How Sad Sacks in Newark Ohio Became the World's Best Salespeople
by Timothy L. Drobnick Sr.
This story is 100% true. It is not fiction. You will learn how what seems to be magic can make you a super star salesperson.
I did not want to be a sales manager. I loved to sell using my system of "The Magic of Numbers and Statistics in Sales." Initially I didn't want to teach it to others because I knew they would have a hard time accepting my system.
I traveled to our Newark, Ohio office which had had a lot of problems and needed to be rebuilt. It had been declared by the current manager as a disaster. He said no one could make any sales in Newark, Ohio.
The Newark sales manager's negative thoughts were so strong that everyone in the office believed there was no way to make sales in the city. I had been told to shut down the office but I persuaded senior management to let me try to rehabilitate the office, rather than shutting it down.
The office's future hung by a thread. The salespeople had doubt firmly planted in their minds. This doubt would have to be dealt with or Newark would be doomed.
But in my heart I knew that the people in Newark were the same as people in Columbus as the people in Dayton as the people in Cincinnati and everywhere else we had opened up offices. I knew that Newark would produce sales.
Our system had been successful everywhere, all we needed to change in Newark was the attitude.
Immediately I let everyone go. I told them that they were correct, this city would not produce sales, and they might as well go find work elsewhere. I knew that in their frame of mind it was an uphill battle and I was better off starting with a new crew.
One young lady begged me to stay, she told me she really enjoyed her work there and she wanted to keep her job.
I warned her that I expected a lot more than the previous manager. I told her that she would be responsible for three times the amount of the previous quota.
With tears in her eyes, she said she would be willing, even excited to triple her sales, but she did not know how to do it.
Standing before me was a woman who was clearly open to learning a new way. I had no doubt she could do it with the methods I could provide.
I explained to her, "If you'll just follow my system I promise you'll hit your quota". So I showed her how to do it.
I explained to her that sales was more than just coming to work. You have to actually work while you're at work. You have to believe while your dialing that the people want what you have. You have to be kind, you have to be sincere, you have to transmute the feeling you have about the products and services to the prospect on the phone. Without this, nothing will ever happened.
I also explained to her that you can keep track of your results by percentages. If for instance, you start out making one sale for every 10 prospects you talk to, that can be a number you can count on no matter what.
So if she wanted to make a certain amount of money in sales per week, that she would have to do a certain amount of presentations each week in order to get a certain amount of sales. And because she would know how many presentations she had to do per sale, she would know how many presentations she had to make each day to make a certain number of sales in a week.
She was amazed the first week when she actually hit her goal. And she had done it herself! The truth of my system became more real and more true to he as week after week she made that quota. Finally she understood that it was all up to her to do a certain amount of presentations, and that would lead to a certain number of sales, that would create an amount of income she could count on.
The next step: getting more sales from turning no's to yes's, by raising herconsistency and continually making her beliefs more positive. And the reward would be even more increases in income.
As I mentored that determined young lady, I hired more salespeople, and I taught them all the same system. Eventually we had a core crew of five people plus myself, and it was a very good crew. Quotas were not a problem, everyone was making quota with the system, it was a very productive, profitable team.
Over time two salespeople from the old crew had come back to me and I allowed them to come back one at a time, and I taught them the new way. At this point I had a blended crew, some new members, and some members from the old sales team. Everyone used the new system, everyone was successful with it. But the greatest challenge was yet to come.
We had been able to turn the sales people from the old crew around, because we showed them that Newark was a great place to work. They could see it for themselves, they made sales, and now they could see that people really wanted our products.
One afternoon I pulled the same sheets of numbers that had been used by the previous manager out of the drawer of my desk. These shame-filled pages still held bookmarks of the unfinished area and notes that detailed that sad results of the old method of calling.
When the old crew saw me pull out the numbers, a chill shot across their face. They asked, we're not going to dial those are we? I said yes we are. These are wonderful numbers we are going to do great with them.
They really didn't want to call those numbers. They told me the numbers did not work. They told me those numbers led to the meanest people they ever called, people who slammed the phone down, wouldn't even talk... and even if they made a sale those people were never home when they tried to deliver.
But this, this was now a powerful crew. These were the best salespeople in this company. This was the team that had been setting records over every other office in the company.
