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( votes)Top sales performers are very much alike. This prompts a novice sales agent to believe that it’s possible to reverse engineer the success by replicating and nurturing those similar qualities.
We actually believe that it is very much correct. It’s a mission possible scenario.
Nobody was born a great salesperson; people learn and train for years to become top sales performers.
In fact, business is so digitally-focused now that face-to-face selling is nearly a dying species in 2021. Yet, those industries that still rely on the professional skills of a live 3-dimensional person either belong to the premium segment or have a high average rate of the B2B segment.
Here are our 12 no-nonsense practicable tips to become a successful salesperson.
12 Practicable Tips on Becoming a Top Sales Performer
Starting in Sales: Love it or Leave it
You may have ended up in sales, no problem. It happens to the best of us; life directs us to places we never expected to end up in.
Do you find yourself hating the job? Leave and try yourself in another company in sales. Still hating it? Leave sales altogether.
Find a Mentor
The easiest way to become a good teacher is to be a student of a good teacher. The best way to become a brilliant surgeon is to shadow a brilliant surgeon.
Did you know that most of the Michelin-starred restaurants will have low salaries for chefs and no cleaning staff, expecting that rookie chefs will clean the floors? At least it was the case at the dawn of this century.
This was because they knew that the knowledge they get during their internship in such an environment is priceless. They knew that those who survive a year in this strenuous working place will be able to land the best-paying job in the industry because of the tricks they learned.
Look around and find yourself a Michelin-star chef equivalent in your niche. Become their shadow and agree to do the grunt work. Even though your time will be 80% wiping the floor and peeling potatoes, 20% of the time spent with genius is the best fast track to your dream of becoming a top sales performer.
Follow the Path of Your Top-5 Sales Icons
One of the top sales skills in 2021 is an analytical mind. Here’s an exercise for those loving analyses:
Find 5-7 salespeople of all times who you look up to.
Read their biographies, listen to their podcasts, watch their TedX speeches.
Reverse engineer their careers and see what milestones brought them on your list. Was it luck? Education? The right time and the right place? Talent? Stamina? Vivisect their life and understand the success factors of those people.
Next thing is to project those aspects into your life.
What do you need to do to follow in that person’s footsteps, but starting from your era, position, education?
Keep Educating Yourself
You can’t sit around and wait for real life to drag you through every scenario possible.
Actively seek to absorb every way out of every potential situation your job may bring by studying other people’s experiences.
If only there was a way to make people share decades of their real-life experiences that you could absorb in a matter of days and like 10 bucks.
Oh, wait!
There is a way! It’s called reading.
One of the habits of successful sales professionals is to keep educating yourself.
Change Jobs Often
Unless you absolutely love your first job and it looks super promising. Job hopping may seem a bit promiscuous, but it’s OK at the beginning of your career.
Why do we think it’s a proper thing to do to become a top seller at the end of the day?
You get exposed to more:
- Industries– every industry works in different ways; the more business models you see, the easier it is for you to understand new models, your mind grows flexible
- Corporate ways- companies differ like night and day in more than a million ways, so knowing the entire spectrum will make you appreciate what’s right what’s wrong
- Set of training- you live and you learn, picking up bits of knowledge from different coaches is priceless
- Standing operating procedures- in a company are akin to laws for society. Being part of a few systems helps to critically appreciate them all
- Clients- the more diverse experiences you have with the clients, the better prepared you are for the next client of yours
Set Goals
Goal setting is a priceless exercise for the professional development of any ambitious person. It’s also one of the healthiest habits of top sales performers.
The role of planning is critical to the success of a salesperson. Goal setting is a skill in the list of top 10 sales competencies.
In fact, the first selling activity that top performers do is to plan. Going from longer periods to shorter ones allows you to have a helicopter view of a big mission, yet ensure manageable chunks of tasks for every day.
Face your Fears
Too many budding salespeople decided to give up on the job after an exercise in cold calling.
Fear of rejection kicked in and they fled the crime scene. However, hearing a lot of no’s is one of the best cures for the fear of rejection.
Moreover, Brian Tracy shares in his video Top 3 Qualities of the Most Successful Sales Professionals, that those agents, who hear the most no’s end up hearing the most yes’s too.
Manage Time Wisely
Time is the most precious resource, while productive time is rare as gold.
Using the Pomodoro technique, GTD method or any other ways of keeping slots of your time for a deep work process is the way to make the best out of your days.
Always Follow Up
Follow-up is oftentimes seen as boring and ineffective. While being a top sales performer suggests taking every effort needed to convert a prospect into a client, however many touchpoints may be needed.
Grant Cardone highlights the importance of follow-up in his 1.6-million-viewed video 5 Tips to Become the BEST Salesperson.
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He, later on, proceeds with another gem of insight:
Use Mixed Strategies
A salesperson must have a digital dimension nowadays. You have to invest in a personal brand. With nearly 1.5 million subscribers, Grant Cardone knows a thing or two about developing a personal brand and omnichannel presence.
He recommends creating a web of communication so that whatever the preference of your clients, you are easy to reach. Using a mix of marketing and sales channels, like phone, social media, personal visits, referrals, and influencers is wise and highly advisory.
Get Face-to-Face
Another sales guru, Mark Wayshak, stresses the importance of personal contact in the era of digital communication.
There’s only one thing better than a great email – and this is a good call.
There’s only one thing better than a great call – and this is a good face-to-face meeting.
Molding human rapport is a multi-stage process and the earlier you include a personal meeting, the smoother the rest of the process is overall.
Top-performing sales reps are the masters of face-to-face communication. The great news is: practice does make perfect.
End on a High Note
Vanessa Van Edwards steps in with a bunch of amazing insights on the psychology of sales providing 5 killer sales techniques backed by science.
One of them teaches to start a talk with a client on a positive note – as opposed to moaning about traffic or weather.
This helps to create a positive framework for the meeting and is proven by science to work (no more spoilers, check it out yourself!)
Another trick is to always remember to end a however painful conversation on a high note. Even if it takes you a bit longer to finalize, make sure to share some positive thoughts so that the entire experience will be remembered as a positive one.
Use the Right Technology
Nimble CRM is an award-winning Customer Relationship Management system that helps 140K+ professionals save 90 minutes a day in saved efficiencies.
Are you obsessed with revenue-making activities and want to leave more time for education, personal meetings, and other 20% of actions as per Pareto?
Try Nimble CRM today for free to see how technology can help you become the top sales performer sooner rather than later!
