The Sales Competitor

By Chris Nelson

Have you ever wondered how some of the highest-performing sales reps continue outperforming the rest of the pack month after month? I'll let you in on a little secret: it is not because they have some sort of God-given talent they were born with that you just don't. In most cases, elite-level performers will have significantly out-earned the rest of the pack or have been promoted and already moved on to the next level before you figure out what has given them such an advantage. They have a surefire method to their success, and it seems impossible for them to fail. After many years of selling, I became an elite-level rep myself. I developed a precise system that has helped me continue to be successful month after month, year after year. But believe me - I didn't start out this way.

• Language: English
• Publisher: Chris Nelson
• Release date: Dec 18, 2020
• ISBN: 9781801280457

Book preview

About the Author

Chris Nelson has spent over two decades in sales, sales management, and sales training. Chris's success is illustrated in his 9 President's Club awards, and four Region of The Year awards for his teams in multiple companies and multiple industries in sales and sales management.

In addition to his personal achievements, Chris has trained and managed over 400 sales reps during his career in multiple industries and countries. During his career, he performed as the US Sales Training Lead at a multi-billion-dollar organization. In addition, he held National Trainer and Field Trainer roles in multiple companies, Field Advisory Boards, and other leadership positions to help guide these companies. He has been involved in creating training curriculum and compensation plans for industry leading companies to drive results through messaging, execution, and accountability.

Chris has also been tasked with re-creating the messaging to shift the market. By analyzing the new market's challenges, the creation of a new strategy, marketing tools, and messaging to accompany this plan, Chris was able to greatly impact the revenue and profitability of multiple companies.

Contents

Dedication

About the Author

Introduction

Chapter 1

Evaluating the Job Opportunity For Future Success....

Chapter 2

Interviewing - Asking The Right Questions From The Right People.......

Chapter 3

Behaviors For Success............................

Chapter 4

Understanding and Adapting To The Sales Environment

Chapter 5

Executing Your Plan..............................

Chapter 6

Sales Principles..................................

Chapter 7

Focus on The Numbers: Reaching Presidents Club.....

Chapter 8

Mindset and the Path To Success...................

Page Left Blank Intentionally

Introduction

Consistent success isn’t about getting lucky.

Have you ever wondered how some of the highest-performing sales reps continue outperforming the rest of the pack month after month? I’ll let you in on a little secret: it is not because they have some sort of God-given talent they were born with that you just don’t.

In most cases, elite-level performers will have significantly out-earned the rest of the pack or have been promoted and already moved on to the next level before you figure out what has given them such an advantage. They have a surefire method to their success, and it seems impossible for them to fail.

After many years of selling, I became an elite-level rep myself. I developed a precise system that has helped me continue to be successful month after month, year after year.

But believe me - I didn’t start out this way.

Sales was my first job out of college. It was the early 1990s, and I had this idea that if I was a likable guy, people would want to buy from me. Besides, I was raised in a household with two parents, who were both high-performing salespeople. How hard could it be?

Quite difficult, as it turns out.

There are lessons you learn as you gain experience in your career. From a young age, my parents shared their insights into the lifestyle of selling and the challenges that come with it. But what I didn’t realize at the time was that there are higher levels of thinking required to become a top performer in your profession. I was too naive to understand that it wasn’t just about becoming good at the physical act of making sales.

In sales, your behavior and appearance play just as big of a role as your sales technique. Your mindset and ability to visualize future successes are just as or more important than the number of phone calls you make.

I have been in sales for over two decades. Twenty-three years of my life have been dedicated to learning, trying, failing, and eventually, mastering the process of selling to a point where my methodology is now a concrete step-by-step guide for reaching the top. I have changed industries on multiple occasions and have had to start right back at the bottom, along with the other new hires. But each time, in every industry, I have used the following proven methods to make my way back to the top.

An Early Test

A situation arose early in my career that made me rethink my life in sales. A few months after landing my first sales job, the company hit a rough patch, and rumors about layoffs began making their way around the office. I started thinking about my potential options if I were to lose my job, and soon realized that I had been taking the position for granted. I was lucky to be in that role, and I was starting to see that I hadn’t been taking the work as seriously as I should have during my first few months. Because of that, I felt that I was on the cusp of being a casualty of the next round of layoffs.

So, I did what I had to do. I swallowed my pride and approached my manager. I told him that I was aware of the upcoming transition and that despite my mediocre sales numbers from my first few months, I was worth taking a chance on. I told him that if he could spare me from being let go, I would become the hardest working rep on the floor. I would be the first one in the office in the mornings and the last to leave at night. I would give everything I had to become an elite-level salesman. And to his credit, my sales manager saw something in me and decided to keep me on the team through the layoff season.

That decision was the turning point in my sales career. Right there, at that moment, I decided that I was going to be the best at every single aspect of my job. I began competing like an athlete. I already had all of the principles of competition from my time as a competitive athlete growing up, so now it was time to apply these skills to selling. Winning big became my vision. I no longer wanted to be an average salesman or average at anything in my life. I wanted the top awards that the company had to offer, and I wanted to make as much money as I possibly could.

