The Winner's Sales Strategy Blog:

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December 30, 2016

How To Lose Friends and Never Influence People

It's true that a likable salesperson is always going to outsell someone who is not likable. After all, selling is a people business, and people have got to like you if you expect to succeed.

The same is true for any business - we have to be likable. The other day I talked about how I strategically repel customers who aren't a fit for us, but for the rest, we do our best to be well-liked!

Inevitably though, customer service problems arise. People make mistakes, or UPS delivers a package to the wrong address, or a receptionist signs for it and gives it to the wrong person. It happens.

We go out of our way to fix those problems, but we can only help customers who approach us properly.

Here's an example:

This week, someone posted on my Facebook page about how he ordered something a week ago and still doesn't have it.

I deleted the post - my Facebook page isn't the place for that - and forwarded his information to my support desk, but a few minutes later, he did it again.

Looking up his ticket history, it appeared that someone responded to him within minutes, but his email apparently went to his spam folder, since auto-generated support tickets do that a lot. (ALWAYS check your spam folder!) As far we knew, the problem was resolved.

But, it wasn't, and instead of trying to contact us by ticket, or instead of picking up the phone, the customer resorted to trash-talking me on my Facebook page.

That's not an example of a customer helping us to help him. After having him publicly call me a crook, when in fact the package was delivered to the correct address, gave me zero desire to help him.

Now think about your role in sales - your job is to make sales. That's it.

To clarify that even more, your real job isn't to 'sell' to people, which implies convincing someone who really may not want your product. Your real job is getting people to 'buy' because when someone buys, as opposed to being sold, they're a lot happier in the end, and you get to deal with less headaches and more referrals!

Unfortunately though, few salespeople help customers to buy. Instead they continually sell. The problem is exacerbated by books and seminars that continue to tell salespeople to pester prospects until they either say yes or no.

Why? How is THAT productive?

Isn't it better to spend time with people who WANT to buy, instead of fighting an uphill battle with people who DON'T?

Place that concept into the context of how YOU are doing your job every day, and think about whether you are getting people to buy, or if you're merely stressing yourself and your prospects out by trying to sell them.

Once you achieve that new way of thinking, that you're not a salesperson as much as someone who gets others to buy, you'll be a lot happier and your commission checks will be a lot bigger!

Learn how you can stop cold calling forever and become a sales rock star by downloading a 37-page PDF preview of the Never Cold Call Again System.

New York Times best-selling author Frank Rumbauskas is the creator 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 NeverColdCall.com

Posted at 12:35 PM in Self-Improvement | Permalink | Comments (0)

My Blunt Opinion on People who Procrastinate

Today I received a request from someone to remove his testimonial from my website, or to at least remove his last name and his location.

It's not because he isn't happy. Not at all. It's because he's constantly inundated with people who see his testimonial on the site, then call him to verify that it's real before they buy.

But here's the clincher: The testimonial only contained his name and town. There was no contact info at all. Which means that people are wasting a bunch of time tracking him down to get him on the phone, all to verify that he is "real."

THIS IS JUST DAMN INSANE!

Seriously, how much time are people wasting on this nonsense, that they could be using to make sales instead? Not to mention that it just isn't right to pester someone who was kind and generous enough to give me a testimonial. I'm willing to bet that it's a huge amount of time, because someone who is doing that to one of my testimonials is probably doing it to all of them. In that amount of time they could close a sale or generate some new leads or read a new sales book.

I really shouldn't have to remind people how fatal the flaw of INDECISION is to success. But apparently some people aren't getting the message!

Napoleon Hill wrote that "I need to think it over" is the last line of defense for people who haven't the courage to say either "yes" or "no."

In fact, I've repeatedly told sales prospects that I'd rather hear them tell me "no" than "I need to think it over." The reason is that the latter statement is a waste of my time. I demand decision. It's one of the things that has made me successful. It's sad that most prospects need to be reassured that it's okay to say "no" before they'll come out and say it. In most cases it's a lot easier to close a sale and hear "yes" than it is to get someone to admit that they want to say "no!"

Indecision is the most fatal character flaw that leads to failure, primarily because it is at the root of most procrastination.

So I'm asking you to make a DECISION, right now, by making the following commitment:

Commit that you will lose the fatal character trait of indecision by making quick, definite decisions any time you face one and you have all, or even most, of the necessary facts at your disposal.

As Hill stated:

"Make a decision. Make ANY decision. ANY decision is better than NO decision."

