If you don't know what (at least) the next two steps are in your sales process, then you're not ready to take any steps in your sales process.

Sure, a few people may be unbelievably fortunate, but that's not a game you can bet on and win. True mastery comes with time, experience, and dedicated intentional practice.

To redefine selling, we need to redefine the sale. Brian Tracy says that “a sale is nothing more than a transfer of enthusiasm from one party to another.” This is my favorite definition. There really isn’t a whole lot more to it than that, and most sales that are made don’t even involve money.

Chances are, if you’re completely torn up by every lost sale, your pipeline is not as robust as it should be.

You might think I’m weird, but I’m here to tell you: those metaphorical punches in the face can be exhilarating, and they help drive my success. Bumps in the road beg you to reevaluate.

Between every stimulus and your response, there is a moment where you get to decide how to proceed. That's what you can't forget. That's what you cannot allow to be beaten out of you. You have a choice.

The counter was reset to zero this week. The hourglass has also just been flipped over- there's a lot of sand at the top. There’s never been a better time to start looking at the long-term than right now.

Your attitude is the foundation for your success. Work on it, build it, and remind yourself of it. The world is a better place when you’ve got your swagger about you, and you can’t count on anybody but yourself (or maybe your mom) to boost it.

A funny thing happens when you stop focusing on the end of the month. It's almost as if you're given more months.

If you can adequately differentiate yourself and demonstrate that you can provide outcomes that nobody else can, then nobody is really a competitor.

New issues and initiatives undoubtedly regularly come up in your personal life and your business. Do they present bona fide opportunities? Or are they just shiny objects and distractions in disguise?

When you ask questions that others won't ask, you learn things that others won't learn...

The disease afflicting most sales organizations is not a lack of skills, desire, or even commitment. What these teams have not created is a culture or environment where continuous improvement is the norm.

Your product is not a commodity. There are significant differences between you and your competitors. However, your prospect may not yet appreciate those differences.

None of your customers do business with you because you occasionally buy them a free meal, entertain them for an afternoon, or make a great presentation. They buy from you because they have a problem, and you have the solution.

The fact is, sales success is difficult to achieve. But there’s a lot of satisfaction in learning to accomplish things that have a high degree of difficulty.

Of course, you need to know how the decision will be made. Of course, it's valuable (but not necessary) to know what the budget will be. But anybody can ask those questions. You need to ask the questions that nobody else can ask.

It's about identifying and understanding what needs to be done, empowering others to do the work they're entrusted to do, and owning the outcome regardless of whether it's good or bad.

Sales is a results-oriented game, so that's usually where you focus. It’s easy to assume that if you set a goal and accomplish it, then the steps you took to achieve it were right. That's a poor assumption.

It's a common assumption that your company knows exactly what it needs to do in order to deliver results and outcomes for the customers you serve. More often than not, that's just not the case.