90% of life is just showing up

That might be true for him.

But it aint true in sales.

Just showing up isn't enough.

Sure. You gotta get in the game.

And you gotta ask.

Because if you never ask, then no one will ever say yes.

But in selling, we always have competition.

And usually lots of it.

In every deal, there are lots of losers who just "showed up", and only one winner.

The secret to winning 90% of your deals is knowing the secret truth about every deal.

You see there's the "information" about the deal that your prospects tell you and every other vendor…

Here's what we are buying
Here's what it needs to do
Here's what we want you to show us
Blah, blah, blah…

But that aint the complete story.

They usually don't tell you the inside story about why they are buying.

And that inside story, is the story you gotta know.

Because once you know the inside story on why they are buying, you can predict with a high % of certainty who they will buy from.

Which means you will know whether they will be buying from you or not, up front.

And once you know this, you don't have to "show up" anymore to the deals that someone else is going to win.

There's never a level playing field in sales.

Never.

It's always tilted in someone's favor.

A while back a put my Persuasive Selling Skills program together to help people like you find the secret truth to every deal fast.

In it I show you how to find that inside story, fast.

And right now I've got some special pricing for you on my Persuasive Selling Skills program.

I know that you need this now.

That's why I put this special offer together for this week.

Go now.

Go and get your copy of Persuasive Selling Skills…

http://industrialego.com/persuasive-selling-special.htm

Sell with Pride!

-Shameless Shamus

You get what you focus on. Every day I make a short focus and action list. I mark only 1-3 items as must-do actions to focus on. The rest are nice to do (and I sometimes get to them as "break-time" from my must-do work). Otherwise I put those off to another day… By focusing on the must-do actions, and keeping those limited to 1-3, I get a LOT of things that I WANT to do, done. This is how you make the reality you desire, one-day at time.

Sell with Pride,

-Shameless Shamus Brown

Questions asked the right way, uncover opportunity.

Questions asked the right way, create a bond between you and the prospect based on a belief that you can help you them.

Ask questions the wrong way, and you will accomplish none of this.

What's the wrong way to ask questions?

Well there's one way I know of that can be really damaging…

It's where the seller asks a question, but he's really just pushing features he has to sell.

I was thinking this morning about approaching a potential new business partner to products for my wife's business.

And I imagined how dumb it would be if I asked…

"Do you have a lot of women on your customer list aged 30-55 years old?"

This would be dumb, because he could reply by saying "Well I have both men and women in that age range. So your product is mostly for women? Hmm, I dunno, my prospects aren't only women…"

See, I would have just screwed myself.

By asking a leading question to see if he wanted what I was selling, I would have immediately disqualified myself. He would now be thinking that I only have a product offer appropriate for a market of women aged 30-55 years old, when in fact this product is not limited to just women, or that age demographic.

You need to be neutral when you question.

Your goal is to find out what the prospects needs and pains are.

His needs and pains, not yours.

So don't color your questions with information about your product.

Focus on diagnosing the prospect's problem. What's happening. Why. What's needed to fix things.

Ask questions the right way, and you'll get closer to the sale.

Sell with Pride,

Shameless Shamus Brown

And there's a wrong time to sell.

The right time to sell is when you have earned the right to sell.

Sounds simple enough.

But lots of people screw this up.

You don't earn the right to sell just because the customer has asked you for information, for a pitch, or a demonstration.

You earn the right to sell when you uncover the driving reason behind the sale.

You need to know the reason WHY people want to buy what they want to buy.

Knowing this is your leverage in every sale.

Once you know the reason why someone is buying, you typically also will know…

• How fast or slow will they make a decision
• Will they really make a decision, or will this drag on, and on
• Which key feature(s) of your product is most important to them

I like knowing this info early.

It lets me quickly make a decision on whether to sell to them, to wait, or to qualify them out and not sell at all.

Huge time saver.

Get this info early and you'll make more sales this year.

Sell with Pride,

-Shameless Shamus Brown

Be proud of being a salesman! Be proud, because all business activity starts with the sale. Sales IS business. The people who create the products you sell NEED you to get their products to the customer. Without you, there would be no business.

