I often heard, “yes, but salespeople are ready to do everything to earn money.” And I can understand where it comes from. There isn’t a better relationship between effort and gain than in sales.
I disagree, even salespeople don’t do everything, and often don’t do obvious things to increase their earning potential. The issue comes mostly from our ability to distinguish and act on the “Non-urgent but important” activities.
( See Put First things, first)
Today, I’m an executive leader, managing 100 million P&L in Europe for an international company. But I started my career in sales, in my actual company. My first job was to find new customers, and I was measured on the number and the value every month.
Like everything in my life, I dig into the experience of others through books. I auto analyzed myself after each meeting to understand what went right, what I could improve. Sales is a very dynamic process, you are always in interaction. So they aren’t such things as statics techniques that work all the time. It all depends on your ability to manage a dynamic exchange.
After six months, I started to have the best results out of a dozen salespeople in my category.
Later, I was promoted to a sales job where I had to develop relationships with existing customers. At 24 years old, I was the youngest sales of around 100 experimented salespeople.
Again, after six months, I started to have the best results.
My methodology was duplicable. As salespeople are interested in earning more, they started to approach me. What is your secret?
I already understood that people don’t often like to read. Even less, professional and personal development books. So I tried to extract a few easy techniques, I had learned in some books, making a big difference.
One of those that I call ” the power of a few personal written words.”
I’m still using it in any situation. Often, things that work are deceptively simple(see my investment strategy).
After each sales visit, where the customer was humanly good with me_whatever, the sales result was_ I wrote a small card to thank that person for the friendly welcome.
Nothing too special. Three sentences with a bit of personalization. It took me 5 minutes per card. In the end, it cost me time and a few stamps per week.
Later in different jobs, I used to keep these writing habits with colleagues, bosses, employees, partners, “a few personal words” to thank them for anything special I was touched by.
But I can’t count how many deeper relationships and millions in business I have built through these small habits.
I shared this sales secret that worked and allowed me to earn two to three times more than my sales colleagues. I provided them with the how :
- Which type of card?
- An example of a writing card.
- How I batch my work to be more productive.
Despite that, I can’t recall one sales colleague who applied it with discipline over a long period. Some didn’t start, and others stopped, even though they began to increase their sales ratios.
Why?
Not because they didn’t believe in it. The main reason was that they were dying, like most of us, under their “Urgent and Important” tasks. They could not build space for their “Non-urgent but Important” activities like writing cards to their warmest prospects.
And as often, the “Non-Urgent but Important” tasks are simple, look futile on your day to day but are crucial to your long term success.
Practice breathing exercises, go to sleep one hour earlier, go for a daily walk, read 15 minutes a day, write daily in your journal…
All these habits have something in common. They look simple, they can have tremendous results in the long term, but they don’t happen on their own. We need to implement them proactively.
One of the critical competencies for success is to work on our “proactive” muscle continuously.
What have you implemented as “proactive habits” that make a difference in your life?
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