sales

Most business etiquette is common sense.  The following are some finer points: If someone tells you that you didn’t get the business, smile, find out why, thank the person for his or her time, make sure the door is open for the next opportunity, and exit courteously. Always allow the customer or prospect to decide […]

Ten Steps to Sales Greatness 1) Do what the top salespeople do. This is arguably the most obvious, most basic, and most important step to becoming a top salesperson. It’s simple: If you take the same actions as the top salespeople, you will eventually also be a top salesperson.  If you do the same things

If you’ve read many of my articles in the past, you’ve undoubtedly come across my statement that the biggest key to business-building and sales success is activity, or, more specifically, activity that leads to sales: prospecting, presenting, and closing. It’s simple, the more people you talk to, the more business you’ll do. Even a blind

As the saying goes, “A house is only as strong as its foundation.” It takes a strong foundation to ensure sales success. Following are the six high-achievement ingredients necessary to build that strong foundation. The Six Ingredients Needed to Build a Solid Sales Foundation Ingredient 1 for high achievement: Be in sales for the right

Several important factors separate those who succeed in selling from those who fail.  Although some of the following items are arguably more important than others, they are all critical to a salesperson’s success. When I talk about top salespeople, I’m referring to people who are not only great at the profession of selling, they are

In an article two months ago, I mentioned the five foundational personality qualities necessary for sales success: people skills, mental toughness, work ethic, attitude, and character (honesty and integrity). If someone is missing any one of these, they won’t make it in sales over the long haul. Of the five, I find that the one

I was recently speaking with a manager at a real estate office about what makes some agents successful and others unsuccessful. He told me, “John, I can sum up the difference between the successful agents and the unsuccessful agents with one quick example: during a major blizzard when everything is shut down and everyone is

You just hired the perfect person: great work ethic, positive and upbeat, they show up early, leave late, take ten minutes of a fifteen-minute break, and do more than expected and more than you ask for. Now let’s take that person and put them into an environment where people are negative, aren’t held accountable, take