Have you ever wondered what it is about that certain salesperson on your team that just seems to always be busy making sales regardless of the economic conditions, the time of year, or just about anything else? I know I have, and for me, it was always very interesting. I was always very curious when I was new to sales how certain people around me did what they did to have such consistent success.

What I learned is that we tend to always buy from salespeople we like and have some trust in. Sounds simple right? Well, it’s not so simple for many people all around the world at businesses trying their hand in sales only to find it’s not as easy as it sounded. What I have seen many do over the years when they start out new in sales is trying to be someone they are not. Or even worse, pretend that they know the answers to every question.

There’s not much worse than talking out of school and making promises or claims you aren’t sure of or can’t back up when you’re a salesperson. It’s my opinion that it’s always best when you aren’t sure to thank your customer for the particular question and the opportunity to find the answer and help them. Just be sure that you do find the answer and you retain the information for next time, making yourself more knowledgeable. However, you must learn that not every question you don’t know the answer to requires you to run back and forth like a chicken with its head cut off. Sometimes people ask questions just to see if you’re gonna BS them!

So, why is that salesperson always busy no matter what, what makes them so good? It’s a combination of many things honestly, but one of those things I believe for certain is the ability to add a tremendous amount of value to the experience by creating a genuine relationship very quickly. When you meet a salesperson who is always at the top of the sales board and operates at a high level, you usually meet someone who is genuine about who they are when they are selling and because of that they make a lot of same-day sales and get lots of referrals.

Great salespeople don’t change who they are when they get a customer in front of them, they use who they are to create a genuine bond and experience between them and the person they are helping so that the person they are helping wants to do business with them. Why? Because no one likes a phony, and when you’re genuine and honest with people you quickly earn their favor, and they begin to like you. After some test of time, and it could be as quickly as the first meeting in certain sales arenas, they begin to trust you enough to make a positive buying decision.

When you’re new to sales it’s tempting to try and be someone you’re not, to pretend you know everything and cause yourself to act and talk out of school. Remember that no one likes a phony, people like and trust genuine people who are being themselves and trying to help. You and I can both smell a fake salesperson a mile away, so always be you and if the customer doesn’t accept that then it’s their problem, not yours I say!

Once you find your style and really begin to fine-tune your scripts so they are natural and personal to you, you will have great success with your customers. They will like and trust you and want to do business with you more often than not. They will also recommend you to their friends and family because once people find someone they connect with and really trust and enjoy doing business with they want to come back and send people they know your way because they know you’ll deliver on the experience. People like helping people they like.

Wrapping It All Up!

So strive to always be you and never try to be anything else. You will learn lots of great things from the people around you and you should always be growing and looking for those opportunities to learn something which will make you better. But make sure you make it your own and genuine to who you are. You’ll accelerate your success this way and word of mouth will help you really establish a solid foundation for your sales career.

As always, if I can be of any help to you or you have some advice or thoughts to add please feel free to comment below and please SHARE with someone who needs to read this! 

Make It A Great Day!

When you’re New to Sales I believe it’s important to remember you must always stay humble. God resists the prideful and arrogant, and most people do as well. An arrogant attitude is not good for relationships and sales is a relationship business. Because I’ve made this mistake myself and learned the hard way, I want to give you some ideas on how you can remain humble and avoid the pitfalls of arrogance especially if you have found yourself having early success in your career and surpassing those around you with more experience.

I believe that there are no born salespeople, we are all simply born either a boy or a girl. However, it is true that some of us are born with innate abilities that give us an advantage in sales IF we recognize them, develop them, and put them to work for us. If you’re reading this it’s likely you focus on self-development, finding inspiration and motivation, and are probably the kind of person who is good at whatever you put your mind to. That’s great, and there’s nothing wrong with success. You want to set goals to have big success in life whatever that looks like to you because anything less would be a waste of your God-given potential!

However, if you find yourself having success early in your sales career, I want to remind you of these two points:

#1- You’re Too New To Know Any Better

and…

#2- You’re Not The Only Reason For Your Success!

I remember when I first got into sales, I didn’t know the first thing about sales. I was successful early on in my career because I had a good work ethic, I was honest with people and gave my best advice to them, and I genuinely wanted to help solve their problems. From that foundation, my sales career began. I was successful but I had no idea why because I was too new to sales to know any better. I just thought I was good and a natural and that’s how it would always be.

That’s arrogant, and it cost me some time I’ll never get back that I could have been working on my natural abilities to grow them, develop them to more advanced levels and increase my skill and ability with people. It would be a few years into selling before I first discovered motivational speakers, sales leaders and great thinkers like Zig Ziglar, Og Mandino, Jim Rohn, Tony Robbins and others who began to shape a new mindset in me and help me realize that growth is the only way to truly be successful, because if you’re not consistently growing you’re going backwards, your dead.

I also figured out that if I was going to be successful long-term in my sales career that I was going to have to develop great relationships with all the people that affected the sales process I worked within. I was in retail furniture sales in the beginning years and then moved into the car business before making my home in the mortgage business where I live now. In those early days, I got to know the warehouse crew, the delivery guys, the service team, and repair technician. All of these people played a critical role in the customer experience which ultimately I felt responsible for.

You never have great success without the help of others, often times I know at least in my life, it’s really the help of many others. No matter the sales award or recognition I have received throughout my career, I could give tremendous credit to someone else for me attaining it. I have learned over the years that my relationships with clients are so important, but the relationships with those on my team are just as important if not more. If we are all looking out for each other because we care about each other’s success, the client is going to receive an amazing experience throughout the sales journey.

Wrapping It All Up

So what’s my point? My point is very simple, stay humble especially if you are having great success which I hope you are. If you can make a habit of reminding yourself that you will accelerate your success. If you’re new to sales you may not realize why you’re having so much success early on. As I mentioned, you’re too new to know better so make sure you find a solid mentor. At least have someone who can hold you accountable and help you develop. Mentors don’t have to be someone you meet in person, like many of mine they can be mentors who you follow on YouTube, Podcasts, read their books, follow their social media pages, etc. Just be sure to grow your natural abilities and add constantly to your toolbox of skills.

And finally don’t ever be so arrogant as I have regrettably been guilty of in the past of thinking that your success is a given and you’re the only reason for it. Many people and decisions made your success possible, be humble and give credit to others always, most importantly to God.

