The Winner's Sales Strategy Blog

Powerful Sales Lessons From Ronald Reagan

You hear a lot about Ronald Reagan from politicians these days, on both sides of the aisle. History regards him as one of America’s greatest presidents, so he gets name-dropped by a lot of people who attempt to identify with him.

But what you don’t hear about is what Ronald Reagan can teach us about sales, because he was a master salesman!

His most important goal – and greatest accomplishment – was toppling the Soviet Union. While it’s generally believed that he did it simply by out-spending them on military buildup and nuclear missiles, that’s not entirely true.

Let me tell you how he really did it.

Reagan’s Introduction to the Soviets

Ronald Reagan’s eventual domination of the Soviet Union began even before he started going after them in earnest.

It was all about the first impression he made. First impressions count. First impressions last. And Reagan’s first impression, to the Soviets, was of a man of power and respect.

When Ronald Reagan arrived for the first time in the Soviet Union, it was winter, and it was downright cold outside – typical Russian winter weather with sub-zero temperatures and gusting winds and snow.

And then it happened….

Ronald Reagan got out of his limo, wearing only a suit with no overcoat. In the below-zero temperatures, he kept his cool (no pun intended), and didn’t shiver or do anything else to indicate that he was cold. He looked like a super-human to those watching on television, and made his Soviet counterparts, dressed in heavy overcoats, scarves, and fur hats, look like wimps.

The collective thoughts of the Soviet people were, “Who is this man?”

And then it was all downhill for them from there. As Sun Tzu said in The Art of War, “Every battle is won before it’s ever fought.” And Reagan had the Soviets psychologically defeated even before the arms race began that eventually brought them down.

What’s YOUR First Impression?

If Reagan brought down the world’s only other superpower besides the United States, based on the first impression he created on his initial visit, then you KNOW that first impressions count.

Ask yourself this: What is YOUR first impression?

Are you showing up with power and authority as Reagan did, causing people to ask themselves, “Who is this person?”

Or are you supplicating and looking desperate and hungry when you approach sales prospects?

I’ve got some news for you: If you want to look weak and desperate, then there’s no better way in the world to accomplish that than by cold calling.

Cold calling sub-communicates that you have nothing else to do, no customers to service, no prospects wanting to do business with you – in other words, that you’re desperate.

It also makes you look greedy, and not in a good way. Cold calling shows that you are out to GET a sale from them, not to GIVE them value and honest service.

So if you want to convey the level of power and authority that Ronald Reagan did in toppling the Soviets, you need to stop cold calling. Immediately. Right now.

New York Times best-selling author Frank Rumbauskas is the author of the Never Cold Call Again® System and has won numerous accolades, such as Readers Choice for Business  Book of the Year from 800-CEO-READ, and has been named one of Fast Company’s top 30 most influential people online. To learn more, and to download a free 37-page PDF preview of his Never Cold Call Again lead-generation system, visit http://www.nevercoldcall.com

Why You Suck At Sales

It’s true. I hate to be the bearer of bad news, but the truth is clear:

You Suck At Sales

Why? Very simply, it’s because you’re selling.

I define buying & selling different than most people. To me, buying is a pleasurable process where you happily exchange money for something you want or need.

Selling, on the other hand, is an uphill process of trying to convince someone that they want or need what you have. It’s all about overcoming objections, coercion, manipulation… I’m getting a headache just thinking about it!

Selling is a tough job, and a losing battle. That’s why salespeople suck at it. Likewise, being sold is not enjoyable to a customer. That’s why people have built-in sales resistance, that’s automatically and unconsciously triggered at any attempt at selling them.

A while back, author Neil Strauss came out with a book called The Game about his experiences in spending a few years with an underground society of so-called “pickup artists” who essentially boiled dating down to a science. Having met Neil a long time ago at a marketing event, I couldn’t resist checking out the book, and it was interesting.

He tells the story of how women, who are approached by extremely attractive men they desire greatly, routinely reject them anyway – just because of how they approach the women!

In other words, they got rejected because they’re basically selling instead of using a better approach.

And guess what – you’re doing the same with your sales prospects. You may have a great product, at a great price, that does a great service for your customers. But if you’re selling you’re not going to get anywhere.

The very best salespeople – the six figure earners – never sell. Instead, they create the circumstances for buying to take place, and sit back and simply let people buy.

