Why attitude is everything in sales
I’ve worked for some of the most beloved sports brands in the world like adidas and TaylorMade Golf and I’ve been a part of many great teams.
Looking back at my most valuable learning experiences, what stands out in particular is the impact that attitude has on our results.
This has been an incredibly important realisation in my career that I’ve carried with me into our current businesses and everyday life.
If you’ve got a poor attitude or members of your team do, I wanted to share with you why it is so devastating to success — and three simple yet highly effective ways to turn it around.
I’ll cover this off in 3 articles. This being the first. So, let’s get started…
Back in the day when I was working with adidas, who at the time owned TaylorMade, the link between attitude and results really struck me. I became most aware of it during and immediately after a sales meeting, when new products were introduced to the sales team.
Product launches come with a lot of fanfare, as the sales team gets together for a first glimpse of new products.
Most times, a new product launch usually went something like this:
Day 1) We would arrive at the conference venue, usually a 5-star golfing resort in a world class location, around midday and it would kick off with the main presentation in the afternoon with keynote presenters and the big reveal of new products in each category.
Day 2) New products that weren’t presented on day 1 got stage time, followed by workshops with every other department that were part of the sales success; marketing, tour, operations, CS etc.
Day 3) Regional break out meetings were held to discuss and plan sales and marketing strategies for each local area and sales teams.
The sales launches were always a yearly highlight for a number of reasons.
One, because I’m a die-hard product guy.
And, two, because I loved the sales and marketing strategy sessions, plotting how to best support and serve our regional teams and customers.
But the biggest reason I enjoyed sales launches so much was something else.
It gave me opportunities to speak with sales executives from other regions and exchange ideas around selling processes and also managing and motivating our sales teams.
This interaction with other regional sales executives was a lesson in psychology.
Simply by observing salespeople during and immediately after the new product was introduced, I could often predict who would kick their sales targets through the roof once they got back to their areas — and who wouldn’t.
I could predict future results — with pretty incredible accuracy — based on a clear segregation of the sales team that would happen organically after new products were presented. Here’s what used to happen…
One group — let’s call this The Big Group — would form an alliance built on scepticism and negative opinions toward the new products.
Typically, this group, fuelled by pessimism, would trade worn out ideas about how the R&D and product teams had failed. That the product wouldn’t support a double digit increase on the sales budget.
About 60–80% of salespeople would make up The Big Group.
Then there was group two. Which we’ll call The Small Group.
This smaller group of the remaining 20–40% would react with excitement and positivity. They had no doubt that the new products gave them everything they needed for double digit growth.
After the presentations, with the product in our hands, the reps in The Big Group had every reason under the sun why the product wouldn’t sell.
Meanwhile, The Small Group could give you a near-endless list of reasons why the product WOULD sell. Not just that, they had also immediately started formulating strategies for how they would sell A LOT of this new product.
Can you guess which group would go on to achieve their sales targets? Of course, The Small Group.
The negativity and pessimism of The Big Group wasn’t completely wasted though.
In role playing strategy sessions, when pretending to be customers, Big Group reps fired every objection imaginable at the role playing salesperson. (Maybe this is another reason why the guys in The Small Group performed so well?!).
This experience really crystallised in my mind the impact of attitude on sales results. I literally witnessed people convince themselves they wouldn’t succeed before trying to sell a single product. They created their future reality with their mindset, BEFORE the first customer meeting.
This understanding of the link between sales and attitude led me to three key takeaways I still use to this day in business. I’ll explain these in my next article.
To your success,
Johan
