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Seeds For Thought
Becoming Your Dynamic Self
In this story, we met Andrew Martin, a young man drifting from job to job looking for the right opportunity. Initially, Andy expected big things from real estate, just as he had expected big things from computer sales and insurance sales. But, in drifting from job to job, there was no change in Andy as a person. All Andy found in changing jobs was a different routine.When Andy finally arrived at Taylor Realty, he found a casual atmosphere. Andy settled into the routine. But he was ambitious. Real estate brokerage is a commission business. You sell a home or an apartment building and you receive commissions. If you don't sell or rent anything, you don't make anything. From this method of compensation, it follows that the most successful commissioned salespeople tend to be self-motivators. Self-motivators are able to make a fresh, clean and enthusiastic start each business day. They put away and leave the rejections and problems of the past in the past. Today is today and they can work unburdened. A commissioned salesperson may leave the house in the morning with few prospects but with the optimistic belief that he or she may have a solid sale by nightfall. 
This is where your Catholic faith becomes so important. While saying your prayers, you find the support of your patron saints and guardian angels. You can put the day's events into perspective. The spiritual is energizing. It is not unusual in a commission driven sales office to find a room full of sales people, all supposedly doing the same job, but with some of the sales people barely making a living and other sales people making a handsome income. In the Taylor Realty office, four of the five salespeople are scraping by, either through choice or because of their lack of special ability. And, one salesperson, Don Nardo, is making a significant income. This particular story is about a young man in the real estate business. However, remember to expand upon the story. Hopefully, you will be looking for the principles and ideas involved in Andy's success and how these principles and ideas might be applied to other business situations. Don't be afraid to expand your thinking. Try to make these principles and ideas your principles and ideas. Feel free to change and adapt them to suit you and your situation. 
Of course, you say, you would choose the several thousand dollar a week salespersons. And, since you are a person with special ability, you try to figure out what the successful agents are doing differently than the less successful agents. What are the successful insurance salespersons doing? What are they saying? What technology are they using? What office support do they have? The end result is for you to answer the question, "What do you think makes a commissioned salesperson successful?" Let's continue with the insurance analogy. Maybe every morning, the "just getting by" agents spend the first hour of the business day drinking coffee, telling war stories, worrying about where to have lunch, and giving their opinions on why the home team won or lost last night's game. Perhaps every morning, the "successful' agents are using that first hour to plan their work days; to call back new customers and help old customers resolve problems with the claims department. Maybe if you talked with the "just getting by" agents, they'd tell you that the economy was bad, that allowing banks to sell insurance was killing the business, that government interference was dampening sales, that interest rates were too low, that the claims department needed revamping, that the sales offices could do with some new carpeting and that the boss wasn't spending enough money on advertising. Now, listen to them. This is important. Listen because they'll talk and talk. They have most of the day to talk and talk. Are they saying that all of their problems are external to them? "If only someone or something else would..." If you talked with the "successful" agents, they'd say, "Just get back to work, kid. Are you here to make friends and be one of the guys or are you here to sell insurance?" Do you think it's easy to choose "making money" over "being one of the guys?" It isn't. It isn't easy to resist the peer pressure to conform. But, like it or not, you have to be the contrarian. You have to do things differently. You have to be different. Successful people are different. Successful people are standing outside the crowd because the way to gauge achievement is to use "the average guys" for comparison. The more of a success you are, the farther you are drawn away from everybody else. Can you handle the fact that success may make you different from your peers? Let's get to Andy who has spent six months on the job. Andy's special ability tells him that he should model himself after the one winner in the office, Don Nardo. At least, Andy knows that the way to make money in the real estate business is not spending the day doing crossword puzzles. Mr. Taylor frankly tells Andy that becoming a master salesperson like Don isn't automatic. To be like Don means that Andy has to learn the business from the ground up. You have to know more about your product than do your customers. You have to know your customers needs. Why and how will your product benefit them? Research. Research. Learn the product you have to sell. Never presume that you can or should stop learning. In this case, Andy needed to learn about investment properties. In your case, it could be computers, or cameras, or office copiers, or pet supplies. Your knowledge will instill confidence in your customers. Many times it will be your confidence that will be the deciding factor in the customer making the decision to buy from you. When buying, many people look to the expertise of the salesperson to lead them to a buying decision. People want to be convinced that they are making a wise decision, the best decision. A primary role of the salesperson is not to be a company/product robot but a friendly convincer. The experienced salesperson