How To Succeed in Sales

Of all the varieties of selling, from rookie mistakes all the way to sleazy dishonest tactics and so-called “closes,” the worst of all is cold calling.

If you look at my definition of “selling”, cold calling definitely takes the cake. It makes it practically impossible to let people buy.

If you want to succeed in sales, and become a top-performing salesperson almost immediately, there are two steps you must take to make that happen:

1. Stop selling, and start creating circumstances where people buy.

2. The first step to that is to stop cold calling – it’s the worst form of selling.

Take those steps, and watch your sales numbers explode and your stress disappear!

And if you're wondering how on earth you can stop cold calling, then download the free 37-PDF of my Never Cold Call Again system. Get it here: http://www.nevercoldcall.com/

New York Times best-selling author Frank Rumbauskas is the author of the Never Cold Call Again® System and has won numerous accolades, such as Readers Choice for Business  Book of the Year from 800-CEO-READ, and has been named one of Fast Company’s top 30 most influential people online. To learn more, and to download a free 37-page PDF preview of his Never Cold Call Again lead-generation system, visit http://www.nevercoldcall.com

Are You STILL Cold Calling? Really?

“You’re still cold calling!”

That’s what a good friend and co-worker said to me one day when he got curious about how I was closing so many sales, seemingly easily.

This was around the time I had perfected by lead-generation methods and organized them into an intelligent system that, by that time, was working on autopilot to bring me leads while I simply spent 100% of my time closing sales from people who were ready to buy.

“That’s just another form of cold calling.”

Now in fairness to him, he was a good salesman. No, a great one.

In fact he usually sold more than me in any given month.

The difference, however, was huge: He had been in the same business, in the same city, for over 25 years. In that time he’d given excellent service – as all successful salespeople do – and as a result he was provided with plenty of referrals. In fact, he usually received more than he could handle and got to pick and choose the best ones, then give other reps his “leftovers” to go close on commission splits.

He had started his sales career in a different time, before the internet, and before sales resistance and opposition to cold calling ran rampant like they do today.

I’ve mentioned in previous emails my “first sales manager with a brain.” When he gave me that pep talk about how he didn’t want me doing the job of a minimum-wage telemarketer, he explained that 25 years ago you could go out cold calling and people would invite you in for a cup of coffee, and would be glad to hear you out.

No more.

This ‘old-timer’ who I worked with didn’t understand that. Due to his huge book of business, he hadn’t made a cold call in over a decade, and had no idea how difficult, if not impossible, cold calling had become.

I suppose it would be like a travel agent coming out of a time capsule, unable to understand the reality that travel agents are obsolete and have been replaced by online travel sites like Expedia.

The old-timer simply assumed that what I was doing was merely a glorified form of cold calling.

When I got myself in front of someone who was pre-disposed, ready, willing, and able to BUY from me, he just assumed that I had actually cold called these people, when in reality I used a far more intelligent and reliable method.

The 3 Categories of Leads

You know from my previous emails on the topic that there are 3 categories of leads. Most salespeople waste their time on the 2 most undesirable categories, while failing to get in front of the valuable ones, the category of people who are pre-disposed to buy.

This is because sales managers & trainers of today are like that old-timer. The last time they were out in the field selling, it was a different world.

There was no way to distinguish one class of leads from another, and so all they were able to do was “throw darts at a board” by cold calling and hope to find enough of the good leads to make a living.

And most did, since cold calling was still acceptable in those days. And people were still mostly tolerant of it.

Today, however, that is no longer the case. It is now crucial to recognize the 3 categories of leads -

1. People who will not buy from you, no matter what

2. People who may or may not (“on the fence”)

3. People who would BUY RIGHT NOW – if they knew about you

Category 1 isn’t so bad – they’ll tell you “no” and unless you’re obstinate or just plain dumb, you’ll move on to someone else.

Category 2, however, is a disaster and the leading cause of failure in sales. These are the people who never make a decision to say either “yes” or “no” and will string you along forever.

(That’s why Category 1 is better – at least they’ll be direct and won’t string you along.)

They’re the ones who will waste your time in multiple appointments, telling you they’re interested, then never return another call or email. Or they’ll tell you to keep calling back in 6 months, only to tell you each time, “Try us in another 6 months.”

Just thinking about these people gets my blood boiling, not only because of how much time & money they cost me early on, but because I consider indecision to be one of the most cowardly traits of human beings.

