I once made a sale to an insurance agent and offered to buy him lunch as a sign of my appreciation. I met him at his office, where we loaded up his wife and daughter and went off to his favorite place. At the time, I was thinking small and was worried about how much the bill was going to be. Within five minutes of sitting down, he’d already introduced me to a friend of his at another table. My client’s intro was, “Vic, this is the kid I was telling you about,” at which time Vic pulls out a card and says, “I want one just like he got. Can you have it at my office today?”
LUNCH OUT = SALES UP!
That brown bag lunch you made to save yourself $10 will cost you hundreds of thousands of dollars in lost sales. Go out, be seen, mix it up, and put yourself in the game. Use your lunchtime to meet clients and don’t waste this opportunity by hanging out with friends and other employees. You can’t save your way to being a millionaire, but you can certainly sell your way there! Quit trying to save money and start doing whatever it takes to be seen, to get noticed, and to make sales!
My wife is an actress here in Hollywood, and I asked her where the best place is for people in her business to be seen. She told me that the place to be seen is at the Ivy. Well, guess where we go to lunch now? People remember who they see and forget who they don’t see. Some people even take it as a “sign” when they see you that they should do something with you.
Lunch is about business and opportunity. It’s not about food, friends, and family. Lunch is an occasion to create contacts and show appreciation for past customers! Utilize it and work this one-hour gold mine. Make the most of every day by knocking out the wasted time and cleverly scheduling your valuable time! Some people might wonder if there’s ever any time to just relax and take it easy. Sure there is, but that comes later, after you’ve reached your goals and made your dreams come true.
If you aren’t where you want to be in life, you’ve got to work every minute and snatch up every opportunity. You owe it to yourself, your family, and your future. Make every moment count!
CHAPTER FIFTEEN QUESTIONS
How much time do you have? Don’t look.
Write down six activities that you consider to be a waste of time for you and how much time you think you waste on each activity per week.
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Multiply each of the above by 52 and then by 20 to calculate the cost of each activity to you every year in time and money.
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Write down the two activities that make you the most money and how much time you spend on them each week.
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CHAPTER SIXTEEN
ATTITUDE
A GREAT ATTITUDE IS WORTH MORE THAN A GREAT PRODUCT
People will pay more for an agreeable, positive, and enjoyable experience than they will for a great product. Who doesn’t want to feel good? Who doesn’t want to be acknowledged for being right? Who doesn’t want to be smiled at and agreed with? Show me a person that doesn’t want to feel good and I’ll show you someone that you don’t want to bother selling! People want to feel good. People are moved by positive and confident people, more than by great products. There will always be a market for products that make people feel good, but a person who can make someone feel good can sell almost anything! The individual who combines a great attitude with a great product becomes unstoppable!
A positive attitude is a thousand times more important than the product itself. Just observe how people on this planet spend their money. A person will spend a small amount of his income on the necessities of life and blow his entire paycheck on entertainment. Why? Because he wants to feel good! Why does Jay Leno make more money than all of the schoolteachers in Los Angeles combined? Because he makes people laugh and feel good.
It’s easy for a buyer to say no to a product or a company, but it’s extremely difficult to say no to a positive experience with another human being. When something makes you feel good, you want more of it, whether it makes sense or not. This is why people do things that aren’t good for them, because for a moment or two, it made them feel good. People will spend money on things that make them feel good before they’ll spend money on things they need. This explains the poverty and debt levels we see today.
Once I saw a beautiful jacket on display in a shop window and was so intrigued by it that I went inside to have a closer look. I asked the clerk the price, which she told me as she helped me slip the jacket on. Admiring my reflection in the mirror, I protested that the price was insane and added that I didn’t even need the thing! With a warm, understanding, and beautiful smile, she said, “No one buys a jacket like this because they need it. They buy it because it’s beautiful and it makes them feel good.” Melting in the truth of her statement, I asked her, “Do you take AMEX?”