The Real Trouble with Assumptions By Colleen Francis

Honest, effective communication hinges on being able to make a distinction between what we know and what we think we know, and to apply this to our professional and personal interactions with clients, friends, colleagues and associates.

This is a concept that was articulated at length by Dr. Brad Blanton in his book, Practicing Radical Honesty: How to Complete the Past, Live in the Present and Build a Future with a Little Help from Your Friends. He describes this distinction along the lines of what is noticed and what is imagined.

To explain this important distinction, let’s look at some examples:

* You notice a colleague arrives 30 minutes late for an internal sales review. You might think that this person simply forgot about the meeting, and your manager sitting across from you might notice the late arrival and assume that this person just doesn’t care about the meeting.

* You notice that the man across from you at a sales meeting is wearing a red tie. What you think you see is a tie that is fashionable, and someone else might notice it and think it’s not fashionable.

* You notice that a client did not return your phone call as promised. You might think it’s because they have chosen a competitor’s product instead. Someone else might assume there’s another reason for the unreturned call (e.g., because the client is on vacation).

The things we see—what we notice—are matters of fact, such as appearance, words or actions. The rest of our experiences are based on subjectivity—what we think we see or what we imagine.

Assumptions can cloud the path to honest communication. People can confuse what they think they see with what they know by verifiable fact to be true. In other words, they can think their opinions are facts. In sales this can lead to trouble.

Learning to distinguish between imagination and fact—between what we think we see and what we know—can pay important dividends in our professional lives. Let’s look at some case studies that explore how this simple distinction can affect the sales success of an organization.

1. Motivating a Sales Force ...

A reward can be a great motivator, but there are perils in giving rewards that you think people will want. Consider the following example:

Recently during a coaching session, Brian, the sales director of an international software company, shared an example of how he attempted to motivate a series of teams. The end of fiscal year was fast approaching and his teams were dangerously close to not hitting their revenue targets.

To get things back on track, Brian promised each team that its members would be treated to a company-sponsored ski trip if the sales numbers were met. Sales started to grow everywhere except for one team on the West coast. Brian reminded this team about the ski trip, hoping to increase their productivity, but to no avail.

Later, the leader of the West coast team gave him an insight into what went wrong: none of the team members were enticed by the skiing offer because none could ski very well… and no one owned the equipment required to participate in the trip.

By attempting to use what he imagined would be a good motivator for everyone; Brian accomplished the opposite with his West coast team.

2. Initiative ...

In sales and in life, imagined assumptions can cripple us if we’re not careful. It not only affects how we interact with others, it can also significantly influence our careers.

Not long ago, I noticed that a client in the insurance business — let’s call him Kevin — had stopped taking the initiative for new marketing ideas and business development.

Several months earlier, Kevin’s boss, Susan, had told him he was in line to be promoted as the new sales director for the region. But months passed without a follow-up discussion about the promotion. Kevin began to imagine that his boss had changed her mind.

In retaliation, he stopped assuming a leadership role, ceased all initiatives and performed only the necessary tasks associated with his position.

After a lengthy period of feeling resentful, Kevin sought out and found a new job. In his exit interview with Susan, he confronted her about being overlooked for the position. He maintained that this demonstrated a lack of respect for his work and that was why he was leaving the company.

Susan was genuinely surprised and said she would have promoted him a long time ago, but had assumed he didn’t want the promotion because of the extra hours it required.

She explained that she had noticed how Kevin had earlier complained about working long hours and not having time enough for his family. Later, Kevin’s frustration appeared to Susan to be a lack of initiative.

A short conversation could have prevented this misunderstanding. Instead, valuable resources went untapped, hard feelings were harbored and everyone lost something.

3. Customer Feedback ...

When consulting with clients, we often observe salespeople avoiding or refusing to deal with a problem, because they imagine that addressing it could anger a customer and send them to the competition. In these situations, we’re inclined to ask whether this behavior creates customer-service issues or disloyal customers down the road.

A customer-service team at a software company was dealing with an error in their software that a client had complained about. The team sensed there was no satisfactory answer to the problem.

The development team indicated that it would take more than nine months to fix it. The customer-service team assumed that the client wanted the problem fixed immediately and that they would be unhappy to hear this news. Weeks passed. The customer-service team delayed calling the client back. Not surprisingly, the client became angry and imagined that the company didn’t care about them. Finally, the client called and demanded to know what was going on.