In his book “How I Raised Myself From Failure To Success In Selling,” Frank Bettger explains that the single best thing he ever did for his sales career was to abandon prospects after they said “no” twice, instead of chasing after them forever. There are too many good prospects out there to waste time chasing bad ones.

Category 3 is the one we want – people who are PRE-DISPOSED to BUY from you! And believe it or not, they’re a good percentage of the market. The problem is that they’re part of the 80% who, per a University of North Carolina study, will never never ever accept a cold call.

“You’re just an order taker!”

 The old-timer believed in the ‘good fight’ and had all the old cliches to go with it: “Getting in the trenches,” “dialing for dollars,” “banging doors” … you’ve probably heard them all I’m sure. And you probably want to puke just as much as I do when I hear them.

This guy really believed that sales somehow didn’t count if they didn’t come from cold calling, as if the money from those commission checks was somehow ‘play money’ that didn’t work in the real world.

I even once worked for a company that had a good marketing department and provided us with plenty of leads, but only ‘self-generated’ leads counted toward quota. How dumb is that??!?!?!? Sales are sales!

Having said all that, when someone in the old-school department accused me of being an order taker, know what my response was?

“Damn right I am!”

Seriously, why would anyone in sales NOT want to be an order taker? In sales we get paid only to do just that – make sales. Commissions come from closed sales, not from cold calls and appointments.

Taking it a step further, about the only way to make a truly huge income in sales is to set yourself up to become an order taker, so that you’re spending absolutely no time on anything other than closing sales and picking up checks.

There just isn’t any other way. There aren’t enough hours in the day to make any alternatives possible.

I’m a HAPPY order taker!

I have to say, becoming one of the so-called ‘order takers’ was the best thing I ever did in sales.

While it’s true that money problems are the leading cause of stress and tension, and getting rid of that cause of stress really makes a big difference in your life, getting rid of work stress along with it takes things to a new level.

You become the invincible person who is never stressed about anything. And you become amazed at how people let insignificant things bother them.

Most of all, you marvel at the people who are still killing themselves cold calling, stressing out over money as a result, and you wonder why they won’t open their minds to new ideas.

So if you want to enjoy happiness and success in selling, stop cold calling, and start using your brain - and modern, Information Age methods - to generate leads, and watch your income skyrocket!    

Real Salespeople NEVER Close Sales!

Last week I had a conference call with another top sales trainer, and an expert on email marketing.

We were discussing how salespeople can use email most effectively.

Andy, the email marketing pro, gave a great tip: NEVER close an email with a typical close such as “Sincerely” or “Thank You.”

He explained that the purpose of a salesperson sending an email is to get a reply back from the prospect, and the best way to do that is to leave the conversation OPEN by ending the email with a thought-provoking question that will force a reply.

Notice I said “thought-provoking” and not the usual sales talk like, “When can I have 15 minutes of your time,” or, “What will it take to get your business?” That is typical sales talk and will get your email deleted.

Andy said that using a typical close to an email CLOSES the conversation, and your chances of getting the sale plummet down to almost nothing!

Should You “Always Be Closing?”

Yesterday I couldn’t help resist quoting Alec Baldwin’s famous line in the movie Glengarry Glen Ross – “Always Be Closing.” It’s a sales classic!

But – is it true in the real world of selling – our modern world?

Napoleon Hill, in his now hard-to-find book, How To Sell Your Way Through Life, explained that a good salesperson never has to “close” a sale. If you’re working with a qualified prospect from the beginning, and you conduct the sales process properly, there is never any need for “closes.”

The sale happens naturally – the prospect simply buys.

Having to “close” a sale suggests that you didn’t do a good job from the beginning. Either your prospect wasn’t qualified and ready to buy, or you acted and sounded like every other salesperson out there, or you gave a boring formal proposal with a price tag on it, instead of using the profit-justification techniques I teach to show a gain instead of a cost at the end of the proposal.

The bottom line is: If you’re having to use closes, you need to learn how to sell effectively, because you’re not doing it right now.

How To Avoid Tacky & Uncomfortable “Closes”

Top sales pros never use any of the typical closes that most salespeople use. In fact, they don’t use any formal closes at all. Prospects simply buy from them – because they want to!

If your prospect doesn’t want to buy from you, then you’re doing something wrong.

