Most salespeople are taught to chase business vs. attract it. Sales advice, especially early on, is filled with platitudes such as ‘get your name out there.’ or ‘hand out as many business cards as possible.’ Neither of those positions you as a must-have expert in your industry. In today’s competitive and saturated business markets, there’s never been a more important time to have a personal brand status. As a former business professor, I’m confident in saying you didn’t take many classes that helped you find, package, and sell your special skill.
Why is this important? Because status sells.
Statistics tell us consumers go with the first person they talk to 67% of the time. The number one challenge small business owners face is overcoming obscurity, meaning not enough people uniquely know who you are or how you can help.
When I moved to Denver six months ago to launch 90-Day Sales Manager™, I knew no one in my target markets of real estate, mortgage, and financial services. But, I was deeply confident in my services, and I knew it was my responsibility, and nobody else’s, to elevate my status in this market.
Here’s How I Attacked a New Market
1. Have a clear opportunity filter of who you want to do business with.
In order to know who you want to work with, you must first define your own beliefs. This comes from your unique past, experience, struggle, mentors, education, and interests. Without a filter, we chase anything with a pulse and a pocketbook. This often results in landing the high maintenance customer. I look for people who are hungry, humble, and coachable based on my belief that trained people outperform untrained people.
2. Identify target markets that fit your filter.
Sales is a game of probability. We aren’t going to win every customer, but once we know who to go after we can drastically increase our odds. In what groups or environments are you most likely to find people who share your beliefs? Most make the mistake of trying to be all things for all people. My target market when coming here was sales managers in FIRM—Financial Services, Insurance, Real Estate, Mortgage. Along the way, I started to attract producers in the title business because of the clients I was already associated with.
Have a clear target market and you’ll start to attract those from other areas based on shared beliefs and philosophies. Even better, your target markets will sell you because they know exactly who you are targeting.
3. Have a clear position in the market as the expert.
Confidence is the one thing that affects everything else. Have an unwavering belief that you are as good, or better, than anyone else in the market. Position yourself as the buyer who gets to choose who you want to work with based on being the expert—this is your opportunity filter. I’m only looking for those who are looking for me. This abundant mindset allows us to pick and choose who we want to do business with.
Anything that feels chased will run.
If I asked you who currently owns your market, there would be two to three people who would come to mind right away. That’s because status sells, and the brain only has room for a few people in each category. Are you in that go-to space? Or are you deletable? It’s never been more important to get attention for your business. Money follows attention. Money follows circulation. It follows purpose. It follows movement.
The reason we want to become a person of interest and elevate our status is to ultimately become a person of influence who can help more people with our services.
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