In the end, this team was responsible for losing the client to the competition because of a perceived notion that the company was indifferent to their needs. Engage Selling Solutions later reviewed this case and concluded that if the customer-service team had chosen to double-check what they had imagined to be true and had provided up front, honest answers, they would have solved the matter to everyone’s satisfaction.

I often observe sales managers or sales teams wrongly concluding that a customer offering negative feedback is simply a troublemaker or a problem client. Worse still, sales teams will make a concerted effort to avoid communicating with that client. That’s when trouble ensues.

When an organization ignores its customers, it has to rely on more — but has to make decisions with less — factual information. The client, in turn, must do the same. With both parties relying on their imaginations to guide them instead of the facts, a bad situation can easily become worse.

Keep this statistic in mind: sixty-seven percent of business is lost every year because of customers who imagine that their service provider is indifferent to their needs and wants. That’s a staggering amount of lost sales for any organization — and it’s especially difficult to accept when mistaken assumptions are at the root of the problem. Without honest communication, an organization cannot understand the true needs and wants of its clients.

4. Customer Service ...

Credible customer service must be rooted in good faith. Consider the following example in which a salesperson made promises that turned out to be too good to be true.

A project group with a hardware manufacturer lost millions of dollars on a contract simply because they wrongly assumed (imagined) they knew what the client expected. In this case, the client made requests for items and services that were not part of the existing contract.

The group assumed that if they signaled that they were unable to fulfill such requests within the allotted resources, the client would become upset and possibly terminate the existing contract or refuse to grant work to the group in the future. The group fulfilled the client’s requests, figuring they would somehow find a way to satisfy everybody.

Instead, it was unable to satisfy anyone. As time passed, they fell behind in their work…very behind. Rather than say anything, they used excuses to protect themselves in the event the truth was discovered. But these excuses took up even more time and caused further delays to the project. Eventually the project had to be stopped. Not only did the company lose the client, the group was also dismantled. Many talented people lost their jobs. The client hired another company and paid even more money for services because that company was up front and managed expectations of what could and could not be accomplished.

The Trouble with Assumptions ...

Assumptions abound for each of us every day. It’s a valid and important part of human thought processes. The trouble with assumptions — arriving at conclusions based on what we think we know — arises when we don’t check them against verifiable facts. In business and sales, this can present a significant problem in the way we interact and communicate with clients and potentials.

Consider the missed opportunities when a prospect reaches a completely wrong conclusion about you, because of assumptions made by either party (or both). Have you ever hesitated to ask whether your prospect was the real decision-maker for a project, worried that you might offend him if he wasn’t?

We have covered many examples in which people hurt their credibility and undermined their own potential simply by not keeping their assumptions in check.

Learning not to assume, and check in to find out the real reason an action was taken is an indispensable skill to have — one that will serve you well in your career whether you’re an ambitious junior sales associate or a seasoned vice-president of sales for a Fortune 500 company.
___________
Colleen Francis is the Founder and President of Engage Selling Solutions, which delivers sales solutions that realize immediate results, achieve lasting success and permanently raise the client's bottom line. She can be reached at EngageSelling.com.

* Read more sales training advice from Colleen Francis ...
- Snap Out of It: 13 Tips for Breaking out of a Slump and Getting Back on Track

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Your Ideal Self and Life By Brian Tracy

Your self-concept is made up of three parts, each of which affects each of the others. Understanding these three parts enables you to put your hands on the keyboard of your own mental computer.

When you learn to take charge of the development of a new and positive self-concept of selling, you can then control your sales destiny for the rest of your career.

Determine Your Direction...
The first part of the self-concept is the "self-ideal." Your self-ideal largely determines the direction in which you are going with your life. It guides the growth and evolution of your character and personality.

Your self-ideal is a combination of all of the qualities and attributes of other people that you most admire. Your self-ideal is a description of the person you would very much like to be if you could embody the qualities that you most aspire to.

Strive Toward Excellence...
Throughout your life, you have seen and read about the qualities of courage, confidence, compassion, love, fortitude, perseverance, patience, forgiveness and integrity.

Over time, these qualities have instilled in you an ideal to which you aspire. You might not always live up to the very best that you know, but you are constantly striving to be a better person in light of those qualities that you value so highly.

In fact, everything that you do on a day-to-day basis is affected by your comparing your activities with these ideal qualities and your striving to behave consistently with them.

