Brian Tracy breaks down sales success: 80% comes down to mindset and attitude, the rest from small advantages in prospecting, rapport, and closing. Salespeople who practiced effective phone scripts saw dramatic increases in appointments and sales.
I've studied selling now for more than 30 years. I made thousands of calls myself. And one of the first things I Learned was the 8020 rule as it applies to the personality of the salesperson. 80% of your success is psychological. 80% of your success is mental. It's how you think and feel about yourself. Now, in sales, we call this the winning edge. We find that the top salespeople have the winning edge in the critical things that they do. They have the winning edge in prospecting because they're just a little better. They have the winning edge in establishing rapport, identifying needs, presenting their product or service, answering objections, closing the sale, and so on. They've developed the little winning edges. Now, here's how it would work. If a horse runs in a horse race and wins by a nose, the horse wins 10 times the prize money of the horse that comes in second by a nose. Now, does this mean that the horse that comes in second is far worse than the horse that comes in first? Does it mean that the horse that comes in first is 10 times better than the horse that comes in second? No, it's just a nose better. Now, in sales, the salesperson who gets the sale gets 100% of the sale and 100% of the commission. Does it mean that the salesperson is 100% better than another salesperson or that the product or service is 100% better? No, it's just a tiny bit better. It's just a tiny bit better in the way it's presented. It's a tiny bit better in the quality of the relationship. So your job is to develop the winning edge in sales. And the way you do it is you stand back and you say, what are the most important things that I do that contribute to my success? I can give you an example. I've worked with a couple of salespeople who did all of their initial prospecting on the telephone. And instead of just approaching the phone with nervousness and saying whatever came out, they worked and worked and worked to develop very effective prospecting scripts. And they practiced them like you would practice for a play in front of a mirror until they could ask questions and listen to the answers and as follow up questions. And as a result, they got more and better appointments. They got face to face with more people who could and would buy within a reasonable period of time. They just simply developed the winning edge in prospecting and their sales increased 5 and 10 times. So what is the area of your selling where you need to develop the winning edge? What's the one or two things that you could do much better that would give you the edge over your competitors. Whatever it is. Remember, you don't have to be a whole lot better to be a top salesperson. You just have to be a little bit better in the key areas. You just have to develop the winning edge.
