What do you do if your late career experience and expertise aren't translating into sales success?

1 Know your audience

One of the most important skills in sales development is understanding who you're talking to and what they need. Don't assume that your experience and expertise are enough to impress or persuade anyone. Instead, do your research and tailor your message to the specific pain points, goals, and motivations of your target audience. Use relevant examples, stories, and data to show how you can solve their problems and add value to their situation. Avoid jargon, acronyms, or technical terms that might confuse or alienate your audience.

3 Leverage your network

Your late career experience and expertise also come with a valuable asset: your network. You've built relationships with colleagues, peers, mentors, clients, and partners over the years. You can use your network to generate referrals, introductions, testimonials, and endorsements for your sales development efforts. Ask your contacts to recommend you to their connections who might benefit from your services or products. Share your content, insights, and offers with your network and encourage them to spread the word. Show appreciation and reciprocity to your network and nurture your relationships.

4 Showcase your value

One of the biggest mistakes that many late career professionals make in sales development is underselling or overselling themselves. You don't want to come across as too humble or too arrogant, too cheap or too expensive, too desperate or too indifferent. You want to strike a balance between confidence and humility, value and affordability, urgency and patience. To do that, you need to showcase your value in a clear, compelling, and consistent way. Highlight your unique selling proposition, your differentiators, and your results. Communicate your value proposition in terms of benefits, outcomes, and impact. Align your value proposition with your audience's needs, wants, and aspirations.

5 Embrace your strengths

Finally, don't let your late career experience and expertise become a liability or a source of insecurity in sales development. Instead, embrace your strengths and use them to your advantage. You have a wealth of knowledge, wisdom, and skills that you can share with your audience. You have a track record of success and credibility that you can leverage to build trust and rapport. You have a passion and a purpose that you can convey to inspire and influence your audience. You have a vision and a mission that you can align with your audience's vision and mission. You have a lot to offer, and you should be proud of it.

6 Here’s what else to consider

This is a space to share examples, stories, or insights that don’t fit into any of the previous sections. What else would you like to add?