Category Archives: Dignity

Bringing a dash of dignity to selling

Has success been elusive? Get EDGY!

Got EDGY?Check this out! Dan’s EDGY introduction of the game-changing book!

I HEART DAN WALDSCHMIDT. He is one of the most accomplished, generous, and committed people I know – committed to OTHER’S success. He is EDGY and real and awesome. The Irreverent Sales Girl would be nowhere near where we are today without his awesome-ness!

Here is what Dan has to say about the book he released today!

“It took us four years of work to figure out what really makes ordinary people do amazing things. Like you, we had read many books about how to be successful in business, how to stay motivated, and how to get rich. When we finished reading each one we though “if that formula works so well why is it that I don’t get the results that the book says I should be getting?”

Wondering how to go from 5 to 6 figures in sales? Check out this Free eBook: http://ebook.solidsixblueprint.com/solid-six-ebook/

We threw away the books and motivational seminars and started looking around at ordinary people who ended up unbelievably achieving outrageous success. We looked for common people who accomplished amazing feats of success and dug a little deeper into their stories. The more we started looking, the more examples we found.

From business to math to science to sports to politics,  we studied 1,000 ordinary people who achieved success against all the odds. What we uncovered were four clear character traits that I had never read about in any book. We call it EDGY. (And wrote our own book about it.)”

IMPORTANT LINKS:

SHORT AUTHOR BIO:

Dan Waldschmidt is an international business strategist, speaker, author, and extreme athlete.  His consulting firm solves complex marketing and business strategy problems for savvy companies all over the world. Dow Jones calls his Edgy Conversations blog one of the top sales sites on the internet. He’s been profiled in Business Week, INC Magazine, BBC, Fox News, The Today Show, and Business Insider, has been the featured guest on dozens of radio programs, and has published hundreds of articles on progressive business strategy. He is author of Edgy Conversations: How Ordinary People Achieve Outrageous Success.

AND, if you order NOW, he’ll send you his workbook FREE!

Love your success UP!

The Irreverent Sales Girl

How to make sure your prospect is listening!

Get your prospect's attention!“If you want to make sure you have your prospect’s 100% attention, let THEM talk!”

~ Alice Heiman

Brilliant!

Wondering how to go from 5 to 6 figures in sales? Check out this Free eBook: http://ebook.solidsixblueprint.com/solid-six-ebook/

Love ’em UP and let THEM talk!

The Irreverent Sales Girl

Spice it up a bit this week!

Spice it up a bit this weekIt’s mid-winter.

It’s mid-quarter (sort of).

The bloom of the New Year has worn off a bit – and it’s too early for Spring Fever.

So, what can you do to spice it up a bit?

This week, I want  you to come up with some BIG reward for yourself. Something to put a little action in your step. Pick something that you rarely do for yourself, like take an afternoon off, or that great bottle of champagne, a massage, a night full of guilt-free TV. Something you don’t normally do, but will really enjoy.

Wondering how to go from 5 to 6 figures in sales? Check out this Free eBook: http://ebook.solidsixblueprint.com/solid-six-ebook/

NOW, pick a goal to accomplish this week.

A S-T-R-E-T-C-H goal. Maybe it’s an extra ten cold calls. Maybe it’s getting your CRM all-the-way-up-to-date. Perhaps it’s setting up 3 extra meetings for next week. Whatever, it is…put THAT at stake this week. Make sure it’s an ACTIVITY goal – not an outcome goal. Activity is always the key!

If you hit your goal – you get the reward!

Then, tell someone else about your game. Your spouse, your boss, a fellow salesperson. (It doesn’t work if you keep it to yourself).

Get to work! Have some fun! Blow your goal out of the water and ENJOY your reward.

It’s too easy to get on the treadmill of doing, doing, doing – make sure you’re taking great care of YOU when you win.

BONUS EXERCISE

Write a comment and tell me what your goal and reward are for the week! I want to see you get CREATIVE!

Let’s get spicy and…

Love ’em UP!

The Irreverent Sales Girl

When you just get stuck

It will happen!Are you stuck?

Even if you are the best in the biz…

Every now and then, you WILL lose your passion and you will lose your way.

The deals you used to be reliable for will not close.

You will worry that you’ve “lost it”.

WHAT TO DO?

You’re not going to like the next idea, but it is CRUCIAL..

