Are You Consistently Inconsistent?

📅  20th August 2020 | 2020/21 Sales Book ReviewsMindset

“Stick to the process” as one sales manager used to bark out at every Monday morning sales meeting.  “The ‘process’ was to achieve four qualified product demonstrations each week. This could be achieved over two days quite easily if you managed your time correctly. After the first ‘bark’ there would be a second, usually in the form of a slide thrust up on a screen stating: “Failure To Plan Is To Plan For Failure”.

This mantra was shoved upon the sales team with regular monotony. And rightly so. Success in sales, as in life, comes from consistent effort. Larry Levine’s “Selling from the Heart” really rams that point home. Ordinary sales reps don’t achieve the big numbers because they are inconsistent in their work-rate. This is code for not doing enough prospecting on a daily basis. Finding new prospects is a relentless task. If I were starting out in sales, this publication would be the first title to occupy my book-shelf.

 

 

The Good

I’ve never had the pleasure of listening to a Larry Levine talk. I would imagine him to be a powerful and charismatic speaker. A real crowd pleaser who encourages you to rise to the sales challenge. And that’s what you get throughout his book (which was published in 2018). There are two main sections. The first which covers YOU and your mindset. The second outlines what top professional sales people actually do to pull in the numbers. Larry Levine leaves the reader in no doubt that successful selling is a Herculean task. Yet with focus, passion and authenticity – if done consistently – one can make it to the the very top.

Like many self-help, motivational style publications there’s a summary at the end of each chapter. The most important of these is at the end of the second chapter. One of the points highlighted is to ‘never stop learning’.  Simple enough to understand but do you or members of your sales team study the art and science of sales to any great depth?

Another important step is get in touch with you as a brand. The author asks the reader how they interact with their prospective clients, their peers and how they generally come across to the world – including the world of Google. In sales, you’ve nowhere to hide!

Large swathes of the book are taken up with prospecting. Should it be done by cold-calling, e-mail, snail mail, referral or networking. Is social selling going to last? Should one sell at events and exhibitions? The answer is staggeringly simple. Do it all. And when you’ve done it all think about getting sales by serving your own community. Not just as a one-off but continually.

The Bad

Being a really successful salesperson is not a faraway utopia if one is prepared to put in the effort. Many do not do that. And it’s all their fault. One has to take personal responsibility. After you’ve lost an opportunity to open a new account, do you analyse and identify why you lost out. Did you prepare properly? Are you in possession of all the facts? Were you thorough in your research. Chances are you didn’t get to know your customer as well as you should have. You have to stop making excuses for poor performance and going through the pretence of doing rudderless ‘sales activity’.

There’s nothing inherently bad about Selling from the Heart. It’s a good, no a great read, as it pulls no punches and strikes at the heart of selling – if you excuse the awful pun. There are, of course, my usual bugbears about the use of Americanism’s and American cultural references. SFTH is printed in a slightly unusual serif font which at first glance was a bit off putting. There’re also some pages printed in something similar to Comic Sans. These refer to some of Larry’s personal contacts. All of them are star performers in their own field.

The Ugly

Part of taking responsibility is doing the tough work with existing customers. Going through the motions of customer support is wholly inadequate nowadays. You have to reinforce the value of your brand and product or service sold by having regular business reviews and provide strategic advice. And above all else, be accountable. Levine sets this out in Chapter 7.

The following chapter outlines what a true sales professional does to stay on top of their game. Consider this statement: ‘If you can’t invest in yourself, why would somebody else invest with you?”

Finally, Larry Levine implores you to write good content for your blog. You do have a blog don’t you?

Happy Selling!

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Tags: behaviours, work ethic

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