Clarity is Essential...
Successful salespeople have very clear ideals for themselves and their careers. Unsuccessful salespeople have fuzzy ideals. Successful salespeople are very clear about being excellent in every part of their work and their personal lives. Unsuccessful salespeople don't give the subject very much thought.

One of the primary characteristics of successful men and women in every walk of life is that they have very clearly defined ideals and they are very aware of whether or not their current behaviors are consistent with their idealized behaviors.

Set Challenging Goals...
Part of your ideals are your goals. As you set higher and more challenging goals, your self-ideal improves and crystallizes.

When you set goals for the kind of person you want to be and the kind of life you want to live, your self-ideal rises and becomes a greater guiding and motivating force in your life.

Your Future is Unlimited...
Perhaps the most important thing for you to realize is that whatever anyone else has done or become, you can do or become as well. Improvements in your self-ideal begin in your imagination, and in your imagination, there are no limits except the ones that you accept.

What is your ideal vision of the very best person you could possibly become? How would you behave each day if you were already that person? Asking yourself these questions and then living your life consistent with the answers is the first step to creating yourself in your ideal image.

Action Exercises:
Here are two things you can do immediately to put these ideas into action.

First, dream big dreams. Set big, exciting, challenging goals and ideals for yourself in every part of your life. Allow yourself to imagine a wonderful life ahead.

Second, think about how you would act if you were an outstanding person in every way. Then, practice being this person, as though you were acting a role in a play. You'll immediately notice a difference in your behavior.
____________
Brian Tracy is one of the world's leading authorities on personal and business success. His fast-moving talks and seminars are loaded with powerful, proven ideas and strategies that you can apply immediately to get better results in every area. Visit the Brian Tracy web site.

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Want to close more deals? Forget the old school way of selling and re-connect with the rookie in you By John Costigan

Can you remember the last time you walked into a car dealership looking to buy a vehicle? I bet your experience went something like this: First, you were introduced to the countless feature benefits that made that particular automobile the number one choice in its category.

Then you were probably invited to go for a test-drive so that you could experience, first hand, all of the wonderful things that splendid piece of machinery could do for you. Upon returning to the lot, you were likely greeted with a beaming smile followed by that quintessential question: “Mr.Customer, what’s it going to take to earn your business.” Ring a bell? Now ask yourself: at that moment, were you anywhere near a real commitment to buy that car?

I chose to preface this article with a car-buying anecdote for a very simple reason. We’ve all been there. We’ve all been subjected to the old-school way of selling that starts with the feature benefits pitch, followed by a product demo and ends with the salesperson asking you for your business. And if you can see what’s wrong with this picture, you are halfway there to closing more deals. So let me get right to it:

There are two critical problems with the old school approach to selling. Firstly, by starting off with a benefits pitch and following with a demo you are not, in any way, securing a commitment to buy from your customer. Secondly, by asking them what you need to do to earn their business, you are losing all your leverage. As a matter of fact, if you do close the deal after asking that question I can guarantee you it will not be as good a deal as you could have gotten had you taken a different approach.

Begin with information gathering to get the customer to open up to you. This should go on for about 15 to 30 minutes, or until you’ve learned enough to really leverage the prospect’s pains to your advantage. For most salespeople, listening is the absolute hardest thing to do. Instead, we want to talk about ourselves and the wonderful products we sell. I can’t emphasize enough how important it is that you break this habit.

Try to remember what it was like when you first started out. Most likely, you didn’t know the product that well and you hadn’t quite found that sales “mojo” that has made you the chatterbox you are today. So what did you do? You let the customer do most of the talking. If you want to start closing more deals, you best start reconnecting with the rookie in you.

Now that you’ve learned all you can about the customer, the issues he’s been having and the consequences he’ll face unless he fixes his problems, resist the temptation to pitch benefits or do a product demo. Close immediately. For those of you skeptics out there thinking it can’t be done, you better believe it! Here’s how: you ask your customer to clearly define the next steps. “Mr. Customer, if we could fix all of these problems for you, what would happen next?”

Find out exactly what the decision process entails and who are the key players. Have you noticed how you are still in control? And what’s even better: You have essentially gotten the prospect to commit to moving the deal forward without ever having to beg for it. Now all you need to do is check back with your company and make sure that you can, in fact, fix all of the customer’s problems.