Wondering how to go from 5 to 6 figures in sales? Check out this Free eBook: http://ebook.solidsixblueprint.com/solid-six-ebook/

GET IN COMMUNICATION!

If you feel stuck, one of four things has probably happened:

1) You have had a major life event (like a death in the family) that has taken you off your game

2)  You have exhausted your “reliable” leads and you are focusing only on them

3)  You have recently lost a deal you were sure would close and you have lost your confidence

4)  You can’t see the pathway to closing the deals you need to close to make your number

 

The answer is simple, but most people don’t do it!

Get in touch with your favorite salespseron and ask THEM what they would do!

KEEP SELLING!

 A deal WILL come through and it will re-ignite you.

NEVER STOP!

You’ve got what it takes…and you KNOW it. (Or else you wouldn’t have read so far!)

PLEASE get in touch with me if you are stuck. I will do whatever it takes to get you un-stuck!

Try me!

Love being a salesperson UP!

The Irreverent Sales Girl

The power of “No Problem”

I was in the audience of greatness.The power of "No Problem"

The woman who was mentoring me was letting me listen in on her calls…

Every time an obstacle came up, Reliably, she said “No Problem”…

It immediately put her buyer (and me) at ease!

Try the magic of “No problem” and see what happens!

Wondering how to go from 5 to 6 figures in sales? Check out this Free eBook: http://ebook.solidsixblueprint.com/solid-six-ebook/

It gives you three things!

1) Time to breathe and re-assess – puts YOU in control

2) Grace to your buyer when sellers are putting on the pressure

3) Partnership – you are on their side and making them feel important!

So, NO PROBLEM. Period. (Even when it might seem there is a problem from the start)

Love ’em ALL UP!

The Irreverent Sales Girl

Check your Confidence Quotient FIRST this year!

Welcome to 2014!Check your Confidence Quotient

Before we get started together this year, I recommend we look at one CRITICAL thing.

How is your MIND SPACE?

THE NUMBER ONE indicator of your success this year, is the level of self-confidence you have going in!

SO, let’s take a look.

On a scale of 1 – 10, how confident are you that you will meet your goals this year?

If you are anywhere below a TEN, let’s take a look at what might be happening and churn up some ideas to whip your confidence RIGHT UP THE SCALE!

Wondering how to go from 5 to 6 figures in sales? Check out this Free eBook: http://ebook.solidsixblueprint.com/solid-six-ebook/

First, let’s take the advice of Jack Canfield. Instead of asking ourselves how we are going to move from a 5 to a 10, we are going to ask ourselves – “Hmmmmmmmm…..why so high? Why am I as high as a 5?”

(You will find some interesting things about what you DO feel good about).

Next, we are going to continue to take the advice of Jack Canfield again and ask “What would it take to move me up to a 6?” No need to jump all the way to the 10. This answer will be much more informative and much more actionable.

Now, look to see what might still be an open, gaping wound from the previous year (or even previous years).

If you’ve lost your swagger, you probably got a good swing (or two or three) to the face with a (hypothetical) two-by-four. Perhaps you missed your quota last year. Perhaps you came in at number 3 when you were sure you were headed for number one. Perhaps you lost that DEAL YOU HAD COUNTED ON to a competitor at the last minute.

Take that two-by-four moment and confront it. Can you see clearly WHAT happened and WHY it happened?

Often, when you look straight at the problem, you can see where YOU had a hand in the negative outcome. Find out if you can forgive yourself . The good news is that if you are the one who caused the negative result, you are also the one who can get the positive result in the future. Huzzah!

Some things you CAN’T control. It is possible that something knocked you off your game and you had nothing to do with it. Take a moment and call a trusted mentor (or even a therapist) to get this sorted out – and sorted out all the way. Until you are completely restored to your brilliance and natural FANTASTIC-NESS!

Restored to FANTASTIC-NESS

Finally, play a game with some friends. 

I was chatting with a couple of my closest girl friends yesterday. We all three realized that we were lacking a bit in the area of self-confidence around our goals this year. SO, here’s what we’re doing:

1) Writing down our top 10 qualities that take us to success

2) Writing down the top 10 qualities of the OTHER two of us – that WE know helps them to success

3) Writing down our top 5 accomplishments from last year –  and identifying how WE made those happen

4) Writing down our top 5 disappointments from last year – and identifying how WE made those happen

5) Getting together again for a chat next week to share what we found with each other

So, what are YOU going to do to make sure you go screaming and proud and confident into your 2014 – armed with all the swagger and pomp you can manage? I would love to hear! 