And having trained salespeople for 10 years, I can tell you exactly what the problem is 9 times out of 10: The prospect was never fully qualified to begin with!

I can hear all the excuses now: “But I don’t get enough leads! I don’t have enough qualified prospects!”

Fine. I understand. I’ve been there too. But, there’s a way out:

If you’re the kind of person who puts good advice into action – and you MUST if you want to succeed in sales – then do this right now: follow the link below and order the Never Cold Call Again system immediately. It will forever solve your problem of not having enough qualified prospects. Once you put it into action, you’ll experience the results you’ve always wanted. And remember, you get to try it free for 30 days before even making a decision to buy it:

Start Your Free Trial Now:
https://www.nevercoldcall.com/ordernow.php

Do it right now. You’ll have the e-book in just a few minutes, and can start putting my system to use immediately. Plus you’ll get over $300 in free bonuses that you can download immediately along with the e-book. (The actual package, the book and CDs, will ship to you within one business day.)

Thanks once again for your time and thank you for reading. Good luck and happy selling!

To your success!

Frank Rumbauskas

PS: Imagine what it would be like if you never had to make a cold call – ever again. Aaaahhhhh… nice, isn’t it? You’ll be able to do exactly that with my Never Cold Call Again system so get it right now:

Start Your Free Trial Now:
https://www.nevercoldcall.com/ordernow.php

WEBINAR: PRO Networking Secrets for EASY Sales!

WEBINAR: PRO Networking Secrets for EASY Sales!

I'm proud to announce my newest LIVE webinar, PRO Networking Secrets for EASY Sales, on Wednesday, March 20th, at 11:00 AM Eastern time, and again at 3:00 PM Eastern time.

DATE: Wednesday, March 20th
TIMES: 11 AM and 3 PM Eastern Time
PRICE: Only $20

This will be a LIVE webinar and nothing will be sold. You get a solid hour of content that's JAM-PACKED with powerful techniques you can begin using, immediately, to begin networking EFFECTIVELY to fill your pipeline with hot, qualified leads - people who are ready to buy right now.

Since relocating to a new city exactly one year ago this month, I've been a networking machine - and I can confidently say that I have PERFECTED the process. My sales reps and I can show up at a networking event and literally walk someone over to a table after, or drive to a nearby Starbucks, and close a sale on the spot.

Learn how on this webinar! I'll be presenting for over one hour, followed by 30 minutes of live Q&A.

 -> Register Here:

Click Here to Register for the 11:00 AM Session

Click Here to Register for the 3:00 PM Session

What You'll Learn:

- Why it's practically guaranteed you're networking all wrong!
- Why "Leads Clubs" and most Chambers are a waste of time
- You'll learn the BEST KEPT SECRET in networking events - the ones
  where sales really happen!
- Why your "30-second commercial" probably sucks
- How to craft a "30-second commercial" that PEOPLE CAN'T RESIST!
- My "stealth" networking tactic that generates MULTIPLE, easy
  sales at every event
- The PRO Networking Secret that less than 1% of salespeople use,
  that will EXPLODE your sales!
- ... and much more!

Can't Make Either Session?

No problem! I'm going to record the webinar as it happens, and you'll receive a recording the following day. So register anyway to be sure you don't miss out on this powerful, hard-hitting content.

And if you do attend a live session, you'll also receive the replay, so you can continually refer back to the material as needed in the future.

 -> Register Here:

Click Here to Register for the 11:00 AM Session

Click Here to Register for the 3:00 PM Session

I look forward to seeing you there!

To your success!

Frank Rumbauskas

PS: Remember, even if you can't make either of the live sessions, you'll still receive the replay video along with the presentation PDF, along with another report I'll be sending out to supplement the webinar, so go ahead and register anyway!

The Major Cause of Failure in Selling

I recently had an experience, one of several like it, that really hits home as to why more salespeople aren’t successful and why the economy in general has been sluggish to recover from recession.

A partner and I recently started another business unrelated to my work as a sales trainer and author. Just like every other single experience I’ve had with starting a business, this one has been slowed down by people in various organizations who seem to go through life absolutely refusing to do anything at all.

First of all, since this is a retail business that will need to take cards, we chose a merchant bank to provide that account. This happens to be an extremely competitive field, one that is very difficult for most salespeople, and as a result you’d think that calling one of them and saying “I’d like to open an account with you” would result in immediate action. But not so.

