Gold Medals Don’t Just Happen: How To Win At Sales

Salespeople are responsible for their attitude and behaviour

Great salespeople are like great athletes in many ways. Gold medals do not just happen for athletes. They are the result of long periods of training, endless repetition of the fundamentals, and an ongoing, relentless emphasis on identifying and living the right behaviours, the right attitudes, and the right techniques. These principles also apply to those that succeed at sales.

So, what processes enable a gold medal performance in the field of sales? The best place to start with this is to understand that there are two very different types of salesperson: the gold medal salesperson and the amateur salesperson. Amateurs are not committed to conditioning, and superior salespeople are.
 

Many people play sports. In all sports there are both amateur athletes and professional athletes. How do each of these two types of athletes behave? Amateur athletes tend to approach their sport in a more ad hoc fashion—they practice and play when they want to and generally are average (or worse) in terms of their results when compared to the very best in their field. Professional athletes, by contrast, are highly focused. They follow well-defined practice routines, and they achieve exceptional results compared to amateur athletes. 

Most salespeople are not (by any reasonable standard) trained sales professionals. They have not put in the training time. There are three sales muscle groups—behaviour, attitude, and technique. When a salesperson works to improve these, they are well on the road to achieving at the gold medal level. 

I am going to focus on attitude. Amateur salespeople tend to think that reality is a fixed concept. Some of them feel that what happens to them is not really within their control and that they are purely or mostly victims of circumstance. These amateur salespeople say things like: “It’s a tough market out there,” or “Gatekeepers are preventing me from getting through to senior decision makers.” After events confirm their self-fulfilling prophecies, they feel they have evidence of these truths. 

Gold medal salespeople, by contrast, do not let outside circumstances deter them from anything, including prospecting. Whether gatekeepers hang up, prospects tell them never to call back, or a deal that is about to be signed falls through, they assume that reality is up to them to define. External factors do not affect the self-belief of the gold medal sales professional. 

The truth is that salespeople are responsible for their attitude and behaviour—and yes, their own reality—no matter what happens. The professional salesperson knows that the control and creation of a belief system is up to them. This in turn impacts directly on the results achieved. 

The difference between being an amateur performer and a gold medal salesperson is acting like an A-Player. An A-Player accepts that it is the individual’s responsibility to get the very most out of their abilities. Moreover, A-Players take control of their beliefs and behaviours and act to become the best version of who they can be. This is how you can achieve your goals as both a salesperson and in all aspects of your life. 

Disempowering beliefs can be changed. The bad news is that it takes effort and a determined willingness to move through your comfort zones. The first step to change is to identify disempowering beliefs. When you are undertaking sales activities, be aware of your negative thoughts throughout the day and write them down—not to reinforce them, but to help you notice how absurd they are. Next, visualise yourself achieving your sales goals for the month, happily doing all you need to do to achieve them. Your head trash will become more noticeable and will eventually recede.

You know you need to make some cold calls. The next thought that probably comes to mind is, “People don’t want to hear from me,” or “The people I speak to are going to be rude and will tell me to go away.” If you allow a dominant negative thought to stay with you, you are likely to resist the action of making cold calls. This is pure head trash.

It is important to realise that your beliefs are just thoughts in your head and can’t be proven to be true or untrue—until you have experienced them to be so in life. When you have identified an example of sales head trash, such as, “I am fearful of people telling me to get lost,” take control and create a new empowering belief that is 180 degrees different from your head-trash belief.

Empowering beliefs are positive and support your actions. If you believe that your company has a great product and that your marketplace is in dire need of your services, as a salesperson you are likely to want to pick up the phone and prospect immediately and with great vigour. You won’t let the occasional grouchy gatekeeper affect your confidence. This is because you believe that your prospects are going to be grateful and happy as a result of your persistence when they do buy from you.

What you believe becomes your reality. Actions are required to achieve results, but all your actions are driven by attitude. Amateur salespeople do not understand the science of how to build a powerful attitude, and thus both their attitude and actions are generally erratic and inconsistent. In contrast, professional sales people recognise that they need a winning attitude, and this can be achieved by working on their belief system.

Anneli Thomson is a Managing Director of Sandler Training UK as well as a world champion triathlete.  Visit www.sandler.com Connect Anneli Thomson