Staying Disciplined

A client called me today to explain why she can't cold call. She's a real estate agent for very high end homes in the Southern California market. She says she feels awkward using the scripts she received from her office.

The message to her prospects is this, "If you are selling your home or are planning to sell your home within the next 3 months, please call me." She can wrap other language around that - but that's the essence of the message.

Somebody she cold calls in the next 2 weeks is going to be delighted she called. Her call solved a problem for them.

That's Blackbelt Coaching. Because I'm probably not the best person to call to say you can't do something. Blackbelt Coaching has no time for "can't". Can't means won't. I want to hear CAN and WILL. I instructed my client to set a two week cold calling schedule. She is to spend 2 hours every day cold calling. My client will now be accountable to me on a daily basis for her cold calling time for the next two weeks.

I was a professional sales person at Xerox Corporation and I was good at it. I loved the competitive spirit of selling and really loved to win big deals. I was also at Xerox at a time when corporations were spending money training managers, sales people, customer service (seems like a long time ago, no?) and I benefited from that training.

I learned that if you are in sales - and we're all selling something - you MUST cold call. It takes discipline and guts and absolutely seperates the men from the boys, so to speak.

I also suggested she buy 100 small American flags, attach them to her card, and get out in the field.

Her call and/or card is a solution to someone's problem.