The Curse of Inaction – and The Results

It’s been the standard routine of unreturned phone calls, people making excuses as to why it hasn’t been done yet, and lots of finger-pointing whenever we confront anyone about why nothing has been set up yet.

Then we talked with our supplier about some things we need done in regard to the product supply chain that would effectively allow us to triple sales. Again, there were lots of lazy excuses such as, “Well, you’d need to speak with so-and-so and he’s on vacation and I really don’t know so maybe next week if you want to call again….” The irony here is that the supplier will prosper much more than we will as a result of these changes, and yet trying to get them off their butts to do anything is like pulling teeth.

And on and on and on. It never ends. Seeing how most businesses operate this way is, to me, the number one reason for the sluggish economic conditions we’re in today. It’s not high taxes or our politicians or the labor unions or anything else. It’s sheer laziness on the part of 90% of the business world.

All of this nonsense got me thinking about the problems salespeople face, and how most of the time, all the help in the world is worthless simply because they don’t use any of it.

A Valuable Opportunity: Wasted and Lost!

Take the free sales plan review that you get with the Never Cold Call Again system. Here is a consulting service that would easily cost hundreds of dollars, and I include it with a program costing a mere $97. I thought we’d be overwhelmed with these reviews – in fact I was almost afraid to offer them at first!

I checked the last 1,000 orders to find out how many people actually sent in the review.

There were only 4. Just 4 out of 1,000. That’s 0.4%, folks.

Needless to say, I was extremely disappointed.

Next, I decided to pull up a tracking link I added to the e-book. It’s the link to the email marketing company I recommend. I figured at least a few hundred people would have clicked on it or entered it into their browser, and that at least several dozen people would have signed up for the service and begun using it to easily generate lots of pre-qualified leads.

So far, a whopping 7 people out of the last 1,000 books sold have used that link.

Only a few have signed up for the service, a service that could drastically improve their sales numbers without much work on their part. In fact, most of our orders don’t come from first-time visitors to our site. The majority come from people who have been newsletter subscribers for at least a month.

Another example: When it comes to the Never Cold Call Again system itself, almost no one returns it under the 30-day trial, but those who do almost always return it unopened, still in the original shrink wrap!

That means they never even tried the system – they gave up without even trying! Without even opening the box!

The bottom line here is that if you don’t take action in your life, the best advice in the world cannot help you.

Every now and then, in between all the glowing testimonials and success stories we receive, there is a call or email from someone who claims to have tried the program and not gotten any real results from it. A short conversation always reveals that they tried only one of the dozens of techniques explained in the program, and maybe for only a week or two at that, before giving up.

There is a reason I discuss the topic of a “system of systems” from time to time and explain, in detail in the course, how to do it. That’s what it takes. But above all, you must take action to build those systems before you can reap any rewards.

Anyone who is going to go through a sales training course, regardless of whether it’s mine or someone else’s, and says “that’s nice” and then goes back to their usual routine without putting any of it into action is facing a long, difficult career consisting of day after day of cold calling with dismal results and endless pressure from managers to improve performance.

Not to mention all the funnel reviews, warnings, “performance improvement plans,” and other forms of hell that managers will put you through.

The bottom line is that if you’re going to seek advice but do nothing with the advice and go back to your old routine, neither myself nor my system can help you. However, if you’re the kind of person who puts good advice into action, then do this right now: follow the link below and order the Never Cold Call Again system immediately. Once you put it into action, you’ll experience the results you’ve always wanted. And remember, you get to try it free for 30 days before even making a decision to buy it:

Start Your Free Trial Now:
https://www.nevercoldcall.com/ordernow.php

Do it right now. You’ll have the e-book in just a few minutes, and can start putting my system to use immediately. Plus you’ll get over $300 in free bonuses that you can download immediately along with the e-book. (The actual package, the book and CDs, will ship to you within one business day.)

Thanks once again for your time and thank you for reading. Good luck and happy selling!

To your success!

Frank Rumbauskas

PS: Imagine what it would be like if you never had to make a cold call – ever again. Aaaahhhhh… nice, isn’t it? You’ll be able to do exactly that with my Never Cold Call Again system so get it right now:

Start Your Free Trial Now:
https://www.nevercoldcall.com/ordernow.php

What Do 100 Cold Calls Really Accomplish?

