Your self-image is the key to your personality and behavior. Change your self-image and you change your personality and behavior!. – Maxwell Maltz
This is a very profound statement and if put to proper use, it has the potential of causing a huge impact on your personal and professional life! So do not commit the mistake of taking it lightly!
Quite a lot of sales people come into this profession when they are not able to do anything else. For all such people sales is not their first choice. It is a compromise! It is a second grade option. And unfortunately, this is also what they keep communicating to themselves continuously! This “self-talk” creates a very poor self-image which actually builds and nurtures their personality and conduct.
Whatever may be your situation and whatever may be your reason of getting into a sales job, you can change it for the better at any time. What the customer thinks about you depends upon your own positioning in your own mind. Before you create your image in the customers mind it is important to analyze the self-image you carry.
Lots of customers feel about salespeople as somebody who is interested in their on commission and benefits. They also think that they had to be aware of their dealing with the other sales people because they may get cheated at any point of time. This basically comes from the fact that this is how the sales people have generally position themselves. Most of the sales people believe that cheating the customer a little is acceptable and is the part of the game.
Especially in our country there are lots of sales people who have the so called “chalta hai” attitude but with this in-fact harms them the most! The customer can always sense this insincere attitude from the sales person’s body language. This only makes the customer suspicious and they ultimately lose a lot of sales.
I am Rakesh Sharma, and I empower you to take your business to its maximum potential. Based on my 30 years of experience in the sales profession and working with lots of clients and sales professionals I have found that there is a distinct difference between the professional sales people who are actually successful and the average sales person who is just in the job for the heck of it. The successful lot has an absolutely different self -image and as a result their behavior is also different. The customer can sense this difference and as a result success seeds more success!
So here I am giving you some tips to shape your self-image which will impact your personality and behavior and you will be able to transform yourself into a sales superstar!
- Think of yourself as an EXTREMELY PUNCTUAL person. Most of the time sales people do not value much of their own time as well as the prospect’s time. Reaching late by a few minutes at the customer’s place is considered acceptable or rather normal! Lack of punctuality directly reflects lack of sincerity. But, this is not how the professional sales people think about themselves. They have a self-image that they extremely punctual and conscious of their time! They value their own time as well as the prospect’s. They will never be late for an appointment, in-fact they will always reach 5 minutes before the appointed time. With this behavior they ensure that the prospect also values them and cherish their professionalism. The small act of punctuality becomes the first evidence of their honesty and seriousness for their job.
2. Think of yourself as an individual with HIGH INTEGRITY. Salespeople bear a false thought process that integrity requires something out of the world, it would require things to be done entirely differently. This attitude has built a negative image for most sales persons, they are generally taken as un-trustworthy and un-reliable. Loss of sales due to lack of trust is not uncommon. To make big sales this fallacy must be shattered!
If you build the self-image of high integrity which simply requires for you to “do exactly as you commit” then the customer will be able to understand you to be different. You will win customers for life! All you need to do is keep your word, deliver on each and every promise each and every time. This promise can be as small as making a telephone call on the fixed time, sending the quotation on the given time, sending the sample and then delivering the product on time. All these small promises if kept will make the big difference and position you as a person of high integrity. The prospects want to deal with somebody who is high on the integrity because integrity directly reflects on reliability and who would want to buy form an un-reliable source?
3. Think yourself as a CONSULTANT TO THE CUSTOMER: The prospect really wants to get the best advice from his salesperson. They expect that the salesperson will give them proper “consultation” and will give the best suited honest advice regarding their product or service specialization. Once a prospect is guided by you as a consultant and as a friend, he will not buy from anyone else even if there is a little difference in the price or the features of the product. As a consultant you do not push your product without the choice of the customer. You behave as an expert and you keep working on your knowledge- about your industry and your product, so that you can give the best advice to the customer all the times.
4. Think yourself as THE BEST COMMUNICATOR: “Selling is the game of communication”. As a sales person, you need to be the best in communication. Communication does not only mean speaking any particular language or even speaking continuously for that matter. Communication is more about listening and empathizing. If you are a great communicator, you will listen and understand the customer’s problem emphatically and reply to his queries and objections with absolute honesty and using the correct choice of words. If you have a self- image of being the best communicator then you will constantly improve upon the quality of your communication. You keep learning the art of communication and keep improving your vocabulary and conversation skills.
5. Think that you are HELPFUL TO THE PROSPECT: The best sales people have very high respect for their product. They believe and know that their product is going to add a high value to the prospect’s life. Think and position yourself as a problem solver. Focus on identifying a problem of the prospect and offer the ideal solution. If you are able to communicate to the customer that you have understood his problem and you position your product accordingly then you are definitely going to make a winning sale.
So friends remember, if you change your self-image in the above for areas then you will be able to position yourself differently. There is an amazing psychological principle which works always. People initially accept you at your on evaluation of yourself based on, the way you describe yourself. They will accept you as per your statement without any argument. And then they will watch your behaviour to make sure that what you said about yourself is true. And this is how people judge you.
Friends my mission is to help more than 1 lakh business owners and salespeople in coming three years by providing them the quality e-sales tools and business growth strategies. You can also become part of this campaign by sharing this article with all your business friends.
Once again change your self-image to make tons of sales. Happy selling!
