Oh To Be Young and In Sales

Does the thought of selling scare you? In most cases, people do not want to be told no. The fear of rejection is greater than the reward of the sale. Lesa and I just celebrated my birthday by going out to our favorite Italian restaurant. For dessert, we went to Sweet Cici's. It was a beautiful evening and Lesa asked me if I wanted to stop at the Jeep Dealer on the way home. I said, "Absolutely!" Before you get ahead of me, I did not get a Jeep for my birthday. That would have been great but we are not quite that spontaneous. I have been wanting one for a long time and I comment on them frequently so we went to drive one. It was late but a very nice young man came out to greet us. His name was Jon. After a few moments, we learned that Jon had just started selling cars three weeks prior after leaving his music engineering job. He had also just gotten married on July fourth a week earlier. During the test drive we heard more of his story.  Jon's decision to change careers was based on his belief that a sales career would provide a better a life for his new family. I related to Jon's story because I made the same decision for my family over thirty years ago. As we returned to the car dealership, he began asking some closing questions. It made me smile when he said, "Mr. Marrs, what would it take for you to drive this Jeep home tonight?" Jon did a lot of things right. He overcame his fear of rejection by making a great first impression, asking great questions, and most importantly, listening and answering our questions. In simple terms, it wasn't difficult for him to ask for my business because he had earned the right. Have a great week!