Last week I was on the phone with another sales author, talking about the futility of cold calling.

He made a VERY good point that I wanted to share with you:

“If you make 100 cold calls, all you’ve done was anger 100 people.”

Think about that.

People BUY from those whom they LIKE.

People do NOT buy from those they don’t like.

And I can’t think of much that will make someone dislike you more than cold calling.

I can tell you that I absolutely, positively will not take cold calls. And it has nothing to do with the fact that I’m the author ofNever Cold Call Again – it has everything to do with the fact that I’m a business owner with too much, more important work to do than be interrupted by cold calls all day long.

Do YOUR Prospects LIKE You?

Yesterday, I wrote about how thrilled I was to attend a networking group where, instead of everyone trying to GET leads from each other, the focus of the group is on GIVING referrals to each other. And the group facilitator made sure this happens. In fact it’s a requirement of membership to provide a minimum number of referrals at each meeting.

Guess what?

I LIKE the people who gave me referrals! And because the leads are referrals, they’re hot leads. I’m already “in the door,” so to speak, because I was brought in by introduction, and I know in advance that they actually want to buy what I can provide.

This is a far cry from cold calling. When you interrupt someone with a cold call, all you “accomplish,” if you can call it that, is to anger and annoy the person.

You blow your chances of developing a relationship – and eventually a sale – with that person.

Worst of all, cold calls annoy people who may very well BE qualified prospects for you – but because you made yourself known via a cold call, they’re probably not going to buy from you!

What Do 100 Cold Calls Really Accomplish?

If I’ve said it once, I’ve said it a thousand times: The math of cold calling doesn’t add up. Anything times zero equals zero. That’s basic grammar school math. So if 50 cold calls equals zero results, 100 cold calls or 1,000 cold calls will also equal zero results.

Math doesn’t lie.

And annoying people with cold calling, while communicating a message that you’re there to “get” a sale from them, isn’t going to get results either.

Then what will get results?

Simple: Modern, effective, Information Age strategies, tactics and techniques that generate an endless supply of hot, qualified leads, without making a single cold call.

And they’re all explained in my Never Cold Call Again system, a system that over 50,000 salespeople have used to transform their careers and their lives. Your copy is ready and waiting to ship to you right now, and you pay nothing but the shipping ($9.25 in the US) and have a full 30 days to decide if you want to keep it and pay for it then, or send it back and never hear from us again.

It’s that simple. We’re even insured & bonded and covered by multiple third-party guarantees after thorough credit, financial, and reputation checks, so you know that this is 100% risk-free for you.

So don’t waste another day making cold calls, angering people, and hating it all the while. Request your 30-day trial of the Never Cold Call Again system right here, right now -

Start Your Free Trial Now:
https://www.nevercoldcall.com/ordernow.php

To your success!

Frank Rumbauskas

PS: Seriously, do you want to waste another day cold calling, hating every minute of it and not getting the results you desire? There’s absolutely no reason not to grab a copy of the Never Cold Call Again system when I’m letting you “try it before you buy it” for a full 30 days so do it right now:

https://www.nevercoldcall.com/ordernow.php

Salespeople Come Across As Greedy - Here's How To Avoid That Problem

Yes, I hate to be the bearer of bad news, but you’re being GREEDY – and it’s HURTING you!

This really hit home over the past year as I’ve been attending lots of networking events in order to meet other like-minded people since relocating to a new city.

Inevitably, at these events, everyone WANTS something. Few people are GIVING. Most are GREEDY.

Yesterday though, an appointment cancelled, so to fill in the time slot, I jumped on Meetup and found a nearby lunch group and dropped in. This one surprised me. It wasn’t about TAKING.

The focus of the group was on GIVING.

Sure, it started out with the old lame routine of going around the room and having everyone give their “30-second commercials.”

But once that was completed, the focus shifted to to see who could GIVE the most referrals!

I thought to myself, “Now this is a group I can get on board with!” In fact, even though I showed up unannounced and it was my first time, I walked out with three solid referrals: One for sales coaching, one for speaking, and one for business lead generation.

(In all fairness, half the people there know knew I am, have my books, and so on, but still, this has NEVER happened at another networking function.)

And therein lies the problem with cold calling.

