Win or Else!

Myopic obsession with winning exacts a price: It atrophies psychic muscle required to sustain self-worth during rejection episodes all sales people must deal with.

When winning is only option sales reps are permitted to consider, failure becomes an abhorrent personal malignancy: often perceived as a form of corporate sedition.

The transgressor is branded unclean, unworthy, and unpromotable. Year-end bonus dollars, along with company-paid Disneyland trips, vanish. The convicted party's family slinks into seclusion as a scarlet F is sewn on their clothing. Decontamination and status restoration can take years.

An Idea Whose Time Should Never Have Arrived

During 70s and 80s superstar scenarios gave sales reps a voyeuristic view of individuality that mass marketing techniques denied them. But today's market fragmentation and lifestyle diversity no longer justify need for sales people to be force-fed surrogate achievement stories.

If only way you can exemplify winning qualities is to employ paid testimonials -- transparently alien to selling, and patently impossible for your audience to attempt -- then you (and your company) have a problem. Instead, try for something your sales force can identify with.

If you can't find a good internal achievement story to build on, try this one: "I'm going to tell you how I lost one of best accounts I ever had, and what it took to get it back!" In minds of your sales force, this will qualify you for beatification: above and beyond even that given unto Lou Holtz and Joe Montana. Amen. _____________________________________ Additional sales meeting monographs can be found at: www.thewritingworks.com/memos.html

7. You don't let people read your ad before they get your freebie. When you use free stuff to lure people to your web site include it below your ad copy or on another web page. If you list freebie above your ad they may never look to see what you're selling.

8. You don't attract target audience that would buy your product or service. A simple way to do this is to survey your existing customers to see what attracted them to buy. This information will help you improve your target marketing and advertising.

9. You don't test and improve your ad copy. There are many people who write an ad copy and never change it. You have to continually test and improve your ad copy to get highest possible response rate.

10. You don't give people any urgency to buy now. Many people are interested in your product but they put off buying it till later and eventually forget about it. Entice them to buy now with a freebie or discount and include a deadline date when offer ends.