10 + 81 Ideas for Creating a Successful 2020 in Sales and Life

10 + 81 Ideas for Creating a Successful 2020 in Sales and Life

by | Dec 8, 2019 | Business, General

A new budget year has already started for some of you, and for the rest, there are still a couple of weeks to go. Either way, you’re out hunting and closing as much as you can before the holidays divert your clients’ focus. If you haven’t already made plans for next year, now’s the time.

When you’re in sales there’s not really a full stop from one sales year to another other than looking at whether you hit your annual targets or not and all that comes with that. Maybe you take a day off and then you immediately switch your focus on to the next year. Being flexible is an important trait in sales.

Here are some ideas to make 2020 the year you soar:

1. Assess and reflect

…on the accounts you closed and the prospects you still have on that list. What created success with some and not others? What were your highs and lows, proud moments, and insights that resulted in you tweaking your sales process moving forward? Talk to a friend, co-worker, or create a voice memo and just get it all out of your system.

2. Who’s on your list

…and who do you want to add? Filling your pipeline is part of the game as you know. Asking for referrals, utilizing Google Maps, LinkedIn, and good ole fashioned networking.

3. What is your current closing rate

…and what do you want it to be? How many calls or visits do you normally need to close your targets? Having this number helps you create a numbers game instead of getting caught up in personal defeat.

4. What activities are you planning

…throughout the year to close your accounts and what are you doing to serve and retain existing clients?

5. Has your ideal client changed?

You get to choose who you do business with and add clients that fit your profile while letting go of the ones that are not buying. This is all a part of doing business.

6. What’s your success formula?

Review and tweak your sales process, from questions to pitches. Simply, what’s your formula for success? Look at your strengths lineup — they’re part of that – you being you is one of the keys.

7. What questions are you asking?

It’s so easy to pitch before you’ve actually asked your prospect what they’re looking for. Being interested in what they have to say is part of the success formula. Your product or service will determine the depth of your questions.

Here are some questions to ask:  a) What does their current situation look like? b) What do they want to achieve or create that they don’t have now? c) What’s stopping them, and, d) What would their life/biz look like if they achieved their dream/target?

Asking these questions will help you get clear on what solution you can provide your prospect. You know that, do you practice your listening skills?

8. What do you want to get out of the year?

What are your personal targets and achievements? It’s important to incorporate your own desires to stay energized and on point. You can use the questions in this post for yourself too.

9. How are you going to celebrate your successes?
10. Define your version of success

…and create a collage/vision board, or simply select one image that represents what you’re striving for in 2020 on all levels. Then select images from royalty-free sites like Unsplash and use an online collage maker like Canva or go old school and cut out images from magazines and then take a picture of it so that you have it on your phone.

I just saw this article on Hubspot about 81 One-Sentence Sales Tips that offer additional tidbits of value. Check it out.

Blogs mentioned above:

Who do you sell to and how

What’s your sales process?

Defining your version of success

 

Learn how we can work together HERE.

What to Do When Sales Suck: 3 Actions

What to Do When Sales Suck: 3 Actions

by | Dec 1, 2019 | Business, General, Strengths

When you compare yourself to others it’s easy to get stressed out or overwhelmed. When you’re in sales it’s a natural thing to see where you’re at as your role is all about hitting or exceeding your number. Many thrive on that game, others don’t and are easily thrown off their targets. 

While looking back can be a motivator for some, tapping into the now, or future motivates others. This is where your strengths can be a great guide. 

When “competition” is a dominant theme within you can’t help but compare yourself to others and that motivates you to achieve more and better. When people challenge you by saying “I don’t think you can do it” you go into “watch me!” mode.  You may want to keep a running score on your actions, targets and the people you’re comparing yourself to. 

For the dreamers, it’s important to stay connected to your vision, what you know is possible ongoingly. A lot of that can be energy, images, a feeling or a combo of all. Tune into this on a regular basis, daily or weekly, meditate, dream, contemplate in ways that work for you. Take deep breaths and expand throughout the day and then allow things to unfold in random ways. 

Others are inspired by the past. Looking at what made you successful in the past to identify what actions you took then vs. now. Use the insights to tweak your daily action list and add items that you know have made a difference to your state of mind and successes in the past. 

When you lose your mojo you often give up on parts of your success formula, what makes you special and unique. The “no time or no money” is one of the most common illusions to get hooked into. Who you are has no price tag, you are unique no matter what happens around you and honoring what that gold is that only you bring is one of the keys to getting your mojo back.

  1. Your dominant talents

Depending on your personality and strengths lineup you will need to take the actions needed to energize your dominant talents (normally your top 10-14). When they are all engaged you’re on fire. By looking at what exactly gets these talents firing you get your unique success formula.

  1. The ZONE

What activities get you in flow mode, in the zone, where time seizes to exist? Start there and just write down a list of activities that get you going in an empowered way.

