Hello ToddCohen.com Sales Community…
I am back after a week of dealing with the typical change-of-season cold…and thank you to those of you who wrote to me and asked when the blogging would continue! Your kindness touched me and I am grateful.
On another note, my colleague Dr. Janice Presser and I both had articles published in the Business World Times last month. Her article was on the topic of humility, an area that also I speak about in my recent white paper. I am passionate on this point that great sales professionals have deep and sustaining humility. This is what I said:
“Humility is at the heart of lasting sales success. Genuine humility is not faked or insincere, and displaying humility is a not weakness, rather it is a strength in character that creates success. …Which would you rather buy from – a salesperson who is modest and real, or one who is arrogant and overconfident?”
I have interacted with many many sales professionals over many years, and I am impressed when a sales professional displays a healthy combination of success and humility. This is not easy to do, and it takes maturity and the understanding that in the game of sales, we are all one deal away from making plan or having a tough month.
To this point, let me add a few other salient points:
- Great sales professionals who have genuine humility attract clients and create relationships where deals get closed. Period.
- Great sales professionals who have real humility attract the positive attention of management. These sales pros are given great assignments and more opportunity to make money!
- Great sales professionals who have humility attract peers and co-workers who want to work with them, making the creation of a productive virtual team easier.
- Great sales professionals who have true humility are typically more confident and in turn inspire confidence in others! They know enough not to spend more time believing their “press” rather than selling and closing business!
- People follow great leaders who are humble.
As a community of sales leaders and professionals, let’s all raise the stakes and make sure we set the bar high for humilty. The results will be more closed business.
Good Selling!
-Todd
Great post, Todd!
Being a good listener ranks among my top personal lessons in humility. When genuinely tuning in, you become engaged in co-creating win-win results.
The natural outcome: loyal advocates who will sneeze about you every chance they get.
Jen-
Great point about listening! I have always been a strong advocate of great listening and have some other articles and blogs on that topic!
Thanks for joining the conversation!
-Todd
Humility is easy. If you’re good at what you do, your numbers will speak for you. That’s one of the things I love about sales is numbers do the talking. You don’t need to kiss up to the boss to get a raise, just going out and selling something is how we get raises!! In addition to being an excellent listener, making your customer feel like they are your only customer goes a long way too. Happy selling my friends.
Thank you so much, usefull +1