Love your confidence UP!

The Irreverent Sales Girl

Be part of something BIG!

Have you ever wanted to use your talents to make something GREAT happen for someone else?

Pretty sure you have!

Recently, the publisher of the Salesforce.com blog told me that she is DYING for Marc Benioff (CEO of Salesforce) to recognize her efforts to support the sales community.

SO, let’s help Jennifer win her game, shall we? (It’s easy, I promise!)

I spend HUNDREDS OF HOURS animating this video (don’t believe me? try animating a video!)

http://youtu.be/HsblniyanTo

You will LOVE IT!

So have fun watching me take my first ever steps, but please hit SHARE, too. If you help us, we can go viral! How fun! And Jennifer will be abl to keep her job! Works for everyone.

Thank you for being awesome!

Wondering how to go from 5 to 6 figures in sales? Check out this Free eBook: http://ebook.solidsixblueprint.com/solid-six-ebook/

Love ’em UP!

The Irreverent Sales Grl

A Fun Mid-Week Quote from Marilyn Monroe!

Mid-Week Quote from Marilyn Monroe

“I am selfish, impatient, and a little insecure. I make mistakes. I am out of control and at times hard to handle. But if you can’t handle me at my worst, then you sure as hell don’t deserve me at my best!”

 

~ Marilyn Monroe

Wondering how to go from 5 to 6 figures in sales? Check out this Free eBook: http://ebook.solidsixblueprint.com/solid-six-ebook/

You can scale your system, but you CAN’T scale relationships!

You can scale your systems, but you can't scale your relationshipsHOW DOES HE DO IT?

The amazing Bob Burg continues to confound me.

He is a best-selling author and a coveted speaker.

Everyone I have ever met who knows him, LOVES him!

Wanna know why?

Well, I wanna know why, too – but here is my theory!

Wondering how to go from 5 to 6 figures in sales? Check out this Free eBook: http://ebook.solidsixblueprint.com/solid-six-ebook/

As we grow our businesses, we MUST learn better systems.

We must deliver our products more efficiently.

Sometimes, we do this by hiring others to do the work that we cannot keep up with.

Sometimes, we use technology to streamline activities.

Sometimes, we outsource activities that help us focus on what makes us great.

Sometimes, though, we do a VERY VERY VERY bad thing.

We try to scale our relationships.

This is how it looks when we do that…

* We send out marketing materials that get the person’s name wrong.

I often get REALLY interested in what someone has to offer and I reach out to that person as “The Irreverent Sales Girl” and I get a communication back that says, “Dear The”. Seriously. This actually happens! Guess how quickly I hit “DELETE”?

Can you IMAGINE how I would feel if this were my financial advisor? Or my accountant?

* We service our clients in “chunks”.

We categorize people using a limited set of data about them. Then, we put them into some kind of “System” where we deliver certain messages or opportunities or services to each of these “categories”.

There are PLENTY of great ways to scale the services we deliver.

For example, we write a book that provides AWESOME information to the masses who will read it. I have never met Brian Tracy, for instance, but his books have provided tremendous value to me! I have paid for his information many times over and have been happy I did it.

Or, we develop a keynote where we get in front of thousands of people who can benefit from our expertise – and will pay for it. And love it.

Movie-makers develop storylines that will entertain me – even propose messages that change my perspective and that I hold dear (The Princess Bride, for example!)

My bank automates a system where I get a notification when my checking account dips below a certain level with an option to transfer money from another account. This serves me.

Even my accountant has lower-level employees actually DO my taxes, but he interacts with me personally when I have a question.

The TRICK to being WILDLY SUCCESSFUL?

You must KNOW when your services CAN be automated to serve your customers and network better.

And you must KNOW when you will put someone off by “scaling” them into your systems.

THEN, you must make people KNOW that you value THEM and actually know something about them and their goals.

As technology expands, the opportunity to try to scale relationships also expands. BUT, people KNOW IT when we are doing this. It is easy to tell when you have been put into a “category”, isn’t it?

TO BE TRULY AWESOME: You must learn when to scale and when to not.

