Attitude and Conviction Affect Your Close Rate — Here’s Why

Attitude and Conviction Affect Your Close Rate — Here’s Why

Sales is the transfer of conviction and inspiration: The person who is most certain during the interaction will win.

Why? Because your prospect is uncertain. Which means your sales conversation will either inspire in them the certainty to say yes — or it will reinforce their uncertainty, and they will say no.

As a seller, your success rests in your attitude: your complete conviction that your solution is the best in the world for your customer.

Related: 3 Steps to Transform Your Mindset in Sales and Overcome Any Challenge

How I know: My first 70,000 hours of selling

Malcolm Gladwell famously said it takes 10,000 hours of practice to attain mastery. I’ve been selling to B2B for over 35 years — that’s more than 70,000 hours of practice.

But I didn’t recognize my true purpose or the power of leading with conviction until I was in my mid-50’s. And that realization changed everything.

I didn’t recognize the power of leading with conviction until I was in my mid-50’s. And that realization changed everything.

I had to ask myself, what shows up for other people when I show up with conviction? The answer was empowerment.

And once I recognized how I could tap into my own power, my success became unstoppable.

Related: 170 Women in Sales Share Their Career-Defining Aha Moment

When you have conviction for what you are selling, buyers know

According to a recent study from the Sales Insight Lab, 51% of top-performing salespeople know they are top performers: They have the confidence, attitude and conviction to walk into a sales meeting knowing exactly the problem they are helping to solve.

On a sales call, attitude and conviction are your two superpowers.

Buyers will pick up on your attitude. Always good to do a quick check before making a sales call.

Be relaxed and ready to serve with a positive attitude — and the conviction that if your solution is a good fit, you will be direct and honest with the prospect to persuade them to walk across the bridge toward their transformation.

The stronger your conviction, your belief and expectancy in yourself, the client, and your solution, the easier it is for your client to walk across and say yes.

Related: Entrepreneurial Selling: The Simple Mindset Shift That Wins More Deals

Your attitude is your energy field, and when you align and connect with your client’s needs to serve a need they can feel it. It’s important to put your self-interests aside and be mentally ready to serve that potential customer.

Related: Body Language and Video for Sellers: Tips and Video Examples

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Learn how to show up to calls with the right body language and attitude — even on video. (5 min read)

6 tips to channel conviction and the right attitude in sales

1. Be persistent

Persistence is one of the most important qualities a sales professional can possess. Can you guess how many sales are closed at the first meeting? A staggering 2%.

And since 48% of salespeople don’t even follow up, how can you expect to make a sale if you aren’t persistent?

Related: The Golden Retriever Mindset: Break Into Your Key Accounts

Going on one sales call is just the first step. Think of your sales process as a pole. On the left is the stage where you identify your prospects for your sales funnel and begin to develop rapport and trust. On the right is the number of customers who said yes.

Your persistent attitude is what moves buyers from the left to the right.

Your sales have gestation periods. Allow the seeds to take root and grow, and harvest at the appropriate time. Give them the attention and nourishment they need. Create value; it’s the constant nourishment that brings a sale to life.

Related: Losing Big Deals? Fix These 5 Sales Process Fails

2. Embrace uncertainty: Trade your expectation for appreciation

Every prospect and every sale is unique. You should prepare for every sales call — but going in with a rigid plan will lead to confusion when things run off course. More critically, it will prevent you from truly accessing the problem that your customer needs solved.

When we have the attitude of embracing uncertainty, we allow solutions to spontaneously emerge.

When we have the attitude of embracing uncertainty, we allow solutions to spontaneously emerge.

My advice is to trade your expectations for appreciation. Sales is an infinite game that changes often. Embrace uncertainty, embrace the gifts from every game, and experience freedom to create value continually, regardless of circumstances.

Stay in the spirit of selling and enjoy the evolution.

3. Find your passion and conviction

Would you believe that only 17.6% of salespeople rate their job satisfaction as “outstanding”?