As always, if I can be of any help to you or you have some advice or thoughts to add please feel free to comment below and please SHARE with someone who needs to read this! 

Make It A Great Day!

Success is defined a few different ways. If you Google it, one of those definitions reads, “a person or thing that achieves desired aims or attains prosperity.”I believe people define success differently. The one thing that I can assure you everyone wants is to be happy. Part of most everyone’s definition of success is to be happy. Success is an important ingredient to a happy life. If you want to have a happy life (however that is defined for you), you need success in all areas of your life. Success is the key that unlocks a happy life.

Don’t Wait For All The Lights To Be Green, They Never Will Be

You can’t wait around for success to happen to you because that’s not how it works. Success comes to you when you take action towards it. The more action you take, the more potential you have for greater success. I believe that success is won in little battles throughout each day in all area’s of your life. You have to have the attitude that success is your duty. Now, having great success in your career but sacrificing your family life does no good if your family life is important to you, and you value it. For most of us, we have MANY different parts of our life we want to be successful in. These are all the things that make up who we are and what we are all about. Therefore, it truly is a duty, and obligation to yourself, family, company you own or work for, community and your future to be as successful as you can be in life.

Start by making a commitment to do your best in all area’s of your life each day. Start right now just focusing on doing your very best. It really is that simple. You have to see success as the only option. This doesn’t mean all of a sudden you won’t fail ever again. Or that you won’t make any mistakes in life from now on. That’s not how God made you. You will fail, but you will learn from failure how to be better next time. In essence, you never really fail unless you give up. Seeing success as your ethical duty in life keeps you in the game, and never quitting on your life.

Are You Looking For A Career Or Just A Job?

This is especially true in your sales career. You have to develop a career mentality, not just think of it as just a job. What’s the difference? Here’s an example I’ll use to explain my thinking on it. You have two guys or two gals it doesn’t matter, they are just starting out working for a well known fast food store. Both are flipping burgers and doing the required job-related tasks. One of them is trading time for money, just waiting for the shift to be over, doing what is required to get the job done and not get fired or catch any hassle. This isn’t a bad employee, it’s just not an outstanding one either. It’s the average person.

Now the other guy or gal is doing his job as well, but they are also looking for ways to help others do theirs better. This person is also looking for ways to learn other responsibilities, not worrying how much more it will pay them now because that’s not the ultimate goal of this person. This person wants success. This person sees themselves running one of these stores someday, or maybe many of them. This person is thinking about a career. See the difference? Now, we aren’t all born to run fast food stores I get that. However, you were designed with the ability to do great things with your life if you see that as the only option. This will mean different things to everyone, but this mentality will allow you to see your potential. So whether you want to run a McDonald’s franchise, or write a book, you need to see success as the only option!

J O B  Stands For “Just Over Broke”

Remember, a job is just that, a JOB or Just Over Broke. I think I heard Grant Cardone say that in a podcast one time and it really sunk in for me. If you have a job, find a way to turn it into a career. If you can’t, then go do something, find something that you can. You need to be all in no matter what it is you’re doing. This way you are more likely to keep your commitment to yourself and do your best every day. This world is LOADED with information, and people willing to give it to you. Often times for FREE. How much success you have in any area of your life is dependent on the degree to which you’re willing to do what is required to attain it.

Financial well being is also vital to your happiness. We live on an economic planet. It takes money to do just about everything in life. While I do NOT think money is the most important thing in life, it’s right up there with God, Family, and Oxygen. If you want true FREEDOM in life, you need money as well as many other things. I am not super motivated by money, however, I am motivated by what you can do with it. The people you can reach. The people you can help. Whether it is family or friends. Maybe your community. Money allows you to make a difference in the lives of others. Yes, you always have your time to donate, I get that. But if you can write a check that keeps a program running for a year doing cancer research locally, for instance, that’s impact! Success is the key.

The Harder You Work, The Luckier You’ll Get

Successful people seem lucky to others, but this is because their actions create successful results which compound and create more success. If they changed their actions and started making bad choices, like everyone else they would pay the consequences of those poor choices. Therefore, successful people take massive action daily, and they make the best choices they know how each time. You must demand this of yourself in all area’s of your life. Don’t fall into the victim role and blame something or someone else for your lack of success in life. It doesn’t matter what it is when you claim responsibility for it and take positive action towards it you have more success.

Be sure to get the people in your life on board with this mindset as well. It does no good to commit to success and then have the people closest to you working the opposite way. Opposites DO NOT attract. Likes ATTRACT! Successful, positive minded, motivated people want to be around other people like that, not the opposite. Negativity brings positive people down, it actually repels positive minded people in many ways. I believe I can actually feel someone’s negative energy just by getting close to them. Usually, when I feel this way, I am right. Just a few interactions with the person and I can see they are negative. Sometimes positive people get into a negative funk, but when success is your duty you bounce out of it almost immediately because it leaves a bad feeling in your gut. You want to think of success as an ethical issue. When you give less than your best in an area of your life, you should feel bad about it. It should bother you. Every day that you don’t live up to your potential is time wasted that you can never get back.

Don’t Waste Your Most Valuable Asset, And The Only One You Can’t Get More Of, Time!

The one thing we cannot get more of in life is TIME. You need to make the most of it every day. You never know how much of it you have left. This is why there is no one area of life where you need to be more successful than any other. If I was going to choose one, I would choose my relationship with God, and his son Jesus Christ. But we truly need success in every aspect of our lives for true happiness, and in abundance. We deserve the best life possible and since we only get one why wouldn’t we want that anyway? God wants us to have a wonderful life, that’s why he has given us everything we need to do just that.

A great story that illustrates perfectly the mentality you have to have in order to reach your true potential, and an inspiring story of faith, is the story of Sylvester Stallone and his Rocky screenplay. Stallone went through a lot, he was so broke he lost his relationship, and his dog. He had to literally sell his best friend (the dog) for money to get by one more day. Stallone came up against failure after failure on his way to making himself a success. He was given a few opportunities to make some quick money, more than he had ever seen at that time, upwards of $400K. But, he knew his potential and he turned down several offers before making a deal to make the movie and star as the main character, Rocky Balboa. Well, he and everyone else involved is glad it turned out the way it did. As we all know the rest is history and he is one of the most successful and well-known people to ever live. Rocky Balboa is almost like a living person to some of us who grew up watching the movies and love the character. But it was almost just another movie. Stallone only saw one option, he was all in. That’s why he was able to succeed.