Even before this turning point in my life, I had always been professionally driven by the opportunity to make money. On some level, I have always understood that making money does not have to be rooted in greed. It could actually provide me the sense of freedom that I longed for. But, it was at this point in time, where I realized that my drive for money, success, and winning big in sales was going to become one of my top priorities in life. So, by challenging myself to earn more money and reach the level of success that I knew I was capable of, I was taking a big step toward protecting myself from ever being in the vulnerable position of being laid off or fired like that again.

In the world of sales, the more money you make, the more opportunities that can open up for you in your career. You also get more control of your career path and financial state, leaving you with less stress and more in control of your own destiny. I was hungry to finally be in control of mine.

The Plan

The first thing I did after my manager told me he was going to keep me around was to create a plan. I knew my goals were going to take hard work, but I wanted to make sure I was being efficient with my time.

On sales teams, there are people who work extremely hard, but are inefficient with their planning and execution, and remain average because of it. Then there are the people who boast about how they are working smarter, not harder. Oftentimes, these people were just being lazy and using this pseudo-wisdom as an excuse.

To be honest, I was terrified at the idea of being a member of either of those groups. The layoffs had lit a fire under me. In a pivotal time in my early career, I had the ambition to become the hardest worker in the room and the focus to become the smartest. I believed that with my unrelenting drive along with my extreme focus, my results would be hard to beat.

As I was planning my approach to begin my ascent to the top, I began looking around the office and wondering what the differences were between the bad, the good, and the great reps.

I noticed something interesting. The salespeople who were poor performers weren’t necessarily less charismatic than everyone else. In fact, some of them had great personalities but were still struggling to close deals. A few of our highest performers were even a little dull. For the first time, I realized that selling and success were about more than having a good personality. Every great sales rep has their own unique way of being great.

That discovery caused me to ask myself an important question. Is it possible that someone could use a set of behaviors, techniques, and skills that they acquire over time to create a top performer, no matter how good of a salesperson they were when they first began working in sales?

Because of the many levels that make up a sales team, there’s a percentage of reps at every company that is trying to claw their way to quota and avoid being fired. I wanted to know whether there were steps one could take to go from bad to good and start performing at a competitive level because the lifestyle of being one bad month away from termination was clearly no way for anyone to live.

The same question applied to the average reps in the office. If you are a good rep but haven’t been able to crack the code to become the best on your team, what steps can you take to get you over that hump?

And, if you are a great rep who is consistently leading your team but hasn’t quite cracked the code for reaching the top 10% of reps at your company and achieving President’s Club status, what does that final push consist of?

Through the experience of studying my colleagues, I recognized many of the top performers were gifted speakers and had engaging personalities. Of course, there were exceptions, but those characteristics surely helped. And if this was the case, was there a way for someone who was average in those skills to become great at them as well? Over the next few months, I continued studying the habits, skills, and mindsets of my most successful peers.

It was back at the age of 22 that I began asking myself these questions. And now, over two decades later, I have created a step-by-step system to help an average rep become an elite-level president’s club member.

Now, I will share it all with you.

It won’t be easy. There are no cheat codes to this game. If someone tries to tell you otherwise, they’re lying to you so they can take advantage of your inexperience. But if you are willing to put in the work and diligently follow the steps that I break down in this book, I promise you will see the entire process of selling in a whole new way.

So what are the steps exactly? Through years of trial and error, I’ve discovered that there are 8 elements to creating a great career in sales:

#1 - Evaluating the Job Opportunity For Future Success

Before you can be successful at sales, you first have to carefully evaluate each job to see if it has strong potential and is a good match to fit your style. In Chapter 1, I’ll go over some of the most important things to look for surrounding money and company culture. I’ll break down what to look for in terms of selling style, value propositions, territories, prospective managers, and more. Many people think they should just take the first job that is offered to them. But as you will learn in this next chapter, knowing what you are looking for in a job means far more than you might think.

#2 - Interviewing

Once you know what you are looking for in a career opportunity, you still have to understand how to go out and actually find the information you will need to secure that job. Sure, there are websites like Glassdoor that allow people to research prospective companies. But the only way to see if a specific position matches your unique skill set is to get really good at asking the questions that matter. From finding out what has made reps successful in the past to talking with current reps and customers to learn from their own experience, I will teach you the exact tools you need to get an in-depth understanding of a company before you even think about signing an offer sheet.

#3 - Behaviors for Success

This is where the fun really begins. This chapter is for the reps who are serious about moving up in the sales world. Learning soft skills like self-awareness, implementing feedback, and understanding communication styles is something we all know we need but aren’t quite sure how to achieve. Those skills took me many years to acquire and many more to master. And, as you will learn, you are never a finished product. That mindset will only lead you down the road to mediocrity. I am still actively learning