Sales Secret #5: Manage Their Head Trash

Sales superstars manage their head trash. Head trash is the negative beliefs we all have about our abilities, our marketplace, our products, and ourselves. Sales superstars realize that most head trash is untrue and don’t let these negative thoughts affect their behavior.

Poor salespeople are at the mercy of their head trash. They let their negative beliefs dictate what they do and how they do it. This affects their ability to make hard decisions and gutsy moves that are necessary. Sales superstars manage head trash and never let it affect what they need to do to move the sale forward.

Research has shown over 80% of what we say to ourselves is negative self-talk. We are our own biggest critic. The most successful sales people find ways of dealing with this self-talk.

Some examples of head trash are: “I can’t call at the C level, I have to talk to purchasing agents.” “I need to have an immediate answer when asked a question.” These are only a couple examples; head trash comes in numerous forms. They all have one thing in common. They hinder our performance. Sales superstars excel because they reprogram their thoughts and do the behavior that nets the best results.

We must find ways of dealing with head trash. The outside world gives us enough negative feelings about ourselves, don’t let head trash contribute to additional negative ideas. Have a system to “take out the trash.” In our workshops we discuss a six-step process to dealing with head trash.

1. Develop an awareness of head trash and commit to changing it.
2. Create a new and healthy more supportive belief.
3. List the actions that someone with this new belief would take.
4. Do the actions, regardless of how they make you feel.
5. Track and measure the results.
6. Review the new belief daily.

By managing head trash we can stay on course and do what’s necessary to move the sales process forward.