Don’t Be Stopped By Sales Terrorists

I received a call from a service contracting sales person named Fred about a situation he found himself in that really took his confidence down a notch facebook videos downloaden app iphone. Fred is the top performer at his company and has achieved a 73% closing rate with a 55% gross margin on his jobs. By all measure of success he was a doing a great job herunterladen.

Then he had a call where after presenting his customized solutions, his buyer lit the fuse on a sales-bomb and completely devastated Fred. The buyer listened to Fred’s presentation and during the course of Fred handling objections, the buyer said, “Fred, you sound like a used car salesman.”

Blind Sided By a Sales Terrorist

Now Fred had always focused his sales approach on creating respect, honor and trust and so that statement completely devastated him cortana herunterladen. In fact, not only did he not sell that job but he then went on a streak of 14 sales presentations on a row without selling a job. He called me asking what he could do to turn things around.

Confidence Blown Away

I asked Fred what did he think had changed after that call and he said that he was doing everything the same except he began to back off on asking for the job and handling objections during the course of his calls. When I asked him why, he said, “Joe, I think I just lost my confidence after that call where I was insulted by being called a slimy sales person.”

I asked him how often has someone told him that he acted like a “used car salesman” before. Fred answered, “Hmmmm I can’t recall ever being called that before. That’s what really got me.” I informed Fred that he was the victim of a sales terrorist. These are people that love to make sales people hurt. They think it’s part of negotiation.

Get Back On The Horse After Falling Off

I asked Fred, “Why are you allowing this one person out of the hundreds of calls you have done, to determine the value of you as a sales person?” he said, “Uh, I don’t know. Sounds kinda silly huh?”

Yes it is silly indeed. I got Fred to eventually realize that if he was going to fail that he should go down with all of the bullets out of his gun. To try everything he knew to close the sale if he really believed in his solutions. Over the next few weeks Fred returned to his normal strong closer status and sold 14 of the next 20 calls he did.

Don’t Be a Victim Of Sales Terror

Whenever you get feedback from a customer that is less than flattering, always ask your self if this is a trend that keeps repeating itself or if it is an isolated sales terrorist incident. Why put so much weight on the feedback of only one person?

What I mean is that if you have found a successful way of selling that is working for you where most of your buyers are telling you that you have done a great job, why change your approach based on the opinion of only one or two people?

Don’t Let Terrorists Win

Never let a sales terrorist bring your confidence down. Learn what works for you and keep doing it even if a few customers don’t like it. Celebrate your success and failure evenly and study the trends. After all, results don’t lie.

Look at yourself and the value you create for your customers by the positive results you get for them not only the few times you crash and burn. You’re a sales pro and you know the principles behind what works. Use those principles over and over to achieve the results you want.

Do You Make This Olympic Sized Mistake von youtube downloaden auf stick?

As the 2010 Winter Olympic games came to a close I am haunted by a certain story which involves snowboarder Lindsay Jacobellis and her failed attempt at redemption ps4 design. Jacobellis suffered a disastrous crash four years ago at the Turin, Italy winter Olympic games when she celebrated too soon just moments from the finish line klaviernoten onlineen. She basically had the race won but could not resist the temptation at showing a little flash at the wrong moment and instead lost the race.

The reason this failure stuck with me far more than all the Olympic victories i witnessed is probably because as a sales coach I see this phenomena far more than I would like when trying to help sales people attain better results garageband windows herunterladen. The pain of losing is vivid to me whenever I hear the sales person tell me that they have a sale that is “pretty much already sold” and then they start talking about it like they actually have closed it herunterladen. But here is the twist. After I question further I find that they aren’t even close to getting the sale.

Do You Over-Celebrate?

So many sales people are guilty of the same Olympic sized mistake that Lindsay Jacobellis made four year ago that it boggles the mind. Here are a few statements from the lips of sales people who celebrate before actually getting the job.

• “This one is basically sold, I’m just waiting for them to transfer the money.”
• “It’s pretty much done, I just have to provide them some more literature.”
• “He really liked the proposal, now the board has to approve it.”
• “I’m gonna be selling this one on Tuesday after they have a chance to talk.”

In all of those statements, the sales person is mistaking making the assumption that the sale is theirs. All they have to do is one more thing. The question is begging to be asked, “Why did you not stay there and do that one more thing?” I really don’t know why sales people delude themselves like this. To me they are setting up the situation to unravel at the end and not only lose the sale but also a great measure of their self-esteem as well.

You Work Too Hard To Not Finish

Just like Olympic athletes, we as sales people have traveled a long way to get close to the finish line. It is an utter disgrace to do all the work, spend all the resources and sacrifice your time only to not finish what you have started. Remember that the sale is not won until you have a signed contract and all financial considerations have been executed.

As a sales manager simply ask your sales person a few questions the next time you hear them celebrate before the cross the finish line. Here are a few questions to ask:

1. “Do you have the signed agreement.”
2. “Did we get a down payment?”
3. “Can I see your presentation of the solutions?”

Most of the early celebrations will be doused with a healthy dose of realism once you ask them one of these question. Remember that it is your job as a sales manager to keep your team grounded, focused and on-track to succeed. You are NOT doing anyone any favors by sharing in their enthusiasm of this very dysfunctional moment.

Winning Is Guaranteed To No One

The final lesson that is learned from the Olympic nightmare that Jacobellis suffered is that even if you do get a second chance at success, winning is promised to no one. It is you that must keep your poise as you are just about to win and make sure that all of you work is finished before you start to tell people that you have won.

In the end, the rewards are clear. Real champions “cross the finish line” before they start to even think about celebrating their success. In fact, I would say that the best people in sales never really celebrate at all. Why? Because after they win a sale they are already thinking about the next one. In sales, the celebration of success and failure must be done evenly. That means that when you lose, you should not be devastated and when you win you must not be too elated as well. Remember that in the sales world, there is always another race to run tomorrow.