Don't Make Waves When You Can Make Ripples

Building a successful selling career isn't about making waves-making big sales. Selling is about developing relationships that produce streams of ongoing business and referrals. And often, those relationships start with a ripple-a small sale.

For many salespeople, chasing big sales that would propel them to the top of the sales charts has been their downfall. Those big sales are typically too few and far between. And, narrowing their focus only on the big sales creates two patterns of behavior that ultimately diminish their success. The first is wasting an inordinate amount of time chasing opportunities that most often don't come to fruition. Unfortunately, the more time they "invest," the less likely they are to let go even when it becomes clear that the opportunity has stalled.

The second destructive behavior is forgoing other opportunities that may not measure up in terms of sales revenue or commission (at least when compared to the expected payoff of a "big" sale), but do have the potential to establish new relationships and lead to additional sales, and perhaps a stream of future business and referrals.

It's easy to become seduced by the potentially big payoff of a big sale. With one or two "wave makers," you satisfy your quota and reach your income goal. It's much harder, and takes more discipline, however, to focus on smaller sales as a means of reaching your goals. But, there are significant benefits-financial and emotional.

When you are concurrently developing several ripples rather than counting on one wave maker, no single opportunity represents a "life or death" outcome in relation to your sales quota and commission. Consequently, you are less likely to become emotionally invested in any one opportunity and more likely to be able to make objective decisions about the quality of the opportunity and your chances of closing it in a timeframe consistent with your goals. If an opportunity doesn't measure up, letting it go doesn't leave you empty-handed. It simply frees up some time to find another opportunity. And, because you have other ripples in development, you can find that opportunity without the pressure you would likely feel if the one, and perhaps only, opportunity in your pipeline to which you had pinned all of your hopes had just fallen through.

Will You Ever Reach Your Personal Goals?

You'll never reach your personal goals until you are completely honest about what you really want. Setting personal goals should not be a "wish and hope" exercise. Instead, setting personal goals should be first and foremost an exercise in being honest with yourself. A time to answer the question, "What do I really want?"

So, what do you really want? More money? More recognition? More free time? More responsibility? Once you decide what you really want-here comes the really hard part-ask yourself, "Why don't I already have it?"

If you really wanted more money, wouldn't you have it? Wouldn't you have implemented the behaviors that would have put you in front of more prospects and created more opportunities to close sales and earn more money? Wouldn't you have stepped up your prospecting and referral generation efforts? Wouldn't you have been more selective about where and with whom you invested your time? If you truly wanted more money, wouldn't you have done the things required to obtain it?

If you really wanted more recognition from your superiors and colleagues, wouldn't you have gone the extra distance to earn it-doing whatever was needed to accomplish department initiatives without being asked? Wouldn't you have jumped in and picked up the slack wherever it was needed before a request for help was issued?

If you really wanted more responsibility, wouldn't you have asked for it, rather than waited for someone to ask you to take it on? Wouldn't you have brought ideas and projects to your superiors and asked for the opportunity to orchestrate and carry them out?

If you really wanted more time, perhaps to spend with your family, wouldn't you have implemented processes to better plan and organize your day so you wouldn't have to take work home at the end of the day or deal with work-related matters over the weekend?

If your goals aren't in alignment with what you truly want-your real passions, your real values, and that which truly drives you-then regardless of how refined your goal-setting process or how detailed your plan of action, you will only be going through the motions. You may reach the end of your plan, but what will you really accomplish? How meaningful will it be?

Before you develop new goals (or review existing goals) determine what you really value-what energizes you and provides you with a sense of satisfaction personally, professionally, spiritually, and in relation to your family and community. In which activities can you remain enthusiastically engaged irrespective of the time or the roadblocks? For work related goals, what would excite you enough to show up for work early and stay late?

Before you establish personal goals, determine what you really want by first examining your values. When your goals reflect your true values, their accomplishment is inevitable.

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