Smart sales pros never put their prospects into a box. They never limit the customer’s options. Smart sales pros know that only makes people feel defensive. When was the last time you sold a defensive customer? Gather information first and then close. Don’t show them your product and don’t jump through any hoops unless you’ve secured a commitment to move forward.

Good luck and good selling!
__________
John Costigan is president and founder of John Costigan Companies. John is known for his training technique where he makes live impromptu phone calls to his students' prospects in front of a live audience. For more information, visit www.JohnCostigan.com

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The Greatest Competitor -- Indifference By Joe Heller

Who is your greatest competitor? Throughout the history of selling, sales professionals have always faced great adversaries that compete for their highly coveted piece of business.

Is yours the large multi-national company or the boutique that somehow seems to call on your best customers? No, the most formidable competitor that has haunted salespeople for decades is the invisible competitor, the unseen attitude of customer indifference.

Why is indifference such a challenging competitor? Psychologically, indifference is rooted in our belief system. It's endemic, an attitude, a viewpoint held by your customers, that you must change in order to close your sales.

In addition, while you are more than able to compete head on against the visible products of your toughest competitor, the balance of power shifts when you are forced to compete against the invisible competitor of the human mind.

Indifference is not based in logic, but lies embedded in your client’s perception. Many factors can contribute to client indifference, including familiarity with an existing product, or “may be” false satisfaction with a competitor's product, or the failure of the buyer to notice additional needs, or their failure to recognize the unique benefits value of your product/service.

However, the most prevalent factor by far is simply complacently, the age-old adage, “but that’s what we’ve always bought.” Indifference comes from the client’s opinion that what you are selling is a commodity-like product with relatively no distinction nor value over their existing product/service.

How do successful salespeople confront the competition of indifference? You attack the issue strategically, armed with a thorough evaluation of a potential client’s current business practices. Indifference is overcome when a salesperson maps out a plan to resolve areas of customers’ hidden frustrations by uncovering previously unidentified needs.

In approaching indifference, the sales professional must understand the psychological considerations that are tied to changing an attitude. Your client needs to be motivated to change.

To combat indifference, you need to acknowledge that indifference affects your customer, gaining permission to ask probing questions that increases your understanding of the customer’s specific needs. By having a questioning strategy, you help the customer gain an awareness of the needs and problems your product can solve.

Probing questions permit you to explore problems that may have been lying dormant, and/or hidden; buried for years under by the initial adoption of poor business practices. Analytical probing allows you to understand the customers’ core business; including new business strategies the client is planning, and to define the competitive pressures within a market niche or segment with the goal of helping the customer realize problems or needs of which they were previously unaware.

Having a questioning strategy designed to overcome indifference permits you to discover who the other suppliers are that are currently doing business with your prospective customer. By evaluating how satisfied the customer is with the current suppliers, you uncover business needs they would like to improve.

Additionally, strategic questioning provides an opportunity to investigate the customer's strategies and goals, allowing you to align your product/service with the achievement of their business objectives. Once a customer's business objective is in the open, you can determine how your product can assist your customer in meeting their stated business goals.

Note: Effective probing that ties questioning and strategy together allows the sales professional to become consultative in their selling approach focusing on the customers business needs.

Probing also allows you to gain insight on how your customers are positioned in the market, allowing you to evaluate how effectively they are competing, identifying who their competitors are, and whether they are gaining or losing market share respective to the specific products and segments they serve.

Raising the customers awareness about their current level of satisfaction or dissatisfaction, helps identify the consequences of leaving things unchanged, promoting the cost of a the need to facilitate change.

If the questions are carefully crafted by your understanding of their business, the customer discerns the immediate financial implications of not acting in a timely manner, advancing the breakdown of the indifference barriers.

Remember the 80/20 Rule, also known as the Pareto Principle states that 80% of sales are made by the top 20% of all sales people. As a result, the lower 80% make 20% of the sales. One major failing of the lower 80% of salespeople is a tendency to introduce an assumed need the customer has not verbalized though probing.

When a salesperson introduces a need the customer hasn't verbally expressed, the customer sees the sales person as "pushy," destroying any comfort level that's been built. The salespersons poor judgment causes the customer to raise their barrier of indifference toward the salesperson's perceived high-pressure tactic.

Learning to recognize indifference by applying the appropriate strategy and tactics to combat it will continually advance the sale and lead to greater success in selling. Occasionally overcoming indifference happens immediately, but more than likely conquering customer indifference takes a long-term commitment.

