One
Hitch-hiking is a 100% commission based travel system. When you make a sale you get a ride. When you don’t, you don’t.
That’s the second way I liken hitch-hikers to salespeople. The first similarity is, in both Hitch-hiking and Sales it can help if you are a little crazy, fairly bold, and have less fear than may be considered healthy.
Most folks would rather stay in one place for a very long time, no matter how dull, painful, or otherwise unpleasant, rather than take even the metaphorical the risk of putting their thumb out and seeing what happens. Most of the working force prefer the security of a regular paycheck, no matter how dull, painful, or otherwise unpleasant the job, rather than risk the high rewards of a sales commission.
In 1983 I traveled from Albuquerque, New Mexico to Deep Creek Lake, Maryland, a distance of approximately 1,800 miles, depending on your route. I made it in three days. The trip back took a little longer as I went out of my way to visit family in Iowa. From there I traveled to California, and in California I went, via thumb, from Santa Monica Pier to Newport Beach and then to San Bernardino, Sacramento, the Bay Area, Chico, and back to the Bay Area in about two weeks time, staying with friends and family. That was one of my longer trips and to this day that is one of my favorite vacation memories.
Sunday, December 13, 2009
The Hitch-hiker’s Guide to Sales Success
Preface
I made my first sale when I was 12 years old. At the time I thought I was just trying to get some cash together by mowing lawns in my neighborhood. It turns out my first sale earned me a steady, if small, weekly salary.
I look back now on that summer in 1973, and on how many doors I knocked on, modifying my approach with each new rejection, until one homeowner said “yes” to my offer, and then surprised me by expecting me back every week.
Wow! After all those discouraging “No’s” I had one very profitable “Yes!” Years later in one of the copious sales training courses I learned the expression “Sales is a series of ‘No’s’ punctuated by profitable ‘Yeses’”
About the same time I started hitch-hiking. Just for fun. I’d get passed by lots of cars over fairly long periods of time. Then someone would stop and I’d get a free ride, often for quite a distance. Lots of “no’s” punctuated by the occasional, rewarding “yes.”
I didn’t realize it then, but my hitch-hiking provided many of the lessons in successful selling that would subsequently be provided me in the course of nearly 30 years as a professional sales-person.
I made my first sale when I was 12 years old. At the time I thought I was just trying to get some cash together by mowing lawns in my neighborhood. It turns out my first sale earned me a steady, if small, weekly salary.
I look back now on that summer in 1973, and on how many doors I knocked on, modifying my approach with each new rejection, until one homeowner said “yes” to my offer, and then surprised me by expecting me back every week.
Wow! After all those discouraging “No’s” I had one very profitable “Yes!” Years later in one of the copious sales training courses I learned the expression “Sales is a series of ‘No’s’ punctuated by profitable ‘Yeses’”
About the same time I started hitch-hiking. Just for fun. I’d get passed by lots of cars over fairly long periods of time. Then someone would stop and I’d get a free ride, often for quite a distance. Lots of “no’s” punctuated by the occasional, rewarding “yes.”
I didn’t realize it then, but my hitch-hiking provided many of the lessons in successful selling that would subsequently be provided me in the course of nearly 30 years as a professional sales-person.
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