When times get tough in the economy or in your target market, shine up your inner gem! I know, just when you thought you’d finally gotten in the groove of your sales cycle, it all changed and went topsy turvy on you. When sales slump, so does your spirit. Time to find your sparkle by returning to games.
How do you shine up your inner gem? Go to the sparkle that’s been there making you unique and valuable almost forever. Ask yourself what lit up your day when you were about six years old. One sales rep, I’ll call her Kelly, didn’t miss a beat to that question. She yelled, “Hopscotch!” I know, it’s not football. But you can use any game or sport you loved. In Kelly’s case, she simply adored the charted squares and triangles and delighted in the motions as she progressed along. It was the action, not the reward that kept her going. This was step one of GEM – Gather Essential Memories. Those are any that stand out as vivid or significant.
In step two, Gain Enlightened Meanings, we can start to flush out old meanings and add or replace them with new ones. In her current life, Kelly was in a sales slump, getting discouraged and scared. I asked what she paid attention to the most – her sales or her activities leading up to them. She said it was her commissions.
I asked her how much she would have liked hopscotch if she ignored the joy of the hopping motion and was only ever reaching for a score. Her answer made her face light up. She chirped, “That would have taken all the fun out of it!” Using hopscotch as a metaphor for her current sales life, Kelly began to keep track of her “hops.” She envisioned each call, contact, or mailing as a hop. She drew a hopscotch chart on a blank sheet of paper and began ticking off her sales activities on the chart. Each time she made a hop, she consciously told herself, “This is fun!”
She had moved right into step three of GEM: Generate Empowered Movement. Perhaps you can guess what happened. Her activity increased and her slump decreased. Instead of her focus being on her declining commissions due to a downturn, she focused on the inner sparkle of the game. Her natural enthusiasm returned to which prospects responded favorably.
We all have infinite gems in our life experience and our natural personality. Sometimes a positive memory from activities we loved as a child can get us back on track. Make the connection metaphorically, link them, and enjoy the countless benefits of a new perspective. At other times, we can use the GEM process to discover some fear-based beliefs that have been lurking beneath our conscious awareness. I’ll do some of those next time.
Everyone has a completely unique mosaic of life stories. Work the GEM process back and forth and you’ll discover a treasure chest of tools for your inner sales sparkle. I’m a GEM collector, so send yours to me for sharing in the next GEM Tales!