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Strengthen Your Sales ABS By Donna L. Cohen Given the
demands of today’s light-speed business world, sales professionals are
increasingly required to come into the ring with a new set of skills—
and a whole lot more. Winning in sales means a commitment to linking
attitude, behavior and skills to forge an invincible circle of success. If you were a boxer, you might have an awesome right hook, but without conditioning your body and your mind for the fight, you are not champion material. Preparing for a fight requires sparring and taking punches, getting your mindset in the right place, and feeling the pain yet persevering. If you could think like a prize boxer when you’re preparing to make a sale, your attitude would be focused. You’d have a solid game plan for what was likely to happen, but you’d still be ready for the unexpected…and prepared to excel in any situation.
Here are some tips for finding the right combination of attitude,
behavior and skills to help you excel during the next round of sales
calls. ‘A’ is for Attitude: Flex Your AttitudeHaving
the conditioning of a boxer, you would be able to concentrate your
efforts on qualifying a prospect rather than “closing.” You could
focus on adding value to the prospect’s business rather than making
the sale. You could easily walk away from a
non-qualifying prospect
because you knew that, with the right
prospect, your selling skills were invincible. It starts with attitude.
Here’s an example. At one point in my business I had to face
the fact that if I wanted to move to the next level, I needed
multimillion-dollar clients. However, years before, I had reported
directly to the president of a $350 million company whose management
philosophy was “management through intimidation and humiliation.” As
a result, my experiences under his leadership led me to conclude that
all CEOs of multimillion-dollar companies used intimidation and
humiliation. So I chose to work only with small companies. I definitely
needed an attitude adjustment.
Here
is what I learned: we may be perfectly comfortable selling at one level
and believe we are highly successful, when in reality we are terrified
of moving out of our comfort zone because of a misperception about our
abilities to sell and achieve at a higher level. Whenever you find
fear arising from
subconsciously negative perceptions, the trick is to
focus instead on your past
and present strengths. Self-doubt
is created in that part of the mind that holds negative beliefs we have
about ourselves and others. Some of the negative thought patterns that
plague salespeople are: I’m not creative, I can’t sell at the
‘C’ level (CEO, CFO, etc.), I’ll be rejected, I’ll look and
sound stupid, my prices aren’t low enough, the
competition has a better
product, and so on. Such thoughts arise from a variety of experiences
and situations, but whatever the underlying belief, negative thoughts
become a self-fulfilling prophecy. Fear,
self-doubt and worry steal valuable time and
energy from our commitment to
providing value to our customers. If you feed your subconscious the
belief, “I can’t call at the C level,” then you can’t. If you
feed your subconscious the belief, “I have value,” then you do. Always
sell from a position of strength. You are either a fit or not, but
either way is fine. Develop an attitude that you are capable, you know
what you’re doing, and you have something valuable to offer, so
whatever non-qualifying prospects may think is irrelevant
to your mindset. When
you find yourself in situations where you feel out of control, take the
time to find out why. It helps to keep a daily log of your
attitudes, tracking and
recording your past
behaviors and activities.
Setting meaningful goals will help you face the future with
self-confidence. ‘B’ is for Behavior: Pump up Your
Behavior Sometimes
simply changing your behavior does the trick. There are times we don’t
take action if we only perceive an either/or choice—either I do it
this way or I do it that way. It might be helpful to explore a third
option. Your attitude becomes more confident when you allow yourself to
pick among three options versus limiting yourself to only two. For
instance, a sales person sold software subscriptions to businesses to
help them comply with tariff tax laws. This individual believed that
attorneys (his main prospects) always wanted to argue about the product
and why it wouldn’t work, and always wanted to change the contract. He
was frustrated because he categorized attorneys in one of two
ways—either argumentative or not argumentative (and he couldn’t find
many of the latter!). By changing his
attitude about attorneys and
then his
behavior, he was able to call
on these prospects and let them “win” certain arguments. It made them
feel good and they bought his services. His clients were so pleased with
the results his solution provided; he soon was selling by
referral only. Work on Those ABSMost
importantly, it pays to work on strengthening the interdependence
between your
attitude,
behavior and skills. Assess
how much attention you are devoting to each area in your “circle of
success.” Make notes in your log about the things you’re going out
of your way to avoid. As you develop new skills and techniques, you may
want to explore new guidelines for your own attitude and behavior. Take
stock of your greatest assets and also continuously look at areas for
improvement. Write up a plan and set up a timetable to activate it.
Practice and review your progress regularly. Evaluate and modify as
necessary. You will find as you change your
attitude and
behaviors you will naturally
develop new skills and techniques. You’ll be champion material. *
* * Donna
L. Cohen is President of Performance Insights, LLC, a sales training and
consulting company in |
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