Note: Questions that the salesperson asks must drive a business solution. Here are a few examples of questions to ask to gain a mutual understanding of a need between you and your prospect. ~ How do you feel about the results you are getting now? Are you on plan to achieve your 1/3/5 year goals? Are there any competitors in the market that are impeding your growth plans? How does that affect your business operations/sales? What impact is that having on your new client acquisition? Customer retention? Your product quality? Your productivity? Your cash flow?

In summary, indifference is a psychological competitor that lies in the attitudes of our customers. Remember, in a questioning strategy there are more than just using open and closed ended questions.

There are questions that are designed to capture account information, help the customer recognize problems and what the problems will cost if not addressed, and questions on how to orient the customer to distinguish that your product is the right solution that will drive results to reach their intended business goals.

Final Thoughts: I've been talking about conquering indifference on the buyer side in order to win a new customers. However, I'd like to point out that 68% of the customers a business looses are rooted in indifference from the sales professional.

From the customers’ perspective, they believe that the supplier has stopped treating them appropriately with care and empathy, no longer valuing their relationship.

Remember, that it takes up to five times more effort/energy/cost to win a new customer verses maintaining a profitable relationship with an existing customer.

Indifference is a critical issue faced by all, causing the loss of more client relationships than any other reason. You must take care of your customers because they are the most valuable assets your business has.
___________
Joe Heller, Sales Consultant
1.888.5HELLER
"Visit www.JoeHeller.com for more information."

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Snap Out of It: 13 Tips for Breaking out of a Slump and Getting Back on Track By Colleen Francis

Sales people who have a poor start at the beginning of a year, often find themselves struggling for the rest of the year to catch up. The good news is, whatever you're experiencing, we've all been there at least once. The bad news is, most of us don't know exactly how to snap out of a slump, and start making sales.

First - don't panic! If you're in panic mode, you can't be creative, and creativity is exactly what you need right now. Besides, just as dogs can smell fear in humans, prospects can smell desperation in sales people. If you panic, your prospects will sense that you're desperate, and they'll avoid you like last night's leftover Tuna Surprise. Just take a deep breath, stay calm and focus on what needs to be done.

Next, don't get down on yourself. Think about a time in your past when you were in a similar situation, and how you were able to climb out if it. Focus on that positive experience, instead of focusing on the negative.

Third, don't get angry. Anger will be misinterpreted by your clients, peers and managers as being emotional or out of control. When you're in a slump more than at any other time, you need to be totally in control, and assure others around you that you know exactly what to do. Whenever you find yourself becoming angry, try to be as honest as possible, and focus on solutions and options - not on laying blame. For more on this particularly prickly subject, see our article Don't Get Angry - Get Results.

Last but most definitely not least, don't quit! The worst thing you can do during a slump is to stop trying. The Chicago White Sox were on the verge of a 90-year slump before winning the World Series last year. Yet during that entire period, their team motto stayed the same: "Win, or die trying." Guess it paid off for them in the end.

Remember: there could be an almost unlimited number of reasons why you're in a slump. It could be the economy, for example. But even in a poor economy, there are top performing sales people, and those who just scrape by. Admitting that your success is up to you is the first step in getting out of a slump, and getting your career back on track.

To help you snap out of a slump and get your year back on track, try some of the following tips, adapted from the strategies of the Top 10%:

1. Reconnect to your plan.

Review your goals and either recommit to the action plan you set for yourself at the beginning of the year - or create a new one! One client of mine recalculates his plan after every month he doesn't hit his quota, to ensure his quota for the next month includes both what he was supposed to do PLUS whatever he missed last month. This helps him redefine his actions and gain clarity on exactly how many calls he needs to make, meetings he needs to secure and business he needs to close to get back on track. If you had a really bad month, you could perhaps work your underage into the next 2-3 months to make it more attainable.

2. Get back to basics.

Once, after Tiger Woods had spent hours on the practice green sinking hundreds of puts, a commentator asked him why he was still practicing considering how consistent he had been. Tiger responded: "I don't like the way the ball is rolling into the cup." That's mastering the basics.

As Tiger knows full well, problems aren't usually caused by something complicated. They're usually the result of doing the simplest thing just slightly wrong. And more often than not, we know exactly what the problem is. In my experience, for example, slumps are almost always caused by not having enough qualified buyers in the pipeline - in other words, not enough prospecting. If you're in a slump, start by looking internally, not externally. Remember that the slump is your slump, not someone else's. Be strong enough to realize this, and take corrective action.

