The Sales Rejection Diet: Your BBA is your ticket to success or failure.
No one wants to hear 'no,' especially in sales. But rejection is part of the sales game--no company is immune. Yet, salespeople cope with rejection in different ways: some by laughing off a rejection, others by feeling hurt and angry and some even become overly aggressive.
If you’re a saleswoman, you may have experienced rejection ways that are both similar to your male colleagues but also in ways that are unique to your gender. Ouch, rejection hurts! You might have been rejected for a promotion because your manager thought you lacked experience. You might have been rejected by a client who preferred to transact business with a man. And, of course, you simply might have been unable to close a deal for any number of reasons. Rejection is part of the sales process, but how you cope with rejection is part of your selling process. How do you deal with rejection, and how's your bounce-back ability?
What Is Bounce Back Ability (BBA)?
We all have a certain amount of bounce back ability. Some of us have more than others. Some people are so elastic that rejection rolls right off them, like water off a duck's back. They hardly notice the attack or setback. Other people let the rejections they receive get to them so much it affects their mental health. In sales, you've got to have a bounce-back ability – but not giving rejection much thought isn't necessarily the right course of action. After all, we can learn from rejection. On the other hand, we need to insulate ourselves from the negative emotional aspects of rejection by putting it into a funny vacuum, so we can enjoy our day--our week.
No matter how much you may love what you do, rejection is part of the game. And if you want to be a sales pro, you must accept it and move on. The sheer number of times you bounce back from rejection depends on how much inner resilience you have. I've outlined some ways you can combat rejection, so you won't stumble so much. Don't let rejection rule your mood or force you to make decisions from a place of insecurity. Use these tips to think about and manage rejection in a whole new light. Not only will you feel better when setbacks arise, but you'll also be able to perform better too!
1.Don't Take It [Too] Personally
Sales coaches are fond of telling people not to take rejection personally. You should just move on with your life and forget it ever happened. Well, I think that's excellent advice. After all, who wants to go around thinking about the thousands of people whose jobs were lost when you couldn't convince them to buy your product? If a sale fails, you shouldn't let it get to you; after all, someone else is going to be picking up where you left off. When you hear the words "no" and "rejection", think of them as "Thanks, but no thanks." "Don't take rejection personally; it's not your hair, your voice, or what you're wearing that caused the sale to fail."
I've received my share of insults from people who don't know the first thing about me, but I'm not going to take it personally. They're just expressing their own biases. When customers reject you, try turning your back on them and inviting Karma to handle them. Or, you can navigate the tricky waters off their bias. If they tell you they prefer to deal with someone else but you, acknowledge their discomfort and make an offer that makes it worth their while. You can cope with rejection without taking it to heart; after all, how you deal with it does define you.
2. Learn from It
Many salespeople get back on the horse after being thrown off by a rejection. You might be one such rebounding beast, knowing that rejection can offer some valuable lessons whether you're a novice seller or a veteran in the field. Instead of letting rejection ruin your day, try to draw a few lessons from it. Maybe you learned that a strategy is not the right one for another demographic. Perhaps your product did not speak to this group, or you did not offer enough incentives. You might want to beef up your market knowledge in some way.
A rejection is a gift-wrapped opportunity to learn. So if things don't go your way, look on the bright side: Maybe you'll discover a way to improve yourself or your work.
3. Evaluate and Record
The more you sell, the more times you'll hear the word, "No." To learn from your dismissals, keep a record of them. It's useful to assess why a deal fell through so that you can remedy that failure if there's a way out of it. You don't necessarily have to spend a lot of time tracking your rejections. Make a spreadsheet with columns dedicated to tracking your failures and typical reasons they occur.
Each of these examples has its own contours, but we can see a pattern of sorts emerging. When you're unable to close a deal, for instance, it's worth digging in and discovering what's blocking it---are there ways to overcome this kind of roadblock?
Rejections are hard to swallow, but that's where the rubber meets the road. A goal-oriented seller needs to be looking for ways to reduce rejections, and doesn’t want to leave any sales on the table, so looking at rejection analysis is a natural fit.