Where Are You In Life Right Now?

You may be in a place right now where you feel successful in your life. That’s awesome! However, we are human beings. We are the most intelligent species on the planet. If we are not growing, we are dying. Eventually, you will want more from life. Remember, you were designed to do great things. So even if you define yourself as successful, you need to keep pushing every day putting your best out there and continue to grow and get better.

If you wouldn’t call yourself successful right now but want to be able to, then consider my advice here on this. I have years of experience and so far what I have learned is you cannot replace hard work with anything else. Success is a mindset and it requires HARD WORK! In order to work hard day in and day out, to get the success you deserve, you need to commit and have no other option on the table for yourself. This post was not only inspired by my life experience but also from the chapter Success Is Your Duty in the book The 10X Rule. I highly recommend this book to you if you find yourself in this place.

It’s like the great Zig Ziglar used to say and I’ll never forget, “You go as far as you can see, and when you get there, you’ll always be able to see further.” Start now. With every area of your life that you want more success to start making better choices, putting in more effort and taking more action. Decide what your definition of success is in each area of your life, and base this off your potential. So really give your potential some serious thought! In the end, you should be able to tell someone exactly what you want to accomplish in your life at the moment.

Because we are always growing and changing throughout our lives, you may find that some things you thought were very important to you no longer are. It doesn’t matter. What is important to you right now is what matters. There are certain things like financial success or marriage that are a lifetime commitment. However, if you are in sales now and you’re selling cars let’s say, then be the best car salesperson you can be! You might not want to sell cars for the rest of your sales career, but until you figure out what it is you’re passionate about, be passionate about success no matter what!

Wrapping it all up!

You will go much further in life a lot faster with this mindset. You will find that even when things aren’t going exactly your way, you have the capability to persevere and grind it out with this mindset! Keep your focus on success, allow no alternate option. With this mindset, a new season is awaiting. No matter the challenge life presents you will dominate it with positive, massive action.

Define what “Success” means to you

We certainly live in a very competitive, and aggressive sales world. Everyone is working to get attention, get ahead, get successful and blow up. If you’re like a lot of salespeople it’s easy to get caught up in all the pushing and shoving out there. But have you stopped for a minute to give some thought to what it is you really want to accomplish with your career?

Have you defined success in your life?

It’s important to take some time away from the noise and all the pushing and shoving and think about what success looks like to you. Be very careful not to get caught up in the motivational hype and lose sight of what’s really important to YOU in YOUR life. Not what’s important to everyone else, or what everyone else says success looks like.

What do you want to accomplish in your selling career, how far do you want to take your selling success? What about your home life, what does that look like and how does that fit into your professional life? How about your faith, what kind of spiritual maturity do you want to develop over time?

Let me ask you, are the actions you’re taking right now helping you get closer to your definition of what success looks like?

If not, then why?

It’s very true and real more now than ever before that if you live in America you can accomplish great things with just sheer will and determination, hard work and passion, and maybe a smartphone. Just kidding, you don’t need the phone. It’s been done so many times by so many unlikely people that we admire, but the story never gets old. You and I are writing our life stories every day!

Look to achieve worthy Goals

Don’t work just to make money to acquire things, and don’t push yourself to do more and more of something if you aren’t passionate about it. A good reason to push yourself is to achieve a worthy Goal. A goal that is designed around your needs and dreams.

There are a lot of people who have a lot of money and things but feel as if they really have nothing at all. Do you know what I mean? You’ve seen it before, some people have dedicated their lives to acquiring, and in the end still feel empty. There’s nothing wrong with having nice things, and if you don’t want to become rich you’ll probably fib about other things too.

But money can’t be your God because if it is you won’t stand a chance. Money isn’t anything, it’s made from a tree, or a bush or something like that. It’s what money does for you and the freedom and choices it gives you that makes money a worthy goal. The ability to take care of your family, help others in your community, and enjoy things in life money makes possible is what makes money a worthy goal.

Design your goals, including financial, around your Needs and your Dreams for your life. Write down the things you NEED for happiness and to truly feel like a success in life first. Then dream a little bit about your life and how you would like to see it grow and develop if you could really have what you want.

Make a list of Goals for your Life and begin to create the map to your Success

Put these needs and dreams for your life on paper and go big by starting small! Create Dreams and Goals for all areas of your life, define what success looks like to you. Write your goals down from short-term goals as short as goals for today, all the way to your long-term goals about 5 years or more out.

Don’t be afraid to design an entire life of goals, have fun with it because you always have the right to go back and make edits, it’s your life! The key is to think about what success truly looks like to you right now at this point in your life, again not what someone else says is a success, and then design a plan around Goals to achieve your Dreams.

Something important to know, it is estimated that only 3% of the population have goals and take the initiative to write them down. Every book I have ever read on success over the years has included talk about goals and the importance of writing them down.

Tip: GREAT Power to achieve comes from consistently writing your goals down daily to remind your conscious mind and your subconscious mind what you want to achieve. I have experienced it many times in my own life. What you focus on you usually accomplish, good or bad, so have a laser-like focus on your goals!

Over my own life and sales career I have had many goals that I have wanted to achieve, and every time I practiced goal setting to achieve them I had more success faster than the time when I haven’t set goals. When I write my goals down daily, however, my performance changes dramatically.

Write your Goals down!

The simple act of writing my goals down daily has produced periods in my life personally, professionally, and spiritually of magnified success. I have used goal setting, more specifically daily goal setting, to accomplish a radical body transformation in 90 days, become a #1 and 5-Star Rated salesperson, and reach other targets I have set for my life.

But you have to first decide what success looks like to you and what is important to you in your life and sales career. Why do you wake up every day and work hard? What are you working hard for, what’s the Goal? If you aren’t working hard towards your Dreams and Goals, then you’re wandering through your life and you’ll be working hard for someone else to achieve their life’s desire instead of yours.

Some of the best advice from the most successful and motivational people out there today is to follow your dreams and go for it. That’s true you really should go for it in life, you only have one life to live so make sure you live it!  Just be smart, join that 3% and use written goal setting to make sure you get there!

I’m truly rooting for your success, comment below with what success means to you!

I have seen how often times people will get into sales as just a “job in between jobs.” They get into sales because it seems easy enough to do if you can handle the long hours, work the weekends, and handle the customers. If you can handle the pressure, multi-task well, and keep yourself fairly organized you can probably find a sales job somewhere and get by OK.

