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- Aug 17, 2013
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In door-to-door sales.
When I was 15 I responded to a flyer on a telephone post. It was a job offer in door to door sales.
When I met the guy, he explained the process. How we'd get paid, what to expect, etc...
I was thrilled to start but then I realized how hard cold sales are.
The first day I started it was raining. Not too hard, just a drizzle.
It was a relatively low-income apartments that we were servicing that day with some decent single family homes near-by.
I'd never knocked on anyone's door before like that. I was terribly nervous.
I was given a script to memorize before I started.
It didn't matter when they answered the door. I fumbled with my words. I sucked something fierce.
Oddly I made 2 sales that day.
I didn't realize it but with each house, approaching got easier. I loosened up a bit.
I quit this job 3 months later after my team leader, another team's associate, and myself got jumped during the day, on a Saturday by 10 or so people. They took our cash, our phones, my team leaders shoes.
I was tired of getting guns pointed at me from knocking on people's doors anyway.
My takeaways were:
Thanks for reading
Mike
P.S. I was selling newspaper subscriptions for $20/3 Months
When I was 15 I responded to a flyer on a telephone post. It was a job offer in door to door sales.
When I met the guy, he explained the process. How we'd get paid, what to expect, etc...
I was thrilled to start but then I realized how hard cold sales are.
The first day I started it was raining. Not too hard, just a drizzle.
It was a relatively low-income apartments that we were servicing that day with some decent single family homes near-by.
I'd never knocked on anyone's door before like that. I was terribly nervous.
I was given a script to memorize before I started.
It didn't matter when they answered the door. I fumbled with my words. I sucked something fierce.
Oddly I made 2 sales that day.
I didn't realize it but with each house, approaching got easier. I loosened up a bit.
I quit this job 3 months later after my team leader, another team's associate, and myself got jumped during the day, on a Saturday by 10 or so people. They took our cash, our phones, my team leaders shoes.
I was tired of getting guns pointed at me from knocking on people's doors anyway.
My takeaways were:
- Not everyone wants what you got but some do
- People get indignant if you interrupt 3 major things - dinner, sex and TV time(don't knock after 8:30pm)
- Sales are easily the hardest job if you are impatient to learning and criticism
- If the script isn't about the customer, ditch it - ours went something like "help us get a bond for college" no wonder we only got 10-15 sales/week (other teams using their own script were in the 100's/week)
- Use competition to make yourself work faster and do stuff better, the other guy might be your best friend but if he gets a sale on the same street, he stole from you
- Sliding scale payout formats make people work harder to get to the next tier or can work against them if they do sell good
- Burn through your early no's. Ignore them. Use that to make your next approach. Most sales came 2 hours into the night (out for 5 hours)
Thanks for reading
Mike
P.S. I was selling newspaper subscriptions for $20/3 Months
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