The 5 Universal Laws of Sales

The 5 Universal Laws of Sales

How to Sell in Recessionary Times

When a law is universal, it means it works even you donā€™t believe in it. For example, it doesnā€™t matter what you think about the Law of Gravity, it exists. To overcome it, you have to work hard and long. And even if youā€™re successful at circumventing gravity, itā€™s only temporary. In the end, the Law wins. Itā€™s the same with The Five Universal Laws of Selling in the Real World, It doesnā€™t matter what you think about them, whether you think they are silly or super, they still work.Ā Each of these laws is currently in operation, creating an end product. A result. Your choice is this: Either let the laws work on their own and live with whatever they produce, orĀ useĀ the laws to create the resultĀ youĀ want.

1. The Law of Singularity

Makes you like no other. Recognize your uniqueness and capitalize on it. Your journey creates the person you are.Ā You will either become the singular person that life makes you or you will use life to become the singular person you choose to be.

The ways in which you become singular areĀ limitless. Discover your core and work to improve it, make it stronger.Ā Do more, read more, experience more, question what you think you know, and always be gathering knowledge. Know that you are a distinct, unique special individual.

Treat everyone with whom you deal as singular, too. They are not someone else.Ā Just at the moment you think you have them all figured out, they do or say something that doesnā€™t fit with the model youā€™ve created for them. To recognize this singularity, you will have to listen to what they say and how they react to what you say. Donā€™t put words in their mouth. Donā€™t hear the first thing they say and assume you know whatā€™s next and start talking as if that were so. Likely as not, it wonā€™t be so. They will surprise you.

2. The Law of Applied Effort

Determines the specifics of the result you get. The more effort, the more result. The better the effort, the better the result. The more directed the effort, the more directed the result.Ā What you get from what you do is determined solely by what you put into it.

So if you want to really win, if you want to become special, you have to learn to work ā€“ hard, smart, long, strong, constantly. Hard work is what generates that thing we tend to think of as luck: being in the right place at the right time, apparently by accident. Mostly, however, that kind of luck is no accident. Itā€™s the result of hard work.

3. The Law of Learning and Knowledge

There is nothing more important than knowledge. Not just product knowledge, but also knowledge of yourself, knowledge of how the world around you works, knowledge of what people will tend to do and say in every situation in which you might find yourself in a selling scenario. In addition to personal skills, you will need knowledge about your business and your everyday life.

The more information you have, the better decisions you can make. Become a sponge. Read, watch, question, go to seminars, go on-line, ask questions, and read more. Gather everything you can. Gather resources that work for you: websites, magazines, blogs, seminar, books. Create networks and alliances. Make friends.

4. The Law of Expectations

Expect to get the sale every time you go in. The fact that you know you wonā€™t doesnā€™t or shouldnā€™t diminish the power of expectation. As you work on becoming expectant, you will discover that more and more frequently you are successful. This is the Weight Lifterā€™s Law: That which you focus on gets stronger. If you expect to succeed, you will.

5. The Law of Sales Vision

The more specific our vision, the closer we can target our result. By not having a clear vision, we have an unclear idea of what our results will be and along with the rest of the world, we donā€™t know what they will be until they happen. Becoming singular requires clear vision. You must know who and what you wish to become. If you donā€™t know where youā€™re going, you cannot make the best decisions to get there. The key is not to focus onĀ changesĀ firstĀ but to focus on deciding who you want to become and make the changes necessary to become that person.

In addition to creating your vision of the future, you have to create a vision in the present. As you transform your interior, transform your exterior ā€“your appearance, your speech and speaking patterns, your first impressions, your behavior in public. Remember, you are always on stage, always making a first impression. Make the vision people have of you congruent with the vision you have of yourself and of the future.

WHEN UNDERSTOOD, LEARNED AND APPLIED,Ā The 5 Universal Laws of Sales will help you become the best salesperson possible ā€“ not only in todayā€™s recessionary market, but also in a world of relative success and plenty. If you become a great salesperson today, imagine how good youā€™ll be when things normal out.

