You're on a roll

Have you ever played darts? I don’t mean pinning a photo of some Z list celebrity on a board and aiming for the eyes – I mean proper, normal darts?

If you have, even just once or twice, then you’ll be familiar with the fact that if you throw them very quickly in succession, that the second and third dart are more likely to land quite close to the first one. It’s like your arm has some sort of targeting mechanism that works for very small periods of time.

Professional darts players know this too. If you ever watch them play, you can see that in the earliest stages of the game, when they’re trying to score as much as possible, that they barely pause between throws.

How is this relevant to you? Well the same could be said of sales people. Have you ever noticed that once a particular sales person gets a good order, that another two of three seem to come along almost immediately? To coin a phrase, these people are “on a roll”.

Gamblers have winning streaks, sales people have roles, but it all comes down to the same thing. Positive results have a sort of magnetism to them. You get one great result and you feel good about it. That positive, good feeling feeds back on itself and you grow more and more successful.

But it’s not all tree hugging, hippy crap – sure, there is something to be said for a positive vibe, but in isolation it’s about as much use as a pork pie at a Barmitzvah.

Feeling good and positive changes the way we act. We speak with more confidence, we smile more, we’re open to new ideas and conversations, hence we essentially become someone that others actually want to do business with.

Armed with this, it’s easy to work out how to turn your losing streak into a winning one. Just tell yourself that it’s finished. It happens to everyone and thanks very much but you’re done with it now. Now take a deep breath and then tell yourself that you are in the midst of another winning streak. Really take the time to believe it, and then pick up the phone and make your next sales call.

If you’ve convinced yourself effectively, you’ll notice a pleasant change in the way people respond to you, and before very long, that winning streak that you just made up will actually become real.

Good luck.