Lots of salespeople are doing this every single day in the modern world of sales. These salespeople have figured out how to work into their companies system, keep their nose clean, and sell enough to keep the boss happy. In the process, they make a little money for themselves. Often times these same people who were “just going to work in sales until something else came along” end up staying in the game far longer than expected. Some of these people even become good salespeople.

However, most of them receive only a very basic level of sales training. Most are shown some type of sales process but then are left to simply figure it out through trial and error with live customers. Eventually, through some determination and common sense, these salespeople are able to figure out a way to “make it work” for them, and they settle in.

These salespeople are often times good employees to the company, and they are usually liked well enough at the office by their colleagues. They never intentionally skate a fellow co-worker, they give their customers adequate service, enough at least to keep them happy. However, these salespeople rarely leave a major impression on their customers, so their customer loyalty is unpredictable. Have you met a salesperson like the one I have described? Hopefully, this doesn’t describe you! But if it does, what can you do?

See this type of salesperson isn’t a bad salesperson, and often times this salesperson is potentially a very good salesperson that just got stuck in what I call the “average trap” and couldn’t get out. The average trap is when you get comfortable, you get into a routine and you stop challenging yourself to grow and get better. Once you fall into the average trap in one area of your life, it can spread like a disease into all areas of your life quickly.

Are You In The Average Trap In Your Sales Career?

Do you set goals for yourself on a regular basis? If not, this is typically a sign of someone who is trapped in average thinking, average amounts of action, and likely living way below their potential. I have never known a single successful person that didn’t believe it was important to their success to practice goal setting.

You will have a harder time and it will take longer to reach new levels of success in sales if you do not set goals for yourself along the way. You should be constantly trying to improve your performance, using goal setting to raise the bar for yourself over time. Hopefully, your goals at the beginning of your career will look much different than 3, 5, or 10 years down the road. That’s one of the many benefits of goal setting. You can look back and see where you started and how far you’ve come, and that keeps you motivated and gives you a sense of purpose and accomplishment!

Has your sales performance improved over time?

If you’re new to sales then you may not have much data to compare to right now. That’s ok. The important thing for you then is to remember not allow yourself to stay stuck on a plateau for too long. You need to find a way to break out of it as fast as possible. One thing that has always helped me do that is to continue the growth and improvement of my knowledge and selling skills. Too many salespeople who have been selling for some time get stuck in a rut and stay there far too long because they stop doing basics things that made them successful before. Don’t do this!

Also, you need to keep track of your sales performance and analyze it. I would definitely sit down at the end of each month and use the data to prepare for and set goals for the next month. As your sales career progresses and you have more data to analyze you’ll be able to set goals more effectively and ensure you are continually improving your performance.

Have your skills improved over time?

A major red flag and indicator of someone who is stuck in the average trap is someone whose sales skills haven’t improved for long periods of time. You will find this one everywhere nowadays. There are far too many salespeople lacking in their sales skills who have been in sales for some time. Some salespeople call themselves professionals, but in reality, they have very basic selling skills and a lot of experience.  It’s somewhat of an epidemic, and just because you have spent time in sales, doesn’t mean you are a true pro.

In today’s modern selling world it’s important to have the right skills. Those salespeople that have the knowledge and skills will dominate their space. Many of the skills you need in today’s selling climate have to do with technology. If you don’t know how to initiate a sale through email, text, phone, or close a deal through those methods then you will need to get your sales game up to par asap. You need to be constantly training and improving your skills along with staying current with today’s technology.

There Is A Shortage Of Great Salespeople In Today’s World.

Do you realize that there is a shortage of great salespeople? Salespeople are mostly “good enough” nowadays, and unfortunately, there are a few bad salespeople. The bad salespeople make it hard for the profession to shake off the stereotypes that get attached to it. But unfortunately, I don’t think you will ever have any profession where there aren’t some bad apples, sales included. This is why it is so important for these good enough salespeople, who make up the majority of salespeople in the world, to commit themselves to the profession and become great. The world desperately needs more great salespeople. The profession gets stronger every time someone like you commits to their career.

Don’t sell yourself short on this, and if you are new to sales make this something you commit to from the start. Even if your current sales job is just something you are doing until you find something you’re more passionate about. I get that! But you will need these skills, and you will most definitely use the sales skills you learn in your career to be successful in life. So commit to learning as much about sales as you can. You have absolutely nothing to lose and everything to gain! The great news for someone who decides to commit themselves to becoming great is that this shortage of great salespeople around the world will make you so much more valuable to customers and companies. People know right away that they are dealing with someone who is different when they encounter a salesperson with confidence, conviction and who is clearly completely committed to their career.

What Are Some Things That Stand Out About Professional Salespeople?

The Professional Is 100% Committed To Their Career. If you’re going to be considered a real professional, you will need to commit to your career. We have covered this but it truly is a crucial point to understand about becoming great at just about anything in life. No matter who I study, no matter the era, successful people are committed, people. This level of commitment demonstrated by the greats is what allows them to move from failure to success when others would end up simply defeated.

The professional was to be great not average. When you are having a conversation with a professional salesperson you can just feel their desire, the passion for helping their customers as they speak about it. I know for me when I speak with people about sales and the responsibility that comes with being a professional, I get very passionate. There is no shame in wanting to be great in your life, the professional works towards daily.

A professional salesperson is committed to their personal development.

A professional salesperson is one that you will often time find using their free time to work on personal development and their sales skills. I know for me I try to be a constant student and learn something new every day. I am an advocate for sales training, and I believe it needs to be done daily to stay sharp! A professional is constantly growing and redefining themselves becoming better versions of themselves over time. A true professional is committed to their personal development.

One of the problems I see in many salespeople is they aren’t completely sold themselves on whether becoming a professional is worth the time and effort. New salespeople hear all the horror stories of failed sales jobs and think that’s what’s in it for them. They think a sales job mean they’ll be overworked and underpaid. Well, let me begin by saying that by now I should have made a pretty good case as to why you would want to consider putting in the effort to become a great salesperson. I want to sell you on becoming great because to me it makes no sense to be in sales and think otherwise. I want you to see that the effort it takes to reach your potential in sales is no greater than the effort to be average.