By picking up the habit of always making quick and definite decisions, and sticking to those decisions and reversing them slowly, if you do at all, you will find success rushing into your life at a pace you'd never even dreamed of before.

Seriously. Please make that decision right now - commit to this and stick with it!

Learn how you can stop cold calling forever and become a sales rock star by downloading a 37-page PDF preview of the Never Cold Call Again System.

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 NeverColdCall.com

Posted at 12:33 PM in Productivity | Permalink | Comments (0)

December 29, 2016

The Reason Why Prospects Don't Call You Back

As much as I’d love to, I make an effort to read each and every email I receive from my readers. However, being a popular sales author, there’s no way I can return all of them, and even reading all of them is impossible due to sheer volume, but I do try.

However, your prospects don’t try. They most likely don’t even care. That’s why they usually don’t call you back.

Why? Because you’re not giving them any value up front, and they know it.

Every time I receive a cold call, or sometimes even an email, 9 times out of 10 I don’t even want to hear it. Why? Because I know very well that it’s someone either trying to sell me something, or trying to get something free from me without any compensation. In other words, there’s no value in it for me.

You may have heard by now the story of my first good sales training course, where I learned that cold calling is a waste of time. In addition, I learned of the acronym “WIIFM” in that training:

WIIFM = "What’s In It For Me"

We were taught that before saying one word to a sales prospect – or doing anything with your prospects – to always ask ourselves, “What’s the WIIFM?” Or to say, you had better have value for the prospect, or it was a total waste of time.

Almost no salespeople do this.

Every time I get unsolicited calls from sales reps, there’s never a WIIFM. And that’s why I don’t call back. Or write back. Or want to hear from them again.

Everything you say to a prospective customer, every word you type to your prospects, every action you take with a prospect, MUST contain a WIIFM. And you’d better give the WIIFM up front if you want the prospect to pay attention! There are no exceptions to this rule.

That’s why cold calling is a waste of time. Forget about all the tough receptionists, advanced anti-cold-call phone systems, no soliciting signs, and all that. If you do manage to get a qualified prospect on the phone or in front of you, the issue is that there’s really no way to open a cold call with a WIIFM. Cold calling, by its very nature, is anti-WIIFM. Cold calls are all about what YOU want, not what’s best for the prospect.

(Also, “elevator speeches” and “unique value propositions” don’t count as WIIFMs. They’re worn-out cliches and catchphrases that sales managers love to throw around, and that’s all.)

The bottom line is if you want to increase your sales numbers, and achieve huge sales success, you must never, ever approach your prospects without giving a WIIFM up front. And if you can’t think of one, you shouldn’t be talking to them in the first place. That means they’re not a genuinely qualified prospect for you – and it’s unethical to attempt to sell anything to anyone that doesn’t deliver powerful WIIFMs – real world value – to them.

In closing, remember that cold calling is by far the most anti-WIIFM sales strategy out there. If you’re cold calling, you have no hope of delivering a true WIIFM, up front, to your prospects, which means you have zero chance of making a sale.

Learn how you can stop cold calling forever and become a sales rock star by downloading a 37-page PDF preview of the Never Cold Call Again System.And if you liked this article, please share it with your network and let me know your thoughts and comments. Thanks!

Posted at 04:34 PM in Sales Prospecting | Permalink | Comments (0)

Cold Calling Scripts: Dead or Alive?

Cold calling scripts are the most commonly recommended tool to assist a new salesperson in prospecting for sales. However, cold calling scripts are frequently overused, abused, and relied upon as crutches. This results in salespeople sounding like robots, and failing to come across as a human being with a real personality. And as anyone who is successful in sales well knows, personality is what really sells. People buy people above and beyond price, features, benefits, and even profitability.

Therefore, the problem with cold calling scripts in general is that they kill off any chance of making a real personal connection with the prospect, especially when they’re read verbatim and you end up sounding like one of those fundraising cold callers who manage to interrupt dinner hour night after night.

However, what if it were possible to personalize a cold calling script, and make it not so “cold” after all? It’s not only possible, but a relatively new sales tool has even made it easy: Social media.

If you’re any good at sales at all, hopefully you’re working lists of targeted prospects – even if you’re cold calling. Making cold calls for sales is bad enough, but if you’re doing it blindly and calling strangers completely at random, it becomes almost totally ineffective.

