There are two common missteps that make you lose sales and they are easy to fix once you see the whole picture.

1)    Over talking. (Too much information)

2)    Over comforting people.

Overtalking undermines your good intentions and dilutes your message. Since too much of anything is no good the same goes for lots of explaining. The longer you go the greater the odds for losing them. You think you are being thorough and you might not realize that you are shooting yourself in the foot. Be careful, we ladies are talkers; we say 3x more words per day on average than men. This is good and bad.

We are expressive and make awesome teachers and presenters. Sometimes we get carried away with details and features and skip over what matters to them. Rx. Keep it emotional and factual—short and sweet—let them know what’s the gain?

Tip: A cop once told me how he was trained to handle domestic violence calls. He said what he learned worked on the job and in real life and I never forgot it. Don’t start off super strong because you can’t easily back off. However, you can always ramp up. You can share more information if you are asked for it but you can’t take back what you have already spilled.

Over comforting is another deal breaker. Over coddle and you take away the need for a customer to take action. Some empathy is good but too much is counter productive. Since you are empathetic, compassionate and caring it makes you credible, trustworthy and nice to do business with. When it hurts you is when you’ve made a persuasive and strong presentation that strikes a chord and you become uncomfortable and you rush to comfort them. If they pause and verbalize hesitation you don’t need to run to their aid—know that smart people talk out loud and be patient for a few beats.

Avoid a patronizing “Ahhh, I am so sorry…” followed by, “ You don’t really need this.” Or, “You can do it yourself.” That might be true. If you feel it’s mean not to comfort them or that you are being manipulative by illuminating a sore spot—STOP— it’s not. Rx. It’s not for you to decide if they need something or can or can’t do it themselves or afford it. You can help them by selling your product or service and delivering them what you promised.

Tip: If comforting people is what you enjoy doing let me reframe it for you. You can comfort people by making things easy for them, by simplifying their life, their condition, and their situation and demonstrating the transformation they will experience you are half way home. The more comfortable you are with your emotions the more comfy you will be with theirs. Practice sitting with discomfort and watch how things change when you hold your tongue an extra beat.