Sales is an Art Form

Sales is an Art Form

Sales

Sales is an art form. We encounter it everyday. Whether we are trying to convince our parents to provide a larger weekly allowance, or someone to be enamored with our attractive qualities, or even a high level sales executive to agree to a twenty-million dollar order, everyone is consciously or unconsciously selling something almost all the time. The better you are at selling, the better the results.

But what about sales as a career? Can those of us not born with the ā€˜gift of gabā€™ learn to sell with the best of them? If sales is an art form, can it also be a science? Are there strategies that will make you better at the craft of selling? Do you think an artist with natural abilities can learn to draw better or be more effective with his or her abilities? The answer to all these questions is, ā€˜of course.ā€™

Successful Sales Person

Tom Hanks, in the role of the team manager in A Field of Their Own, has one of the most memorable and useful lines of any movie. He says, ā€œIf it were easy, anyone could do it.ā€ That applies to baseball, sales, and actually any aspect of life. Sales is not easy. Not everyone can be a salesperson. Even fewer can be a successful sales person. And no one can be a successful sales professional without the willingness to work hard at all times.

Attitude

For some, the willingness to work hard is an inherent attitudeā€”they were born with it. It is simply how they attack everything they do. For most of us, however, it is an attitude we choose to have. Much like we choose to have a positive attitude, we choose to work hard. At all times.

At all costs. Whether or not we feel like it. Without this behavior, it is not possible to be a successful sales person. If you do not choose to work hard at all times, do us both a favor: close this book, give it to someone who will work hard, and find something else to do with your life. Without the willingness to work hard, you will not be able to practice the Psychology of Selling, you will not be a salesperson, and you will not be successful. The choice is yours.

 

Attributes of a Positive Attitude

Attributes of a Positive Attitude

It is said that our thinking makes things either good or bad. That the reality of life is dependent solely on how we choose to see the things that make it up. This explains a very important fact of life: our mind and its thinking process are responsible for 90 percent of our success in life. Positive thinking, therefore, is essential for success in sales and for our quality of life. Our mind is the most powerful tool there is. By itself, it is responsible for each of us being content or sad, determined or indecisive, strong or weak, positive or negative. The way in which our mind works, therefore, determines the way in which we feel and the way in which we act.

 

Failure

Be aware that while many people intend to be successful in sales, only 20 percent are truly successful: those who produce 80 percent of their companyā€™s sales revenues. Corporations such as General Electric (for whom I was once employed) had a philosophy that tried to eliminate the bottom twenty percent of their sales force every year and reload with newly hired sales people, introducing new hungry, blood into their sales organization.

The question is: Why do the top twenty percent succeed and the bottom twenty fail? While there may be contributing circumstances (such as being in the wrong place at the wrong time. I know this happens. First hand!), the following three areas are the prime contributors to oneā€™s success or failure in sales:

  • Fear
  • Excuses
  • Procrastination

 

Create Meaningful Conversation

Create Meaningful Conversation

Regardless of the changes in cultural expectations and realities, todayā€™s requirements to be successful in sales are exactly the same as theyā€™ve always been: listen to the client, hear what they are saying and use whatā€™s been heard to create solutions to their problems for which they are willing to pay you. The difficulty for todayā€™s sales person, then, is not in knowing what to do, the difficultly is in listening to the client. The difficulty is in knowing what to ask. The difficulty is in creating one of the most common of interpersonal events ā€“ a conversation.

We are always reluctant to give out information for which there has been no request. We realize that kind of talking on our part gives away our innermost thoughts, so we avoid it.

When the other person asks questions that elicit that same information, however, we are more than willing to tell them the same exact same thing we were reluctant to share unasked. Questions, then, become the prerequisite for conversation and conversation is the prerequisite for gathering information critical to the sales process.