Death of the Salesman

“Let no feeling of a discouragement prey upon you, and in the end you are sure to succeed.”  Remember of life is a manifestation of our thoughts; change your thoughts and change your world. 

You can make positive deposits in your own economy everyday by reading an listening to powerful positive life-changing content and by associating with encouraging and hope-building people. Zig Ziglar. 

When it comes down to success in sales, you need to allow the Law of Averages to work in your favor. There is a direct correlation between how many phone calls one makes, how many sales presentations one executes, and how much money one makes.  In essence, the more phone calls one makes, the more sales one closes.

Back in 2003, when I first started my career as a Financial Advisor, my boss told me that I needed to make 100 cold calls, to get 10 people on the phone. Of those 10, only 3 would remain on the line after an introduction and the other 7 would hang up immediately. Those other 3 were my opportunity to close. I needed to pitch 10-15 people a day to generate 1 new account. That means I needed to make 300 -500 phone calls a day, to generate 1 or 2 new accounts.  In my current position, we receive all inbound leads with a much better success rate; here one hundred calls, yields 10 qualified buyers, yielding 2 to 3 new accounts. The point is no matter what sales profession you choose, you need to know the numbers required in order to attain a particular ends. You need to plan your work and work your plan all day, every day.

The best sales representatives are resilient; they possess tremendous bounce back ability. No matter what trials or tribulations they are dealt, they just keep trucking on, persevering, and pressing forward.  Always remember that like Sylvester Stallone said in Rocky, “It ain’t about how hard you hit, it is about how hard you can get hit and keep moving forward…” Never let one bad sales call lead into the next. Just keep smiling and dialing, and the Law of Averages will work in your favor.

In addition to making a ton of sales calls and presentations, as sales people, we need to ask as many people to buy as possible. “The secret to sales is to just ask people to buy,” says Larry Winget.  The Bible also says, “Ask and ye shall receive.”  If you don’t ask, you will never receive.  Studies have shown that half of all sales calls end without the Salesperson asking the prospect to buy once, sixty six percent of all sales people give up after hearing no twice, and 92 percent of salespeople have given up after hearing no four times.

Studies have also shown that 90 percent of all sales calls are closed on the first call and 80 percent of all sales calls were closed after the sales representative had asked the prospect to buy for a fifth time. This means that we need to ask every prospect to buy a minimum of 5 times.  A prospects, “NO,” simply means not yet.  As a sales rep, you are going to hear many no’s to get to that one yes.  We must fail many times in order to succeed only once.  Be persistent, overcome objections and continue asking the prospect to buy. As sales reps, we seldom get a second chance to close a prospect after our first call; we need to exhaust all efforts and use every tool in our tool box to close that prospect on the first interaction. We may never get a second opportunity.

In closing I will leave you with a famous quote from one of my favorite motivators Napoleon Hill: “Life is checkers with time. It’s always your next move. Move with quick decision and time will favor you. Stand still and time will wipe you off the board. You can’t always make the right move, but if you make enough moves you can take advantage of the Law of Averages and pile up a creditable score before the game of life has ended.” Times ticking, so get moving.

Daniel Hardwick

We are what we think; all that we are arises from our thoughts. With our thoughts, we make our world. The Buddha   

“Beginning today, treat everyone you meet as if they were going to be dead by midnight. Extend to them all the care, kindness, and understanding you can muster, and do it with no thought of any reward. Your life will never be the same again.” — Og Mandino (1923-1996)