[E65a] Sales Mindset Week: Comparison Is A Dangerous Game

One of the most common things that happen on the sales floor (and in our lives) is comparison.

We compare our results to what other people are producing.

For some, this can work really well as a way to motivate. Every sales floor needs a ‘rabbit’ for the rest of the team to chase. Without a top rep setting and raising the bar it can be tough to move the whole team in the right direction.

But for some, seeing another salesperson crush it can be demotivating. “I could never close deals like they do.” “I wish I was that good.”

How do you use comparison?

Should you compare your results to what others are doing?

I just had to cover this topic regarding mindset, so I made a bonus episode.

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Episode 65a – Transcript

Hi and welcome to a special episode of The Sales Experience Podcast. This is kind of a bonus episode. I know that we just did 61 through 65 which was on sales mindset 2.0 how to focus on the right mindset to help you achieve your sales goals. And of course, it can also apply to any other area in your life. Going through everything you heard me say it over and over again, I’m going to keep saying it over and over again.

It’s not that anything is right or wrong or good or bad, or you’ve got to not have a negative one in order to have a positive one. You can’t win without having a positive mindset. Generally that’s true. But sometimes a negative mindset can actually drive some people where they just focus on kind of some negative things or fear or something else that motivates them that will actually drive better results.

Other people find more success when they’re in a positive mind frame. I personally think a more positive mindset, especially when dealing with consumers, um, clients, businesses, whoever your prospect is in order to move them forward, you want to have a positive outlook trying to help them, trying to do the best thing for them.

However, you know, the whole point of this show is for you to identify like this week it was about identifying in yourself the mindset that you currently have, what’s working, what’s not working in terms of how to get your goals.

Now in this special episode, why I wanted to throw this in as an additional item is I was thinking about it after recording the last one and all of the different things that can go into a positive, a negative, a mediocre mindset and comparison. That’s what I realize is that there’s a lot of times where I see people either win or lose in the sales team because of comparison.

This obviously happens in life as well. Social media is just magnifying and expanding this as a thing that happens for a lot of people where you’re scrolling through some kind of social media feed, whether it’s Facebook, LinkedIn, Twitter, Instagram, whatever it is, and you’re seeing other people who have what you think you want to have or they’re displaying things.

As Sam Crowley says, so he’s got the Every Day Is Saturday Podcast. Make sure you check that out. If there’s anything that you want to create in your life or you just want to hear some motivating, exciting podcasts. That guy’s been doing it forever and I love listening to his episodes. Because it’s just so fun and so short and it’s kind of the basis of what I’ve done with this and trying to make it a daily thing. But as Sam Crowley says all the time, it’s not that other people have better lives than you.

It’s just they take better pictures and so that it’s better pictures, better filters, better angles. Um, you know, nowadays online there’s a lot of people like influencers, especially fitness people on Instagram coming out and showing here is the picture with the angles. And the lighting that I take. And then here’s the real world picture and you can see how everyone is more normal.

Nobody is really perfect and how everyone is. But that comparison eats people alive. It can be difficult. I know for myself, I struggle with that where scrolling through Facebook, literally it looks like everybody’s on vacation. Everyone has a giant home, everyone has lots of money, everyone has shiny cars. Everyone’s family is perfect, everyone’s lives are perfect. And what I know is that what people show on the outside is what they want others to see. And that is generally different than what’s happening on the inside.

Everybody, I will tell you this, and I know this to be true. Everybody has something they’re going through. Could be health, finances, relationship work, you know, mental stuff. There’s something that everybody is dealing with. Could be something in their family. Somebody is sick. There’s always a challenge. Everyone’s got something. And for a lot of people it even goes to the extreme.

I know this from myself where I’ve been at many times in my life where there’s things going on behind the scenes in my life that I really don’t even want anybody to know about. I want everybody to, um, uh, not realize what I have going on or see those things, see whatever I’m struggling with, whatever challenges, whatever is eating me alive inside, you know, I want it to be okay on the outside. And so I deal with that as well.

Comparison can really kill it. And I mentioned him the other day and again, whether you’re religious or not, Pastor Steven Furtick, which he has some great things I’ve heard over the years. But one thing he suggests and watch out for is don’t compare other people’s highlight films to your behind the scenes. And what that means is when you scroll through social media or you see somebody out and about, you see someone driving around, you see someone at the store, you see someone at work on the sales floor closing deals or having success.

You don’t compare their highlights, what they want you to see with the dirty nasty behind the scenes crap that you have going on inside reason why I mention all this, not just as a general mindset, kind of an attitude adjustment focus for you to have, but it’s also to keep that in mind.

