Pick Up The Phone and Sell

CHAPTER 9FEAR IS THE ENEMY OF PICKING UP THE PHONE

If confidence, belief, positivity, enthusiasm, optimism, and gratitude are the mindsets that enable sales success and make it easy to make proactive calls, what gets in the way? Which mindset is so prevalent and so overpowering that it controls the behavior of nearly all salespeople?

The answer is a single ugly word.

It's damaging and harmful, and it costs us money.

It hurts our customers and our families.

This word, this mindset, is fear.

Fear is the most powerful human emotion because it totally controls our behavior.

It stops us from doing what we know is right and good.

Nearly all salespeople know, for example, that proactive phone calls are a more effective way to grow sales than emails, and yet most people email instead of call.

Nearly all salespeople know that following up on quotes and proposals will close more of them, and yet we don't call.

Nearly all salespeople know that asking for referrals is a great way to expand our customer base, and yet we tend not to ask.

We think about these efforts a lot. We even think about doing them.

We may even plan how and when we will take these actions.

But then, most times, we don't do them.

We find other things to do. Safer things that make us less uncomfortable.

Or we replan our plan. We try to make it perfect, but it will never be all the way perfect.

It is fear that does this to us.

In fact, if you find yourself avoiding something that you know you should be doing, it is almost ...