On the contrary, the smart sales professional always works targeted prospects. Before picking up the phone to make that call – or even consider how the initial contact will be made in the first place – a good sales pro will identify who his or her ideal prospects are, define the characteristics of those ideal prospects, and then begin compiling a list of whom to target.

If you’re in B2B sales, this is a piece of cake. You should be familiar with your territory and who is in it. If you’re in B2C sales, it’s not so cut-and-dry, but birth & marriage announcements in newspapers, as well as promotion and job change announcements in your local business journal – as well as purchased lists – certainly simplify the process and help you create a list of ideal customers for your product or service.

With your target list complete – whether it’s 25, 50, 100 prospects, or more – you can begin the research phase. Find out who the key decision makers are, and begin researching them on social media properties, particularly LinkedIn, the grandaddy of social media for salespeople.

Facebook is also useful for learning about the personal side of your prospects, and for identifying “icebreakers” that you can use when making the initial contact. These would be any common interests, such as hobbies, education, sports teams, and so on, that you can use as conversation starters.

Armed with this knowledge, it’s time to make that call. But, we’re talking about cold calling scripts, remember?

For starters, a sales script should never be more than an outline, or a roadmap for you to follow on your call. Structure it in bullet-point fashion, with flowchart navigation so you can skip to different parts of the script in order to expedite your call. For example, if your prospect is already familiar with what you sell, you can skip over that section and move on to the next, whether it’s identifying needs, or setting the appointment.

Remember that one of the leading causes of failure in selling is making the mistake of insisting on going through your entire sales process, or call script, or what have you – I’ve seen companies with “steps of a sale” as many as 20 (!) which certainly annoyed prospects and led to lost sales.

If I’ve said it once, I’ve said it a thousand times: If someone wants to buy, get out of the way, stop selling, and just let them buy!

With your outline-style script in hand, craft an introduction or opening line for each individual prospect, armed with some personal or professional insight about them – and hopefully some common ground – that you can use to open the conversation. Doing this shifts the premise of the call from business to personal, removing sales resistance and making it a thousand times easier to get in the door.

Given the difficulty of reaching valuable prospects on the telephone these days, an even better way to make that initial contact is to do it directly via social media. Facebook, LinkedIn, and direct messages on Twitter are all viable options for making an intial connection with your prospect and beginning a relationship that will likely end in a sale for you.

So remember, when considering the use of cold calling scripts, a script should only ever be used as an outline, and if you insist on using them at all, use the power of social media to learn as much as you can about your prospect, and customize that script for each individual call.

Posted at 04:33 PM in Cold Calling Scripts | Permalink | Comments (0)

That's It - I'm Going On Strike! (See Ya!)

NOTICE: I'm Officially "On Strike!"

That was the subject line of an email my good friend Jeff wrote to our moron of a sales manager one day.

I'll tell you the story of how this happened:

A couple of months prior, Jeff and I had worked together for some time and both decided to change companies. We had some friends who were very happy at a competitor, so we both applied and interviewed.

During the interview process, the sales manager told us that based on our stellar track records, we'd be free to work on our own schedules and do as we pleased, as long as the numbers kept coming in.

We were hired. We brought the numbers in. But...

The sales manager lied!

The promise our sales manager Barry had made about "freedom" was completely false.

We were required to attend total waste-of-time sales meetings at 8:00 am every Monday, Wednesday, and Friday. The meetings had no purpose and merely took valuable selling time out of our day.

We were required to email daily activity reports to the Director of Sales every morning by 9:00 am detailing how many cold calls we'd made the previous day, along with all appointments including name and contact information so he could call and confirm that we had really been there. (!)

If we didn't get those reports in by 9, at 9:30 we'd receive very rude emails with the subject line, "Missing Dailies!"

Twice a week, from 8-12 every Tuesday and Thursday, were mandatory "cold calling blitzes." Another waste of time. That's eight hours - an ENTIRE working day - that could've been spent in appointments with qualified prospects, lost.

Jeff wouldn't tolerate this, so he went "On Strike!' He sent our idiot manager an email with that subject line, and explained all the reasons why the pointless sales meetings, the daily activity reports, and the cold calling blitzes were a huge waste of time for a qualified salesperson.

And, he was right. That company is now...

Out Of Business!

The last time I came across the moron manager, he was driving an old beater car and didn't look too happy. The sales director who mandated the blitzes and daily reports ended up leaving sales management completely and is now working elsewhere at lower pay.

