Author: Nate Moller

Maybe I need to be a bit more controversial to get more response on the Everyone needs a sales job post! Or maybe, just maybe, the majority of you have to agree that EVERYONE should have at least one (or more) sales job(s) in their lifetime. Here’s a bit more about my background in sales:

My first year out of college I got a sales job with a great company in Utah. It was all based on commission, had a really tough learning curve, and was definitely “not for everyone” as I heard many times in the first 6 weeks. Looking back, I’m not sure if this was a hint that I should look elsewhere or what. However, this sales job literally changed my life. I can honestly say that I learned more in 2 1/2 years of sales training than I learned in my entire college education. College is great – however, the perspective I gained from this job was amazing. I learned about the power of mindset, motivation, positive attitude, and not being satisfied with mediocrity. I had a team leader who believed in his team: he was never negative, never pessimistic, and always gave me encouragement and positive reinforcement.

One of the things I did that I believe helped me really meet my potential at this job was the “Moller Mission Statement“. It went something like this:

“I am the best salesman at [put in your company name] with a 6 week average of over [specific amount of money] in sales. I am making [specific amount of money] per week which is helping me achieve and exceed my six month goal of [specific amount of money] by June 30, [year] and [specific amount of money] by Dec. 31, [year]. My keys to success have been confidence, focus, overcoming all fears, hard work, persistence, patience, and expecting to succeed, along with listening to the best, taking effective notes which I apply immediately, setting specific goals that I review daily, and focusing on getting 3 new sales per day, clients that need the products we are offering. I never worry about things I can’t change. I focus only on what I do have control over: attitude, knowledge, skills and work ethic. I’m happy to be running my business successfully and will continue to develop multiple streams of income. These multiple streams of income will help me achieve my life goal: [specific long term goal].

As I created this Moller Mission Statement and began believing in it, I saw amazing things happen. Sales increased, my attitude changed, and I really did do what I was saying. The funniest part was that I hit my year goal almost to the dollar, a goal that, at first, I almost thought was out of reach.

So, in summary, Everyone needs a sales job!

I wanted to ask some questions, share some insites, and just vent about branding…

• What is branding?
• Where do I start?
• Why is branding so helpful? or Is it really that helpful?
• Is branding something you can track?
• Can you get an ROI on branding?
• Why do companies choose branding as a marketing strategy and tactic?
• Are there just long term effects of branding or can they be short term as well?

This is what en.wikipedia has to say about a brand:

“A brand is a collection of images and ideas representing an economic producer; more specifically, it refers to the concrete symbols such as a name, logo, slogan, and design scheme…A brand is therefore one of the most valuable elements in an advertising theme, as it demonstrates what the brand owner is able to offer in the marketplace…”

Branding is a key factor in business building.

Need I say more? Does anyone not know what this is? It’s extremely effective “branding”!

I’m reading a marketing book right now that talks about the importance of developing a marketing strategy before you create marketing tactics. This means that you need to know WHY you are doing what you plan to do before you start implementing specific marketing tactics. Creating a brand starts with a well thought out mission statement and/or vision. You must answer the question:

How is what I’m planning on doing going to help others?

If you are able to answer this question in two or three sentences and feel strongly about it, you have taken one of the first big steps in building a brand.

More to come…What are your thoughts?

I had a client ask about marketing with podcasts or video. I did some research and this is what I found – not new news, just some help.

1. Make the video quality stuff. If it’s not good, it’s probably not going to be worth the time invested.

2. Put the site name in the video. (Not all video farms allow links.)

Here are a few sites you can share your video with:

youtube.com
myspace.com
google.com
spikedhumor.com
revver.com (this one pays you)
metacafe.com (this one too, but I’m yet to make a dime on it)
stupidvideos.com

Here are a few websites to propagate your video:

digg.com
milkandcookies.com
reddit.com
stumbleupon.com

Do any of you have anything to add?

“If you are small and niche I don’t think it hurts to link out to competing sites or even to feature their brand or their owners as content. You can get exposure and work your way up the social ladder by siphoning off their brand value. But I think there is far more value in featuring them and recommending them than in having them mentioned in an ad. Interviewing people, for example, is an easy way to get great content and build mind share.” – Aaron Wall, www.seobook.com

Wow, this is an interesting, yet compelling strategy. As many of you know, one of my sites is www.clogon.com where I sell clogging shoes and taps. One of my competitors is Trevor Dewitt, owner of clogdancing.com. They don’t sell clogging shoes but are #2 for traffic in the clogging industry (right behind ClogOn.com!) It would be interesting to hear his reaction when I call and ask to feature him as a “Featured Fellow Clogger”. I’m sure it will get a great response and, like Aaron says, “…get exposure and work [my] way up the social ladder by siphoning off their brand value.”