  1. Introspection

What if you compared yourself to where you were let’s say a year ago and acknowledge the achievements you’ve made since then in all areas of life? Look back to powerful moments when you felt on top of the world, professionally and personally. Even during growth years that aren’t flowing as we anticipate there are still moments of “yeah baby, I’ve got this.” 

What’s next? Pick the topic(s) above that you connect with and create a simple note on your phone to track insights and events that matter as they happen. Ask yourself what happened, how it made you feel, what worked/didn’t work, who was there, insights and lessons learned. By connecting within into your own awarenesses you access the best teacher of all – You.

Creating a Career Autobiography

Creating a Career Autobiography

by | Nov 24, 2019 | Strengths

Definition of career

: a profession for which one trains and which is undertaken as a permanent calling

: a field for or pursuit of consecutive progressive achievement especially in public, professional, or business life

Two weeks ago I spoke about 3 steps to creating your autobiography, this week I have suggestions for creating your career autobiography.

Our personal life is affected by our business life and sometimes the lines get blurry. When you’re in careers and professions like sales it’s easy for work to take over when you’re a high-achiever and enjoy what you’re doing. 

Apart from writing and later updating your resume, do you sit down and reflect on what you’ve created to date in the area of business?

What achievements are you most proud of and what about them makes them special?  

What if you listed all the jobs that you’ve had that you can remember from your childhood to date. List what your experience was, what you learned from it and if it influenced you to embark on your current career path?

Next, look at your strengths, both BP10™ and CliftonStrengths®. How many of your talents/strengths were used in each of these jobs?

I was talking to someone about this recently and was reminded of sales jobs I had as a kid that I had totally forgotten about. My dream, however, was to be an interior designer. That is until ended up in the hospital at 14, had a nurse that impressed me so much that I chose to become a nurse instead. I did a 180 from a hospital stay.

Now that doesn’t mean that I gave up an interior design, in fact, I’ve been practicing as I’ve moved around the world and lived in many places, the only difference is that it just didn’t end up being my chosen profession.

Is it important to you to climb the ladder and have the title or do you just love carrying the bag and interacting with people while selling them your product?

Many people get so focused on titles that they stop looking at how their current job contributes to their life and what becoming a manager, VP or CEO would mean to their life.

I’ve seen many great salespeople become managers and fail miserably. Not everyone is wired to be a manager just because they’re successful in sales. There are pros and cons with all careers and finding what’s a fit for you is the only thing that is really important. 

What does success look like for you?

That’s one of the first questions to look at, especially when you start feeling like you’re losing your mojo. What makes you happy and what doesn’t?

There’s a lot of freedom when you’re in sales as long as you perform and serve your clients well.

Doing what comes naturally to you is important and you also need to make money to live. There are so many different types of sales positions, sometimes shifting to another product with a different sales cycle or a different corporate culture makes all the difference. 

Assessments

What I love about assessments is that they help you identify talents that you may not have thought about marketing or investing in.

When you hear the same message said in different ways it’s sometimes easier to take that in. BP10™, DISC, Kolbe-A are some of the assessments I enjoyed taking from a business perspective. They give you a language to express the uniqueness of what you bring and added to that you have CliftonStrengths® that adds your “how” as a person and the “How to Fascinate” assessment that measures how others see you which I’ve found so far mirrors your strengths.

It takes a team using all their talents to successfully build, sustain and grow a thriving business.

What talents and strengths does your team excel in?

Hypnosis – What’s the Big Deal?

Hypnosis – What’s the Big Deal?

by | Nov 17, 2019 | Business, General

Many people are familiar with hypnosis from watching some sort of stage hypnosis show where people are doing all kinds of silly stuff, I’m not talking about that. There are many facets to hypnosis as well as teachings.

I like to describe hypnosis as a guided meditation. You have full choice whether you follow the guidance or not and you can hear every word spoken while in this very relaxed state of mind. The scenes you’re guided through often include plenty of room for each individual to envision the dreamscape in a way that works for them. In other words, there’s plenty of room for interpretation as far as what things look like. You get to tap into your memories and apply your ideal scenes which is why it’s so powerful. 

It’s very relaxing

Change happens while you’re in this relaxed state and that is one reason why transformation happens with little effort.

You’re in dialog with your unconscious mind

Think about that. The reasons we fail to hit targets if we are in action are often due to our tendency to sabotage ourselves. Lets say you want to build a fit body which requires consistent actions in the area of movement and food choices. Maybe you follow the plan the first week or month and then you start skipping days and before you know it you’re completely off.

Chris Howard, who I was certified in transformational hypnosis by, gave us this great analogy: 

“Think of your conscious mind as the captain of a ship, and the unconscious mind as the crew, who controls the ship?“

You might want to say the captain but does the captain do anything else but give the order? So, if the ship doesn’t turn or operate as you desire there’s either a mutiny of sorts happening or the captain not communicating clearly and the crew needing more information.  