This company fired one of the very top sales reps, in that industry and in that city, all because he wouldn't waste 8 hours a week in cold call blitzes when he had qualified prospects who wanted to meet with him during that time.

They lost both myself and my friend, both top producers, because we wouldn't tolerate their babyish policies.

And now they're GONE.

Will you work smart? Or will you take the advice of unqualified managers who worship at the altar of cold calling & "activity" and wind up... GONE?

If you don't want to end up GONE, here are two steps to avoid that fate:

1. Recognize unqualified managers and be wary of their "advice".

2. The first step to that is to stop cold calling - it's just doesn't work anymore.

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

Learn how you can stop cold calling forever and become a sales rock star by downloading a 37-page PDF preview of the Never Cold Call Again System. And if you liked this article, please share it with your network and let me know your thoughts and comments. Thanks!

Posted at 04:28 PM in Cold Calling Blitzes | Permalink | Comments (0)

Why I Don't Tolerate Indecision and Indecisive People

Today I received a request from someone to remove his testimonial from my website, or to at least remove his last name and his location.

It's not because he isn't happy. Not at all. It's because he's constantly inundated with people who see his testimonial on the site, then call him to verify that it's real before they buy.

THIS IS JUST DAMN INSANE!

I really shouldn't have to remind people how fatal the flaw of INDECISION is to success. But apparently some people aren't getting the message!

Napoleon Hill wrote that "I need to think it over" is the last line of defense for people who haven't the courage to say either "yes" or "no."

Indecision is the most fatal character flaw that leads to failure, primarily because it is at the root of most procrastination.

So I'm asking you to make a DECISION, right now, by making the following commitment:

Commit that you will lose the fatal character trait of indecision by making quick, definite decisions any time you face one and you have all, or even most, of the necessary facts at your disposal.

As Hill stated:

"Make a decision. Make ANY decision. ANY decision is better than NO decision."

Seriously. Please make that decision right now - commit to this and stick with it!

Learn how you can stop cold calling forever and become a sales rock star by downloading a 37-page PDF preview of the Never Cold Call Again System. 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 NeverColdCall.com

Posted at 04:25 PM in Productivity | Permalink | Comments (0)

The Evil Cold Calling Conspiracy - Against YOU

A consipiracy exists in the world of selling. A cold calling conspiracy.

What I’m talking about is the requirement by most sales organizations to make cold calls on your time and at your expense. They say that cold calls equal appointments equal sales, but that’s not true anymore. All sales managers are guilty of teaching it, believing it, and using it. “Increase your activity and increase your income” are the mantra. We’re told to do the sales math to “motivate” ourselves. Have you heard this one? “If you make five hundred dollars commission per sale and it takes five appointments to get the sale and twenty calls to get an appointment, then each cold call is worth five dollars in your pocket.”

Did anyone ever really believe this crap?

Hey boss, put your money where your mouth is! If that were really true, companies would pay us the five dollars per call! They don’t because that equation never works in the real world… for anyone. The simple fact is that we are only paid for completed sales, not for attempts. Directing salespeople to make more calls and increase activity is a weak excuse for a sales manager or trainer to justify his or her job. Cold calling is an expensive waste of your time. The reason companies have you cold calling is because it is a waste of your time and your money, not theirs. You only make money when you sell something, yet over eighty percent of most salespeople’s time is spent looking for someone to sell to.

The bottom line is that you, as a sales professional, cannot afford to continue fooling away your time on low-percentage activities like cold calling. It’s a way for companies to save money at your expense. You must focus your attention on activities that get real results in this new Information Age economy, and the effectiveness of cold calling fell dramatically when we left the old Industrial Age and entered this bold new era. Forget cold calling and learn how to market yourself intelligently, systematically, and automatically. Self-marketing is the key to success in today’s selling environment and the “secret” of all those top producers who obviously don’t cold call and won’t tell you what it is they’re doing to make those huge numbers every month. Remember, Napoleon Hill’s great work is entitled “Think and Grow Rich,” not “Work Harder and Stay Broke.” Don’t become a victim of the Cold Calling Conspiracy – learn to market yourself successfully and join the elite club of top producers. I did it and you can too.

Learn how you can stop cold calling forever and become a sales rock star by downloading a 37-page PDF preview of the Never Cold Call Again System.