What do you all think? Have you seen any results from this type of marketing?

So which comes first: narrowing down the niche idea or finding suppliers? It’s like the chicken or the egg question!

This is a question that is coming to my attention more and more as I teach others how to build their own internet businesses.

Narrowing down the niche:

• You want to have high demand (see www.digitalpoint.com/tools/suggestion) – at least 16 searches per day to make the idea even worth your time
• You want to have minimal competition (use google and type in allintitle:”any keyword phrase” to see what the real competition is for Search Engine Placement – my target numbers are 30,000 competitors or less; this usually means that within 2-4 months I may be close to the front page of Google if I’m aggressive with other marketing strategies
• As your narrowing down the niche, you don’t want to get “over excited” because the other speed bump you may run in to is….Finding Suppliers

Keyword Phrase digitalpoint.com/tools/suggestion allintitle:”keyword pharse”
target: 16/day+ target: less than 30,000

clogging 137.0/day ——————————37,100
clogging shoes 68.0/day ——————————-730
clogging cue sheets 23.0/day ——————————-285

Finding Suppliers – Why not look for these first?

• There are many ways to find suppliers: contact them directly, talk to competitors, use tools like TheShipper

As I think about it, why not look for suppliers first and then, when suppliers are found, think about keywords and phrases you can optimize with? To me, this seems much easier and a better way to manage time.

As I direct clients to a supplier I want to make sure they look for things that they already know something about; I let them know that they need to be prepared to write information concerning the product or industry they are leaning towards (or at least be willing to put in the time necessary to become a “guru” in that area). Granted, they don’t have to know everything about the products but they have to be willing to share valuable information related to the products in order to optimize most effectively. I plan to have a part 2 to this blog post: I think it’s very debateable and appreciate feedback.

What are your thoughts?

The title states it clearly: everyone should have at least one sales job in their lifetime. Debatable, isn’t it!?

“Sales guys are scam artists.”
“Salesman are unethical.”
“I hate sales people.”
“I’m definitely not good at sales.”

I’m sure we’ve all heard, or said, something like this. Funny thing is, if you’ve said this, you are basically “selling” the reason why you hate salesmen. Welcome to the “Art of the Sale!” The question is, how can someone say this if they’ve never been in the sales industry before? Do they really feel they have a legitimate argument if they have no experience? It’s like fans that gripe about referees or umpires: if they’ve never been one, how can they logically criticize until they “step up to the plate”?

Sales guys get such a bad rap, possibly because of the “used car salesman” approach or the “door-to-door vacuum sales person”. To understand sales, you have to realize that every sales job is different:

Right after graduation from college I took a job with a copier & printer company doing “cold calling”, door-to-door sales. I was given no leads, no referrals, nothing – just thrown out there cold turkey.

As I look back at that experience I can easily say that I learned so much; it’s not exactly what I’d want to do for a life-long career but was a step in the right direction. I also learned how important creating business relationships can be in generating new business.

Just before I left that job for a better, more life-long option, I made a sale to a client for over $50,000. Why? It wasn’t because I knew all there was to know about the product; it wasn’t because I lied to them about what they were getting; it definitely wasn’t because we had the “best price in town.” It was primarily because of the friendship we had developed. It’s amazing what a few rounds of golf can do for a business relationship – it’s almost like taking surprise flowers to your wife! Clients like to be “wined & dined” and be taken care of. Everyone likes to have friends.

So, the whole point of this article is to prove the aforementioned statement: Everyone should have at least one sales job in their lifetime. If you really want to understand what motivation is, what commitment is, what hard work is, what creating win/win situations is – get a sales job. If you want to learn about the power of confidence and belief, the importance of setting and reviewing goals frequently, the influence being nice to people has on your success, and the psychology of why people do (or don’t do) what they do – get a sales job!

More to come…any thoughts?

As we all know, managing our time is crucial to our success in any endeavor we pursue. Here are a few thoughts to help us sharpen the use of our time:

1) Set Goals

• Write down goals (a goal unwritten is only a wish)
• A goal has to be useful, measurable and attainable
• Prioritize goals – ask yourself “What’s most important right now?”
• Evaluate goals frequently
• Visualize your goals, think about how to accomplish them, then “JUST DO IT!”

2) Avoid Procrastination

Procrastination is a time waster of which you have complete control. Here are some ideas to keep procrastination under control:

• slice up tasks into more manageable pieces and start on the easiest ones
• chart your progress – “Small success leads to big success!” If you write down and track progress, it helps confidence and aids you in seeing progress, even if its only small
• set a deadline for completing projects

These are just a few ideas I’ve had that, if implemented, have helped me manage my time more effectively. Any other ideas would be appreciated.