That right there tells us that perhaps 82.4% of salespeople should consider switching fields. You can’t fake it when it comes to sales. You must have a passion for your job and sell with conviction for your product or service.

Knowing your passion is knowing how you are best suited to serve humanity. In sales, our passion translates into asking yourself, “How can I help,” vs. “What’s in it for me?”

When your passion matches with the needs of humanity (or in this case, your customer), you will experience wealth and abundance.

As I mentioned above, it wasn’t until later in my career that I learned how to find my purpose and tap into my strength.

So I can tell you from personal experience that when you understand your purpose and align it with your career in sales, you will have the inspiration and desire to be in the spirit of selling on a daily basis.

Related: 77 Motivational Sales Quotes To Inspire Your Team in 2023

4. Set goals

In the book, What They Don’t Teach You at Harvard Business School, Mark McCormack tells of a study conducted between 1979 and 1989 with graduates of the MBA program at Harvard.

84% of the graduates had no specific goals other than graduation and enjoying their summer.

13% had meaningful worthy goals, but they weren’t written down.

3% of the graduates had written goals and plans.

Ten years later, the 13% who had formed the habit of setting goals earned twice as much as the 84% who did not set goals.

And the 3%? They earned on average, 10x more than the others. 

Related: How to Set the Right Goals For Sales Reps (With Examples)

Goals declare the direction you will move in. They set an intention and help you to pursue your desires. Goals give order to the movement.

Selling is about creating value for customers, persuading clients to move in a direction toward their promised land. Selling is directing movement. Think of yourself in the role of a value creator because that is what the true sales pros are.

Sales goals force us to think and utilize the laws and rules of the game to create, how to give order and direction to the movement.

Whatever you conceive, believe, desire and feel is realized in your experience. A goal achiever knows that his mind creates his world.

5. Develop your strengths

What is it that you do well, and how can you do it better?

We all have talents, but we forget to use another gift we have: time.

Do you invest your time or spend it? I believe the use of time is one of the greatest opportunities for sales people. 

If you measure how much time you invest in selling, calling, contacting, following up and persuading, you’d find the percentage of time used in the best way to actually be quite small. Forbes did a study in 2017 and it showed that salespeople actually spent about one-third of their day selling.

If you made just a 10% shift in time investment over a year, you would cause a quantum leap in your sales performance.

Your strengths are your gifts. Ask yourself, “How well am I investing my talents, time and my mind on a daily basis?”

I’m confident that if you truly consider that question, you will hit a golden vein of opportunity for yourself. Develop your strengths and watch your selling confidence and conviction rise.

Related: How to Thrive in Your Sales Career as an Introvert

6. Learn from your losses

If you sow good seeds, you will reap a good harvest. If you sow bad ones, you reap a bad harvest.

If you are having trouble selling and you don’t know why, look in the mirror. 

Never come from a place of need when you are selling. When you come from a place of need, you will lose. Always come from a place of abundance. That is where your power is.

The truth is that sometimes you will lose. Just like in nature, a hailstorm can destroy a good crop. When that happens, look for the good. Never beat yourself up. Failure is feedback.

If your sale fails and your results are not what you expected, use some time to reflect and do some introspection on your behavior.

Did you ask the prospect the right questions?

Did you meet all the players?

Did you uncover the need and motives?

Did you sell yourself, the company and product with conviction?

Did you ask for a commitment?

How much value did you create?

Who else can you serve?

All of this requires THINKING. Remember, if we don’t use our mental muscles, we lose them. In the end, as a salesperson, you’re always sowing. And it’s important to note that you do not sow and reap in the same season. 

Conclusion, with attitude and conviction

Know this, if you are giving and serving others with the use of your talents; the good you sow will come back to you multiplied. It’s a compounding process that operates by law. Following these tips will help you set the right attitude toward yourself, others and circumstances and develop a conviction of certainty that will close the sale more often than not.


Edited by Kendra Fortmeyer @ Sales Hacker 2023

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