Do you want to be a millionaire? Come on now, don’t give the recession excuse. There are many companies including Disney, GE, and Microsoft that were started and blossomed during past recessions. No matter where you are in your life, you can still be what you wish to be. Napoleon Hill said this in his book Think and Grow Rich, which was written in 1937 after interviewing 500 multimillionaires. He helped people, particularly sales people to become a millionaire with the help of his Sage advice. You too can become a millionaire. And you can become one with sales as a profession.
All business owners have good sales acumen and many have solid grounding in salesmanship. Some are trained in sales and others have honed their innate sales abilities to perfection.
William Wrigley Jr. was a traveling salesman. He sold baking soda. As a premium, he offered chewing gum to his baking soda customers. The customers liked the chewing gum so much that they were interested more in the gum than the soda. The salesman decided to manufacture chewing gum instead. And the rest as you know is history. Wrigley dominated the gum industry and the salesman became one of the richest men in America.
Ray Kroc was a milk shake machine salesman. He was the one that created the McDonald’s franchise system and became very wealthy as a result of that. The McDonald brothers had entered into a huge debt and Ray Kroc purchased the small burger house in New York City from them. He kept the name unchanged and started franchises of the burger house, first in the USA and then all over the entire world. Today there are over 200,000 McDonald outlets all over the world.
Lee Ka Shing is one of the wealthiest men in Hong Kong. He started working at a very young age when his father died. By the time he was 20 he had worked at several odd jobs. He entered direct marketing at the age of 20. He became a millionaire with the direct selling business.
Even inventors that became wealthy with innovative products acknowledge the importance of sales. They know that without good sales strategies they cannot survive for long even if they have a unique product or service. Both Bill Gates and Warren Buffet are well versed in the nuances of sales apart from their core skill of software development and investment respectively.
A good salesman is ever alert for business possibilities both with the product that he is selling as well as the possibilities existing outside. Through the process of selling he develops a passion to spot the potential to make money. Salesmanship brings out that acumen to spot possibilities.
The spirit to spot an opportunity and seize it to become rich by a salesman (sales boy, rather) is well captured and depicted in the latest Oscar award winner, “Slum dog millionaire”. A poor chai walah (tea beverage seller) selling hot cups of tea to call centre workers becomes a millionaire in the Bollywood movie. It doesn’t happen by chance. To woo his childhood lady love and get her attention he participates in the Indian equivalent of “Who wants to become a millionaire”. The only way he can catch her attention is to participate in the TV program and stay there longer because she watches the show regularly.
The movie opens with the salesman taking a seat in the game show facing a mean, cruel, and unctuous host. He answers each question and is just one question away from winning the 20 million rupees grand prize when the show ends for the day. The game show host is sure that the salesman who has been raised amidst squalor and exploitation is cheating. He tips off the police and the poor salesman is whisked away for interrogation. But the gritty salesman explains braving torture, like explaining each scar on his face, how each question in the show has answers in some turn of his life, including his stint as a tea beverage seller. The authorities are impressed by the authenticity and let him go to participate in the show the next day to answer the final question. He does answer the final question and wins the 20 million grand prize as well as his lady love.
The movie captures the fierce will to survive and win, qualities found in successful sales persons. Sales training can help prepare such fighting and winning attitudes. The real and reel life stories can be replicated with sales motivational training. But are you prepared for it?