Posted at 04:23 PM in Cold Calling | Permalink | Comments (0)

December 28, 2016

The ULTIMATE Sales Call

I belong to a Master Mind group here in Dallas consisting of a few other business owners. We meet once a month for a half-day, and in the true Master Mind format as introduced to the world by Napoleon Hill, we each describe our current greatest challenge, and the other members discuss it and provide input and suggestions.

The results are frequently astounding.

At yesterday's monthly meeting, one business owner explained that she was having a tremendous problem with keeping her sales reps motivated.

And that's when someone came up with a BRILLIANT solution to the problem, one that he's used with great success in his own business.

We all know that the absolute best time to go out and sell is immediately after you close a big sale and are on that natural high that follows! That's how salespeople "get on a roll" - they ride the emotional high of closing a large sale, or difficult sale, or one they've been after for a long time.

I'm sure you've experienced this yourself!

The suggestion given to that particular business owner's problem was simple:

Record ALL of your sales calls (meaning appointments).

When you have one of those REALLY great ones, hang onto that recording, save it to your computer, put it on your iPad or on a CD in the car, whatever.

Then, each and every morning before going out to sell for the day, LISTEN TO IT!

Even if your best sales call happened months or even years ago, listening to it in the morning, before going to work, will create the effect of being back on that emotional high you experienced after closing that sale!

The Psychology of Sales Success

I've explained "rolls" and "ruts" before. You "get on a roll" after experiencing a great success, as I've just described.

The emotions carry over, and your body language, vocal intonation, and other sub-communication transmit your enthusiasm and confidence to the prospect, and it makes them want to BUY from you. No hard selling required!

On the other hand, when you get into a "rut," you may have noticed how difficult it is to get out of, and you seem to get deeper and deeper into it.

I discovered the reason why while studying the science of social dynamics.

Most people seem to believe that repeated failure and rejection will "steel you against it" to where you eventually become immune to it.

But, the reality is different. The truth is that repeated rejection beats you down subconsciously until your enthusiasm is destroyed. This comes across to prospects via your sub-communication, and it repels them. It makes them not want to buy from you, or even be around you, for that matter.

The biggest culprit of all when it comes to this problem is cold calling.

When you're rejected 98 out of every 100 times, your subconscious mind gets beaten down fast. So if you want to EXPLODE your sales - FAST - then follow these two steps:

1. Record your sales calls until you find that "best" sales call. Then listen to it every morning before you begin your selling day!

2. Stop cold calling immediately. As the science of social dynamics explains, the repeated rejection of cold calling will put you into a sales rut, one that's nearly impossible to get out of... and you DON'T want that.

Frank has been developing and improving company sales processes and marketing strategies for countless clients since 2003, and thousands have attended his sales workshops and seminars. When you’re ready to massively increase your revenue and greatly reduce sales force turnover, send Frank a message on LinkedIn.

Posted at 10:46 AM in Sales Tips | Permalink | Comments (0)

December 27, 2016

Donald J. Trump's Amazing Sales Secrets

Every election season, I contemplate going into the business of a campaign manager or consultant.

Why?

Because political campaigns are years - no, decades - behind the times when it comes to sales and marketing. Some are slowly getting with the times, but they’re nowhere close yet.

Even basic things like configuring email servers to make sure a candidate’s emails go into the inbox, not spam box, aren’t being done. This is a 10-15 minute job that anyone with a basic knowledge of email deliverability can do, and yet political campaigns aren’t getting it done.

It frustrates me to see a candidate I like, sign up for his or her email newsletter, only to have all the emails to go my spam box.

However, one candidate’s emails not only arrived in the inbox but appeared to be whitelisted by email providers.

His name?

Donald J. Trump.

Trump blew away his competitors by a huge margin that was totally unexpected, and it’s because did something different.

He never used pre-rehearsed talking points, he didn't repeat lines given to him by his handlers, and his speeches weren't written by speechwriters.

And he was the only candidate who did all this. Which made him genuine.

Meanwhile, everyone else in the field had let a bunch of outdated dinosaurs of campaign managers run their campaigns, and it showed. If you ask them why they didn't differentiate, the way Trump has, they will tell you, “This is the way it’s done,” or, “That’s the way we’ve always done it.”

Sound familiar? Something tells me more than one sales manager has told you that....

Let Donald Trump Explode Your Sales

Trump’s business advice has always been excellent, but it’s observing his campaign strategy that really tells all - and can help YOU to explode your sales.

Trump outright rejects the idea of “That’s how it’s supposed to be done” or “That’s the way it’s always been done in politics.”