first establishes a sincere bond of trust with the prospect and then leads the prospect to the buying decision. In words, it's, "Mr. Franklin, having listened to your needs, I know you're looking for the best lawn mower you can buy for less than $300 and having researched all the models, I would recommend the Green Top LX50 with the turbocharged shredder as a strong best buy." Because he is becoming a thoughtful, spiritual man of action, Andy can see the pay off of research, hard work and persistence. Perhaps the results will not come immediately, but they will come eventually. Andy invests research and prayer time in his future. When you research and you pray to your patron saints and guardian angels, you are investing time in your own future. This is a key point. Reflection and prayer give you the patience to realize that the rewards of investing may not be immediate. The rewards may not come tomorrow or next week. If the rewards come in six months or next year, that's all right. Time passes quickly and six months and next year come quickly and, then, those who have made research and prayer investments start to reap the benefits of those investments and so on and so on as they continue to invest in the future. The insurance salesperson who invests by helping an "old" customer with a claims problem may not have the "old" customer as a new customer for another three years until renewal but, maybe, in the mean time, that old customer will be referring other customers who become new business. Stop. Reflect. Pray. What do you think? Andy does his weeks and weeks of research only to find that, really, he's less than half-done. He takes a deep breath. He keeps his chin up. He invests some more. He prays some more. From his research, Andy has a list of the real estate investors in town and he has learned different things about each of them and their buildings. Now, he has to put the research to work. He doesn't wait for the off chance that one of the investors may call him. At this point in the story, the investors don't even know Andy. He's the new kid in town. Andy has to find a way to tell these investors, "Hey, I'm here, I'm special and we can do business together." Andy's web presence is a good catalyst to start things bubbling. The website and opt-in emails are a means for Andy to open up a dialogue with the town's investors. "Mr. X, did you receive e-newsletter? Great. What did you think about that article on historical rehabs?" And, gradually in the conversation, by listening, he can learn more about the particular investor's objectives, goals and philosophy on real estate investment. When the appropriate time comes in the conversation, Andy can introduce his rental and brokerage services. Make contact. Keep the contacts going. Establish name recognition. Reinforce the services offered. Read and think about the words of Lao-Tzu again, "The journey of a thousand miles begins with the first step." This is a defining moment. Start your journey now and you need never look back. Mr. X may not be Andy's client for one month or two months or six months or two years, but eventually, perhaps. Andy is a young man. He is one of the youngest people in his field ... eventually... The website and the opt-in e-newsletters give Andy a means to separate himself from the crowd of other investment property brokers in Newton. Presumably, Andy is different. He does more work than the other brokers. He offers a new service. And, he cares enough to keep following up. The first contact may not do it, or the second, or third, or fourth, or eighth or the eighteenth, but, eventually... 
What is the real objective of a commissioned salesperson?The car salesperson can't worry that much about the car. The car is there. Really, the salesman can add some icing on the cake, add some sizzle to his or her presentation, but the majority of buyers in today's market aren't that coercible that they will buy a car and accessories that they don't want. The successful car salesman is really trying to do two things. First, he wants a shot at showing as many cars as possible to as many buyers as possible. The more he shows, the more he sells. Secondly, he wants the opportunity to sell himself and the dealership to the buyer. The auto salesperson might say, "You can buy another car somewhere else. You can even buy this exact car somewhere else. But, if you buy this car, here, from me, you have me backing up the purchase. I want you to think of me as kind of an insurance policy for buying this car at this dealership from me. Here's what I want you to know: I want you to want to give me your business now and in the future. I want you to want to refer your friends and family to me." The car salesman sells himself, his confident enthusiastic positive mental attitude self. The same basically holds true for Andy. He's selling someone else's building. He can't do that much to change his product. He can add some icing and sizzle but not much more. Perhaps, he can give the seller some tips on dressing up the building for sale, but Andy really can't change the building. Andy's real opportunity, what he can do, is to have many investors, whom he knows on a first name basis, to present the property to, and, he can tell the buyer that he will be around after the sale, if he is needed. And, by knowing his individual investors, he can try to make the best investor/building match. The e-newsletters and, later, the Roundtable and New Investors meetings all help to build Andy's image and generate business for him. Andy succeeds. Andy succeeds big. But, Andy was ill prepared for early success. He becomes self-righteous, domineering and full of himself. But being a good Catholic, Andy is able to pull himself back to his values. No success plan is foolproof. Every success plan is going to have hurdles and obstacles and time losing and money losing offshoots. Some people can't find their way over, around and back. People of faith usually can. 
Go to Lesson Twenty Nine23 | 24 | 25 | 26 | 28 | 27 | 29 | 30 Index
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