SalesHQ

Henrik

 I am a huge fan of writing a journal opf your daily activities. The good the bad and the ugly. Revist the journal nightly and rewrite it into a story form along with being a guidebook for you. The do's and don'ts.

 Writing the journal allows you to become informed of the small things that did not get done with the no sale. It also allows you to tweak your process just a little more each day.

You will be able to recall certain phone calls in the past that  can and will help you with calls in the present and future.

Best of all it keeps you sanity,.

If I'm having a bad day I tell my mind that I need an attitide adjustment.  Our voice, our tone, and body posture reflects frustration even over the phone.  Plus, don't take yourself so serious because sales can be the luck of the draw.

 Bad days are part of the deal.  They're inevitable and everyone has them.  What you do with them is the key to success.  Use bad days to motivate you to improve your presentation.  Eliminate any/all negative self-talk.  This will shorten the bad days and bring on more Great Days.

Thats just sales. No matter how good you are you will have your ups & downs.

One of the things that I have found to help is to realize that what you are doing is working towards a sale.  Figure out how many calls it typically takes to make a sale.  Lets say it is 100 and that a typical sale makes you $100.  Then you figure it makes you $1 for every call you make.  Somedays you make calls all day and get nothing, some days you make 3 or 4 sales in a day.  OK.  You are calling people who do not know you.  They have no relationship to you.  They are just people on the other end of the phone.  Do you listen to every telemarketer who calls??  Some will, some won't, next call.  Keep on calling through.  If you have a good day keep on calling because your success contineus to travel through the phone lines.  If you have a bad day.  Keep calling.  Someone will eventually want what you have to offer.

I keep a bunch of afirmations on my desk and read them when I feel down.  You must stay up!!

Henrik - Everyone's right on their advice on this one.  When a baseball player hits an average of 300, he's considered a success.  However, he's been unsuccessful 70% of the time he's been up to bat.  You can learn as much from the bad calls, as the good ones.  I'm mot a big fan of the writing, and rewriting as Rich suggests, but I do completely agree in taking notes from a call and reviewing them.  You say you're new to this.  Pick out one or two calls and ask an experienced coworker, or even your boss, what they might have done differently.  When I sold as a master distributor, through resellers who sold and integrated my products, I often saw sales people making the same mistakes over and over.  When I would question them for details about a particular opportunity, they had no idea of who they had lost to, the reason the prospect gave for not buying, or that they even bought anything at all.  If they bought from someone else you lost.  If they didn't buy anything at all, they were never a serious prospect.   Finding out why, and determining if there are similarities in your wins and losses, will help you develop better techniques.

I also sold insurance for several years when I graduated from college.  It's not easy.  If you believe in your company and the products you offer, it will show.  I was having a particularily bad week, and my District Manager, made sure to make me feel worse by pointing it out to me and really belittled me in front of my coworkers.  All of them knew I was already down, and felt he had been way to hard on me.  I was not happy about his unprofessional public brow beating, but I was working on a deal that came through for multi-millions of dollars the next day.  My coworkers were quite amused when this same manager almost choked when he had to publicly acknowledge me as leading the district of forty-five sales people at the end of the week. 

Here's what I do to try to trick my brain and stay motivated.  Try to start the day on a positive note.  Save a call or prospect that you know is interested to give you a mental lift as your first call of the day.  What I really like to do is save a call that looks like a pretty good one for late in the day, or especially for my last call on Friday.  That way I can "dwell" on that success until the next morning, or if it's Friday, over the entire weekend.

Lori

 I discovered a fantastic benefit to writing the jorunal and then changing it to a short article or story.Using the computer and spell check  I have increased my ability to communicate more effectively due to the writing.  Have you found that  with your writing?

I would have to say...just keep on going and don't stop making those calls.  Sales does has some slower spots...but if you keep your pipeline full of lots of people to call back in a day...you will find the slow spots start to fade away...hence more sales.  Just have to keep at it and don't let the frustraction come across on the phone...because you never know... the next call may just make your day!  Also I like the idea of keeping track of your calls.  Because it is a numbers game.  Keeping note of your weekly, daily targets also help keep me focused.  Then I'm always aware of how much I need to be closing...Have lots of leads to call...I always look at the numbers as one call closer to a "yes"!  Oh...one more thing about the objections....if you feel you are getting stumped on an objection..talking to you manager about it might help. A good manager will help coach you...the more money you make...the more money they make.  It's all a learning experience...and it never ends...but it does get easier.  Good Luck!!

