If you are in an industry that has been impacted by the recession, and you are doing everything possible to continue to bring in revenue, then you are working twice as hard, twice as long and twice as smart.  If not, you are probably failing right now.  Twice as long is plenty obvious. Twice as smart means planning the strategies and tactics you’ll use for each opportunity. But what about twice as hard?  Is that working twice as hard today and tomorrow or is that working twice as hard with every prospect?

If you are working twice as hard with every prospect you could actually be making some of these mistakes:

• Instead of asking questions you revert to presenting
• Rather than presenting only after reaching 2nd and then 3rd base you revert to presenting too early in the process by completely skipping 2nd and 3rd base
• You jump through hoops and revert to providing quotes and proposals for unqualified prospects
• You talk way too much instead of listening
• You lose your edge and become way too patient and trusting of your prospects’ stalls and put-offs
• Your Need for Approval is back and getting in the way
• You are getting emotional because you are so frustrated and discouraged

Take a step back and remember this.  Only 6% of all salespeople are elite and only another 20% are strong.  74% of the 14 million salespeople are struggling because they talk to much, present too early, don’t have an effective process and are unable to execute their strategies and tactics because of the myriad of weaknesses they have.  The top salespeople  continue to train, refine and practice the things that made them top salespeople; listening skills, questioning skills, relationship skills, qualifying skills, and closing skills.

If you had to practice in just one area of selling today, what would it be?

Think of selling as finding opportunities, then defining the opportunity by uncovering compelling reasons to buy, then qualifying and finally closing.  Which of those four areas could be improved?

Presenting?  You don’t need to practice that.

Proposals?  Same thing.

Pick an area of selling where you know you could be better, review that section in Baseline Selling and practice the heck out of it.