When you make a cold call, what you’re REALLY sub-communicating to the prospect is, “I need a sale!” Or, “I want a sale!” And that makes you look greedy – and even worse, needy! Desperate!

The successful salesperson never tries to GET. Instead, the successful salesperson GIVES VALUE FIRST even before thinking about what they might “get” in return. In the real world, if you give value first, there is no “taking” at all. The prospect willingly buys from you because they see that there’s something in it for them.

Let me repeat: The ONLY reason people buy is because there’s something in it for them!

You can bet your life that those three people who so generously gave me hot referrals will get many more in return from me. That’s because they willingly gave me something of value, without expecting nor requesting anything in return from me.

When you’re cold calling, however, the exact opposite happens. It’s completely obvious to the prospect that you’re out to “get” rather than to give value.

They know full well that if you were a person who gives value first, you’d be out servicing your existing customers. Or you’d be at a networking group, giving out referrals like those generous people gave me yesterday.

Cold calling removes all value from the equation and sends a message that you’re there only for YOUR benefit, not theirs. They won’t see value, they won’t trust you, and they won’t buy.

No one will ever buy because you want or need a sale. They’ll only buy because they see a gain in buying from you. So always strive to give value first. And remember that no matter how much value you can offer a prospect, if your approach is via a typical cold call, the context of your delivery will kill your chances every time.

So stop cold calling, start giving value first, and watch the sales start rolling in!

To your success,

Frank Rumbauskas

How to Get TONS of Sales Referrals, Quick & Easy

Yep, it’s true. Getting referrals is easy.

As I wrote you a couple of weeks ago, one of the most common questions I get from salespeople is, “How can I get more referrals?” And in that email, I explained the system I advise for newer salespeople who haven’t yet built up a solid network.

Having said that, there is an even easier – and better – way to get referrals. But rather than explain it literally, let’s visit with our old friends Bill and Joe, two very real salespeople I used to work with, whose names have been changed here for privacy reasons.
Bill’s Referral Selling Story

As you know by now, Bill is very much a believer in cold calling. He used to sit in the cubicle right next to mine, and I’d hear him cold calling nonstop – he was really a machine!

Bill made so many cold calls that he really did rack up a decent number of appointments, and through them, he made enough sales to hit his number each month and keep his job. Which I suppose was good enough for him, but I wouldn’t be happy with just getting by – remember when I told you he drove all summer long with no air conditioning due to lack of funds?

In any case, Bill was always a very busy man. Endless cold calls, lots of appointments, and of course the work of processing all those orders and following up with internal staff to make sure they were delivered on time.

This was all well and good, except for one very fatal flaw: Bill’s ever-full schedule never left him with enough time to really follow up with customers, make absolutely sure they were happy, and give them as much extra value as possible! He couldn’t do it, because that wouldn’t leave enough time for all those cold calls each and every day, and then he wouldn’t hit his number and would be out of a job very quickly.

As a result of all this, Bill had no right to ask customers for referrals. Sure, after closing a sale he’d ask, “Do you know anyone who might also need this,” but we all know how poorly that strategy works. Customers don’t like to refer friends and colleagues until you’ve proven that you can deliver on your promises.

And so Bill’s vicious cycle of cold call, appointment, sale, then more cold calls never ended.
Joe’s Referral Selling Story

Joe had an entirely different selling style. He didn’t cold call at all. Instead, he used intelligent methods of what I like to call “self-marketing” and positioning himself so he was visible to highly qualified prospects – people who were looking to buy right now.

On top of not having to cold call, Joe was able to sell exponentially more than Bill. This was due to the fact that never having to make cold calls means you recover all those endless hours you would’ve otherwise spent prospecting. Instead of wasting that time looking for someone to sell to, you get to spend it closing sales instead! And isn’t that what we’re paid to do in the first place?

However, that’s not the end of the story. In addition to selling exponentially more than Bill because he had so much more time available, Bill also had a lot more time to spend following up with customers and making absolutely certain they were 100% satisfied.

By doing this, Bill delivered value.

And when you deliver value, you stand out from all other salespeople, in a very big way, because almost no one in sales strives to deliver value.

It’s like Napoleon Hill’s estimate that 98 out of every 100 people won’t go the extra mile; in fact most of them won’t even go the first mile! (Later in his life he said the number is closer to 100 out of 100, with a rare exception here and there.)

