Sell When You Don’t Need the Work

“Make the calls like you don’t need the business.” Ever heard that expression? It refers to a selling attitude and putting some confidence in your voice even when—make that, ESPECIALLY when—you don’t have enough work and sales are down. By selling like you don’t need the sale, you exude confidence and it can be heard in your voice. Do it right and, voila, you pick up a new customer!

What about this one: “Make the calls when you don’t need the business.” That’s a whole different story and, quite frankly, one that not many of us can relate to these days. Here’s how it works:

You work hard to get your sales momentum going, slaving on call after call, day after day, week after week, month after...well, you get the picture. After what is likely to be years, you finally hit seven figures in annual sales, and perhaps even multiple times over. You’ve made it. You’re at the top.

Now what?

It is easy to get focused on hitting a goal—a certain sales figure you have in your head. Think that’s the hard part? Nope. The hard part is knowing what to do once that goal is reached.

Sure, you know that you are supposed to keep selling. You’ve read that you will lose between 10-15 percent of your business each year. But, hey, you’re busy working the clients you’ve got and that’s important, too—right?

A year goes by. Then another. You are still making good money, but you are also spending it as fast as it comes in. You justify it in your head and think that the fun will never end and the income will never stop.

Hello? McFly?

Unless you are making the calls when you don’t need the business, there is a dark day in your future. It’s the day when you learn that you’ve lost a major account and you have nothing—N-O-T-H-I-N-G—to replace it. Since you have been delinquent in making any new-business calls, you are facing a long, arduous journey of rebuilding that sales momentum and replacing the business. In the meantime, your income takes a significant and immediate hit.