Selling Security Systems Like a Pro

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1. Are Salespeople Born or Made?

We have all heard it said that so-and-so is a born salesperson—as if to imply that he or she was born with a God-given talent for sales in the same way that some people are born with musical or artistic gifts. However, when it comes to selling, my experience tells me something entirely different. I don’t believe people are born with sales skills or a selling personality; instead, they are developed into successful salespeople by their managers or the other salespeople they associate with.

In 1966, after completing almost five years in the U.S. Navy, I went looking for a job. I had little experience in anything not related to shipboard work. I had delivered newspapers as a young boy, but that was pretty much it. So with no resume and only the desire and need to work, I applied for a variety of jobs.

Interview after interview I was turned away for lack of experience. It was frustrating to say the least. Company after company, recruiter after recruiter told me I should apply for a job for which I had experience. And over and over again I asked the simple question, how does one get experience if no one will hire them until they have experience? It seemed I was going in circles and getting nowhere fast … until the day I read a local help-wanted ad that changed my life. The ad read as follows:

Men wanted to move stock from warehouse.

No experience necessary.

Apply in person Monday between 8 am and 9 am.

$500 per month guaranteed.

1234 Claiborne Ave, suite 4

The next day, at least an hour before I was supposed to arrive, I showed up at the address given in the ad. To my surprise I found thirty or more other applicants waiting to be interviewed. We looked like those people who stand in line for hours to get concert tickets.

As each applicant arrived, the receptionist gave them an application to fill out as well as a test to take—a psychological aptitude test, I later learned. They ushered us into a meeting room set up classroom-style to complete our applications and tests.

To this day I can still remember what I was feeling as I looked at all of the other people vying for the position. I felt the competition. I felt slightly intimidated. I worried about my chances to secure the job when so many others were also applying. I found myself sizing up my fellow competitors, comparing myself to them. I had no basis for comparison other than the toughness I’d developed in the streets and during my years in the Navy. However, I felt I needed to do something, say something—anything—to the recruiter in order to position myself at the top of the selection process. I badly needed this job and I was scared.

Much to my surprise, a few of the applicants left the room early and didn’t return. I couldn’t understand why, but I was happy they left and secretly wished everyone else would do the same, because then the job would surely be mine.

After what felt like an eternity, a well-dressed man entered the room and walked to the front. He didn’t say anything at first; he just slowly looked around the room, his eyes resting on each one of us and then moving on to the next person. Finally he welcomed us all to the meeting. He apologized for having to gather us all together like this but, since there were so many applicants and only a couple of positions to fill, he wanted to first introduce his company to us. Then he would take the time to interview those applicants that he felt could qualify and who wanted to be considered for the position. He asked us if we thought this plan was fair.

Hearing no dissenters he began. He started by telling us how long his company had been in business, and how many branches there were across the United States. Basically, he explained, there were branches in every major city, and a few minor ones, in the United States. He further explained that he too had sat in a room very much like this one many years ago, applying for the job he eventually got, and that many years later, here he was, in charge—the boss. He said he understood what many of us were thinking because he too had many of the same thoughts and fears when he was in our shoes.

He continued by saying that some of us were destined to be successful. As he looked around again at each of us he said, Some of you will make it big in life, earning the kind of money only doctors and lawyers usually earn. Some of you are destined to be great.

However, he continued, some of you, unfortunately, are destined to lead mediocre lives, just getting by, barely making a living. Some of you will live your lives helping make those of us destined to be great more comfortable. And that’s OK, because someone has to fill those jobs. Someone has to wait tables. Someone has to wash dishes. Someone has to clean our streets. And someone has to pick up our garbage. And you know which one you are. Deep down inside of each of you is the realization that you will be an achiever or not. Deep down inside you know who you are, and what role you are destined to fill.

As he talked about success and failure, I was telling myself that I was the one who would be the achiever. I was the one who would be great. I wouldn’t be the one picking up garbage for a living.

After a few more minutes he said that we would take a short break. We are doing this to give those of you who have decided that you are the street cleaner or the garbage collector a chance to leave gracefully, without fanfare. But, he said, I’ve always thought I should take the time to thank the people who have decided that it is their lot in life to collect my garbage. Thank God for them. What would we do without them? So before we break I’d like to take this opportunity to thank you personally. He once again looked each of us directly in the eye. I’d like to thank you for doing that much-needed service. And as for the rest of you who believe you are destined to be successful, look around the room. Some of the faces you are looking at now won’t be here when we return after the break. They won’t be here because they are the garbage collectors and they know it.

Then the meeting adjourned for the break. I can tell you that, like others around me, I needed to go to the bathroom, but I was afraid to even leave the room for fear that someone would think, There goes one of the garbage collectors. I was afraid to budge.

