The Sales Stoic

April 7th - Review and adjust, routinely

5 min

Actionable tips:

  • Regularly review your sales strategies and ask if there’s a better way. Staying curious helps you innovate and improve.
  • Instead of seeing shifting circumstances as barriers, view them as a chance to adapt and grow. Adjust your approach with each client to see what resonates.
  • When faced with rejection, don’t default to frustration, ask yourself, ‘What can I learn from this?’ Treat every ‘no’ as valuable feedback that helps refine your pitch and approach.

“There are two things that hold people back: overconfidence and doubt. Overconfidence makes you think there's nothing more to learn, while doubt convinces you that happiness is impossible in the chaos of life.” - Epictetus

A rigid mindset, whether arrogance or cynicism, holds you back. The best reps adapt, stay curious, and embrace change.

Overconfidence makes you think you have nothing left to learn while doubt convinces you success isn’t possible.

Both limit your growth.

Just like top companies pivot to stay ahead, sales pros who adjust their approach also uncover new opportunities.

Stay open. Stay flexible. That’s how you win.

Remember you will die.

Subscribe to The Sales Stoic for daily insights: https://www.dealfront.com/resources/newsletters/the-sales-stoic/

Follow Jack & Zac: Jack: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jack-frimston-5010177b/ Zac: https://www.linkedin.com/in/zac-thompson-33a9a39b/

Connect with We Have a Meeting: LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/company/we-have-a-meeting/ Website: https://www.wehaveameeting.com/

Disclaimer:

The Sales Stoic draws inspiration from the profound wisdom of Stoicism as presented in Ryan Holiday's "The Daily Stoic." As avid readers & fans, we deeply respect the work of Ryan Holiday, and acknowledge the significant impact of Stoic philosophy on our own approach to sales and life.

While The Sales Stoic applies the core principles of Stoicism to the unique challenges and opportunities faced by salespeople, it is an original work with its own distinct voice and focus. We aim to build upon the timeless wisdom of Stoicism to empower sales professionals with practical guidance and actionable insights for success in their careers and personal lives.

  • Jack Frimston

    Jack Frimston

    Co-Founder at We Have a Meeting

  • Zac Thompson

    Zac Thompson

    Co-Founder at We Have a Meeting

Can you feel it? Can you feel it? Can you feel it? Sorry for the sound at home. It's the 7th of April. Flexibility... you nearly did it. Is your sales superpower. Right? Superpower. Pow, pow, pow. 7th of April. There are two things that must be rooted out in human beings. Arrogant opinion and mistrust.

Arrogant opinion expects that there is nothing further needed and mistrust assumes that under the torrent of circumstance They can be no happiness epic teachers epic teachers Flexibility so let's talk about this because what this isn't saying is you should Chop and change your sales processes every single day But what I see sometimes with sales teams when we're coaching or we're working in giving training They'll have a script one day, then they'll have another script

Then they'll have another script. Then they'll have a different opener. Then they'll try a different thing. It's very tick tock. They've seen one thing on the ticky tocky then they're swapping it. Flexibility is knowing what you want to achieve, but being flexible with the ways that are going to get you there and not being stupid. If, if you do the same thing over and over again and you're not getting any different results, that's insanity. Flexibility is when you're flexible with those. Nice. I think you did that. think,

One of the things that I think we see a lot of on LinkedIn is people in the comments, you someone's put like, this is my opener. This is the question and structure I use and his results I get from it. And people in the comments like that wouldn't work. You want to do this thing. This this is my hill to down. This is my thing without realizing it's horses for courses. person might be the relationship builder. One person might be the challenger. One person might be a little bit more Sandler.

It's finding what works for you. That's the game of selling. There is no right and wrong. And the only thing you should know is that you know nothing. Cold calling doesn't work. Say it again. Cold calling doesn't work. And say cold calling. Cold calling. It all sounds the same doesn't it? doesn't sound the same. Cold calling doesn't work. They haven't completed that sentence have they, Zach? No. What is the full sentence? The full sentence is for me. Cold calling. That's not the full sentence. Sorry. Cold calling doesn't work.

for me. That's the full sentence. calling. So people are saying this and I know that we sometimes get Larry and say, cold email sucks. And what we might mean is cold email sucks for me. But what we're trying to say is cold calling is the goat. But no, what I'm trying to say is being flexible with everything. Like understanding, okay, I'm going to run at this, but actually if this isn't working, I need to know that actually there might be another way to take this.

or a different journey or a different path, but actually you're still moving towards the same goal. Yes, exactly. Let's just go back a step very quickly. Say cool. Cool. Say cold. Cold. Say cool. Cool. Say cool, cold, cool. Cool, cold, cool. You actually got better at that. Thank you. I feel like you've outed me. I've been working on my diction. You have. You work on your what? So how else do you think salespeople can use

flexibility as a superpower on their day-to-day basis? Well, the big one is going to be if you're selling to different ICPs, your approach should be somewhat flexible. The result might be the same, right? I might ring a CEO, not much time on the hands, with a different opener that I ring a marketing director with, but perhaps they're all part of the same decision-making tree. So I was to ring a marketing director, I might say...

Is that a really tricky task for you? Could help me with something. Can I tell you very quickly what I've called? If it's completely irrelevant, I won't bother you again. Yeah. But CEO, I'd say Jack, I'll be honest. You probably get loads of these is a cold call. Do you want to hang up on me now or let me have 30 seconds? nice. Two very different openers that hopefully match the ICP. And there should be some flexibility there. But you see the outcome I'm looking for is still the same. I get my 30 seconds to tell them, you know, those problems you've got on the tool?

And I think the, the thing is like, you might have a mobile number of a CEO. If you can't get him on his phone, how's he going to get to be flexible with your methods? Yeah. Pigeon direct mail, pigeon, direct mail, maybe pigeon or direct mail. You've just got to be flexible with all of those different methods. You know, I'm just going to keep adding those little AI bits. I've been Jack Frimston. I've been Zach Thompson. Remember you would die.

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