1) Protect your attitude. You absolutely must do everything you can do to develop, protect, and nurture a contagiously enthusiastic attitude. Now more than ever, your attitude will be the biggest determining factor affecting your success this year. Think about all the negative people you're going to run into today, this week and this month. Are you going to infect them with your positive, can do attitude, or are you going to get more and more negative with each phone call? IT IS UP TO YOU!!
Starting this week, get into the habit of feeding your mind and attitude daily with affirmations, by listening to motivational CD's, by reading two pages a day in a positive book, and by goal setting. If you haven't read books like, "The Success Principles" by Jack Canfield, or "Beyond Positive Thinking" by Dr. Robert Anthony, then go to Amazon and order them today.
2) Sharpen Your Sales Skills. Let's face it - there is no room for error in today's economy. Sloppy sales presentations, poorly qualified leads, and just plain lazy and bad habits are going to make you miserable in your job this year. You must, and I mean must, learn, practice and use effective sales techniques that will allow you to identify buyers and then deliver effective presentations to close business.
The Top 20% will be well because they already use effective skills and spend time getting better, but the bottom 80% are going to sink like a stone. I'd say that up to one quarter of all sales reps will lose their jobs this year because they won't improve enough to make it in this economy.
3) Start Listening To Your Prospects. Now more than ever, it's crucially important that you learn how to connect with your prospects and show them you really care about what they're going through and what their needs are. 80% of your competition is going to pitch and pitch and pitch, and this is going to turn off the people they are trying to sell.
The Top 20% are going to take the time to understand the difficulties their prospects and clients are going through and they're going to find ways to help them. And it all begins with listening.
People are going to buy from people they like, know and trust, and the best way to build this rapport is by asking questions and actually listening to their answers. But whatever you do, you must begin showing your prospects you care, and best way to do that is by listening.
So there you have it! Three simple things you can do that will guarantee you success in 2009. Just remember, 80% of your competition won't do these things, but if you will, you will smoke them in sales. In fact, you will become a Top 20% producer, and I'll bet that will make your 2009 successful, won't it?
So commit to yourself today and start implementing these three techniques. Believe me, this time next year, you'll be glad you did!
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Tags: business, cold calling, sales, prospecting, sales training, motivation, close, sales management, inside sales