Adam Sand breaks down why roofing sales reps burn out: they hit the "Point of Truth" where reality clashes with expectations and quit. He maps a five-stage mindset progression and shows how reps who survive adapt to each homeowner, accept long stretches without commission, and debrief every appointment to catch missed objections.
Today we're going to be talking about three things that you can do as a sales rep that will make or break the sale. First one is going to be mindset. In terms of mindset, being a sales rep at a roofing company is a hard job. There is a reason why 70% of outside sales reps don't hit their one year anniversary. When I was inside as a roofing sales rep, I'm a multimillion dollar sales rep. This is kind of the process that I saw relatively quickly and it affected a lot of sales reps. This is how I broke it down. First stage uninformed optimism. This is your first introductory interview with a sales manager and or owner and you have an individual sitting in front of you stating that their average rep makes a hundred thousand dollars a year and their top rep makes a quarter of a million dollars each year, but it's more than likely 100% commission. This is where it all starts. You have no idea what it takes. You're confident in yourself like we all are or were. That your work ethic. It's possible. And that's going to lead to stage two. You decide to accept the role as a sales rep and after a couple weeks you may experience results leading you to be an informed pessimist. You now know that this job is significantly harder than you expected. You may have started off with a couple closes, may be the best at reciting scripts, but now you've gone two weeks without selling. So now what? Stage three. This is the Point of Truth. This is now where the path of the sales rep splits into two options. One does the same exact thing that they have been and the same exact results keep happening. Sure, they may get a sale here or there, but overall they are underperforming. And that's going to lead to stage four where they see another opportunity and say, hey, let's go try that instead. That sounds like I can make more money. That sounds like it's going to be a better opportunity, better company, better culture, whatever the case may be. And then they hop back to uninformed optimism, informed pessimism, and they get trapped in a loop for 20 straight years. Now, in terms of what happens with rep B is going to move forward onto this path. The other option from stage three of the Point of Truth is sticking with it. Okay, so stage four is where you become an informed optimist. Because now you understand the good things, the bad things, and how to maximize the good and limit the bad, then stage five is obviously sticking with that path for years, understanding what it takes to be successful at this job. Always adapting to achieve what you originally thought was exciting and relatively easy. So how do we keep you on that rep b path? The answer is pretty simple. You need to be always adapting to your surroundings. Every single homeowner is different and there's a difference between understanding that concept and embracing that concept. You need to be a million in the house every single time. So whether you have like 70 year old Sally and Larry in front of you, or a 27 year old first time home buyer, or a 45 year old who used to be in the roofing industry but is too old to do it himself, each and every time you need to connect with these individuals on a level that their spouse may not even be on. You guys need to be their best friend. If it's a 70 year old woman, you guys need to be their grandson. Like you have to get them to fall in love with you. The second thing that I want to touch on is being self aware. And what I mean by that is understanding the value of money and understand how hard it is to make money. The roofing business is one of, if not the only business that in a couple hours you can make two times the amount of money a typical American makes in two weeks. But with all that good, there's always a bad. And that is you could work an entire 60 hour workweek on top of the drive time to appointments and not make a single dollar. If you're going to embrace the good and love the good, then you need to accept the bad. The last point I have is something that I personally love to do and probably to the point where it was kind of harmful to me of becoming a bad habit, that is thinking about every single appointment and what you could have done with the knowledge you now have. Always self reflecting, always looking back on what happened throughout an appointment is crucial. For example, like if the homeowner said that they needed to talk to their dad about this project and that's why they told you no, Were you blindsided by that answer? Were there moments throughout the warmup or call to action that you labeled that objection and addressed it and overcame it without them even having to bring it up? Or did you skip over something? Did you miss that? This must have been like their first big project as an adult and they would need some reassurance from someone else to say that they should go through with it. There are constantly things to think about from a two to three hour long appointment. And every single thing that you learn from the previous appointment you can apply to the next appointment to better your chances. That's what I mean by always be learning, adapting and self awareness.
