You may be able to sell a diverse range of products and services, but achieving some of your most ambitious professional goals means you also have to be good at selling yourself.
This doesn’t mean just creating a great-looking resume, or being able to make a strong case when you go to your manager for a promotion or raise. You sell yourself by the performance you demonstrate on the job every single day. Talk to anyone who’s accomplished a lot in their career and they will likely tell you the same thing.
When you listen to the lead musicians in a symphony orchestra, for example, you expect that it took them daily practice to get to where they are. The same is true for a hockey player who moves from rookie to captain of a team that wins the Stanley Cup. They put in their time on the ice, and they keep taking action to make sure they get closer to their goal.
Like music or sports, sales can involve a lot of repetitive tasks, including the way you reach out to prospects, pitch them and convert them into paying customers. When you’re heads-down in those repetitive processes, it’s easy to lose sight of your larger ambitions.
Sometimes it’s a new role within your existing team, or one that opens up in another department where you might transfer your skills. It might be the hope of changing your commission structure, rather than just a nominal pay bump.
Some salespeople are just looking for a change in terms of the territory to which they’re assigned, the size of clients they serve or the set of products and services they’re focused on. However you define “success in sales,” these are some of the most actionable things you can do to get closer to it:
Months one to two
You’ve been cold calling and sending out mass emails to prospects for as long as you can remember. It’s time to show you can be more strategic than that by rethinking your approach to filling and managing your pipeline.
Start by thinking about reaching out to customers through a new avenue, like social media. You might assume it’s a waste of time, but by carving out just a few minutes a few times a week, you’ll likely be surprised by the results.
Begin sharing your own thought leadership on LinkedIn. Reshare the posts from prospects or customers you know on Twitter and help amplify their messages. Film an Instagram Story where you run through your sales pitch and show how much insight you can cram into a few seconds.
While you’re doing this, begin making better use of the data that’s already in your CRM. Look for trends and patterns in terms of what’s helping other reps get to a closed deal and see if there’s anything you can apply. What are some of the common objections or requests for additional information that you can get ahead of?
Finish up these two months by revising the sales enablement materials your marketing department painstakingly worked on, but which often go unused. See if they could help you close your next deal. If not, share some constructive feedback with the marketing team.
Months two to four
Now that you’re active on social media and developing customer relationships that way, think about raising your profile even further.
Volunteer to host the next company webinar, perhaps recruiting a customer you’ve successfully sold in the past and having a fireside chat-style discussion about how they’ve used your products.
Talk to the marketing team about sitting down to discuss the most common pain points your customers raise in meetings. See if these could be developed into an eBook or other marketing asset. You could wind up generating far more qualified leads than you ever thought possible.
Finally, use the last sales team meeting by month four to talk about your use of CRM data so far with the rest of the group. You’re setting a strong example while also getting more feedback about how everyone’s working. This could make you even better at crushing your quota more often.
Months five to six
Based on what you’ve learned about using social media, put forth a plan about how you’ll personally help further the launch of a new product or service, or even just a new promotion your company is offering.
At the same time, begin getting up to speed on the artificial intelligence (AI) capabilities of CRM. How can you harness AI to reduce the purchasing cycle for your client base, or to improve your win rate? What can you take away that you could pass on to the customer service team to reduce the volume of questions or complaints they get?
Having laid the groundwork for a more strategic alliance with the marketing team, meanwhile, brainstorm about how you could create a drip campaign or other content strategy to increase your share of wallet within existing customers. How can you make cross-sells and upsells almost irresistible?
Conclusion
You’ll have noticed a few consistent practices that are part of this six-month strategy.
Using social media is a good example of taking a more omnichannel approach to selling — working in ways your customer prefers, rather than the ways you know and with which you are most comfortable.
There’s also been a deep focus on data and analytics to take the guesswork and randomness out of selling. Instead, you’re using insight to offer value to clients, which shows you’ll likely do the same thing if you get more responsibility.
Finally, you’re working less as a silo within the sales team and more like a true partner with the marketing department. Building those kinds of bridges is the mark of a true leader, and it’s going to get you noticed by the powers that be.
Six months isn’t a lot of time, but it offers considerable scope to take action in ways that could transform your career. You’ll be selling yourself in ways that show exactly why you deserve the career you seek.