I actually believe it takes more out of a salesperson to produce below their potential than it does to take massive action towards achieving it. When you aren’t living up to your potential, it brings your spirit and will to win down. It brings your attitude down and limits your success. You are always better off working towards your potential and taking positive action! I believe we are created in God’s image, uniquely designed by the creator himself to do amazing things with the abilities he has blessed us with for our lives here on earth. If you are not using your gifts and abilities, it’s only natural that you will feel guilty about this. It’s only natural that you will have this little voice in the back of your head that is calling for you constantly.

Some people get good at ignoring that voice, and they do it for so long eventually it becomes harder and harder to hear. At some point, the voice gets so low and weak that it’s no longer there at all. This is the “numb” stage of the average trap. This is where you have been living below your potential for so long you are now sold on this level of existence and have accepted it. The good news is you can be “unsold” on this thinking, and that’s what I am hoping to do for you. When you are new to sales it’s like anything else in life that is new and interesting. Whether it’s a new relationship, a new friendship, a new car, a new career, whatever it is it doesn’t matter. When it’s new you are excited and it’s easy to be fully committed to it, you are sold. You’re sold and that’s why you exhibit such energy and enthusiasm day after day in the beginning.

You need to maintain that commitment and excitement for your sales career right from the beginning. Like every profession, sales has its ups and downs, but you have the ability to choose how you’re going to handle it and deal with it. Stay sold on your goals and the things you wish to accomplish in your career. Listen to that little voice that tells you to do big things and dream about great accomplishments. Learn to make this way of thinking your lifestyle.

Here Are Some Things I Think About To Stay Sold On My Sales Career!

Committing myself to greatness and maintaining professionalism at all times is very rewarding personally and professionally. My sales career allows me to have a purpose, I am able to help people through the products and services I sell. I create the buying experience my customers want and frankly deserve. My sales career makes my life about more than just me because I am responsible for all my customers.

I acquire ongoing knowledge because of my profession, which in turn makes me more valuable to my customers and the company I work for. Customers will pay more to do business with you if you are able to handle things for them efficiently, and professionally. It is a very rewarding feeling to know that someone is willing to pay a little more because they know you will be worth it. That is creating personal value and worth!

I have been able to create some wonderful relationships over my years selling. You will hopefully find this to be one of your favorite parts of sales as you get started. I would recommend to you that you get involved with your customers right from the start. Establish yourself a great follow up system. You are in the people business first and foremost, and people still choose to buy from salespeople they like AND trust every day. I have also developed a tremendous sense of “job security” since committing to and becoming a sales professional. I know that no matter where I go, I know how to sell. I know how to create an opportunity and sell, so there will always be work for someone like myself. A professional knows that his services are always needed because there is such a shortage of great professional salespeople in today’s world.

My sales career offers me the opportunity to make the income I desire. This is something you can really use to motivate yourself in sales if you are driven by financial reward. If you are not money motivated, that’s ok I get that too. Personally, I am more motivated by what money does for me than I am the actual money itself. But no matter your view on money, there is no denying the fact that the more money you have, the more people you can help and freedom you will enjoy. A sales career can offer great financial rewards, especially for someone who is committed to becoming a professional and focuses on their training. I love to train and it brings me a greater sense of accomplishment knowing that I can handle myself in the sales process and produce a successful income for myself and my family.

With customers researching more and more online now than ever before, today’s customer is full of information and looking for someone to help them sort it all out. There is a need for the salesperson just as much today as there was 20 years ago. As technology gets more and more sophisticated our customers will need us more in different ways. If you don’t commit yourself now, you will be left behind. A sales career is no different than any other career, if you don’t know what you’re doing you won’t be successful. If you are not successful you eventually won’t enjoy selling and may even develop a disdain for sales. If you have decided that you want to be great in your sales career, and you want to become a professional salesperson, make sure you commit yourself to continued training and learning. I am rooting for you to be a great salesperson because I love this profession and I want to see more great salespeople out there having success in their careers. I want people to look at a career in sales and see it for what it can be, a wonderful opportunity to create a truly successful life.

Wrapping it all up!

Well, I hope at this point I have made my case to you about the choice you have to make. Regardless, you will make a choice. Will you choose to become a professional, and enjoy a successful career in sales? Or will you choose to remain an amateur status, consistently falling short of your true potential? What kind of a choice are you going to make? In today’s world sales is all about “what have you done for me lately?” You deserve to enjoy a career that offers you personal, professional, and financial fulfillment. Your customers are going to change more and more, and if you don’t choose wisely for your sales career and decide to commit yourself to becoming a pro, you will be left trying to keep your head above water.

So you may be new to sales, or maybe you have been in sales for a little while now and you’re asking yourself the same question many people in sales jobs ask themselves. Is this a way of life for me? For some people, a sales position may not be the right career. However, even if you are not a professional salesperson, or you find that a career in sales isn’t your thing, just remember that EVERYONE on planet earth sells to get what they want. How successful, happy, and fulfilled you are in life is determined in part by the level to which you can sell others on your ideas, wants, desires, products or services. Selling is not only a way of life, It impacts the quality of our lives tremendously. 

One of the things I am most grateful for is that I have become a professional salesperson. I am also a constant student, always looking for ways to improve. When you understand the sales process from start to finish, you can always create income for yourself by selling. When you know how to sell, you never have to worry about providing for your family, and in most cases the more hustle you add to skill the bigger the checks!

If you are just starting out in your sales career and find that you’re asking yourself whether or not sales is for you, I want to share a few things with you that have stuck with me over the years and have truly helped me build a successful career. These next points will make you be more effective at the beginning of your career and build the foundation you need for lasting success, and avoid negative setbacks or mentality. You will question yourself less, instead of asking whether this is a way of life, you will hopefully begin to see selling as a great way of life!

For Starters, You Need To Be Honest

This couldn’t be truer in sales. You really need to remember that honesty is always the best way to handle every situation, Period! You want to build a sales career on a foundation of honesty. You want people to trust you because when they trust you they stay loyal. They stay loyal because they know you have their best interest in mind. You also want to have a reputation for honesty and fairness among your peers. If you are in a sales environment where you work on a team, it’s vital you’re always honest about your dealings with your co-workers. Nothing can ruin a salesperson faster than getting a reputation for dishonesty, or taking what’s not theirs.