Hill explained that going the extra mile is the one thing, above all others, that will always guarantee success, far out of proportion than most people ever dream of. And that same truth applies in sales.

Joe never had to ask for referrals, because his customers willingly offered them – they couldn’t give them to him fast enough!

All because he took the time to visit with customers after the fact to make sure they were happy, and to ask if he could be of any additional service – with no intention or expectation of getting referrals from them.

There you have it: That is the easiest and best way to get TONS of referrals!

However, you have to have enough hours available in your day to do it.

And if you’re wasting endless hours cold calling, you’ll forever be stuck in the same vicious cycle Bill was always stuck in.

But that’s the bad news. Now for the good news:

There’s a way out of cold calling. Lots of them. In fact I’ve assembled them into one package – my Never Cold Call Againsystem – that will get hot, qualfiied prospects calling you, ready to buy right now!

And the best part is you get to try it out, on me, for a full 30 days. If you don’t like it for any reason, simply send it back within 30 days and you’ll never pay a dime. Do it right now:

Start Your Free Trial Now:
https://www.nevercoldcall.com/ordernow.php

Remember, there really is an easy way to get tons of endless referrals. But you’ll never have enough time in the day to make it work if you’re stuck cold calling, so break the cold calling cycle right now.

Need LOTS of Sales, Fast? Here's Your Answer.

I spent this weekend at a convention of salespeople, run by their association, and I spent a lot of time face-to-face and one-on-one with these reps, learning what their challenges are and how they can overcome them.

Here’s the interesting part – they’re selling services that businesses need, that are on the cutting edge, and that are (or should be) very easy to sell.

In other words, they’re not selling useless trinkets that no one wants. They’re selling a very valuable service that’s quickly becoming a necessity for small businesses to have, and that prospects are happy and excited to buy!

And yet, they think it’s going to be hard! They think they’ll get sales resistance, or they think they’ll have trouble reaching decision makers.

This baffled me at first. Why aren’t prospects jumping all over this, I wondered? After doing a bit more fact finding, I started to get to the bottom of it.

The problem is that most of these reps are going in with the wrong mindset. They’re going in with a selling mindset, instead of thinking, “People want to buy this.”

I convinced these salespeople that they’re selling a service that people want and need. That prospects (qualified prospects, that is) will be excited to hear about it. And that when they expect these things to take place, they will – and people will simply buy!

That’s not all I taught them – there’s far too much to include here – but I was thrilled to learn that after I’d left on Saturday afternoon, a few of the reps went back to prospecting business owners (on a weekend, no less!) and already had leads and deals lined up for this week!

All this because of a simple change in mindset!

The Secret to Sales Success

If you go into a sales situation with a “selling” mindset and you expect resistance and objections, of course you’re going to get them.

Your anticipation of failure comes through in your voice tone, your body language, and a hundred other subtle ways. Prospects sense it, and they shut you down.

But when you come in with thoughts of, “You will love this and you are going to buy,” then those thoughts come across in all of your non-verbal forms of sub-communication, and prospects pick up on that – and act accordingly!

With that in mind, here’s what you can do – right now – to jumpstart your sales numbers, fast:

1. Take inventory of all the ways your product or service benefits your customers, put yourself in their shoes, and understand once and for all how happy and excited prospects will be to hear about it!

2. Make sure you are only dealing with prospects who are fully qualified, who have a current need for your product or service, and who are capable of buying. Don’t make cold calls at random and then wonder why you’re getting zero results.

As to that second point, if you’re wondering how on earth you’re going to get in front of those highly valuable prospects we all want, I’ve laid out the answers in my Never Cold Call Again system which covers, in step-by-step detail, dozens of lead generation techniques you can begin using immediately, at no cost, and start generating hot leads from highly qualified prospects who want to buy right now.

I’ll ship it to you today and let you “try it before you buy it” for 30 days, before you even have to decide if you want to pay for it, or just send it back and never hear from me again:

Start Your Free Trial Now:
https://www.nevercoldcall.com/ordernow.php

To your success!

Frank Rumbauskas

PS: Remember, the Never Cold Call Again system is fully updated and revised for 2013, with all-new modules on social media lead generation and advanced referral selling, on top of the original system which has produced astounding results for over 50,000 salespeople, so don’t hesitate! Get your copy right now:

Start Your Free Trial Now:
https://www.nevercoldcall.com/ordernow.php