How to Overcome The Greatest Barrier to Sales Success

Jonathan Farrington says the biggest obstacle to sales success is the “Egocentric Predicament.”

Wait a minute! What?

Put simply, the “egocentric predicament” refers to placing your own interests above the client’s.

To put others’ interests above your own requires extensive hard work overcoming yourself.

And overcoming yourself, Jonathan adds, isn’t an easy process.

But when you do, you can better focus on the needs of your clients. And then your sales performance takes right off!

Even though letting go of yourself and focusing on others is difficult, you can start the process right now.

Here’s how:

1. Begin with Practicing Self-Acceptance

How can you focus on others if you don’t like many parts of yourself?

The good news is you’re not alone. Every human being has parts of themselves they don’t like.

You’ll never be perfect at this. But the more you accept and love yourself, exactly as you are (good and bad), the better off you are.

Psych Central actually has a nice post with tips for self acceptance from 12 experienced therapists.

2. Always Do the Right Thing

The “right thing” isn’t always clear – and it’s rarely easy. Sometimes it means doing something that results in a seemingly negative outcome for you.

But, the law of the universe, regardless of your spiritual or religious background, is “what goes around, comes around.”

Do the right thing for your customer, even if it appears to hurt you, and you’ll get back much more than you had to give up.

3. Calmly Listen and Care

When your clients or prospects talk, the real issue at hand isn’t what they say. Usually, they’re communicating something else entirely.

For example, if a prospect tells you they fired the previous vendor because they were so angry with their erratic service, the real issue isn’t the prospect.

They’re really concerned with trust. They couldn’t trust the vendor, so they had to move on. And your chances of closing the sale skyrocket when you discuss how trustworthy and reliable you are with your services.

Your customer will give you feedback about how well you’re listening. If they’re silent, angry, confused, or keep talking about the same thing multiple times, you didn’t get their real message.

If they nod their head in approval, sound or appear relieved, or verbally say,”Yep, that’s the problem,” you’ve found the real issue.