My friend Dan Kennedy tells a story about two guys who owned a sales training company that flew in to see him for a day of sales management consulting to help grow their business. At about 9 AM they confessed neither of them liked selling and at about 9:30 AM they had their check returned to them and were headed back to the airport.
Clients often ask me of all the things I do what do I like best. Quite frankly, I don’t like much of what I do. What I like is sleeping, reading, fishing and puttering around in my yard/garden, going to the beach, and visiting with friends and family. Unfortunately, I’ve never figured out how to make significant income from doing those things.
I like making large deposits from selling and closing deals. I don’t like all the preparation that is necessary to conduct high level sales skill training, all the marketing and writing sales copy, the sales coaching and consulting with clients, and putting up with their bullshit, getting up early and working 16 hour days, six days a week. I don’t like traveling, hotels, dealing with clients, and the long hours and endless self-promotion. But I do all of it anyway.
The list of things I don’t like is by far larger than the list of things I do like. There is more not to like about what I do than there is to like. But I do them anyway because I have not been able to figure out how to get people to pay me money if I don’t do them.
Selling Skills
But of all the things I must do to earn money, I like selling the most. I enjoy learning about it. Never tire of working and studying to improve my selling skills, and I am fascinated by the thrill of the chase and the ability to influence the outcome of the conversation. Because of my endless fascination and study of it I am also extremely good at it.
The process of executing selling skills successfully, either face-to-face or on the telephone provides an adrenaline rush. Not only do I like it, I need it like an addict needs a fix, and so do most of the other highly successful salespeople that I have ever met.
If you don’t feel the same way about improving your selling skills and have an emotional need to convince people of your point of view then you are in a terrible fix or as Charles Barkley would say you ‘are in a turrible fix’ because partner that’s where the money is. Of all the professions and occupations in this country, none is as important to the economy as the sales profession. As Red Motley said many years ago, “nothing happens until somebody sells something”.
I’m here to tell you that if you want to become financially independent and control your own destiny and live life on your own terms, you need to embrace selling, learn to like it and love it, and commit to becoming expert at it. The ability to sell is the equivalent to being a master hunter in the days when the wild buffalo roamed the plains. It is the basis for superiority, for mastery over man and circumstances. Having superior selling skills gives you power and confidence to create your own life while others who lack effective selling skills continue to be someone else’s slave.
Please leave a comment below. I am interested in your thoughts about selling and whether you have the same psychological need as I do to convince others of your point of view.