Can you remember a time when you knew nothing about your job, but you still got it done? It wasn’t consistent, your income went up and down, but you still made it happen. You made a sale but didn’t really know why. You missed a sale and you were mystified for days. Can you remember a time when you used sheer persuasion, even begging or pleading, and the buyer felt sorry for you and you made the sale? Leave that for the amateur and the underpaid professionals and start observing now so you can predict!
Observation is the only way you’ll acquire a strategic understanding of the sales process, and it’s the only way to develop your prediction abilities and become one of the greats.
Remember, no matter what your job or role is in life, you need the ability to predict. You’re either getting your way in life or you’re not. Even if you’re not a salesperson per se, start observing where you are not getting your way and start taking notes.
Those who understand selling will get their way in life and those who don’t, won’t! Are you ready to become a great? Are you prepared to pay the price and do the work? If you are, I assure you that it will change your life dramatically, quickly, and forever!
CHAPTER FOUR QUESTIONS
Define “commitment” (per the definition the author used and look up each word).
Write down an example of something you didn’t fully commit to and the result.
Write down an example of something you committed to completely and the result.
What is the skill of prediction? How is it gained?
What is the only reason a person would not enjoy selling?
CHAPTER FIVE
THE MOST IMPORTANT SALE
SELLING YOURSELF
Only to the degree you are sold can you sell. This is a critical and unavoidable fact that cannot be missed if you’re to become great at what you do. This fact also happens to be one of the most important tools you’ll ever have as a salesperson, and it can be used to monitor your career. The bottom line is, if you’re not selling to some degree, you’re not sold. If sales are slow, you’re not sold. If you’re not getting your way, you’re not sold. If you’ve got some other excuse, you’re not completely sold.
In order to become a great salesperson, you have to sell yourself on what you’re selling. Make this the most important sale of your life and continue making that sale over and over to yourself. You have to sell yourself completely!
I know salespeople who know the game but are not completely and absolutely sold on their product, service, or company. Because of their lack of conviction, they are not consistent producers. You’ve got to be absolutely convinced that your product, your company, your services, or your ideas are superior to all others. Many salespeople believe that their products are superior, and while many products tend to offer similar benefits to yours, you have to be sold that your product, service, or idea is somehow superior. You have to be 100 percent certain that what you’re selling is better than all other options. The fraud can’t get consistent results because he is not completely sold on his product.
This one point is critical for greatness, and you cannot negotiate it in any way. You have to be utterly convinced and believe in what you’re selling so strongly that you become unreasonable. That’s right: Unreasonable, even fanatical! You’ve got to be so convinced that you won’t even consider any logic suggesting otherwise. I am not saying that you should be arrogant about the product’s superiority, but that you should be completely sold on it. You must never allow the consideration to enter your mind that anyone else could even compete with you. That’s not to say that others won’t try, but you have to be so convinced and so sold on it yourself that you won’t consider or allow others to consider any other option.
Throughout most of my selling career I’ve sold more expensive products than my direct competitors. I have also gotten more money for similar products than my competitors have because I believed so strongly in my service, my level of care, and the superiority of my products. Whether this was true to others or not was less important to me than my own conviction. While I’ve sold products that were priced higher than those my competitors were selling, I’ve never asked a buyer to pay a price that I wasn’t fully sold on myself, and that, I believe, is the only way to achieve higher prices.
I have been accused of asking astronomical prices for some of the products I’ve sold. The critics thought that I was asking a high amount in the hope that I’d get more than the product was worth—the idea of “if you don’t ask for it you won’t get it.” But the truth is, I’ve never asked a high price just for the sake of starting high. I decide on a price because I’m so convinced of the product’s worth that I would pay that price myself to have it!