achievement. So you could think that youโre not doing very well in your sales presentations, when youโre actually excelling.
How to Use Your Clout
Knowing your numbers can help you get booked, secure an optimum time slot, and give you leverage when promoters want to make changes.
For instance, if the promoter says, โI know your contract says you can speak for 90 minutes, but we need you to do it in 60. Can you do that?โ
โWell, I could,โ youโd respond, โbut let me tell you what itโs going to cost you. If I do it in 60 minutes, weโre going to lose about 30% in sales. Iโve got an average closing ratio of 20%. Youโve got 500 buying units here. My product costs $1,000.โ Pause to do the quick calculation. โThat means you, personally, would lose about $15,000.โ
โOh,โ your promoter says as the figure sinks in. โOkay. You can have your 90 minutes.โ
If your closing percentage were artificially low because you didnโt calculate it properly, you just wouldnโt have the same impact.
Sure, you could insist that they honor your contract, and you should if the situation warrants it.
But itโs far better to turn potentially awkward interactions into win-wins.
Know your numbers and show promoters that itโs in their best interest to give you the consideration youโve earned.
