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3 secrets of high performance selling

High performance. You’ll know it when you see it. It’s one of those stories you can tell a dozen times and still get emotional every time.

It is captivating to watch. More of an experience than a simple event or occasion.

Do you remember this one?

Warren Moon and the Oilers had the 1993 NFL Playoffs on their hands when, two minutes into the third quarter, the score was 35-3. A complete blowout. With a crippled Buffalo offense (Jim Kelly and Thurman Thomas were both injured), the Bills had little chance of winning this game. That is, until Bill’s backup quarterback, Frank Reich, began an unthinkable series of jaw-dropping plays.

With the score 35-10, Buffalo recovered an onside kick and Reich threw a 38-yard bomb to Don Beebe to make it 35-17. He didn’t stop there. Five unanswered touchdowns by Reich put the Bills ahead, but in the final minute, the Oilers tied it on a field goal. In overtime, Nate Odomes tagged out Warren Moon to set up the most unlikely victory and greatest comeback in NFL history.

Final score: 41-38 for the Bills.

High performance?

Most of us don’t know how to describe it otherwise.

Is it a comeback? an underdog story? pure passion? The truth is that it looks like many things.

That’s why it can be so hard to explain. Even harder to do. Which brings us back to selling: high performance selling.

What is high performance selling? And how can you do it?

Here are some observations for you on high-yield selling:
* You are baking a cake without scoring a touchdown.

I’m not sure how to put it another way.

This applies to anything you do. By now you probably have all the right ingredients. You know how to build a report. How to qualify your prospect. How to close the deal You have a recipe that you go to for your sales process.

If you don’t already have the basics of the selling process, then you should pick up a new book from my friend, Jill Konrath, coming out in a few days: SNAP Selling. (And by the way, I don’t get paid to wholeheartedly recommend that book to you.)

Here’s the key to remember: you’re creating art. You’re not grabbing a ball and running as fast as you can towards the end zone. There are factors out of your control that require you to adapt. You need to recognize that. And even if you master the baking part (don’t burn yourself), you still have to add your own icing to what you create. You have to make it yours.

Now here are three high-performance sales secrets:

1. Failure begins to look more like success.

When you fail and it starts to look like a success to your peers, you know you’re a high-performing salesperson.

look. Let’s be very frank, very fast. Life is not a competition with anyone but the rock star you were meant to be. If you think I’m advocating that you look around you and compare yourself to everyone else, you’re dead wrong.

You know better than that. That is a complete waste of time.

This is what I’m trying to say. High achievers view failure as one more step toward success. It is not an act. It is a way of life.

Rejection and loss are not end points. They are guides.

High-performance selling requires the discipline to look at each opportunity and say, “What could I have done differently?” This is a reality: sometimes there is nothing you could have done better. (But I haven’t had one of those moments yet.) I have always found 3-4 (up to a dozen) small bugs that contributed to my failure.

It was by adjusting and relaunching that I was able to turn that failure into a scandalous success.

Master your failures.

2. Extreme behavior is an expected activity.

You have to know that going in is going to be hard. Rougher and tougher than anything you’ve allowed yourself to imagine before.

There’s a reason we call this the top 1%.

The air is thin at the top. And not because your nose is out of joint. Because you’re pumping your knees so hard you can barely breathe.

You have to be ready to work harder than you ever imagined (and then double it).

Listen, you can live a balanced life working a guaranteed 35-hour week at Target. You will have plenty of time for all your hobbies without the stress of having to change the world. But high performance requires smarter and harder work, both.

You need extreme:

* Effort – you put more value, more passion than anyone else…
* Creativity: you care more about your prospect, about your ability to provide a solution…
* Discipline: Don’t let your immediate feelings stop you from reaching your long-term goals…

In this age of tolerance and equality, it’s almost heresy to suggest that you need to be different. That’s the only path to high-performance selling.

There is no other way.

3. It starts (and ends) in your mind.

You can only achieve what you believe in. The battle for high performance is won long before you make the necessary moves to win. It’s all in your head.

Your dreams. Your fears. They are all part of what you will ever achieve. High achievers think about high performance.

It’s that easy. They think, they obsess, they plan high-performance sales.

* They don’t fear, they act.
* They don’t wonder, they discover.
* They don’t hesitate, they try.

It is a fundamental difference between those who envy and those who are.

It’s all in your head long before it happens.

And because that’s all that’s in your head, no fears, no doubts, no questions, that’s all you have time to act on. And what a big difference that makes.

You really are invincible. You are a high performance salesperson.

Remember Frank Reich we talked about earlier?

In fact, he had a track record of high performance.

Reich was selected by the Buffalo Bills in the third round (57th overall) in the 1985 NFL Draft. The Bills had already drafted future Hall of Famer Jim Kelly in 1983 and when Kelly signed with the Bills in 1986, Reich’s only option was as a backup quarterback. Reich got his first start, only for Kelly to suffer a shoulder injury in 1989, after more than three years of playing only a supporting role.

And he took the opportunity. In front of a Rich Stadium crowd of over 76,000 fans and a Monday Night Football audience, Reich led the Bills to two straight wins. He rallied the Bills in the fourth quarter by throwing two drives down the field for a 23-20 victory over the previously undefeated Los Angeles Rams.

However, Reich returned the following season, when Kelly was injured again late in the season. Reich provided the Bills with two other key victories, clinching them the AFC East title and home field advantage during the playoffs.

He is now the coach of the Indianapolis Colts, where he expects a high performance from the quarterback he coaches, Peyton Manning.

What about you? Is it time to sell something high-yield?

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