3 Roadblocks Preventing Sales Reps From Selling With Their Heart

"Doubts in your mind are a much greater roadblock to success than obstacles on the journey"

Orrin Woodward

In society and especially within our business culture, an image of the heart is often associated with yielding kindness or weakness. However, the heart is strong and powerful, the driving force of life, one heartbeat at a time!

Your ability to succeed as a sales professional becomes crippled when there's an unbalanced connection with your heart. Embracing a heart-centered approach to sales rests with your ability to stop, look inward, and reflect upon the course of action you know is the right one, rather than succumbing to external pressures and misaligned sales tactics.

Our heart is the absolute key to our survival. Plain and simple, if our heart stops beating, we die. We know this, so we take good care of it. We exercise, we eat healthy and we try to avoid stress; all in the name of heart-health.

A BEATING HEART

Unfortunately, many sales organizations have become bottom line focused and results driven. They're looking outward as they're being led by their brain. Their core values have been thrown to the waste side as money and profit have become the driving force.

“If your goals aren’t synced with the substance of your heart, then achieving them won’t matter much.”

Danielle LaPorte

What we seem to have forgotten is in order for the brain to work we need a strong heart. When I look inside many sales organizations, often times I find an unhealthy heart where the sales reps values and beliefs are misaligned. Layer on top of this misaligned values in management and folks... this is a recipe for sales disaster.

REMOVE THE ROADBLOCKS

"Poor sales performance is due to an unhealthy sales lifestyle"

In a sales context, let's refer to the Merriam Webster definition... something that blocks progress or prevents accomplishment of an objective

What prevents many in sales from selling with their heart?

THEIR BIG FAT EGO

Heartfelt professionals check their ego at the door. Media and the movies portray salespeople as egomaniacs with slick-backed hair and a “do whatever it takes to close the sale” mentality. Doesn't this remind you of Glengarry Glen Ross? While there’s always some truth to stereotypes, the biggest exceptions to the rule lie within ourselves.

Ego plays a huge role in a sales success but it can also hinder one from sales growth.

In today's highly connected, digitally driven and socially empowered business world; highly assertive, a know-it-all mentality combined with super-charged egos will be the kiss of sales death.

"A huge ego is a sales growth buzz-kill"

Top performing sales professionals, the true superstars - sell from the heart, are the open-minded, curious, collaborative, vulnerable, open to learning and aim for partnerships when working with their clients. These sales professionals have humility and operate without any deception whatsoever. This is a direct conflict to the behavior of ego-driven salespeople.

VIEWING IT AS A SIGN OF WEAKNESS

Honoring your heart is not a sign of weakness. This especially holds true within the sales world. True power resides with listening to your 'gut' and finding it within your heart by making a commitment to clear all that stands in the way of a heartfelt connection.

Sharing your knowledge is not a sign of weakness. The focus must be placed on how you can help your clients and prospects. Share your knowledge, your insights and what you can do for others rather than for yourself. I guarantee no one likes a know-it all, self-centered and stereo-typical sales rep... This does not build followership.

It takes strength, sales professionals who lead with their heart and not just their wallet are able to connect with the emotional needs of their clients and prospects. They understand people have the need to be valued, respected, heard and acknowledged. By acknowledging and not forgetting the human element, heart-centered professionals maintain the wisdom to positively transform their clients business by helping them to do better business, a profitable one.

FAILURE TO LISTEN

A heartfelt connection leads to a heartfelt conversation.

“We hear through our ears, but we listen through our minds.”

Something magical happens when sales reps set aside their "sales bravado" to become engaged in a real, genuine and heartfelt business conversation. Yes, this means placing your clients and prospects front and center in your conversation.

Are you sincerely listening without an agenda?

Leave your hidden agenda back at the office. With sincerity focus in and listen to your clients. Zero in on how you can best serve their hopes, dreams and goals. Zig Ziglar said it best, 

“You can have everything in life that you want if you just give enough other people what they want.”

When you fail to listen with your heart this means you're not giving your full attention. You're failing to allow your clients and prospects to express their feelings, concerns and issues in a way that is heard and understood.

GET YOUR HEART IN YOUR CAREER

Placing your heart at the forefront is about opening the human door to connection, to serve, and to become vulnerable. It’s about showing up in a way that lifts the spirits of the people around you. It’s about the willingness to be real, relatable and authentic.

Bringing your heart to what you do makes for a deeper, richer experience which benefits both you, your clients and your prospects. I encourage all of you to step away from the armor and the sales facade. Create opportunities for in-depth relationships that can never be experienced hiding behind a “professional” sales mask.

A HEARTFELT SALES PROFESSIONAL

Sales professionals must learn to serve with their heart.

• Servants make themselves available to serve
• Servants pay attention to others needs
• Servants complete every task with equal dedication
• Servants become faithful and trustworthy
• Servants go beyond making their clients happy, it's their purpose

I challenge all of you in sales to find ways to do servant activities.

If you want to be 'great', if you want to be 'successful', learn to become a servant. Stop selling…Start serving... Start with your heart and lead yourself.

I understand, I get where you all are coming from. Every day, I walk in your shoes. I am fully committed to helping your sales team integrate social aspects and modern strategies into your current sales process to grow new business. I want you to get results. This is why I am passionate about doing this the right way, the genuine way, the authentic way! It's about understanding value before visibility.

Selling From the Heart is making a difference! I poured my heart into every page of this book and I think you're going to love it. You can find it on Amazon in paperback and Kindle. You can click on the book image below and this will take you to Amazon.

You can find more material inside Selling From The Heart.

In a world full of empty suits, I'm passionate about helping sales reps succeed by getting valuable before they get visible. I help sales teams understand the true value they bring to the market. 

I appreciate getting the opportunity to share my stories. Integrating the use of social and sharing my story on LinkedIn was my “game-changer” in the highly competitive office technology world. With great pride I transform, challenge, coach and inspire sales teams to grow new business by helping them share their story and how they communicate it out by integrating the use of social inside the sales process. You can follow me on LinkedIn, Twitter and on my podcast by clicking on Selling from the Heart.