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Using Positive Persistence As A Selling Tool

Written by: Mark Satterfield

Article Overview: Persistence is one of the most powerful marketing tools any company has. Learn steps you can take to make sure you grow your business during a recession.

Using Positive Persistence As A Selling Tool

You've probably heard the story that it took Thomas Edison 1,000 tires before he invented the light bulb. But did you know that, 12 publishers rejected J.K Rowling's first Harry Potter book before an obscure publishing house finally picked it up? That Decca Records turned down the Beatles?

That Walt Disney was fired by a boss who said that he "lacked imagination"? That Michael Jordan was cut from his high-school varsity basketball team in his sophomore year? That Dr. Seuss was rejected 27 times by publishing houses?

So why am I telling you this? Because persistence, the ability to hold your course in the face of rejection is perhaps one of the most important elements for successfully marketing your services. And quite frankly, most people give up way to easily and early.

If the promotional letter doesn't immediately bring new customers calling, the tendency is to say, "Marketing won't work for me." If there are more than one or two steps to the system for bringing in new clients, the process is rejected as being "Too complicated". Which is kind of a good news/bad news situation.

The good news is that now that the economy is headed south a lot of your competitors will simply dry up and vanish. Since beginning my business career in 1977 I've seen how the dot.com boom, the real estate bubbles and blind over-optimism makes even poor business people successful. The proverbial "high tides raise all boats." And then comes the inevitable "bust".

No longer is business just coming in over the transom. People get scared. They start to cut back on unnecessary expenses. Which raises the question, is spending money on marketing, on promoting your business, discretionary? I think you know what I'm going to say.

Marketing is perhaps most important during these tough times. Ask anyone whose been around for a while. Look at the super successful people in your field. What you'll observe is that their marketing investment actually went UP during tough times. But the key is that you have to use smart marketing.

What that means is that you no longer can afford to just throw stuff against a wall and hope some of it sticks. No, you've got to be smart about it. Your promotional material has to make an offer that your prospects haven't heard a gazillion times before. You can't run "me too" campaigns.

What this means is that you'll probably have to look outside your industry for some good ideas. I believe that the failure to consider anything that hasn't already been done within your industry is one of the primary reasons why so much marketing sounds exactly alike and fails to attract attention.

You need a process. You need a system so that every dollar you spend on marketing is trackable. So you know what is working. In other words, you need to approach marketing as an investment, not as an expense. But in order to do that you're gong to need to have a plan. So what's yours?

Are you just going to hide under a rock and hope the bad times go away? Or, are you going to act like a true business owner and face the tough times with the resolve to actually capitalize on the fearfulness of others and improve your market share? Unfortunately, most will hide under the rock.

But then again, most business owners don't really think like owners, they think like technicians. By this I mean most owners just want to do the "thing-they-do." Consult. Train. Drill teeth. Argue cases. You get the idea.

So the decision is yours. You can be like the person who said that, "They were not going to do any marketing until business got better." The natural question is how will your business get better if you don't get the word out to those who are most likely to hire you about what you do?

Do you expect that people will just "hear about you?" Or will you wait until the next good-times-bubble emerges (probably in 2-3 years) and then you can go back to your proven marketing strategy of "Aggressively answering the phone?" Which is why Michael Gerber's often quoted (and substantiated) statistics that 80% of new businesses fold within the first 5 years is so true.

So what's the other option? Find a system or a process that has been successful for others and adapt it to your particular business. But remember that the key point is that you need to do something. Simply sticking your head in the sand is not an option if you are going to still be in business two years from now. Your really smart (and successful) competitors know this. I hope you do too.

Related Articles
  Kurlan's Law of Increased Sales Effectiveness
  A View on the Law of Attraction
  What Is The Value Of Persistence?
  Starting a Home Business Requires Persistence
  The Power of Persistence

Article Tags: business sales training, executive sales training, insurance sales training, positive persistence, powerful marketing tools, sales development training, sales presentation training, sales rep training, sales team training, telesales training, training in sales



Related Forum Posts
Re: Persistence gives live to small business. - Persistence is the key to success on any enterprise
Re: What can You Learn from a Jobless and Homeless Woman? - Positive thinking and a desire for success are fundamental qualities of an entrepreneur in my opinion.
Re: What inspires you? - Put a Visual Board of your dream and look at it for 10 days. And see the fun. Another inspiration thing is to have "Constant Positive Affirmations". This really shifts energy towards your goal. Say it in the morning and before bed. Robert
Wow! - Wow, this comes in as a close second to one of the best resources listed on EC.com. The first for me was the free Camtasia Tool.
Re: Why Some Websites Sell and Others Don’t? - Thanks for starting this inspirational thread,am working on owning my own site.This is a vital info for me. I will take note of this important quote as a beginner "Forget about the magic bullet that will make you rich overnight. Persistence is more important than intelligence"


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