It was quite an accomplishment for this sales team to have the top sales records in our very large multi-statecompany. I looked each of them in the eye and said, "TIt's different this time, and when you call those people, they will say yes!" There is nothing to fear from the old numbers, as long as you have a different attitude, you have new sales skills. You have sold Newark before. My dejected group told me it would would "Try". That was the warning.
So we started dialing. I did everything I could keep the room cheery, I made a pot of gourmet coffee, the aroma would fill the room. I brought in some doughnuts, I tried to make a few jokes. However at five o'clock we did not even have one sale.
I had never left at the end of the work day without having made at least $700 in sales. .I had made a promise to my supervisor to never leave at the end of the day without at least $700 in sales. But all day my team had been calling, and the day was winding down. Normally we did $1200 or more per day in sales. I wasn't worried yet, even though we had made no progress.Certainly my people together could sell at least $700 in sales in only one hour if they put their skills to work.
Two hours left now. I told everyone to stop. The room was gloomy with fear and negative thoughts that had been part of their office life from the old manager. These old thoughts had taken control of them again. It was almost as if the negative thoughts had been imprinted in the number sheets and was rubbing off on all my sales crew.
I reminded them that their success came from the changes they made in their beliefs and attitudes. It was not about the numbers,a nd it wasn't about the management. I simply pointed out to them their own innate sales skills, and showed them ways to help them put that drive into action. Success had come from skills they had already demonstrated, they could still take these numbers, and numbers, and make sales. I knew that.
We tried on again. They started to whine, they started to talk negatively. I knew I was losing my crew. By 8:30 I had had enough. We only had 30 minutes left and we had no sales.
I stopped my crew. I told them, "I have made a promise never to turn in less than 700 dollars for one days sales to my boss". We have 30 minutes left to keep this promise. I have listened to your complaints and negative comments and whining all day.
I told them, "You are the best crew I have ever had, and probably one of the best I will ever have. But today was terrible. I'm disappointed because I know you can do better. You have let yourselves down, but you are ruining yourselves with your negativity. It's you, not the numbers."
They knew I was angry when I asked them to give me the very worst sheet of numbers in the room. They agreed with little delay on a specific sheet on numbers. I took it, and I announced that we would make that $700 today if I had to do it all myself. I told them to get the drivers ready to deliver product and pick up checks. I warned them that we were going to be very busy in a short while.
I chose two of my sales people to listen to me on the phone and write down orders as they heard me make them, because I knew I would not have time to write down these sales, so they would have to listen closely because I would not repeat myself. In order to make my quota in less than half an hour I'd have to make 20 sales in about 20 minutes.There was only time for yes's. For my plan to work, everyone had to say yes. And I knew, with my belief, that no one could say no to me. If I was sincere, if I believed I was doing the right thing and doing something good for someone, I could do it. No one would say no.
So I made that first call and I sold the first person I talked to, and I sold second person I talked to, and I sold the third person I talked to.It was true! Not one of them could say no to me. I was truly at the top of my game! And I was proving to my people that they could choose not to allow the negativity in their minds to stop their sales. I was showing them they could control it.
When the day was over I was down to what my people told me were the "worst of the worst" numbers. Yet I was still making sales and Imade the seven hundred dollars of quota just as I told them I would. The products were delivered and the and the checks were collected. My sales team was speechless. Now they knew I would never, ever accept "bad numbers" as an excuse for lack of sales. I had done it right before their eyes.
That was just the beginning. Now they knew that success was up to them. My sales team outsold other offices with 3 to 4 times the numbers of sales staff. The local district gave us what they considered the worst sales territory, and we turned that around to have our highest sales figures ever.
They knew they could do it, and we still outsold many of the offices with 12-15 phones and 20-25 salespersons.Although my 5 people had to share 3 phones, and we were calling an area no one else wanted, my people knew that did not matter.
The sales team I had trained was doing better even than I had done as an individual sales person, and I had sold approximately one out of every three, which was a very respectable number and made me a top salesperson. The sales were unbelievably high. But my sales team had proven that it could be done, because, they were doing it.
Timothy L. Drobnick Sr. is still helping people learn how to become the best salespeople. View the slideshow to see how Tim can help you be the best salesperson you can be. You can get a unique content version of this article.
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