Great Sales Habits - Schedule Time For Busy Work
Written by Paul McCord on February 15, 2008
Like many salespeople and small business owners, I find staying focused during prime selling hours to be difficult.
Interruptions, minor emergencies, emails, phone calls, and a myriad of other issues and concerns are constantly trying to draw my attention away from my primary business activity—selling.
Listen, I have only certain hours during the day that are my prime selling hours. If I lose those hours, I lose revenue; I lose precious time that no matter how hard I work, I can never regain.
Consequently, it is important I keep my focus on true sales activities between 8am and 5pm.
Nevertheless, there are things that must be done and some of those things simply won’t wait until non-selling hours.
So what did I do?
Great Sales Habits - Talk We, Not Me
Written by Kevin Sasser on February 13, 2008
There’s a great beer commercial in which a reporter is in the locker room after a game attempting to interview an extremely self-centered and egotistical football player.
After hearing the player drone on about his individual accomplishments, with absolutely no acknowledgment of his teammates contributions, the reporter retorts that “there’s no “I” in TEAM”, to which the player replies “Yeah? well there’s no “WE” either”.
When discussing your solution, stay away from personal pronouns such as “Me, My, I, etc.” and replace with “We, Our, Together, etc.”.
This will help you in building a comfort level with the prospect that you are representing a solid and established provider, instead of some guy who works out of the trunk of his car.
Great Sales Habits - Waking Up Early
Written by Jan on February 11, 2008
Today is Monday - and with that, we’re starting up the 6th full work week of 2008.
Over the weekend, I came across an older post by Dave Cheong on his personal blog. While Dave is a software engineer, his productivity tips apply to most of us in the sales profession as well.
In his post, Dave talked about how waking up early has made a huge difference in his life. I can see how that could easily be the case for him. But when you think about it, it really could apply to us too.
In sales, where we’re sometimes away from the office for days or weeks, it’s very easy to fall back to unproductive habits. The habit of going to bed late, for instance. And related to that, the habit of just waking up a bit later in the morning than we should.
With your management a couple of hundred miles or a timezone away or no one in your office to check up on you, who is going to notice - right
Locked In
Written by Brandon Hull on February 4, 2008
I’ve talked about Initiators and Finishers.
Initiators and Finishers are nearly always found in the larger group of professionals who are locked in. By “locked in,” I mean they are fully, continually engaged in the pursuit of excellence.
Locked in means you and your long-term goals, short-term objectives and immediate tasks are one. It means you’re not distracted away from them for more trivial pursuits. It means you welcome opportunities and challenges alike, and sometimes through intelligence, sometimes through creativity, sometimes through sheer will you complete projects with superior results.
When you’re locked in, you not only aspire to excellence, it’s seen in your work and life. You engage people. You look to make an impact–not by words alone, but by actions. You know most people settle for less while you push yourself, to see what you’re truly capable of.
To be a top 1% sales professional, you’ve got to be locked in. You’ve got to take initiative, be proactive. You’ve got to work through setbacks. You’ve got to finish what you start. And you’ve got to stamp your projects with superior performance.
Being locked in is the surest path to job security and, ultimately, financial freedom.
Other resources: 212 Club, Message to Garcia, Brian Tracy article archive, How to Give Yourself the Best Chance in Life
With more coming soon…
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