How Journaling Can Improve Your Sales

The act of journaling requires you to explore, without censure, your feelings and reactions to any given topic. It is just this freedom from censure that allows you to find new tactics for your sales pitches, and new aspects to your sales career, as well as learn from mistakes.

One of the most important characteristics of good salesmanship is focus. As a salesperson, you need to continually adapt your sales pitch to the conversations you have with your clients. This means listening for the conversational cue, the opportunity to interject a pitch that could close the sale.

At times during your career, you'll realize that you missed an opportunity to close a sale because you missed a conversational cue. By journaling the experience, you've reinforced the lesson learned.

You will also be able to console yourself in your writing. Being able to tell yourself "It's okay" will prevent the collapse of your confidence.

The act of selling requires you to stay on task, monitor everything that comes out of your mouth. Verbal mistakes can cost a sale. As a salesperson, you're likely to have mental guidelines that prevent you from blurting out those "It seemed like a good thing to say at the time" deal killers.

But when you write, you needn't censure yourself. This provides you with the opportunity to think outside the box without risking the sale. This enables you to more safely expand your pitch, and so improve your sales.

For example, if a client had an objection to purchasing the product you hadn't encountered before, you my have been caught off guard. You didn't have anything in your sales pitch to counter it. You can write about it later, recording the conversation and your reactions to it. Most likely, you will come up with something you might have said to overcome that objection.

This may seem like locking the barn door after the horse has fled, but chances are, you'll encounter this objection, or one similar to it, again. Next time, you won't be caught off guard. Next time, you will make the sale.

You should also write about your successes, congratulating yourself on how well you did with a particularly difficult client, or for reaching your weekly sales goal. This positive reinforcement will give you confidence in your abilities. For salespeople, confidence is as essential as a good pen and a calculator.

Keeping a sales journal allows you to develop your sales career. Having a written record of your wins and losses, your good days and bad days, allows you to assess your growth as a salesperson. It enables you to analyze your techniques, and build on what works for you.

A sales journal can act much like a business plan in determining your career path. Writing down your goals makes them more concrete, and so become realistic goals.

Is your goal to become director or vice-president for the sales department? Then write down your observations of those who already achieved those positions. What makes them successful? What would you do differently? This will help crystallize who you are as a salesperson and how you can achieve your goals.

Journaling can improve your sales by providing you with personal insight, providing a written record of your mindset as a salesperson. This insight is derived through unedited and uncensored writings, and so becomes a true guide to your career goals. And for every salesperson, that's making the sale.