Getting in a right state versus getting in the right state

When I ask salespeople and business people, "What are the key attributes of a top sales person?" they come up with words like the following…

Motivated, professional, positive, friendly, resilient, tenacious, communicative, outgoing, smart, reliable, trustworthy, independent, go-getting, smart, respectable, ambitious…

What do you think these words have in common? I’m sure you will agree that they are all attitudes.

I have worked with literally thousands of sales and business people and they all believe that attitudes are more prevalent than skills in sales and business.

“If you don’t have the right attitude then you’ve no chance!”

Infact, even when taking the skills into account, most business people, salespeople and entrepreneurs believe that the answer is about 80% attitudes versus 20% skills. Now I’m not saying that skills aren’t important because they clearly are crucially important. You probably know a salesperson with all of the right attitudes and none of the sales skills… Right? They’re the most dangerous thing known to a sales team aren’t they… a motivated idiot!

The best way to look at it is that attitude is your ability to access your skills. Without getting into the right state you are unlikely to be able to access the skills that you do have.

For an example of this think about making a really important sales presentation… Perhaps a major sales pitch that will help you to hit your sales targets but to a very senior CEO of a multi-national company. Do you sometimes find it a little hard to make the sames sales presentation that you’ve made a hundred times before? Of course you do. That’s your change in attitude affecting your ability to access your skills.

Despite this, salespeople and sales managers continually ask for skills training! Why? Because most of the time it’s easier to train a new skill than it is to get a new attitude because learning a new attitude can really hurt. But it’s the only way. Skills without the right supporting attitude are like trams without rails. They look great but they’re not going anywhere!

Have a think about a few potential stressful sales situations such as cold calling, presenting to a senior director or negotiating a major deal. Do you get in the right state or a right state?

Let’s have a look at the top 10 right states that sales superstars utilise to get the successes that they desire…

1. Confidence

Confidence is key for salespeople, business people and entrepreneurs of all levels. Without confidence the whole shooting match collapses around your ears. Many people believe that confidence is something that you’ve either got or you haven’t, that there’s nothing that you can do about it. They’re so wrong.

I used to have arguments at parties with some quite educated people about this but frankly they can keep their small minded ideas… I and hundreds of my clients know different. Confidence is a state of mind. It’s a set of processes. Anyone can learn them. The question is, are you going to or not?

2. Motivation

Top performers in all fields are motivated. Top performers in sales and business are no different. Motivation provides the drive that gets you up in the morning and keeps you up at night. Motivation is what drives you to make that one extra call after everyone else has gone home. Motivation is the force behind the persistence that keeps you going through all of the “Nos” until you get to “Yes”.

Motivation to many seems intangible. You’ll hear people say things like, “That just does not motivate me” as if motivation is something external to themselves, something that happens to them. This is not the case.

Motivation is internal and sales superstars practise techniques to improve motivation. For more on motivational exercises subscribe to Jooplar’s feed now and be the first to get our inspirational updates.

3. Tenacity and persistence

Imagine for a second that you have set up a new business selling a new form of consulting service. There’s nothing like it in the marketplace and you are going to have to educate your clients on its worth. After a bit or research you settle on a price and go to visit half a dozen selected clients to get their opinion. Unfortunately, every one of them says that it’s too expensive. What do you do?

A) Reduce the price to match what they think?
B) Re-evaluate the product and add more benefits?
C) Start negotiating furiously?
D) Visit some more clients?

Let me tell you that 90%+ of answers fall into the A, B or C categories. Now I admit that there is a lot of information missing here but I believe that the answer is D with maybe a small pinch of C.

Apparently, Colonel Sanders (aka Mr. Kentucky Chicken) was rejected 1012 times before someone bit on his idea. Read the biography of most successful people and you will see as much failures as successes.

Success in sales and business means playing the long game and that means tenacity and persistence. If you keep going after everyone else gives up and goes home then you are going to be successful.

4. Good sense of humour

I’ve read a lot of books about sales that recommend telling the odd joke or two and I think this is great if you’re good at them but the thought of some of the best salespeople I’ve met telling one-liners is somewhat frightening!

By sense of humour what I am talking about is a love of life, a love of people; an ability to smile at life’s little challenges. In sales, things will go wrong and people will let you down… If you can’t take a joke then you shouldn’t have signed up!

5. Focused

Top performers are focused. They do not get distracted. They keep their attention and their efforts targeted on what they want to achieve.

Think about your office for a minute… what are people doing at 830am? 845am? 9am? 12 noon? 445pm? I could carry on. I bet a lot are surfing the internet, emailing, chatting, drinking coffee. Now think of the top performers… how are they different? What are they doing when others are chatting, drinking coffee and instant messaging?

Try… diverting incoming calls when you’re busy and only taking predetermined breaks for chatting to colleagues. If you’re on the road use your travel time for study, research and catching up on calls (obviously not when driving).

6. Goal driven & target oriented

Top performers are goal driven. Not for them the wishy-washy, “I want to be successful” or the excuses like “I don’t really believe in goal setting”!

All tosh.

If you want to get successful then get yourself a target oriented, goal driven attitude.

One of the best ways to adopt this kind of approach is to read about top performers in any field. Read sales books by any of the great sales writers. Read bios of champion athletes. Set yourself apart from journeyman sales mediocrity and get goal focused now!

7. Interested and open

Be interested in your clients. Ask them about their business, their lives, their challenges and their aspirations. Pay attention. Demonstrate to them that you are interested. This may seem facile but most salespeople just aren’t interested enough in anyone but themselves. By getting interested, genuinely interested you’ll set yourself well apart from your competitors.

Share with your clients. Share your business with them. Share your interests with them when appropriate. Share the conversation with them. Questioning is important. Listening is important. Sharing information is important. Make sure that your clients feel that they are dealing with a human being. Use your intelligence, intuition and your knowledge of the client and their situation to know when and what to share.

8. Client focused

Client centric, value based, solution selling… what have they all got in common? They are all client focused.

Most salespeople (infact most people) live their lives on “Me! Me! Me!” I have sat in on thousands of sales calls and most are truly horrendous affairs….

“Hello this is John from so and so and we’ve got so and so and it has this and this and this and it can do this and this and this for you…. What? You don’t want it. Surely you do… didn’t I tell you it has this and this and it can do this and this for you…”

Awful! Get over it. Clients aren’t interested in you, your product, your company or your solutions. They are interested in what you might be able to do for them.

Ask not, what can this client buy off me, ask what can I do for them?

9. Hardworking - go the extra mile

Sales superstars are hard working. Sorry! I know that’s perhaps not what you wanted to hear but success is directly related to effort. Anyone, who tells you it isn’t is either lying, has not got any or won the lottery!

Yes, we’re going to work smarter. Yes, we’re going to be a sales ace and therefore outsell the competition. Yes, we’re going to target smarter, track our records and work our system diligently. But ultimately, the harder you work, the more you will achieve. Period.

Still not convinced? Person A and person B are identical. They have the same attitudes, skills and procedures. For purposes of this question they will get identical results in any give scenario. The only difference is that A works 60 hours a week and B, 20 hours. Who will sell more?

10. Takes responsibility

Too many people blame anything other than themselves for their lack of sales success. The good news about this approach is that it’s extremely rare for a salesperson to run out of people or things to blame…

…poor upbringing, bad education, unsupportive company, bad management, no training, wrong client area, poor clients, wrong market conditions, wrong product, product too expensive etc…

People who take responsibility for their sales success know that the only thing standing between mediocrity and superstar status is them. Do yourself a favour and choose now…

I am going to stop blaming events and other people for my sales results and am going to take responsibility for them right now.