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4. Regroup and Revisit
When you are very close to winning a deal and then suddenly lose it, you may suffer the "deal-gone-bad" syndrome. When this happens, don't wallow in your misery: Learn from the incident, and then focus on your next opportunity.
Of course, this is easier said than done. You've suffered a string of bad deals. You really needed the income that the sale would have earned. Management had a target on your back. And yet, focusing on the loss isn't going to change the situation. Remember, if you're carrying around the baggage from those rejections, you're not giving your full attention to the next golden opportunity. In fact, while you're licking your wounds in your office, you might be missing out on the next big opportunity.
It’s crucial to train your inner bounce-back ability and internalise the mantra “That failure led to that success.” Resist the temptation to dwell on what didn’t work, or even worse, why it didn’t work. Instead, see it as an opportunity to go back in time and change what you might have done differently so you can apply those lessons for your next sale.
5. Seek Out Support
One of the problems that people in sales often have is that they feel alone in their place of work. Lots of them don't ask for help because they fear it will make them seem as if they lack skills, and sometimes the best thing you can do is ask for help. If you're not comfortable asking assistance or advice from the people you work with, find a professional support group or mentor to talk things over with.
Like a sales coach, a good manager will recognise that rejection is not just an individual problem; it's an organisational one. If your colleagues and supervisors are willing to talk about the situation, you can assess rejections together. When they offer advice or constructive criticism, think it over and try to learn from each experience so you can handle similar situations differently next time.
If sales meetings make you want to hide under your desk, it’s a clear sign that you need to get out of your own head. If you don’t want to hire a business coach or discuss your challenges with other salespeople on your team, talk to a friend who has some experience in the business world. Look—you're still lion-hearted when you reach out for help. Lions live in a group. You don't have to be a lone wolf to achieve your career goals. Recognising when you need support is a sign of your courage and self-knowledge. With help, you can turn a pattern of rejections into a string of sales.
6. Keep Emotions at Bay
We live in an emotional world but there are times when you need to curb your emotions. If your love life is anything to go by, it's up to you to decide how you'd like to balance logic and emotion but when it comes to sales, I think it's definitely time for the cold, hard facts.?
Bottling up your emotions will keep you from making a perfectly calculated assessment of the situation. Anger is a natural reaction, but it can cloud your judgment. Maybe a buyer has given you the runaround--making you jump through hoops before deciding they didn't want to buy after all. Bottling up your frustrations makes you blind and stupid. Instead, try to compartmentalise your feelings, rely on rational thought, and learn from the experience without allowing yourself to sink into despondency.
7. Don't Give Up
If you've been in a sales slump, give yourself a pep talk. Don't be discouraged. You need to get back on the horse, even if it's scared the heck out of you before. It's time to ask yourself: Who are you really? What are your goals in the sales field?
Just as you have made it a point to analyse each rejection, spend some time assessing why you're in a sales slump. Look at the situation from all angles. Is your company having issues that are contributing to failed sales? Are they amid a marketing fiasco? Are they having reputation issues? Next, what about the product or services you're selling? Evaluate them from your customer's viewpoint. Are there better products on the market? Are there good products on the market in your niche that are priced cheaper?
Yes, you do have to do your own evaluation—before you ask for a raise. Have you been disorganised lately? Are you having personal issues that are affecting your selling performance? Are you feeling disillusioned with your employer? You need to identify the problem areas if you want to advance in the company.
As a problem solver, you don't give up on yourself any more than a dog gives up on a juicy bone. You might resolve to look for a new job with a different company that offers a better class of products. That's not giving up on yourself--that's searching for new opportunities. You might resolve to deal with the personal issues that are affecting your performance. Maybe you're drinking more than you usually do. Perhaps you're in the midst of a complicated relationship. In cases like these, seek out some help so that you can insulate your career from what's happening at home.
When you change direction, it's best to do so with the grace and flexibility of a catwalk model. A slump often indicates that you need to seek out new solutions to severe problems. Be brave enough to stay on track despite naysayers. And don't give up. Be relentless in your quest for success.
Learn to handle rejection and you'll learn to handle success. Ambition is the engine that drives sales numbers, but don't confine such an important engine to just sales. Rejection can be a powerful tonic—if only you could find a way to tincture yourself with it.