Step Five

So I’m looking around on the web, and there’s a woman who has done the Landmark forum who is giving something like “Five Tips to Sales Success” – A list that starts out like many of those top 5 or top 10 keys to success articles that you’ll see in a lot of blogs all over the internet. The first four are fairly standard – They talk about things like knowing your goals, articulating them clearly, etc. It’s the last one that caught my attention. ‘Step five’ was for what to do if someone says something that completely catches you off guard or throws you for a loop.

I found the blogger’s response interesting because it applies not just to sales situations but any place you are trying to achieve a certain result or make a difference and the conversation is going in a very different direction than you want it to go. Here’s what this blogger has to say about it:

Sometimes the response throws you for a loop. Then, all the abundance theory or business training in the world can’t help you from the very human reactions of anger, frustration, shame, and resentment. Sometimes you get too confused to formulate a winning verbal response. That’s when the money call become a nightmare. You might beg or curse or anything in between. But whatever you say, you have lost the thread of control that you had when you dialed.

That’s when step 5 comes in. Step 5, which I call “Give In and Win”, has been sited in so many areas of self-actualization that it’s become a fundamental. Landmark Education, for example, calls it “commitment without attachment,” Zen teaching often asserts, “the strongest tree is the one that can bend.” All these are nuances of the same life-affirming tenant. My Mom puts it her way, “There’s more than one way to skin a cat.”

Step 5 calls on you for instant creativity. When you feel the pain in the pit of your stomach because the credit card company refused to reduce your rate, the boss turned you down for an extra week vacation, your client said “the check is in the mail,” it’s your signal to ignore the feeling and find alternatives that work for you.

At first, it helps to come up with several acceptable alternatives before you make the call. Prioritize them, and use them in a pinch. Eventually, you will be able to spout them as soon as you get a “no.” Unfortunately, we are taught to ridicule people who keep asking as pushy salesmen types. Non sense. If you can’t keep striving for a “yes”, you don’t have enough commitment, in the first place. Besides, sometimes another’s way is actually better.

Suggesting multiple creative requests and asking the other guy to choose from among them is another way to compromise. As you accept compromise as a ‘win,’ you experience more and more successful money calls. You begin to lose the “woe is me, nothing ever good happen” attitude. You begin to expect success. And it comes.

There’s more to this blog post, and it’s all interesting so go check out the Alphawomen blog to read more.