How You Practice Is How You Play the Game

The most coachable salespeople love to role-play.

How you practice the game is how you play the game. If you don’t practice using the language that you are going to use when you are sitting face-to-face with your dream client, that is not how you’re going to play.

A Momentary Flash Of Brilliance

Occasionally, something brilliant comes out of your mouth. Something unexpected. You’re in the middle of a conversation with your dream client, and you say something so brilliant even you are stunned. Occasionally.

Most of the time, you say what you’ve said hundreds–if not thousands–of times before. You say what you’re comfortable saying. And you’re afraid of saying something that you haven’t said before because you don’t know how your dream client is going to respond.

Get The Language Inside You

It’s nice to be lucky, but it’s better to win by intention. If you are going to win by intention, you have to get the language you need inside your body. You have to be comfortable saying the words, lest you be afraid to say them.

The way to get the language inside you is to say the words out loud to other people. But those other people do not have to be your dream clients, and you don’t have to learn everything on the playing field, nor do you have to learn everything the hard way. You can practice. You can rehearse.

Practicing and rehearsing the language is how you get it inside you.

Find a Study Buddy

I absolutely love the question “Are you concerned about the price, are you concerned about the cost?” When used well, this is a powerful question. There are three or four possible answers your dream client may give you. But you will never be comfortable asking the question unless you know what the response is going to be and what comes next.

Find someone else on your team who is as interested in improving their performance as you are. Make a list of all the most challenging conversations you need to rehearse. Take turns offering each other objections, resisting in a fashion that makes it much more difficult than anything you expect to hear from a prospective client.

As you develop the language, rehearsing the words that you’re going to say out loud. When one of you does well, allow the person in the role of the sales rep to get the outcome they want. If they don’t do as well as they need to, push back and make them take another run at it.

You know the difficult conversations you are likely going to have with your dream clients. You know what objections to expect. There is no reason that you should prepare for every conversation. There’s always room for improvisation when you’re prospect greets with something novel or unexpected, but that is the exception, not the rule.

How you practice the game is how you will play the game. If you don’t practice, you won’t play the game as well as you are able.