So remember, your role as a salesperson is to supply the customer with enough information to make a good buying decision. You want to give honest facts, comparisons, testimonials, advice, and you want to be honest in every way. You also want to treat others in your office the same. Fair and Honest. In the end, it will always be worth it. By always doing the right thing you will have less stress, happier customers, better working relationships and bigger paychecks throughout your career.

You Need To Have A Great Attitude

This one goes without saying, you need a great attitude. I did an entire post on attitude, you can read that here. However, when you are new to sales there is a 90-day phenomenon that seems to exist. This is where a new salesperson will come in and start off hot right out the gates. Their sales performance is great, their attitude is great, and they make sales! However, it seems like after 90 days something happens to the new salesperson. Don’t lose your excitement, Attitude makes all the difference in a sales career! Maybe you get some negative information about your product, service, company, or whatever it is and now your attitude isn’t as good about things as it was before. You start to focus on things that you didn’t pay any attention to in the first few months, and the result is your sales performance suffers.

Keep your attitude where it needs to be. It needs to be great! No attitude other than a great one is going to pay you in sales, trust me. You cannot have a massively successful career in sales with a bad, negative attitude. No-one is going to want to work with you, manage you, or buy from you. Keep your attitude great, keep it positive, and you’ll have more success in sales and enjoy your career!

How hard you hustle makes a difference

For ten years of my sales career, I worked as a salesperson, and then sales manager and trainer for a large furniture company. My mentor during this era of my career was the CEO of the company. He took me under his wing and taught me the skills I have built my career on. He also taught me the quality of hard work and hustle.

He was and probably still is the hardest working person I’ve ever seen. He was tremendously successful with his business, a true inspiration for me. Ever since then I have known that as long as I am capable and willing to hustle, I can be successful in my life. Basically, my belief has always been however much I am willing to put of myself into something, I can expect to receive that in return. I can’t put 50% effort into something and expect 100% in return, right? I learned very quickly hard work was the way to see major success in sales, and life! So I hustled and worked hard. The harder I worked the more success I had. You really need to hustle, especially in today’s competitive selling environment. One of the biggest value adds to your customer is your amount of hustle. People like working with someone who hustles and isn’t afraid to do hard work. They’re usually willing to pay more for the level of service that comes from someone who hustles!

So if you’re new to sales maybe bringing some light to these things will help you realize that a career in sales is a great career to choose. You can shake off the uncertainty of whether this is a way of life for you or not. Commit and go all in. A sales career requires hard work, passion, persistence, and a great attitude to become successful. OK, so what if you are honest, you have a great attitude, and you hustle like crazy always looking to go that extra mile for people and still find yourself questioning things. You might feel like selling is something you could be really good at, and you like helping people, but for some reason, your performance is always up and down. Why is it so hard for you to have the consistency in your job that brings the consistent income as well? Well, ask yourself this:

Are you getting the training you need?

Regardless of tenure, every salesperson needs training. Actually, you need daily training, and you need training specific to your skill set, as well as a regular practice of the basics. This is no different than the old analogy we’ve all heard before about why professional athletes like Tom Brady practice the basics, run plays over and over, and watch hours of tape all week long before game day on Sunday. It’s no different as a salesperson, only your game tape is role-playing with a co-worker. Your plays are knowing your product knowledge so when your customer has a question you are an authority on what you sell.

You need to know the sales process, selling skills, closing skills, prospecting skills, follow up skills and techniques for every part of your job. To become a professional in your sales career you need to acquire not only experience but technical skill and understanding of the profession. If you are questioning whether sales is it for you, most likely you are not getting the results you want. Without the professional training, you need your sales results will always be up and down as well as your attitude about the job.

I am a big believer in training. You must keep the saw sharp and training daily does just that. I highly recommend YOU invest in your own training if your company doesn’t already offer training to you. I don’t mean Saturday meetings or a once a quarter get together. I am talking about technology that offers daily training and support to your sales career.  If you are able to have success in sales you will enjoy sales. But it’s really like that with everything, isn’t it? I mean, if you are a teacher and you aren’t able to teach your students, how much are you going to enjoy being a teacher? Get the proper and ongoing training you need so you can succeed in your sales career!

Another thing that some people really struggle with when they are in sales is the commission. For some reason, this word has become almost as dirty as the word PROFIT! Or, the other side of the coin with the commission, and this I think is more common, is the fear of the unknown. Many people fear to work on straight commission or a pay scale that heavily weighted towards commissions opposed to a fixed salary or hourly wage. Are you unsure about working on commission? Well, everything is a commission in life!

I would choose being paid on commission over a fixed salary or fixed hourly wage EVERY SINGLE TIME. I always want to be in control of my income. I don’t want to be told how much I can make. That’s the beauty of a commissioned sales career. As I mentioned above, if you hustle and work hard, the sky is the limit. Assuming, of course, you work for a company that doesn’t cap your commissions in some way and personally I never would. Working on commission shouldn’t cause you to be concerned or stressed, instead, it should motivate and excite you to set your own income goal and then go out, take action and achieve it. Working on commission is freeing and truly the American way. If sales are your career, I wouldn’t get paid any other way!

Finally, remember this about the commission. It’s not a dirty word. Everything in life is a commission. When you find the right person in life and treat them right, the commission is love, friendship, and happiness. When you go to school, work hard, study and apply yourself the commission is good grades, scholarships, and opportunity. I could go on and on. It’s foolish to think only “salespeople” work for commissions. Commissions are a good thing and everyone works for a commission in some way, remember that!

Wrapping it all up!

A sales career can be a great way of life. Selling is a very important profession, and I hope I have made my case as to why it’s vital to your success in life regardless if you choose it for a career or not. If it is your career, remember that what you do every day is significant. You need to be honest and have integrity at all times.You need to have a great attitude and hustle. There is nothing that can replace the hard work you need to put in in order to have a successful career. Make sure you get the training you need and be willing to invest in yourself when necessary to acquire the skills and knowledge you need to consistently succeed at high levels and earn big commissions.

I am my Brand.

Everything that we do and everything that we don't do is going to affect our personal brand. In today's world if you want to have extraordinary results, especially as a salesperson in the car business you MUST establish a brand. That brand must fill a need, offer a service, and consistently deliver on an experience time and time again so people give you their trust and business, and best of all send you referrals.

We must take extreme ownership and do what it takes to get above the noise in our communities and become THE go-to guy or gal for the product we sell. If you sell New GM vehicles then ask yourself, what makes you the best option for your customers and what are you doing ahead of time to make sure they already know that or someone is telling them that by the time they realize they have the need?

