Daily Inspiration 12-30-11

"Our attitudes control our lives. Attitudes are a secret power

working twenty-four hours a day, for good or bad. It is of

paramount importance that we know how to harness

and control this great force."

-- Irving Berlin

I teach sales and have done that since 1975, and yet I'm continually learning about this subject, even today. What I have found by asking and by observing is that most salespeople that I've been around want silver bullets and magic genies to aid them and they almost all want to know more about closing sales. They want the right lines to say, the right sequence to say them in to speed up the process and help them be more successful. They typically rank closing the sale as the most important step in a sale.

To me, the close of a sale is a forgone conclusion to a well thought greeting--and even before we even meet the potential customer in our attitudes about what we do and how we do it.

If we have an attitude of desiring to improve our skills and be the best that we can be at what we do, we will learn with an eager mind and the skills will flow accordingly. This helps us believe in ourselves and in our own abilities. Let's call this preparation.

Then, it will be in our best interest to have an attitude of sincere and helpful service thinking what will be best suited for our new customer. It should be obvious that it is far more important what the customer wants than what we might want. We are the servant as salespeople, not the customer.

Next, is learning to pay far more attention to asking good questions, than in making a presentation. We can't be of service if we aren't clear what our customer wants. Once we are clear on what our customer wants, and can supply that, a presentation is like a bit of icing on a cake.

Last is all encompassing and the single most important quality in a good salesperson: Confidence. This comes from all of the above and I call that a momentum maker. It is this place of feeling good about yourself, what you do, how you do it and your focus on service and integrity.

With this, there is no need to learn much about closing sales. There are only a few things that make a really good salesperson in my opinion. These are desire, attitude, and confidence.

Manipulation Is So Yesterday. . .

Spread Some Joy Today--choose your own attitude. No one else is qualified.