Use Your Passion to Achieve Breakthroughs in Sales, with Jay Abraham [Episode 608]

Jay Abraham, Founder and CEO of Abraham Group, Inc. and business book author, joins me on this episode.

KEY TAKEAWAYS

• Jay says the single biggest challenge facing sales professionals today is authenticity, credibility, and true intent on behalf of the prospective buyer. Sales reps are rewarded for the actual value they create for others.
• The solution you provide must fairly remedy the pain the prospective buyer has, whether for productivity, savings, labor, time-to-market, or other need.
• More sales are made with storytelling, metaphors, and analogies than are made with Powerpoint decks. Jay does not respond to requests for ‘a deck.’ It is a disservice to a product to think a prospect can see its value in a deck.
• The best presentations do not involve a laptop or tablet. They harness passion for the people the solution will benefit.
• Andy recently read The Abraham Mindshift Challenge that examines a different way to do business. Don’t look at what other companies in your category are doing. Look at meeting the needs of your market.
• Andy quotes a statement about breakthroughs from Jay’s Getting Everything You Can book. Don’t network only within your industry, but mainly outside of it. Big breakthroughs come from outside an industry. Jay explains by examples.
• The key to success is examining, understanding, appreciating, recognizing, exploring, acknowledging, and respecting how the ‘other side’ is experiencing life. It is empathy in practice. Jay tells attitudes to avoid in sales.
• Jay discusses Stephen M.R. Covey’s research on trust. He found that 90% of people working in fields that rely on trust are sub-optimal in their ability to generate trust. Noble and worthy values are not found universally.
• Empathy decreased year after year among college freshman for three decades according to the University of Michigan. It seems to be replaced by self-absorption. Salespeople need human values, especially empathy.
• Jay talks about teaching young people how to connect with others. Breakthroughs come by open-mindedness, including curiosity. Don’t be hardened in your positions.
• Jay has a 747 flight story. He learned that if the wings were rigid they would crack off. Flexibility is essential to successful flight, or to anything else in life. Knowledge doubles quickly. No one knows it all.
• It’s improbable that your particular company has discovered the very best method of doing anything they do. There is always going to be a better way to do things.