We all need to take extreme ownership of our career, and our personal brand. So here are a few tips to make sure from the initial contact online to the meeting in the dealership that you are the ONLY option your customers consider.

1- Be Genuine

We must make sure whatever claims we make on social media or in person, whatever you say you will do, make sure it's genuine so you are able to deliver on it each and every time. Don't say you're available 24/7 if you don't answer your phone on Sunday's. Make sure you set the right expectations, become known for honesty, integrity, and reliability, they're HUGE! 

2- Be Informative

I know you want to have extraordinary results and become successful as a car salesman or woman, and nowadays you need to stay aware of the market, know the industry, and be engaged with your network and community. We need to show that our brand has real value, and part of the value we can bring is INFORMATION! We can be informative and truly be a resource people refer to when our services are needed.

3- Be Open to Change

It's no secret that things are much different in the car business now than they were 20 years ago, even 5 years ago in some parts of the country and world. If your brand is going to be successful, if we are going to be successful in the car business, we must be open to change. Changes in technology, processes, mindsets, practices, whatever it is we must be open to change when change is good. So if you never used Facebook or LinkedIn before to sell cars and you have enough word of mouth to sell your 20-30 cars a month great. But 99% of salespeople are not you. So be open to change and never think you've have seen, heard or learned it all (Or at least share this blog with them. :) ).

Take extreme ownership of your brand and you will begin to see greater results, I promise!

Some of the most successful people in this world and to ever live would tell you that hard work is required to become very successful. To think that hard work isn't necessary to become a success is arrogant and naive. However, is just working hard really the answer?

You can work really hard every night after work on your golf swing, you can spend hours each evening in your backyard honing in your swing. But if you are working hard practicing the wrong mechanics, you won't become successful on the golf course and shoot a low score. No, you have to focus your efforts on practicing correct mechanics so you can accomplish your goal of playing good golf.

I think we tend to give the advice to other people who want to succeed that they need to work hard, which they do, but we need to be careful not to lead them to think that just working bell to bell is going to make success happen. In sales, especially car sales, if you're not working hard on the right things you will end up becoming very unhappy and miserable working many hours for little reward.

So if you want to get better at anything, be successful in the car business or any business, lose weight, find a great partner, make new friends, or anything else you need to work hard on the things that will allow you to have success in that area of your life... but work hard on the right things, don't just put in a lot of time and effort being busy.

You can learn a lot about selling, customer service, marketing, negotiating, cold calling, the sales process, the car business, people, the human mind, and anything else you want to know about from ready books, watching videos on YouTube, or following thought leaders and successful people all over the internet and social media. You will find that anything you want to do well at comes down to working really hard on just a few things, maybe even just one.

So in 2018 be sure to focus your efforts on the right things, the few things, maybe even that one thing that you can work really hard at and achieve extraordinary results! 

What does it mean to grind it out? The “Grind” is a very popular mantra with many modern motivational leaders and entrepreneurs. Hustle and Grind. You hear these terms all the time, regardless if you’re listening to a fitness expert or a sales trainer. But what does it mean to truly grind it out? Learn how grinding it out can change your life and your career.

You Must Be All In, 100% Committed

First of all being able to grind it out requires that you’re all in. You must be completely committed. If you’re not, it will be nearly impossible for you to stick with whatever you’re doing amidst major challenge or set back. You may be able to handle one or two challenges. But if you’re not truly all in and committed, eventually you will give up on your pursuit. You’ll allow excuses to ruin your chances. Don’t do this. Part of grinding it out is digging in deep and staying with something even when times get tough and you want to quit.

If you decide to do something, if you truly want something in your life, go for it and be all in. When a failure or a major challenge show up along the way, being all in will force you to find a way to keep grinding. Make no other option available for yourself. Burn the ships as they say. Go All In, and regardless of what you are faced with for hurdles, remember to keep grinding.

You Either Win Or Die Trying

Being all in also requires you be true to yourself and who you really are. You have to understand that the only thing you can control is yourself. You have to take full responsibility for everything you do, every choice that you make. Don’t be a victim of life, playing a victim harms your ability to reach your true potential. It stunts your growth. The victim is always a victim, and never a victor.

You have to be your own biggest fan, and be true to who you are. Throughout life, you will have mentors. If you don’t have any now, you should find some. Find someone or a few people that are successful in life and that you admire. Pick mentors that are much more successful than you are. Choose mentors that you will likely not outgrow anytime soon. You may find yourself imitating these mentors in certain ways. But, remember to always make everything your own. Be genuine.

Trust Your Instincts, Especially About Other People

Be mindful of your sales career, know who you should and shouldn’t be spending your time with. I try to remember something a friend told me years ago. He said, “Only a Fool Doesn’t Listen.” It’s true, you would be a fool to not listen to opportunity when it’s presented to you in your career. Just remember the grass isn’t always greener on the other side. There is no substitution for hard work. Watch out for scams and big promises! In your sales career, you will need other people if you are to be successful at the highest levels. Even for the most independent sales professional, there is support staff that keep the sales machine moving forward. If you can get everyone in your life on the same page with you, it makes achieving your goals that much faster. When the people who are closest to you understand your commitment level, and compliment that with their attitudes and actions, it makes it easier for you to reach your potential. Regardless, you need to take full responsibility for the people in your life, make sure they understand where you’re coming from. You cannot be all in on something and have someone in your immediate circle like a husband or wife for instance that is not. It won’t work.

Don’t Try To Figure Everything Out All At Once

Maybe you just want to reach a certain income level right now. Or, you may want to one day be known as one of greatest in your industry. Maybe you just want to be successful financially so you have more time to spend doing the things you love to do, with the people you love the most. Whatever your goals are, don’t spend all your time trying to figure everything out. TAKE ACTION! It’s no secret, all the successful people we admire say you have to take massive action if you want to be massively successful in life. Taking normal levels of activity will not create amazing results. So many times we want to figure it out first and perfect our plan before we act. We fear we will fail if we don’t have it all figured out first. What you need to do is just take action. Just get started on whatever it is you want to accomplish in your career and life.

