Success Superpower- Short term memory
How the best sales professionals rebound from failure
Happy Tuesday everyone! I hope this weeks edition is as beneficial for you reading it…. as it was for me writing it. If it is, then please forward it along to somebody you feel could use it in their life. Thank you for being a part of the journey.
If there’s one word we hear a lot in sales, its the word
NO!
No, I don’t want to talk.
No, I don’t want to move forward.
No, I’m not interested.
No, I don’t qualify.
No, No, No, No.
Most sane people would give up at this point. After all, why push forward when the answer was so clearly NO? Isn’t that what we’re supposed to do? Give up, pack our bags and go home. Try something new because CLEARLY I’ve made a bad career decision… All I ever hear is NO!
I’m not sure why great sales people push through these negative reactions, but they somehow do. They are undeterred by the constant negativity and rejection. Instead they are driven by the possibility of a win. Driven by the possibility that they can provide a solution to their customers problems. When a customer doesn’t buy, they feel sorry for the customer because they have decided not to fix the issue…. They’ll be fine, but there customer won’t be, and that’s the real loss.
Great sales people aren’t upset with themselves, they’re upset that the problem isn’t solved.
“That’s great Steve, but that still doesn’t explain how they shrug off rejection and keep going” you might be saying. The answer to that is another super power that all great sales people have.
Great sales people do not dwell on the past….
Great sales people (or great leaders, executives, coaches, etc) are always looking forward. Their eyes are always looking at what happens today and tomorrow, because yesterday is over. Yes, we should learn from our mistakes, but that only serves to better us going forward, not to remind ourselves of all we have done wrong in the past.
You can’t ride the bike forward, if all you do is look behind you. You’re also a heck of a lot more likely to hit a pothole and crash
.
Here’s the harsh reality…..we’ve all made mistakes and we’re all going to keep making mistakes. Get over it… nobody cares…. Move on and do it better next time. Keep playing the game and trying to win. It doesn’t matter that we lost the first three games of the Worlds Series, if we win the next four, we’ll be the champions!
We cannot expect our outcomes to change unless we are willing to change first. To do that, I’d like to challenge you to change the way you speak and in turn, the thoughts you surround yourself with.
Here are some common statements that you will hear from people that have this super power.
“I understand where we are at now, how do we fix it going forward”
“Here’s what needs to happen next”
“Here’s what I’m going to do to make it better”
“It’s unfortunate X,Y,Z happened, but here’s what we’re going to do now to fix it"
“I thought this worked really well and we’re going to keep it going”
“I need to have more conversations this month. I’m going to make that a priority”
“Last month was a good month, but it’s a new month. Time to get after it”
Here’s things you will never hear them say.
“I hope I don’t have another bad month”
“I got burned really bad in the past doing X,Y,Z… hope it doesn’t happen again”
“I’ve talked to guys like this before. It’s a waste of time”
“I’ve already tried that and it doesn’t work”
