Have you noticed that the crisis has brought to light the two different types of sellers?
The first type of seller is choosing to “wait out” the crisis and hopes for things to get back to “normal.” The second type, the type I’d advise you to be, understands what’s occurring, how it affects their market, and is proactively continuing their efforts. Whether it be increasing their previous methods, or completely pivoting their services or target markets, they’ve chosen to move forward despite how hard their sales and business has been hit by COVID-19.
That’s the thing. Everyone throughout the crisis, and even now as things progress to reopen at various rates across the world, has had a choice on how they’ve chosen to respond.
For some, the crisis was the right time to take a much needed step back and reassess their plans, and as I’ve discussed, that’s OK!
The point of this though is to think beyond the crisis. Obviously, what we’ve experienced this year is a generational, once-in-a-lifetime type event, but these two “types” of sellers can be found in virtually every sales organization when dealing with obstacles of every size.
Think about it, one seller will hear an objection and abandon the pursuit to continue selling and another will hear the same objection but dig deeper to investigate and even potentially still wind up with a sale. One seller might receive negative performance feedback from a manager, and decide it’s time to search for another company, another might use it as fuel to improve their numbers and performance.
Remember the power of choices.
Again, this isn’t so much a right or a wrong thing (sometimes, trying to find a new company IS the right choice!) as much as it is giving ourselves the power to remember that we can take control to varying degrees in virtually every situation we find ourselves in.
And that’s what I advocate that we all remember.
As we continue throughout the pandemic, and in the future when other obstacles occur, let’s keep in mind that we do have the choice to make the most and best out of every situation.
