Consistency In Sales
Consistency in sales is highly underrated. There’s so much to be said about the ability to show up every day and do the mundane things that don’t feel like they’re leading anywhere, until… they do. This kind of behavior shows everybody that you can be counted on. Your leaders, your coworkers, and especially your customers.
Years ago, my manager complimented me when he said, “I know you won’t get outworked.” While a little dubious (I didn’t want to be expected to be a workaholic), I understood where it came from. He knew he could trust that I'd put in the effort and that no major details would be missed, but that’s only part of the formula for sales success.
Well over a hundred years ago, OG sales philosopher Arthur Sheldon coined the acronym AREA.
- Ability: the knowledge, skill, and judgment to know what should be done
- Reliability: the character, trustworthiness, and ethics to make others believe in you
- Endurance: the physical and mental capacity to keep going and perform consistently
- Action: actually doing the things you know need to be done.
To me, consistency is Reliability and Endurance, with a dash of Action as well, because it requires the willpower and integrity to do what needs to be done when it needs to be done, especially when it’s hard.
What people often miss about Ability is the judgment part. Companies are more than happy to throw skills training at the problem. What about knowing which skills to use? When? How? With Whom? Why do they work?
Over two-plus decades in sales, those are the questions reps are always left to figure out for themselves. Few do. Even fewer can articulate those answers with enough specificity to actually communicate them to the rest of their teams.
I’ve heard it said that “before you climb the ladder of success, make sure it’s leaning up against the right wall.” AI is making it very easy to climb quickly.
When everybody is trying to do more, and AI tools make it easier, the real key to success is wall selection.
The successful veteran reps on your team know which wall matters most, though they usually don’t know how to exactly articulate it. They’ll tell you the key to their success is their tenure and their relationships. Your rookies don’t have two decades to hang around and develop relationships by chance. You have to dig deeper with those veterans and encourage them to get more specific about the answers to those questions above.
What does a great relationship look like? Is it getting your call returned? Is it knowing what it will take to get that call returned? Is it knowing the names of their kids? Or knowing what those kids are planning for their lives and working toward?
What did it take to start a relationship like that? What did you lean into? What might it take today, given a drastically different environment? Recalling the specifics is valuable, but not as much as the out-loud thoughts and the debate about what things look like moving forward.
All it takes is a long lunch, and the willingness to do the same kind of discovery intensity you’d bring to a huge deal. It’s asking the extra questions, and not taking anything less than a specific answer. It’s working through the tension that happens when someone doesn’t want to get any more specific, but understands that’s the best way to be helpful.
Most sellers are luckier than they’ll ever admit, but it doesn’t need to be that way. You can articulate, name, and teach those behaviors. They live inside the heads of your top performers.
Jeff Bajorek is a sales consultatnt who helps sales teams design and implement their sales strategies with a focus on the fundamentals, and by noticing what others don't.
Website - www.jeffbajorek.com