I am a NASCAR fan. If you are, great. If not, bear with me for a minute and I will get to the point.

In a newspaper interview, driver Jeff Burton of NASCAR fame, talked about changes in his profession.

In Jeff’s interview, he talked of his frustration with not winning nearly the number of races in the past two years that he had in previous years.

He attributed it to changes in the business that he and other experienced drivers have not kept up with.

He mentioned some of the newer drivers who have been winning in their first year or two in NASCAR: Ryan Newman, Kevin Harvick and Jimmie Johnson, among others. He was also nice enough not to name some of his peers that have been absent from the winner’s circle recently. I will, just for the record. Rusty Wallace, Dale Jarrett and Ricky Rudd are a few of the experienced — and still excellent — drivers that have struggled recently.

What about your career in the selling business? Have you leveled off, or even slipped back in the past few years while others who aren’t as experienced pass ed you in sales and in income?

If these more successful people are working for your company, good. You can (if you are willing) find out what they are doing. If these people work for a competitor and are taking your business away, finding out what is going on may be harder, but it’s not impossible.

Jeff Burton discussed the fact that much of the technology available today (wind-tunnel testing of new engines and aerodynamic set-ups, and think tanks full of engineers using laptops instead of wrenches) is new to him and some of his more experienced rivals.

The veteran drivers are used to driving “by the seat of their pants,” so to speak, and telling the crew chief what changes they want just before and during the race.

The “young guns” listen to the engineers and, in a sense, work as test pilots.

Making changes to accommodate new conditions can affect confidence, career path and income. If you don’t or won’t realize this, it could be a long time before you are in the winner’s circle.

Warren Buffett, the billionaire investor out of Omaha, Neb., when interviewed about his success, said: “the chains of habit are too light to be felt until they are too strong to be broken.”

Bad habits and good habits stay with us, so if the chains of bad or old habits have you in their grip, break them. Start forming better habits by practicing new strategies every day, on every sales call, at every planning session, and on post-call reviews.

In the selling business, we have new technology available to help us: laptop computers, computer reports from the office, hand-held devices, sales rep software for planning and follow-up, and sales management programs that help you be your own best sales manager.

Analyze your results as an engineer would. Study your accounts. Decide which ones are worth more effort and which ones should be cut loose. Use pre- and post-planning guides and analyze time spent before, during and after each sales call.

If you will analyze your situation like Jeff Burton is doing, you may find that you are running your sales effort by the seat of your pants. There are not a lot of engineers for salespeople to consult like the NASCAR drivers have, but there is help inside and outside your field. Your management, fellow salespeople, vendors, industry magazines, books, tapes, live seminars and computer programs can all be invaluable to you — if you search them out and use them.

Like Jeff Burton, if you realize you need to change and take the steps to do so, you’re much more likely to wind up leading the pack.

To share your selling ideas, fax: (414) 228-1134, contact Mr. Dixon at (877) 379-3566.




POSTED ON: 10/1/2003