Should you push to close on the first call?

Asking for the sale is not the same as pushing

Every first call should end with a clear ask: for the sale if the buyer is ready, or for a specific next step if they are not. Agents who never ask lose sales the buyer was willing to make. Pushing is different. It means repeating the close after the buyer has hesitated, talking over a doubt, or inventing a reason they must decide today.

It is a common question among telesales agents, and final expense and Medicare agents in particular debate whether to finish the application on the first call or come back to it.

What Rackham found about closing

In his book SPIN Selling (1988), Neil Rackham reports research at Huthwaite on more than 35,000 sales calls. His argument in the book is that techniques that work in small sales, pushing for the close among them, can fail in larger ones. Huthwaite’s own summary of the research says that repeated use of closing techniques sharply lowers the chance of winning a large sale, and that top performers propose the highest realistic commitment the customer can give instead of pressing for the order.

On a phone floor that commitment can take several forms: the sale itself, an application started, a follow-up booked with the partner on the line, or documents the buyer agrees to read before the next call. What SPIN, Cialdini and empathy say about sales calls.

Which sales close on one call

Products differ, and so does the honest answer.

In our view, the line falls on how much of the decision the buyer still has to make. The more persuasion a lead needs, the more the first call is about understanding the buyer, and the less a hard close helps.

For one picture of how common first-call closing is, MaxContact, a contact centre software company, surveyed 167 UK contact centre leaders in outbound sales teams in May 2024 and reported a mean first-call close rate of 27.81%, published on Call Centre Helper. It is a self-reported average across mixed products and lead types, so it is no target for your floor. A Hiya article on first call close notes that the rate can be counted against first calls only or against all calls placed; pick one and keep it. What contact-to-sale conversion is.

What pushing costs

• Cancellations. In our view, a yes given to end the call is the one most likely to be reversed. Count sales that stick, by your floor’s own definition. What counts as a sale.
• Trust. The FTC’s consumer advice on phone scams tells people that honest businesses give them time and that pressure to decide on the spot is a warning sign. A pushed close looks like that sign.
• Compliance. Urgency must be real. The FTC’s guide to the Telemarketing Sales Rule explains that the rule bars misleading statements made to get a sale. How that applies to your products is for your compliance team; BestPair does not provide legal or compliance advice.

Make the follow-up call count

1. Book it on the first call. A day and time, with the partner on the line if they share the decision.
2. Say what will happen. What the buyer will have looked at, and what you will bring.
3. Open with what they said last time. People tend to act in line with what they have already said, the commitment and consistency principle in Robert Cialdini’s Influence (1984). Repeat their words back, not your pitch.
4. Ask once, clearly. If the answer is still no, thank them and close the file. Handling "I need to think about it".

Whether to push for a first-call close or book more follow-ups is a choice your own data can test: split leads at random, run both approaches in the same weeks and compare sales that stick per contact. How to prove a change raised sales.

Sources

• Huthwaite International, "SPIN Selling applies science to the art of selling": Huthwaite’s summary of the research behind SPIN Selling, including its finding on closing in large sales.
• SPIN Selling, Neil Rackham: the book record (1988), the source of the 35,000 sales calls figure.
• Call Centre Helper, "Boosting Your Contact Centre Sales Performance": MaxContact’s UK benchmarking survey of outbound sales leaders, republished as a guest article.
• Hiya blog, on first call resolution and first call close: a vendor article on how first call close is calculated.
• FTC consumer advice, "Phone Scams": what the FTC tells consumers to watch for on a call.
• FTC, "Complying with the Telemarketing Sales Rule": the regulator’s guide to the rule.
• Influence, Robert B. Cialdini: the book record for the commitment and consistency principle.