I recently came across a video on YouTube saying that 75% of self-made billionaires had some sort of direct sales experience before making their fortune. The guy who created the video had experiences in door to door sales and can definitely say that these skills can lead to massive success.
Work ethic
The first thing that you learn from working in direct sales is a strong belief work ethic. Most direct sales job work on commission which means you get paid depending on how much you sell. Since customers are not handed to you, you have to actively look for them by making calls, sending out emails or even knocking on doors. A direct sales environment makes you really believe that if you work harder, you will definitely make more money. Seeing this on a day to day basis causes you to develop a really strong work ethic. However, most people don't actually have a strong internal belief in work ethic. This is because most people work in places where it does not really matter how hard you work. For example, a cashier who serves 5 more customers per hour will not get paid more that the average cashier, a nurse who goes out of her way to help patients still gets paid the same amount. When you work in a place that does not reward work ethic, you stop believing in it. You will normally think why should you work harder when you won't get rewarded. You don't have the internal belief or the discipline needed to chase after your goals. On the other hand, if you spend a decent amount of time in sales, you start to really believe that the harder you work, the more you will get rewarded. This makes you more discipline and more willing to work hard on something that may or may not reward you. So its no surprise that most self made billionaires have some sales experience.
Social Skills
In door to door sales, the guy would knock on a door and if somebody opened, he would take up to 5 minutes to convince them that he was a good person. This meant that his social skills had to be fine tuned. You need to sound confident otherwise people won't take you seriously. You need to show people that you care about them in order for people to trust you and on top of that, you need to be funny and relatable in order for the person to help you. Generally, you need to become the person's friend in about 5 minutes. This means that if you can't form a good relationship in a short period of time, you will never make any sales. Well, how does this relate to the self made billionaire? If you are a likeable person, people would love to help you out by purchasing your products. Business owners are more likely to work with you and most importantly you will have a large network. There is a famous saying that says that your network is your net-worth.
Rejection
The 3rd skill is learning on how to deal with rejection. When you are doing door to door sales, you are not under any supervision. There is no boss to look after you seeing if you are sending more emails or knocking on more doors and because of this, there is always a struggle going inside your head. A part of you know that you need to continue to knock on more doors to make more sales but then, there is always that part that constantly telling you to give up by using excuses such as the neighborhood, the weather or the product itself and just call it a day. All of this comes in direct link with how you take rejection. Rejection comes in many form. You will be yelled at or have doors slammed in your face. Overtime, as you continue to work in sales, you will start to become more resistant to rejection. We care so much about what everyone else think that we stick to what everyone else does because that is the only way to avoid rejection. Remember that success can only be achieved if you take risks. You must be brave enough to face your fear of rejection. You should never stop trying even after getting rejected over and over again.
This means that working in sales can really change your life because of the 3 skills that it teaches. It teaches you that working harder will get you better results. It teaches you the social skills you need to build a business. It also teaches you how to deal with rejection and negativity. So these 3 skills are definitely crucial for reaching that level of success.
Check out other self improvement videos on from the same person on his YouTube channel: https://www.youtube.com/channel/UCBIt1VN5j37PVM8LLSuTTlw/videos
Great post, i have been doing Door to Door sales for over 20yrs, i think i have sold almost every product that can be sold Door to Door LOL.
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