You Need to Stop Selling

After you’ve launched your business, the day will come when it is time to start knocking on doors and selling.

When that day comes, your first inclination will probably be to dash out to buy every book you can find about selling. If you can absorb all the powerful advice they contain from their powerful-looking authors, you will be moving your product quickly, right? Well maybe yes. But probably not.

You see, attempting to identify the traits of the perfect salesperson is a waste of time. All you need is to understand your own strengths and perfect them. I’ve been the top salesperson at every company where I’ve ever worked. I’ve won awards, grossed the highest profits and opened a lot of doors. And I did this by being true to myself - by understanding my instinctive talents and strengths and by becoming friends with everyone around me.

Sales is about having a good time and making as many friends as possible. So enjoy what you do. Because when you do, it shows and customers will buy, for a very simple reason:

People Want to Do Business with Their Friends

This is really simple. To make more sales, make more friends. That’s it. Just be likeable. If you do, your customers will buy from you over the next guy. I guarantee that even if you’re more expensive than the next gal or guy, they’ll be happy to pay for your product or service.

If you’re not likeable, then you really shouldn’t be in sales. You need to be in accounting or some other job where it doesn’t really matter if you’re liked.

Once you’ve established friendship, you’ll establish trust. You’ll be seen as an advisor. As a consultant. And you need to become a consultant to your client. Not a salesperson. Not a rep. Not an account manager. A consultant. And the first step in becoming that trusted advisor, that consultant, is to first to become a friend.

The bottom line is that people do business with people they like and people they trust. The product or service is often secondary.

So talk friendly, not professionally. Listen to people and help them solve problems. If you are a real friend, you might never have to think about the word “selling” again.

by Sean Yazbeck

Sean Yazbeck is newly appointed professor of entrepreneurship and leadership at Trump University. He is familiar to audiences worldwide as the winner of The Apprentice's fifth-season competition, in which he outdistanced 17 other candidates and beame the only one to hear the words, "You're hired!" from Donald J. Trump.

Sean was born and raised in London, England, and moved to the US in 1999. He resides in Miami, where he is a director of business development for a recruitment consultancy registered on the London Stock Exchange. Sean has brokered multimillion dollar deals wtih Fortune 500 companies in more than 20 global locations.

Too Much Self-Esteem?

Recently, a new study found that today’s college students are more narcissistic and self-centered than ever before. The psychologists who conducted the research blamed the trend, in part, to the fact that the current generation of American parents are constantly telling their children how wonderful they are the whole time they’re growing up.

“We need to stop endlessly repeating ‘You’re special’ and having children repeat that back,” said lead author Jean Twenge of San Diego State University.

It’s not that we don’t want our children to think that they’re special. It’s just that we give them such an inflated sense of self-worth and we make them think they can accomplish anything and everything that they often feel they don’t even have to try in life. They feel they can do anything without making much of an effort.

And this translates into real life. I define myself as being “cautiously positive.” People who say, “You can do anything you want,” are simply unrealistic. Some things are just not possible. For example, if I thought today I could become an Olympic gold medal swimmer, I’d need a shrink more than I’d need a swimming coach. No matter how many lessons I take, how hard I train, or how many steroids I consume, it’ll never happen.

We all encounter roadblocks, obstacles that block our progress. Some of them are surmountable. But most often, we have options if we remain positive. We can’t all do everything we want. But when we encounter problems, we can walk away, climb over, go around, or go under them. If we keep our focus and momentum intact, we’ll be able to achieve our goals.

by Donald J. Trump
Donald J. Trump is Chairman of Trump University.

Why Business Smarts Are Investing Smarts

A great quote from Warren Buffett goes: "I'm a better investor because I'm a businessman, and I'm a better businessman because I'm a better investor." So let me tell you how to be a better investor by being better at business.

Business knowledge varies among these three kinds of people:

1. Non-Investors: They expect that someone (such as their parents, their kids, a spouse, a company, or the government) will take care of them when their working days are over.
2. Passive Investors: They turn their money over to someone or some organization, such as a mutual fund, to manage. It's the passive investor who tends to believe the financial planners' mantra of "work hard, save money, get out of debt, invest for the long term, and diversify."
3. Active Investors: These people tend to manage their own portfolios and assets, as well as hand-picking their advisors, who are not brokers or sales people. To be a successful active investor requires a higher financial IQ, more real world entrepreneurial business experience, and a very smart advisory team.

For non-investors and passive investors, investing is risky. The main reason is because these two groups of people have no control over the investments they're involved in. While active investors know there's risk, they also realize that the greater the control they have, the less the risk.

Getting a Grip on Business

What do I mean by control? Let me illustrate using the example of driving a car. To be a safe driver, there are six basic controls we all must have:

1. Steering wheel
2. Gas pedal
3. Brakes
4. Gear shift
5. Driver's education/license
6. Insurance

You wouldn't drive a car if you didn't have any one of the above controls. Yet, when it comes to investing, this is what most people do -- they invest without having any influence over the six basic controls of investing or a business:

1. Income
2. Expenses
3. Asset value
4. Liabilities
5. Financial education/management
6. Insurance

The reason Warren Buffett says he's a better investor is because he's a businessman who has control of those six levers of a business. In other words, he can tell how good an investment is by how well management manipulates these basic controls. In most of his investments, Buffett doesn't just buy an equity position, he does his best to buy control of the business.