5 Words That Will Make Your Sales Suck

I really don’t get excited about accounting & finance, but today was amazing because I thought someone had paid-it-forward on my bank statement. I was mentally halfway packed for a fabulous vacation when something annoying caught my attention. Digging up my prior months’ financial statements made it clear that my windfall was a mistake—a mistake that resulted from an earlier mistake made by the bank that I had spent hours correcting the month before…and the month before that.

I called my financial person. She knows me. I explained the situation and she said that she would “try again” (up-spoken) to fix it. Was it a question that she would even try? I told her not to bother since I would be happy to “keep the change” as long as it was legal and she and her company didn’t mind.

She chuckled and then she said the magic words—the magic words that for so many, have turned hard work and great service into sucky sales results.

 All I can do is…

“All I can do is…”
She said those words!

She then proceeded to tell me a whole lot of what she would do to try (up-spoken) to fix it. Really, what she was doing was a lot. I couldn’t even imagine anything else that someone providing top-notch service would or could do. I really tried to imagine what I was not getting because she put it in my head that I wasn’t getting the best.

Because the minute she diminished her tremendous efforts by implying that there was more someone else could do (All I can do is…), or there was more that could be done (All I can do is…), I was no longer giving her credit for being anything other than not as good as she probably is.

She unsold herself.

We want to buy from people who sell themselves by providing value, and we’re just too damn busy to work hard to hunt for that value. We want it to be obvious.

Even when credit is due it’s hard to get credit for the value you provide. Sometimes it’s because the credit-givers are stingy—they just don’t value you or they’re too selfish. Sometimes it’s because the credit-getting opportunity is squandered.