On the sales floor, I see a lot of people on the sales floor and a sales team at the dealership in the showroom, a, you know, in a call center working home, uh, working at home, Eh, in a remote environment. I see a lot of people who maybe their average and performance or they’re struggling for performance and they see other people closing deals, making money, having success.

Instead of being driven to that and being like, I want to be like John Because John is crushing it and I want to take notes from him. I would love to spend time with him. Maybe I’ll take them out to coffee or lunch. I want to figure out what John is doing so that I can replicate that and get to that level and help myself win better, easier, have more success, and just be generally happier with what I’m doing in the sales environment.

That’s one attitude, but that’s not what most people do. The really driven people will do. They’ll say, I want to sit next to John. Hey manager, please move me next to John. I want to sit next to John. I’m going to absorb everything I can. I want to win. If you have that attitude, you’re doing great. That’s the right approach. If you’re not doing that, then you really want to look at why not?

Because what happens a lot, and this is kind of goes into the discussion I had the other day with the sheep and the crabs and mediocrity is a lot of times we look at our lives, we look at the people that we’re hanging out with, our circle of friends, and then we see someone who is successful and you get kind of in that crab mode where you comparing yourself to them and it’s like, oh, there’s so much further on, or I’m going to try to drag them down, or I don’t even want to hang out with them because there’s so much better than me.

Right.

Do not ever think that anybody is better than you in any way. Now, what could be true is that what they’re doing versus what you’re doing is obviously working but more in line with the fact that maybe that’s more in tune with who they are, their strengths, their skills, abilities, experiences, and their talents overall and so maybe they’re in the right place more than you are.

A lot of times it’s that self awareness and reflection of where should I really be? Like that person is just crushing it. Absolutely crushing it in sales and maybe that’s more of where they should be and maybe I should be in a different department or a different role or selling something different. Maybe you know, big ticket items. Sales is not for me or maybe small ticket sales is not for me and I should be doing bigger stuff.

So try to keep that in mind that it may be a function of the right fit for them versus you. But if it’s apples to apples and you’re both like in the place where you should be, you know that you should be in sales, you know this is a good fit for you, then don’t look at them with envy and jealousy and have that comparison as a negative thing where you feel bad. Right.

Same thing like when you’re scrolling through social media, if you see other people’s success or their highlight films and it makes you feel bad about your current situation, that something to reflect on instead. What I think. And I think what’s more healthy is, hey, that’s great. That’s awesome for them. I’m at a different point in my life. I’m in a different place. Or what can I do to have more of what I want from my goals, where it’s also not a comparison of what somebody else has for their goals.

Cause everybody’s different. Right? And I’ve seen this before, played out where on the sales floor somebody is crushing it, they’re doing great. They have goals they got a family to take care of. And then there’s a younger single guy maybe living at home still. And he’s comparison comparing his kind of goals, his efforts and, and, and the results to other people and saying, well, you know, I’m not married. I don’t have kids. I don’t have a house.

You know, my goals aren’t important. I just want to buy a car. I just want to move out. And that’s not as good. And so there’s this comparison that’s like, I’m less than, instead of my goals are equally important, but they’re different. So remember, we’re all different. When you look at that comparison, when it comes to mindset and success on the floor, remember two things.

One is we’re all different and so what somebody else is doing is different than you.

What their goals are is different than you. You want to make it all about you and what’s important to you and your life at this moment. Then you want to shift your, your mind from comparing other people who are winning the top people on the leaderboard to yourself and feeling bad about yourself and negative about yourself too. Instead going, how can I be like John, what can they do? What is he doing that successful that I can apply to me in my own custom way because I’m different than John, but maybe there’s some things I can learn from. How do I get better at my craft? What do I need to learn and study?

Because one of the things is when you compare yourself to other people who are winning, that should help you say it is possible. Because a lot of people say, well, I can never be like John John’s closing. You know, 40 deals a month or five deals a month or whatever it is for your business and instead you want to go, wow, John’s closing that many sales.

That means it’s possible. I just got to figure out the formula for the same thing that for a longest time nobody thought somebody could run a four minute mile or less and then somebody finally did it and then everyone else realized it was possible and then within months there was a lot of people running even faster than a four minute mile and it just became the snowball effect of belief.

So when you see someone winning, don’t compare and put yourself down. See that and say, I can do that too. It’s possible. If it’s possible, how do I figure it out? Hopefully that helps us. Bonus episode. I appreciate you listening to this.

Hopefully all this is helping you find more success, create more success, create the better sales experience for yourself, where you’re enjoying every single day and what you’re doing, and then also creating and pushing that experience to your customers so that they’re enjoying the process of buying from you. And we’re changing that landscape.

And as always, remember everything in life is sales and people remember the experience you gave them.