3. Work smarter and harder.

Think of 10 things you could do this week to work more effectively. Then commit to working just a little bit harder until you're out of this bad spell. So you have to be out of "balance" for a short time. Would you rather that you're out of balance, or your checkbook? The choice is yours.

4. Get a coach.

Have someone you respect listen to your phone calls, watch you at networking events and evaluate your presentations. This could be a manager, a colleague, a friend or a hired gun. Whoever you choose, ask them to be honest with you, and when they are, do something with the advice they give you.

5. Coach yourself.

Video or audio tape your presentations and calls, and be honest with yourself. Would you buy from you?

6. Change your presentation.

Maybe it's time to turn your presentation style upside down, or inside out. What you're doing now obviously isn't working, so if you want a different result, you have to do something different. Try starting with the end, or in the middle. And while we're talking about change, everyone should read the cover story of the June 2005 issue of Fast Company magazine: "Change or die." It's an excellent article on why change is so hard - yet so necessary.

7. Stay away from life suckers.

You know who they are. The one who lies in wait at the water cooler, just so they can whine, moan and complain to whatever poor, parched soul happens to wander by. The one lurking in the lunchroom way past 1pm to tell you about how nothing is ever right, and they're always getting the short end of the stick.

When you've slept only 4 hours, they were up all night. If you have a stomachache, they've got near-fatal food poisoning. When you have a headache, you better believe they've got a migraine. Life suckers can't help you; they have problems of their own.

8. Get to work earlier.

Yes, I know, you're already screaming at me: "Colleen, I need balance!" Not while you're in a slump, you don't. Right now, you're behind, and you need to do something about it. Only the mediocre use balance as their battle cry during a slump. So suck it up for this short period, and save the balance until you're back on top.

9. Change your mood.

Listen to your favorite song, comedian or motivational speaker in the car on your way to your next sales meeting. This will help put you into an excellent, upbeat mood when you start your presentation, which will cause you to shine - and your prospect to take a shine to you.

10. Change your environment.

This could be as simple as de-cluttering your office. It's impossible to feel fresh and excited about what you do if you can't see your desk. A chaotic work environment will make you depressed to be there, and if you're depressed to be at work, you won't snap out of your slump.

Changing your environment could also mean - gasp, yes, it's true! - taking the day off from selling! If you need motivation, go sit in a coffee shop or someplace with a nice view and read books and articles on positive attitude and self-development. If you need to be re-created, take a hike (literally), and then come back to the office re-energized and ready to take on the world.

Personally, I find that getting away for around 4 days (say, Thursday-Sunday, as I'm doing as I write this to you right now) can dramatically help me to create, re-organize and re-energize. It's also one of the best ways I know of to avoid another slump in the future.

11. Follow a leader.

Trail the best sales person you know on their calls for a day. See what they're doing differently than you, and how you can incorporate those ideas in your business. Note that this doesn't have to be someone from the office. You can learn a lot from watching sales people in other industries, too.

12. Take your boss to work.

Take your boss with you on calls for a week. This will force you to be more prepared and on your best behavior. You'll also probably receive more feedback than you probably want. Instead of rejecting this feedback, use it to be better.

13. Prove that money can buy a little happiness.

Buy something you can't afford. This is radical, I know, and not many of you will like this idea or think it's responsible of me to suggest it. But it works better for me than any other "counter slump maneuver" I know of, so I felt it wouldn't be right not to at least share the possibility with you.

Of course, I don't mean racking up all your credit cards to the limit buying gold toilets, and then spending the next twenty years paying them off at 21% interest. What I mean - and what I personally do - is book a first-class trip for 6 months from now. Then, I have to make more sales to earn the money to go. Or book a training class 9 months from now, and again you'll be motivated to sell more in order to pay for it. I don't know about you, but for me, the "coming into work early" and all the other hard tasks on this list get a whole lot easier to embrace when I know that I have a trip to Hawaii coming up in a few months, which I really don't want to cancel.

Having a slump is not the end of the world, so long as it's short, temporary and you know what to do about it.

Know what motivates you. Be disciplined - it's the one thing that separates the best from the mediocre - and stay focused on those activities that you know will pull you out of the slump. And remember to keep it all in perspective.

You are responsible for your slump, and only you can change it. But you can change it, and once you accept the fact that you can reverse your fortune, you'll already be on the road to recovery.