No. He re-wrote the rules of the game. And as President-Elect, he's re-writing the rules of that role as well.

Even if Trump didn't win the presidency, he'd still have made hundreds of millions of dollars through books deals, TV shows, movies, and the like.

In the end, simply by rejecting the idea of “That’s how it’s always been done,” and re-writing the rules, he unexpectedly won in the end. For re-writing the rules and rejecting the idea of doing things because "that's how it's always been done," he now has the title of President-Elect and will soon become the 45th President of the United States.

How You Can Do The Same

Emulate Trump. Love him or hate him, he’s right. By emulating his attitude of rejecting “The way it’s always been done,” you too can explode your success, make a name for yourself, massively increase your sales, build a fortune - the possibilities are endless.

And it all starts with rejecting the bad advice you get day in and day out of “That’s the way it’s done.”

STOP THAT RIGHT NOW!

Here’s a better idea: Start using new-school, cutting edge systems and strategies that get leads and sales on autopilot, and watch how everyone is in amazement of you. They envy your success. And they’re not sure how you’re doing it while they’re all “playing by the rules.”

It goes beyond stopping cold calling. It takes a next-level commitment: To learn and implement the secrets that get sales pouring in, while you make a star of yourself like Trump has for himself and everyone envies your sudden and new-found success.

Reject the idea of doing things "the way they've always been done." Differentiate. Be different. Do something different. And prepare for Trump-like success.

To your success,
Frank J. Rumbauskas

PS: Just to show that I practice what I preach, notice my new headshot photo below - I specifically asked the photographer to make me look like Trump!

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 NeverColdCall.com

Frank has been developing and improving company sales processes and marketing strategies for countless clients since 2003, and thousands have attended his sales workshops and seminars. When you’re ready to massively increase your revenue and greatly reduce sales force turnover, contact Frank at [email protected]

Posted at 01:54 PM in Donald Trump | Permalink | Comments (0)

Who Cares If The Glass is Half Empty or Half Full? There's A Third Option

We've all heard that saying about the proverbial glass of water a million times. It's a cheesy way of telling optimists apart from pessimists.

Pessimists see the glass as half empty, while optimists see the glass as half full.

But, is any of this really true?

Optimism vs. Pessimism vs. POWER

It's no secret that POWER holds the key to success in many ways. I talk a lot about having power over your prospect in selling. Napoleon Hill wrote about gaining power through the Master Mind principle nearly a hundred years ago.

And last night, I came across this powerful quote (no pun intended!) in Mark Cuban's excellent book, How To Win At The Sport Of Business, as it relates to that eternal glass of water:

"It's not whether the glass is half empty or half full, it's who is pouring the water that counts."

WOW!

I couldn't have said it any better myself. It's not about how you see the glass, it's about who is IN CONTROL of the glass!

Are You In Control Of Your Life?

Are you in control of your life and your destiny, or do you leave that in the hands of others?

If you are, why? Your life and the direction that life is headed are the most important things in the world to you. But if you're not in control of it - if you're not the one "pouring the water," so to speak, you life will be out of control! And you'll land on whatever rocks the circumstances of life lead you to.

That reminds me of another quote. One of Napoleon Bonaparte's generals said, "Sir, the circumstances for the attack aren't quite right," to which Napoleon replied, "Circumstances? Hell, I make circumstances! ATTACK!"

Attacking The Circumstances of YOUR Life!

To win at the game of life, you need to be in control. You need to be "pouring the water" while everyone else sits around trying to decide if the glass if half empty or half full.

This isn't just about life - it's about winning at anything.

And that includes sales. Are you in control of the sales game? Or do you let others control YOU?

Guess what? Salespeople who are in control, who get power up front and keep it throughout all interactions with the prospect, get sales. They're the big winners in the sales game.

Guess what else? The fastest and easiest way to give away your power in sales is by cold calling. Cold calling sub-communicates to people that you are desperate, that you are in serious need of a sale, and the moment they pick up on that, they are in control!

They get to decide whether or not you get that sale. It gives them the power, and leaves you to their mercy. That's what so many cold calling salespeople don't understand: That all leads are NOT created equal, and that leads generated from cold calling have the absolute lowest closing rate of all!

Which leads have the highest close rate? The kind where people call YOU.

Stop fooling your time away cold calling, and instead, build a reputation. Learn how to use self-marketing strategies to get people calling you. When that happens, YOU are in control of the sale, and guess what, you’ll usually get the sale!