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Julie and Julia Contains Lesson for Salespeople
My ability to relate comes from my passion for what I do and have done. I could relate to both Julie and Julia’s love of cooking and of writing as well as all that they went through, including Julia’s being rejected by her first publisher. Interestingly, in both cases their passion developed over time and had lots of points where they could have quit. Sales has been that way for me.
I didn’t start out knowing that I wanted a career in sales. What happened is that in my spare time while stationed at Mather AFB, I decided to use the time to sell so I’d have extra money to invest. After all, sales couldn’t be that hard, could it?
Well, I quickly learned that it can be and is challenging. The clue that I really enjoyed it was that I voluntarily read about sales and marketing in my free time then I taught it to others in the organization. When I got out of the Air Force on January 1, 1979, I needed a job. I didn’t want to go into engineering, didn’t think I knew enough to go into manufacturing to work my way up, and knew that all companies rely on sales so one path into upper management would be through sales and marketing.
I found that when I believe in what my products and services can do for my customers and clients, I get really enthusiastic. This “passion” helps me stay the course through the learning curves, the rejections, and the work necessary to get to the next prospect. There’s effort involved in building a trust-based relationship with a prospect.
The biggest challenge for me was going against the prevailing hard sell mindset. According to my spiritual beliefs, I am accountable for what I do, so controlling another person’s actions just to benefit my wallet is unacceptable. On the other hand, finding out first what they need then showing them how my products and services deliver the results they want is a spiritual service. My approach was heart-based and soft sell. Money was never my foremost objective, important – yes, but second to the customer’s needs. Using soft sell techniques, I was always a sales leader.
Like Julie and Julia, I grew into both my commitment to and passion for a career in sales. Like them, I’ve needed persistence and experienced frustration and the desire to never go out the door again because I so humiliated myself. It also took creativity to blaze my own way in putting the customer or client first. Thanks to Judith & Jim , I now know that my style of sales and marketing is called soft sell. I love to help customers buy solutions to their problems or desires. And I love teaching and coaching others to use soft sell sales and marketing techniques so they will find selling fun, fulfilling and mutually rewarding
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