11 bad behaviors of salespeople

As we head into a new year, it’s a good time to reflect on a few behaviors you may have that are actually submarining your sales. Things a sales manager may never point out.

Now, some of you may not like these, but you need to know they’re costing you:

1. Enjoying a cigarette moments before an appointment.
2. Wearing heavy cologne and/or excessive jewelry.
3. Driving a highbrow car in a lowbrow industry.
4. Swearing in front of customers.
5. Talking poorly of your behind-the-scenes support personnel.
6. Interrupting your buyer for any reason.
7. Calling buyers back the next day.
8. Arguing with people for the sake of being right, or worse, for the sake of arguing.
9. Under-dressing for customer contact or looking generally disorganized.
10. Underestimating the smell of coffee breath vs. brushing your teeth and eating a normal breakfast.
11. Calling executives of your customers “the suits” and refusing to get to know them.

You can, of course, ignore these and assume that all is well. And you’ll avoid the pain of knowing that any one of these have cost you a sale in 2006.

Or you can admit that you’ve got shortcomings that may be costing you money.