So true Lori I have three spiral notebooks with over one hundred thousand words condensed to twenty-eight thousand words. .That iis what happens.With b2c I am fortunate that the outcome is more successful than b2c and it allows me to remain positive with all the successful days.I may have to think about 2-6 unsuccessful sales during the month if that many.For me this particular extra activity is very helpful.

Hm being a gatekeepr how often are you crabby?

Smile - Right on the money.  And you're correct about the "gatekeepers".  Sometimes they tend to pride themselves on being difficult and "protecting" bosses.  When I look back over the majority of my "bad" days, they usually fall into two categories.  First, spending too much time dealing with gatekeepers, and second, feeling like a professional quoter, when what I have to offer in the way of product or service wouldn't even get me excited.  Also remember, if a prospect is tough for you to get to, they're probably as tough for your competition.  Some of my best customers were the toughest to get in the first place, and have even joked that they would have been better off if they had not been so difficult, and done business with me sooner.

Smile - Wow! And what if there's something that is important to your boss that you don't know about?  Your boss may never find out because you have blocked the salesperson from him/her.  So, you're not only in sales - you're one of  "Them" :-) (gatekeepers).  But I guess we're getting off the topic.  Technically we are all gatekeepers at one time or another. How about a new forum on gatekeepers?

 I am not an expert in being a positive thinker.  I too get IMMENSELY frustrated when I don't close a phone sale, as I do the same thing you do, only I sell radio time to local businesses around the country.  I also get very very frustrated when I have an unsuccessful day.

I try to approach the problem with humor.  Most of the time it works.

I saw The Beatles for the first time in February, 1964.  I was six.  I saw them on The Ed Sullivan Show.  Four months before, John F. Kennedy was shot in Dallas.  JFK was our youngest President, and he had a beautiful wife, and two very lovely children.  Caroline Kennedy is my age, and when my mother told me, I felt like ten feet tall.  I thought at that moment that if a kid my age is in the White House, it makes everything possible.

America was devastated.  The rest of the world was devastated with us.  England seemed to understand so She gave us a wonderful gift to cheer us up.  Four young, handsome, musically talented men who played and wrote uptempo, singable and fun sounding songs.  We were enthralled.  The Beatles gave us hope.  It was as though JFK was reaching out from beyond the grave.  The Beatles offered a painkiller, a toy and a laugh.

A journalist asked John Lennon what he thought was the secret to The Beatles' success.  He said, "I have no idea.  If I knew the answer, we would find four boys, put them in suits and put them on the Ed Sullivan Show."

They were at the right place and the right time.  America needed them.

The point is, we never know what makes one day a bumper crop and another day a drought.  Persistence is key above all. It's about staying focused, which is something I need to work on every day.

My point on persistence is brought home by a quote from Thomas Edison, inventor of the light bulb and the phonograph:  

 "I have not failed.  I've just found 10,000 ways that won't work."

Henriku,  I find that in the mornings going to work the music I play on the radio/dvd make a huge difference for me to start my day.  It gets me in a good mood before I get there.  It sets my tone for the day.  So, if you feel like the "Rolling Stones" at 6:30 am then that's what you do.  And if your day still sucks during,  pull out the ipod on lunch and listen to music again and even if you just walk around the building outside, it will help.  Hey, life is short and its not worth over time getting all stressed out and head for a heart attack!  How did you week go so far, I have been sick . 

Great Attitude Mr. Durm, I like that.  That is what the music does for me keeps me pumped!

Great posts everyone.  I've been thinking about this some more, and I have come to the conclusion that there are up days and down days, but the only "unsuccessful" days are when you don't learn something from the experience.  And Maureen, I like the fact that you're not an "expert" in the art of positive thinking.  Neither am I.  But you, like all of us, find a way to press on.