When the meeting resumed some fifteen minutes later, to my surprise and happiness, at least half of the applicants had either left or had been told to leave. I didn’t know which and I didn’t care. The more people left, the better my chances of getting one of the couple of open positions.

As the meeting continued, the company executive talked more about the company and the compensation package. By then I was hooked. I wanted this job and I hoped I would have the chance to prove I was the one the company should hire. However, others came to a different conclusion. One by one they got up and left the room.

At the end of the meeting, the company executive told the remaining applicants that he and other managers of the company would be available to interview each of us one-on-one after another fifteen-minute break. The successful candidates would be chosen on the basis of those interviews.

By the end of the day I had the job, along with two other applicants. And by week’s end I was the only person remaining from the original interview.

In case you are wondering about the claims the company made during their opening presentation, the ad was true. As promised, the job was to move stock from the warehouse. However, as it turned out, I didn’t move the stock the way I had imagined. I moved it when, as instructed, I knocked on doors and successfully sold a Kirby vacuum cleaner. It was a door-to-door sales position.

The company hadn’t lied about the income either. As long as I did everything they taught me to do, and did it every day, I always made more than what they had guaranteed.

I didn’t apply for a sales job; at least I hadn’t intended to. I didn’t consider myself a salesperson, born or not. If I’d known, I probably would not have answered the ad. I was tricked into applying for a sales position, and for that I thank the Kirby Company to this day.

Kirby taught me a process for selling. They told me—and I was open-minded enough to believe them—that if I followed the steps they laid out, studied and practiced my presentation, and knocked on enough doors, I would succeed. If you divided the world into two groups, they said, one would be more or less inclined to buy anything you asked them to buy. The other group wouldn’t buy anything you asked them to buy. The secret was to ask enough people to buy your product and you would, at the very least, stumble onto the group that would buy. You just had to keep asking, keep knocking, keep believing, and keep smiling.

Since then my career has soared, and I continue to enjoy the fruits of my success. I have also had the pleasure of sharing the skills I developed in sales with thousands of other salespeople and watching as their careers blossomed.

I know many companies that only use door-to-door methods to sell their wares. They find the method to be a quicker, more efficient way to reach a potential buyer, and they have grown their businesses dramatically as a result.

There is a saying that good things come to those who wait. But I believe that in sales, the only thing that comes to those who wait is whatever is left behind by those who hustle. The door-to-door salesperson will almost always out-produce and out-earn the salesperson who waits patiently for leads to come in, regardless of where those leads come from.

Selling is a process that you or anyone else can learn. And if you practice, study, and use a scripted presentation designed to achieve results, you too will be highly successful.

In the next few chapters I will lay out the process for sales success in an easy-to-learn and easy-to-follow way. If you follow the steps and practice them diligently, you will see your sales—and your income—grow. I guarantee it.

2. Establishing Income Goals

Are you a professional salesperson? How does one qualify as a professional salesperson? How can you prove someone is a professional salesperson? What observable qualities do professional salesperson posses? What does a professional salesperson know?

I had a discussion recently with a director of training for a national security alarm company. We were discussing statistics he should gather about sales performance in order to better help his company’s sales force. Directors of sales teams, sales managers, and team leaders regularly face the challenge of analyzing members of their sales team to determine training requirements, field support, or counseling, or to decide when it is time to cut losses and terminate a salesperson. I told him that from my experience the best approach was to start with the desired results and work backwards. I went on to explain what I meant.

I believe all professional salespeople should know to a decimal point what their performance statistics are, and therefore what they must do to achieve their desired income. Unfortunately, newer salespeople likely do not know their statistics, and thus need help and training to learn how to measure their own performance. As managers, I explained, we should know the statistics for each of our salespeople so we can help them become successful.

Compare sales with other professions and you will notice similarities. For example, baseball players know within a decimal point what their batting average is, and they track that average on a monthly basis. They know that their average most often dictates their earning ability. The higher the average the more they can negotiate for when it is time to renew their contract.

Basketball players, tennis pros, and volleyball players are acutely aware of how their statistics determine their incomes. Salespeople should also be acutely aware of the statistics that drive their success, and their managers must be aware too. When sales pros know the equivalent of their batting averages, they possess an important piece of their income forecast model. They know what they have to do to achieve their financial goals. Not knowing your closing ratio makes income forecasting near impossible.

Let’s say that a salesperson—we’ll call her Sarah—has joined my company. As her manager, shortly after hiring her, regardless of her level of experience, I will ask how much money she wanted to earn in total compensation that year. Will she know the answer to that question? We all have a desired income level, but often the less experienced sales people don’t sit down and say out loud to themselves, their spouses, their friends, or their relatives