Your body works the same way. Just think about all the functions our body takes care of without us even having to think about it. That’s the power of the unconscious mind and that is the part of you that you access when you’re in this relaxed state.

Things change fast

Because you can talk to your your unconscious mind without any judgments there is choice involved. Your body has a desire to help as does the unconscious mind. 

You’re in total control

As mentioned above, you hear everything that is spoken and if you disagree you’ll awaken or question the information. That’s why a hypnosis session includes a chat prior where targets are established so that the guided journey applies to you. 

You’re safe

There is nothing that will be done to you. The hypnotists offers suggestions that you then interpret and either agree with or not. It’s similar to reading a book or watching a movie, how we experience the story and journey is individual. 

Now why is this all important? Ultimately, your well-being is at stake when you don’t listen to or communicate with your body. The signals may be subtle until they’re not and symptoms or dis-ease shows up. The same goes with dreams and targets, forgotten or not, hypnosis makes it easier to access what that looks like for you.

Bottomline is, why not establish a line of communication that is focused on what you desire to create and then go from there?

For more information on hypnosis look no further than the Mayo Clinic. 

3 Steps to Creating Your Autobiography

3 Steps to Creating Your Autobiography

by | Nov 10, 2019 | General

Transformation: an act, process, or instance of transforming or being transformed.

When you look at the transformation from a story perspective looking back at your life and the journey you’ve had to date it’s been quite the movie, hasn’t it? It’s so easy to focus on what’s ahead without acknowledging what came before.

Transformation is powerful. You can shift your experience of the past and create a future that you were not seeing as possible an hour or day prior. 

Imagine looking back at your life as an observer, remembering life events, making notes and then as you get to present time taking a look at this from an adult’s perspective and see what the story of your life so far has been about.

Creating your autobiography

Years ago, I participated in a course where we all created an autobiography. It was a powerful exercise and true gift that I’ll always be grateful for. I remember thinking how wonderful it would be if every person on this planet would create their version, it’s such a gift.

Collecting images, looking at conversations, people and events, while weaving our life story together. It could be a collage of images for every year, words, you get to create it in the way you want to, it’s your story after all.

One of the things I, and many with me, got from this experience was that we have a choice in how we share our story, no matter how traumatic the events were at the time. When you take the time to review and get present to your own story, making peace with the experiences, it opens up the door to new possibilities, choices, and actions.

Life is a movie

What if you were to create your life as one of your favorite movies? The plotlines of most stories will include the hero – You, who starts out with a story and a set of circumstances. Next, something happens, villains may appear, and you’re forced to take action if you want to live. Along the way, your own personal Yoda(s) may appear, or there will be challenges continually thrown your way that forces you to step up and take action until the threat has been eliminated. The hero is a different person at the end of the story, often wiser from the experiences and no longer apologizing for who they are.

Much like your own life. What happened to you growing up will stay with you, and depending on the nature of your story, some are great where they are, others are better off transforming into a story where you get to be your own everyday hero.

Have you ever looked at why you’re drawn to the movies you watch, or what you get to experience through them? And why there are other movies that you would never think of seeing?

Your turn

Here are some ideas for an outline you could use if creating your own autobiography sounds fun.

STEP 1

Grab a bunch of papers or create a new document. Number each page from 0 to your current age.

  • PEOPLE: Write down the people that were in your life at that time (parents, family, friends, foes, classmates, teammates, neighbors, etc. List the names.)
  • IMAGES: Add pictures from your life or google images that represent you and the people in your life if there are none. Unsplash is a great site where you can download free and royalty-free images
  • PERSONAL EVENTS: What were the events that happened in your life during that year – good or bad?
  • WORLD EVENTS: What big events happened in the world at that time?
  • EXPERIENCE: How do you remember feeling that year, about yourself and about others? Happy, loved, safe, sad, angry, helpless, abandoned, scared, lonely, …
  • NEW STORY: Leave blank for now

 

STEP2

  • REVIEW: Now that you’ve created your life story what do you get present to? Who are you? How would you describe this person?
  • INSIGHTS: What did you learn about life this year? What choices are you making as a result of this event? What beliefs did you form about yourself and others?
  • NEW STORY: Looking at where you are today, as an adult, how can you recreate your story in a way that empowers you? Go through each year and add an empowering statement

 

STEP 3

Just like the hero in a movie you now get to choose how you want your story to play out from this day forward. What is the happy-ever-after story you want to experience? You may have heard the proverb “If there’s a will there’s a way”, in other words, anything is possible if you set the intention and take the actions necessary to create it.

  • YOUR NEW NARRATIVE: Who are you now as a result of the life you’ve lived to date? If you were to describe yourself as a character what would that look like?
  • YOUR VISION, what do you want to share with the world? It could be power words, a collage of images, or simply taking 5 minutes a day to tune within and connecting with your hero self and see what guidance you get from within.