Sell with Pride,

-Shameless Shamus Brown

Or asked another way, how do you get more done in less time?

Simple answer: Get busier.

People who do more, get more done.

"Uhh, yeah no shit, Shamus."

Seriously though…

There's a saying that goes "If you want to something to get done, give it to a busy person."

In the past 10 years I've learned how to do more "new things" than I did probably in the previous 20 years of my life.

And one of the things I discovered is how much fear and uncertainty slows us down, stops, and even paralyzes people at times.

Yep, been there.

But if you want to get a lot done…

If you want to get more done faster…

You got to just get into action, and get so busy that you don't have time to worry or let fear stop you.

That's key – worry will kill you.

Learn to run your days so that you minimize the emotions of fear and worry in your day.

How to Set Yourself Up to Win Daily

Some people say do the hard things first in the day.

Other's say do the easy things first so you can get them out of the way.

I'll tell you what works for me.

Plan your day so that you do the things that you are competent at getting results on in the first half or so of your day.

This way you use your most productive energy in a way that builds your confidence.

You see, reinforcing your own confidence daily, is key to building and staying successful.

Small "wins" build confidence, and lay the foundation for bigger wins. Your mind needs constant training and reinforcement that you are capable of achieving anything you can dream up.

Then in the second half or so of your day, do the new things. Do the harder things you are unsure of. Do the things that cause you to feel insecure, out of your comfort zone, incompetent, etc.

Learning those new things will cause you to feel lots of uncomfortable emotions.

But the new things are where your big breakthroughs will come from to move life forward in for you in bigger ways.

To sum it up then…

1. Get Busier to Crowd Out Fear, Doubt and Worry
2. Get Results & Build Confidence Early in Your Day
3. Learn New Things in the Second Half of Your Day

Let me know how this works out for you.

Sell with Pride!

-Shameless Shamus Brown

Whether you make New Year's Resolutions or not (I Don't), January is a great time to set Motivating and Big Goals for yourself. For most of us the calendar is free from distractions for the next 5-6 months, plenty of time to get some major momentum, and big progress in life and business.

Sell with Pride,

-Shameless Shamus Brown

Now it might be easier to call this a self-defense course, a practical martial arts program, or a combat training system.

But the simple fact is, this was a training on how to kill an attacker, when the chips are down, it's him or me, and there is no other option.

The training was designed by a former Naval Warfare Intelligence Officer who was instrumental in creating the modern hand-to-hand combat fighting techniques taught to the Navy SEALs today.

I figured before this training that maybe I was gonna learn a lot of fast punches, kicks, throws, and other Bruce Lee kinda stuff.

But I was wrong…

How to stop an attacker isn't about the kick or the punch.

The most important thing I learned was how to think about attackers and violence.

I had some experience with violence before taking this program.

I had a gun pulled on me once.

I got in more than my share of fights as kid.

And I've had my nose broken 5 times. One time in a fist fight, the other incidents each have their own story…

I walk around in state of constant awareness of my surroundings probably as a result of these and other experiences in my life. I am always both curious about the world around me while simultaneously scanning for and assessing possible threats.

But the training added something new to my thinking.

It gave me the distinction between people who want to "teach you a lesson" and people who plan to kill you.

Bar fights, and fights between boys, usually involves showing off, standing up for pride, and teaching someone else a lesson.

All stupid stuff. Some of which I participated in when I was younger though.

All this kind of violence, you just want to stay away from, talk your way out of, and avoid at all cost.

Why?

Because in standing up for your pride, you can still freakin die in a bar fight.

The other guy probably doesn't want to kill you. But when fists, feet and hands fly you never how bad the damage will be.

Some guys have died in bar fights not from getting punched but from smacking their skull on the ground when they got knocked down.

Those sorts of "ego clashes" I stay away from.

And I actually have stayed away from such clashes for a long time, but before this weekend of training, I always felt a pull that if only I was more of badass – you know, bigger, stronger, faster – then just maybe I wouldn't have to worry when someone verbally challenged me.

My thinking flipped though after the first hour of this program because we spent some time looking at videos of prison murders and street fights, and we talked about all this kind of "real world" stuff that most of us never experience.

