In James Clear’s book Atomic Habits, he references a story from the University of Florida that struck me a few weeks ago:
On the first day of class, Jerry Uelsmann, a professor at the University of Florida, divided his film photography students into two groups.
Everyone on the left side of the classroom, he explained, would be in the “quantity” group. They would be graded solely on the amount of work they produced. On the final day of class, he would tally the number of photos submitted by each student. One hundred photos would rate an A, ninety photos a B, eighty photos a C, and so on.
Meanwhile, everyone on the right side of the room would be in the “quality” group. They would be graded only on the excellence of their work. They would only need to produce one photo during the semester, but to get an A, it had to be a nearly perfect image.
At the end of the term, he was surprised to find that all the best photos were produced by the quantity group. During the semester, these students were busy taking photos, experimenting with composition and lighting, testing out various methods in the darkroom, and learning from their mistakes. In the process of creating hundreds of photos, they honed their skills.
Meanwhile, the quality group sat around speculating about perfection. In the end, they had little to show for their efforts other than unverified theories and one mediocre photo.
While many sales leaders may disagree with the approach, the story above outlines a key sales philosophy that has stood the test of time: the volume of customer touchpoints creates value (not the other way around.)
First, value is a product of consistency.
If we ask ourselves why we buy from the same brands and people over and over again, I’d be willing to bet that at least one of the factors is because we found consistency in the experience (e.g. the tall, non-fat, mocha latte at Starbucks; our favorite pair of Levi’s jeans; the 13th generation iPhone). We rationalize paying $8 for a latte, $98 for jeans, and $1,200 for the phone because we believe that the consistent and reliable value that we’ve experienced over the course of multiple purchases and interactions exceeds the price. In short, everything is expensive in the absence of value.
Sales takeaway: how often (frequency) we get in front of both prospective customers and existing customers has a strong connection to the value with which we add. Is the standing every-thirty-days call enough, or are there ways to continuously add value and be proactive between those moments of connection? Quantity first.
Second, volume creates value over time.
Circling back to the story from James Clear at the start of this post, “…in the process of creating hundreds of photos, they honed their skills…”
The prerequisites for any sales role for which I hire requires three (3) things: competency, coachability, and most importantly, resilience. While some like to think that every call to a new or existing customer is of the absolute best quality, we are human — and we all have good days and not-so-good days. A customer call that we have on Monday at 8AM is different than a call we have on Thursday at 2PM. All calls can’t be winners.
In order to become better than we were yesterday, to hit a quota that seems everything but attainable, to become an excellent sales professional — we need to hone our skills and continuously practice our craft so that the value we bring becomes greater with every future call. Think about all the objections we’ve overcome, all the contracts we’ve signed, and proposals we’ve presented — all those learnings (that history) contributes to the value we create for our customers.
Sales takeaway: our customers will ultimately benefit from a growth mindset and our first-hand stories of successes and challenges. What could happen if we added a few more calls to our calendar every week? Do the chances of us adding value to our customers’ experiences go up or down? Quantity first.
Lastly, repetition breeds familiarity.
When I was interviewing for my first entry level sales job in 2007, I asked the hiring manager what the best sales reps do to be successful. He said “the person who makes the most calls, sends out the most emails, and puts in the most effort to get their name out there will inevitably be successful.”
In a world where all brands are created equal, when given the choice to buy something from a brand that is foreign versus a brand that is familiar, humans will gravitate to the familiar 9 out of 10 times.
So, how does one become familiar? By repeatedly getting in front of your audience. Now, there are countless brand recall studies in the digital marketing world (which we won’t go over here), but the same principle applies for us in sales: being top of mind (read: being memorable) during a customer’s moment of need is a result of a consistent effort to stay in front of them over time.
Sales takeaway: We know that “people buy from people they trust” (it sounds like such a cliche, but as my friend Steve Taylor says, “It’s a cliche because it’s true.”) but how often are we getting in front of new and existing customers to build that trust? Once a quarter? Once a month?” What can we do to stay top of mind and become more familiar with those in our target buying audiences? Quantity first.
Look, there is substance and merit in focusing on the value in which we provide to customers. However, customers won’t see the value unless we put it in front of them consistently and repeatedly over time. So, in order to truly demonstrate value to our customers, we first must start with the volume in which we interact.
Let’s get after it.
KL
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