Grinding It Out Means You’re Relentless, You Never Quit

You don’t even consider the idea of quitting. When you make a mistake, when you get set back by something or someone, you just find a way to keep moving forward. You regroup and find a better way, and you learn from your mistakes. However, what is better than learning from making mistakes, is learning from the mistakes of others. Part of grinding it out is studying others and always being a student. If you want to make more sales, you need to study how to sell. If you want more money, you need to understand money so it doesn’t avoid you and leave you easily. If you want better relationships with people, studying human behavior and relationships would be beneficial. The greatest in any field are constant students, never too proud to learn something new, or learn a better or more efficient way to do something.

Don’t be afraid to put in the time, and do the hard work. Anything worth doing, anything that will bring great reward to you, will require hard work and probably some patience on your part. Often times we look at successful people and assume they were lucky, that their success was easy. We don’t know about all the hard work, the failures, the times they were told no or doubted themselves before they finally became successful. Often the super successful are regular people like you and me that just simply believed in what they were doing, they refused to quit,  and then they had their breakthrough.

Many Times People Miss Their Breakthrough By Quitting Just Before Their Big Break Comes

Please, don’t let this happen to you. Don’t sell yourself short by giving up on yourself. Always look for one more way to give it another try. The only way you can fail in life is if you quit. Don’t quit, persist relentlessly. Grind it out! This is especially important to remember in sales. If you are new to sales, you will want to remember that rejection is part of the game, and it’s not personal. Keep moving forward. Every no you hear brings you closer to hearing a yes. If you are doing your best, and you have the proper training, then it’s just a matter of persistence. The more stick-with-it-ness you have in sales, the more successful you will be. I have seen new salespeople come in and have a very hard time with this. Rejection can be hard for certain people. They take it personally. When someone says no to you in sales, you have to remember they are saying no to your offer, not to you. Many times all this no requires in order to make it a yes, is the willingness to stay in there and keep working hard to get a yes.

Nothing Great Can Be Achieved Without The Ability To Grind It Out

Grinding it out doesn’t have to be seen as something that is bad, or dreadful. Grinding it out means you have found a passion within yourself to put your best effort into everything you do. You have come to a place where you refuse to settle for less than you deserve. You can decide right now that you refuse to be one of those people that just dream about what they want but never gets to experience it. Be determined, commit, go all in and decide to get everything life has to offer you. Use your unique abilities and talents that God gave you to go out into the marketplace and get your piece of the pie. Bring value to everything you do. The ultimate goal is to get yourself to a point in life where you can have true freedom,  where you can choose how you spend your time.

Wrapping it all up!

So the goal is to get yourself to a point where you do everything on your terms, and you do it with intent. Even if you’re not doing exactly what you want to be doing right now, you can choose to take responsibility for that, be awesome at what you are doing, and take steps towards what you truly want. You can choose. You have free will. You have one life to live so you have to take action on this now! Grind it out every day. Each day gets the most out of life that you can. Be willing to grind and do whatever it takes to reach your goals, to be yourself and stay true to you. The people you are around will respect you because you are genuine, you are real. Your choices won’t always be right, and you’ll never be perfect. However, refuse to quit. Take that option off the table. Commit to making it work, and grinding it out no matter what. You will find the freedom, and the success you are looking for in life if you do.

Do you want to be successful and accomplish great things with your God-given potential? I know I do, but it can be overwhelming trying to figure out what you need to do each and every day to move in the direction of success and get the results you expect from yourself. Are you making the same mistake that myself and so many people make every day of trying to do everything instead of narrowing your focus to the few things that will lead to the greatest results by following a proven principal for success?

Many people determined to be successful mistake being busy and taking lots of action for succeeding, or think that's what it takes to be successful. While I agree 100% with people like Tony Robbins and Grant Cardone who say to take massive action, I also believe that management consultant Joseph M. Juran gave us a simple formula for success and focusing our actions most effectively when he suggested the Pareto Principal named after economist Vilfredo Pareto, otherwise known as the 80/20 Rule.

In sales, as it is with anything in life that you want to have extraordinary results, your success is not determined by how many things you do, but by how narrow you can make your focus and take massive action on the few small things that make all the results you want actually happen. Your goal should be to do a few things really well, not to do everything. It's critical that you determine what matters most to your success and then do those things!

The 80/20 Rule suggests that a small amount, 20% of what you do and actions you take will create most of your success or 80%. Basically, the majority of what you want in anything in life including your sales career will come from the minority of what you do. The problem is that we get caught in a trap of thinking everything matters equally, but that's not the case, some things really do matter more and some things just need to be removed from our routines until those important actions have been taken and completed.

I know I have found myself in the mindset of thinking because I am busy I am being productive, have you done this before? You're checking email instead of making more calls, or organizing your files instead of following up customers from the previous day. Yes, you are busy when you're doing those things and they have their place and time but are you being the most productive you can be is what you need to ask yourself.

"Don't focus on being busy, focus on being productive, what matters most should fuel your day!" - Gary Keller

It's your responsibility to drill down to the few actions that are going to produce the most results. You need to give this some thought and consideration, maybe speak with your mentor or if you don't have one look to connect with someone in your space who is successful doing what you are doing and find out what things they do to produce all that success. I promise you the most successful people follow the 80/20 Rule whether they realize it or not.

Once you have figured out those key actions or maybe it's simply ONE thing that will make all the difference you have to be disciplined and say no to distractions. This might mean you don't check your email every hour, or you don't organize your files right away. Say no to whatever is NOT the most important work of the day until the most important work has been done.

Remember the point of this principle for success and what I am trying to drive home to you here, is that not all actions matter equally, and success will come from doing the thing/s that matter the most, I promise. When you develop this mindset you will see your results start to increase, and then you can take it even further by drilling down to what is the 20% of the 20% of actions and so on until you find the single most important thing you need to be doing each and every day to fuel your results.

You may not like to hear this but some customers are going to be much more valuable than others, some people in your life will create most your business success, and just a few financial decisions will result in most your financial success in life. It is just how it works, whether we like it or not! But if you don't figure out who and what these things are that are most important, you will be left with average results far less than your potential.

I challenge you to begin to apply the 80/20 Rule to your life and see what happens, give thought to the actions you take and drill down to the single most important, the 20% of what you do that produces 80% or more of your results and then take massive action on those few things. Continue to drill down until you know exactly what it is that will produce success, and then repeat.

Remember that doing the most important thing each day is always the most important thing, and by following this principle for success you will increase your chances of reaching your potential and enjoying the successes meant for you in life.

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