I’ll tell the truth here. I have NO IDEA how Bob Burg, or Jules Taggart, or Carol Roth, or Phil Gerbyshak, or Dan Waldschmidt, or Anthony Iannorino, or countless others do it. But, they DO. I am determined to crack the code and I will be happy to share it with you when I do.

In the meantime, look at your systems.

Where are you SERVING your customers and network with automation? And where are you making them feel small or angry? (BIG PROBLEM FOR YOU: These people will never tell you – they will simply ignore you).

Find ways to LOVE ‘EM ALL UP!

The Irreverent Sales Girl

 

 

 

The more conversations you have, the more discouraged you will become…

The more conversations you haveAs we all now know, protecting our mental space is PARAMOUNT! It is the single best thing we can do for ourselves, whether we are “sales professionals” or anything else. Becoming discouraged can become dangerous and even fatal to our most dearly-held dreams.

DO NOT FALL INTO THE DEADLY TRAP THAT MOST OF US DO!

If we want to be wildly successful and a crazy important INFLUENCER (which I’m betting you do, if you are reading this), we must have many, many, many conversations. With many, many, many people.

The trap we fall into is that we only talk to the people we think will be receptive. We judge by their demeanor, or their background, or their title who might be the most receptive audience.

Wondering how to go from 5 to 6 figures in sales? Check out this Free eBook: http://ebook.solidsixblueprint.com/solid-six-ebook/

This is ONE WAY of protecting our mental space: Only talk with people who will not ignore you, say ‘no’, or not disagree.

That is not what is going to get us where we want to go!

Wildly successful people cannot afford to “play it safe”.

The Antidote?

FIND YOUR VISION

Whether you are in sales and you are committed to blowing your quota out of the water, or if you are trying to get a new project going in your community, or interested in making a change in the way your family gets along with each other – you are going to have to have conversations that are uncomfortable, risky, and not always rewarding.

When you have your VISION squarely in front of you and it resonates in your soul – or simply drives you to excellence from sheer desire to WIN – THAT is when you can start to move the needle on how effective you are.

THAT IS WHEN YOU BECOME UNSTOPPABLE

Let’s get a little bit obvious and trite here for a moment, but just to prove a grand point. Then, we will bring it back to YOUR success.

Dr. Martin Luther King, Jr. had a vision,  a dream. While his dream and his stand is VERY popular now – and we revere the man – you have got to remember that this man was COMPLETELY OUT OF HIS GOURD when he first started.

Nearly every conversation he had was risky and unpopular…at first. Then, it began to take hold.

Can you EVEN IMAGINE how many unpopular conversations he had to have with people? He was risking HIS livelihood and asking others to do the same.

But, know what? THEY DID! And sometimes at great cost to them and their families.

THE GOOD NEWS

Your goals are probably not as dangerous as Dr. King’s. (And if they are, I salute you! Go, Go, Go, GO, GO!)

But, they are lofty. Ideas and dreams and goals have a very short shelf life. They must be moved forward and they must gain momentum and this requires lots and lots of conversations.

CONVERSATIONS ARE THE ONLY THING IN THIS WORLD THAT MOVE THINGS FORWARD

So, if you want to be number 1 in sales, you have got to get great at having conversations. The more conversations you have, the better you will get at having them be effective the first time. But, you will not start there. And you will not finish there, either.

Every pro, in any field has started out by having conversations that did not work. They learned, they modified, they clarified. But, they could only learn, modify, and clarify by HAVING the conversations. They did not work them out in their heads.

Every pro, in any field, CONTINUES to have conversations that do not work. Some of us call these COLD CALLS. Others call it networking.

Do you know that TRUE PROS do NOT resist COLD CALLING? They KNOW that is where the action is and where their future lies. More about that later. (Your competition may know this, too.)

Here is what it looks like to be great at having conversations.

Be someone who has lots of them. Period.

It does NOT mean that your conversations will turn out the way you planned. It means that you are someone who is WILLING to have lots of conversations.

AND… Back to the title of the post!

The more conversations you have, the more discouraged you will become…

…if you are attached to them all turning out OK.

The reality is, if you can manage your mental space and be OK no matter HOW the conversation goes…

THE MORE CONVERSATIONS YOU HAVE, THE MORE WILD SUCCESS YOU WILL HAVE!

And, that is all!

Know that I admire your courage and dedication to whatever it takes.

Love ALL the conversations UP!

The Irreverent Sales Girl