And the fact that you can die, unintentionally by getting knocked down badly way in a bar fight, just aint worth it.

Had never really thought about that one before…

Knowing when to fight, and when to walk away was one of the two biggest lessons of the program.

The bulk of the rest of the time was spent learning and practicing how to kill attackers quickly once you've made the decision that you have to.

To do that though, we first had to get into the mindset that there is no half-way on violence.

You either need to turn it on to kill someone who is intent on, or likely to kill you. Or you talk your way, and walk your way out of lesser, ego-driven, shows of toughness.

I have a certain confidence now that I didn't have before.

And I tell you about this for a reason.

Selling involves a lot of ego and pride too.

Too many sellers go after deals, or stick with certain deals for too long, because they got something to prove.

And much like a bar fight where you get banged up, bruised and bashed in even when you win, going after deals you shouldn't be in will beat you up too.

There is no pride to be had in battling for a sale, because "Hey I gotta be in the game too".

I used to hear that kinda crap all the time from some of the sales managers and sales reps I knew.

Saying "I gotta be in the game too" is a formula for working REAL hard, getting your ass-kicked a lot, and not making a lot of money.

You're much better off honing your opportunity assessment skills and training your mind to learn how to get out of every opportunity as early as possible, and with confidence that it is not your deal.

You see the truth about selling is not every opportunity, is an opportunity for you!

I hope that I never have to kill someone else.

And as a result of my new way of thinking I don't worry so much about the knuckleheads anymore. I just stay away from them.

I want you to be as successful as you can be in your selling.

Find the deals that are for you, and walk away early from the ones that are just going to beat you up and then buy from the other guy.

Those blows to the head just aren't worth it.

Sell with Pride!

-Shameless Shamus Brown

Where did 2011 go?

Before I went to bed last night, I was thinking, how it's already been a few days since I last wrote you.

And then this morning as I looked at the date of my last email, I realized that it was 2 weeks ago.

Aaackkk!

Where did the time go?

Ummm…

Well I did say that writing this was going to be an occasional, sometimes frequent thing for me

And Hey, I got busy in the moment with Christmas shopping, parties, plays, and more fun family stuff in the run-up to the big holiday.

But now those are just excuses, aren't they?

Which got me to thinking about prospecting…

Prospecting is NOT something where you magically make deals appear.

You can't just start prospecting and expect to instantly get sales and make quota.

(if it was this easy, believe me, you wouldn't have a job)

Yes I know, there are occasional exceptions where the magic does happen, and you get a deal as soon as you start engaging people.

But count your blessings when it happens, because you can't build a business or a sales career on expecting magic to just happen.

No.

Prospecting is about discipline, regularity, and consistency.

Some days it works great and you find interested people with ease.

Other days… well it seems like the world hates you and your product is garbage.

But you have to put the time in.

Regularly, and consistently.

Because over time, no matter how much negativity you get from some prospects, there will be a few people that love you.

And the ones that love you…

The ones that need you…

Are the ones that you can make your sales career on.

So go out and find them.

It's not too late for 2012.

You got 3 business days left in 2011 to get started.

And after that you got 365 calendar days in 2012.

It's never too late to start being consistent today, no matter what you were like yesterday.

So put in a little bit of time every day (or at least every business day) to finding new prospects, and the sales magic will find you.

Sell with Pride!

-Shameless Shamus Brown

Yes, I know it may seem like it takes you hours, days, weeks, even months in some cases to make a sale.

But the sale itself, the buying decision that is, happens in an instant.

Do you know when that moment is?

It's the moment when your prospect recognizes that you can solve his problem and that he has a problem serious enough to warrant solving right now.

Both conditions are necessary to make the sale.

All selling boils down to this.

Get someone to realize they have a problem

Get them to realize that it's serious enough to solve right now.

Get them to recognize that you can best solve their problem.

That's selling.

It's not about pitching.

It's not about telling people how great you are.

You can tell people how great you are till you get sick of hearing yourself talk.

But it won't matter unless…

They know they have a problem.

They know they need to solve it.

They know you can best solve their problem.

Now go out and find some problems to solve.

Sell with Pride!

-Shameless Shamus Brown