Believe in yourself. I know you can do it.
___________
Colleen Francis is the Founder and President of Engage Selling Solutions, which delivers sales solutions that realize immediate results, achieve lasting success and permanently raise the client's bottom line. She can be reached at EngageSelling.com.

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A Winner's Attitude By Kelley Robertson

What does it take to be successful in sales? Certainly effort, hard work and dedication is important.

An excellent understanding of the sales process is also essential. But it's more than that. The most successful people I know have a slightly different outlook than their coworkers and associates.

I recently worked with a group of people who, collectively, had an extensive amount of sales experience. And, for the most part, they all boasted a pretty successful career.

Even though they expressed some frustration that they didn't close as many sales as they would like to, or that prospects didn't always return their calls, they didn't bitch, moan, whine or complain about it. In fact, I didn't hear a single complaint during the entire session.

After more than a decade of conducting sales training workshops and programs, I can say that this mentality is rare.

It was evident that this group of people possessed a winners attitude. And I believe that this attitude contributed to their success. So, just what is a winner's attitude?

A winner's attitude is the ability to focus on your long- term goals even though your short-term results are not on track. This is more difficult than it seems.

Too many people take their eyes off their long-term goal when they experience a slow month or two and end up focusing on their lack of results.

As a result, they get sidetracked and their sales continue to suffer. In the words of Earl Nightingale, "You become what you think about."

A winner's attitude means resisting the temptation to blame the economy, competition, or current market conditions when sales are soft.

Winners focus on what they can control unlike the average sales person who redirects the blame to take the heat off himself.

A winner's attitude means exploring different options and approaches to selling. The best sales people constantly hone their skills. They read books and articles. They listen to CDs or Podcasts. They take advantage of every training program they can including webinars and tele-seminars.

Winners know that business gets more competitive every day and they take action to improve their knowledge and skill. They work at incorporating new techniques into their existing style.

A winner's attitude means focusing on showing the value of your product or service. Unlike average sales people, winners don't focus on price. They know that most buyers and customers are more concerned with solving their problems and getting a complete solution rather than getting the cheapest or lowest price.

While average sales people are quick to offer a discount, winners concentrate on showing customers how their product is different than their competitors.

A winner's attitude is accepting the fact that you won't close every sale. Winners recognize that a series of 'no's' brings them that much closer to a 'yes'.

Winners may not enjoy losing a sale to a competitor but they're not going to beat themselves up when it happens, providing, of course, they can say that they did everything in their power to capture that business.

A winner's attitude means learning from every sales interaction to improve your future results. Winners take every opportunity to learn. A sales manager once told me that he evaluated every single sale when he first took on a new territory many years earlier.

This brief analysis and self-critique helped him improve his performance so he didn't repeat his mistakes. Plus, in each subsequent sales call, he modified his approach slightly, and in a few short years, sales in his territory increased many times over.

A winner's attitude is one of optimism and enthusiasm. The most successful people I know all have a great outlook. They know that every cloud has a silver lining, and when 'stuff' happens, they recover quickly. They look for ways to prevent 'stuff' from occurring because they learn from every situation (see above point).

Winners don't dwell on the past-they focus on the future because they realize that they can't change what has already happened. However, they do know that they CAN influence what happens from that point forward.

Sales managers who possess a winner's attitude work with their sales reps instead of chastising them for a lost sales opportunity. Winning sales managers coach their team, go on sales calls with their reps, and provide on-going training for their sales people. They also go to bat for their team and support help in every way possible.

Sales managers with a winner's attitude celebrate individual and team results and they foster a strong sense of pride within the organization. Ultimately, they lead by example and create a team of winners.

What are you doing to develop a winner's attitude?

© 2008 Kelley Robertson, All rights reserved.
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Kelley Robertson is a professional speaker and trainer on sales, negotiating, customer service, and employee motivation. Receive a FREE copy of "100 Ways to Increase Your Sales" by subscribing to his free newsletter available at his website. Visit KelleyRobertson.com. He is also the author of "The Secrets of Power Selling" and "Stop, Ask & Listen-Proven Sales Techniques to Turn Browsers into Buyers." For information on his programs contact him at 905-633-7750 or Kelley@RobertsonTrainingGroup.com.

* Read more sales training articles from Kelley Robertson ...
- Characteristics of Successful Salespeople
- The Impact of Follow Up
- The Easiest Sale

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