How do you expect to achieve excellence in anything unless you’re willing to take some risk?
I’m tired of running into people who think they can be excellent in something but at the same time are afraid to stick their nose out and actually try it. If you’re not willing to demonstrate some risk, how do you expect to be excellent at anything?
The only thing I could ever demonstrate excellence in without taking some risk would be sleeping.
For salespeople, it’s about being willing to take risk. The more risk a salesperson is willing to take, the greater the potential reward.
Today there are far too many salespeople who are doing everything they can to eliminate risk. No wonder there are so many struggling to make their numbers.
Sales excellence will only come with risk. Now I’m not advocating salespeople should go out and risk everything every day. What I am advocating is being willing to increase the level of risk you’re currently willing to take.
If you have not been willing to make requests of customers then your added level of risk is to start doing so. You might be one who typically has avoided trying to make sales calls on the C-suite. If that describes you, then maybe your new level of risk is to start focusing your effort on the C-suite.
Your objective is to become comfortable in taking your level of risk to a much higher level than it is at currently. By doing it in incremental steps, you’ll find yourself no longer seeing things as being risky, but rather seeing them as smart moves. That right there is the objective — increase your confidence to the point where risk is no longer seen as risk.
It’s only at this point you will be in a position to be able to start thinking about becoming excellent in knowing how to sell.
Copyright 2011, Mark Hunter “The Sales Hunter.” Sales Motivation Blog.
