Success per Tom Hopkins

Great motivator Tom Hopkins measured success based on four areas of fulfillment:
1) financial accomplishments, based on self-image and goals;
2) emotional stability and the ability to control emotional handicaps;
3) physical fitness and feeling good physically;
4) maintaining spiritual awareness and a personal relationship with a higher power.

Said Hopkins, "If you can meet all four of these, you're a successful human being by my measure of success."

Success is always a moving target. What Tom has done is to slow the target down in order to make success an identifiable goal. In my life the fourth point is inter-elated to the other 3 points. I established this connection in my life, long before the other goals were a part of my thinking.

- Mel

Brad Justice’s talk on forming a new sales habit.

This past Friday Brad Justice from Team Office Kansas City was our  speaker at Sale Professional’s monthly meeting. His talk was based on a book that he has read:
The Power of Habit: Why We Do What We Do in Life and Business
By Charles Duhigg

Brad gave us some wonderful examples of how he has internalized the  message that he has taken from this book and passed it along to his office  furniture sales representatives.  

While each of us has some bad habits, there are good habits which can be applied to a sales career.   The habit that he has passed along to his sales reps includes a white board and a magic marker.  Using the White Board, the Sales Reps chart every contact that they make during a day.

The goal is contact a minimum of 20 client/prospects each and every day. It takes 21 days to develop a new habit and Brad’s sales people have made his message theirs.  As a result both the salespeople and the company are making more money.

After listening to his presentation I made the decision to develop the 20 touches a day habit.  On Monday I made 24 contacts with prospects and customers. One of my customers bought a new report, another one talked of expansion and I picked up a new Suspect (I suspect he may be a prospect)

Tuesday – Day 2 of 21

• I started my day at a customer’s location to sell some new services. 
• At 11 AM I started a 2 hour Internet demonstration with a prospect in Minneapolis
• 2 PM finished sending follow up information to my Internet Demo client
• 3 PM I have contacted 10 clients and customers including the two from this morning.
• 10 down and 10 to go
• 4:30 and I have had 22 client and prospect touches, today

On the way to my 22 client touches, my mail box remained closed, Facebook has not been touched, and on my desk there is a laundry list of people who I will be reaching out to touch in the future.

How many clients/customers/prospects have you touched today?

Action

This past weekend I attended a conference called Men Under Construction. There were over 1400 men who gave up their Saturday to listen to speakers and take time to reflect on their lives, families, friends and careers.

One of the speakers was the QB for the Chargers, a guy named Phillips. He gave an excellent talk. One of the phrases that he uses each day is: Now It Begins.

He uses this phrase to stop and mentally prepare himself for a new day, a new meeting, a new set of circumstances, or for the presentation of the same set of circumstances that he faced yesterday. Each day is a new day and each time that we meet a new situation or encounter an old one, we need to stop and mentally prepared ourselves to handle it in a positive manner

ACTION

Highly successful people tend to think in ways that facilitate effective action. They don't spend a lot of time worrying about the things they have to accomplish. When faced with a deadline, they go ahead and do the work. They don't get stuck in an endless loop, thinking, "I should really finish this up today," or "I'll get to this when I have more time." The next time you face a task or deadline, take a page from the book of the highly successful people of the world, and jump right in.

18 Negotiation Steps

1. Plan your meeting.  Know who you are negotiating with.  Do not shoot from the hip.

2. Always start talking about your business values before you start negotiating anything.

3. Get your prospects to confirm before negotiating, that they agree with  the value of your business proposition.

4. When the prospect asks for the first  Concession  -- hesitate  immediately.

5. Practice what you are going to say with someone in the office.  Most SR do not rehearse and get burned by a prepared negotiator at the prospect’s company.

6. Never give any concessions unless they give you something in return.

7. When negotiating difficult areas, never agree immediately.  Always wait and pause before answering. Great negotiators talk less, listen more, and pause longer.

8. Never agree to anything early in the negotiations.  Studies have shown that the longer it takes to get a concession the greater value they  will  place on that concession.

9. Always write down every discussed concession.

10. To successfully negotiate with  a senior manager, you must give them something.   Buyers have a strong desire to feel that they worked hard to get their company a good  deal.  In negotiating perception is reality.  Let the prospect believe that they have achieved something, (they won).

11. Use concessions as negotiation steps that moves you forward during the sale.

12. Never let a senior manager bully you by an imposed deadline.  That is a negotiating tactic.   Always ask for time ( and hour, a phone call, the next day) when you can get back after you have considered the concession request.

13. Never be a bad person; always position your self as the 3rd party in the negotiations – “my firm does not have that as an option.”

14. When the prospect tells you their business needs, always say, “ I understand that that is  important to  you”  You must agree with their needs before they will agree with your  needs.  Agreeing is not accepting, but it shows peer respect - A friend of mine went to Japan for his company to negotiate a big contract.  He thought that everyone was agreeing with his proposal until he found out that they were nodding their heads because they understood what he  was saying - not agreeing with what he was proposing. Lesson Learned?

15. When asked for a price concession by the prospect, instead of giving the requested concession, give greater value to your product and keep the same price.

16. When negotiating across the table, position your self based on the type of issues you are being challenged with.   When asking a concession,  Lean Forward.  When listening to a concession request, lean back in your chair as in a contemplative mood.

17. Never E mail or overnight a proposal to a prospect.**  Hand-deliver all proposals and walk through the proposal page by page with the executive. Emails have hurt the negotiating tactics of all sales representatives.

18. Always send and E Mail and a Thank you Card when you get back from the negotiations.  You can confirm all mutual negotiations which were agreed upon in the e mail.

If the prospect is in town, take the proposal.  If the prospect is a long drive or flight,
determine the cost and anticipated close possibilities before jumping in your car or on to an airline.  I have worked on negotiations via the telephone.  It can be done, it takes some practice.  

One of the best ways to negotiate is to set the rules up front.  I begin my installation of
my software the moment I start talking to someone on the telephone.  If you start by using the word “no” when they ask for something, it goes along ways towards reducing the risk of losing an order during negotiations.   

Something else that needs to be discussed with your company and that is how far can you negotiate.  I used to work for very large companies and negotiation was more than painful, because of the short string that the company had on my negotiating abilities.

Mel Carney, Sales Professionals