Interview with a Sales Coach Expert (Aaron Chong): Episode 7

Terence:

Okay, Aaron, as your marketer, I know we’ve brought in tens of thousands of people into your webinars and you’ve personally coach like, I don’t know how many people, but a lot of people in sales. Well, what do you see as, is the number one mistake that people make in sales?

Aaron:

Wow, that’s a great question, Terence. I think a lot of people have been asking me this as well. What’s the number one mistake that you should be avoiding in sales? Now, after looking at a lot of salespeople that I’ve coached so far, I would say the number one mistake that I always, always see that people falls into that is very detrimental to the sales that every single time is they focus on the mistake itself. 

It’s a it’s a mistake of focus, right? So before I tell you that when they do it, then it will it will cause them to take all the wrong actions and they’ll and they’ll look at themselves and they think to themself, oh, I’m useless. I, I this sales is not for me. Right. And it caused them to fail very badly. And until a certain point they don’t even want to do sales anymore. Right. If your sales is hard and the problem is this, the number one mistake is, is they focus on the results and it’s that tough. 

But the thing is, if you focus on the results. You’re pushing to get the results. And if you’ve pushed to get the results, the results will run away. It’s the law again. So what happened is, in order to avoid these mistakes, one should focus on the process. 

Why? Because the result is a byproduct of you practicing the process. That’s a number one mistake that kills a lot of sales people. Sales because a lot of times I talk to them, right? They keep on talking to me about their results and the results. They want to reach this. They want to reach this. A lot of people want to have the easy way out. I want to get the result, but they’re not willing to do the things. They don’t know, what things they need to focus on, and they’re not being taught so as well.

So sometimes it’s not their fault. So to me, if I focus on, let’s say today you want to have six packs, just imagine yourself every single morning. You wake up and you tell yourself, I want to have six pack, I want to have six packs, I want to have six pack tomorrow. I’m going to have six pack tomorrow. I’m going to have six packs. Tell yourself for ten years you’re focusing on the results, isn’t it? Tell yourself for ten years. People say your mind controls your body, right? No, I’m going to have to expect tomorrow. I’m going to have to expect tomorrow. Wake up. I’m going to have six pack. For ten years. You do that. Do you think you’re going to have six packs?

Terence: No.

Aaron: And why do people still focus on it?

Terence: No idea.

Aaron: Exactly. They don’t know. So here’s the thing. If I would have six packs and I don’t focus on that, I say I don’t care whether I have six pax or not. But every single day I say I focus on the process. Now, today, how many push ups I must do, how many sit ups, how many crunches I must do. Right? I have a target of doing 30, 40, 50 crunches a day. I don’t care whether I do. I have 1000 crunches I want to do. 

Then I can slot in whenever I just focus on a process. When I’m free, I just do 5%. When I’m free. When I just do five crunches sit ups. Do you think within the next 5 to 10 years I would have more abs than the person telling them? Focus on the process. You know, I want to get six packs six packs six packs, but I did not focus on the process. I did not focus on the on the result. Sorry. So if I don’t focus on results and focus on the process and I keep doing it, the six pack will be a byproduct.

Terence:  absolutely.

Aaron: Of that process that I’ve been through.

Aaron: Yeah. So you focus on having a healthy life, healthy diet and healthy sleep and exercise. You have a much, much better chance of getting a six pack.

Terence: Absolutely. And that’s true.

Aaron: Well, to a certain extent, right. Healthy life is a goal that we it’s a it’s a journey. It’s a goal that people want to go. But how do you want to have a healthy life? So it comes down to processes. So if you bring it down to the activism process that they can do to have a healthy life, for instance, if you go to a supermarket, if you want to be able to have a healthy life and to show a six pack because the goal is to reduce the fat in order to show your muscle definition, you can do sit up for ten years and you won’t have any muscle definition is because your fat is covering it. So in order to do that, you must reduce the fat, right? 

So in order to reduce the fat, you must eat healthily. So in order for you to eat healthy, the goal is to have that. Then you go to supermarket. So some of the processes that I do, I won’t walk towards any snack aisle, I won’t walk to any candy aisle, so I avoid all that. So that is the process that you go to when you go to a supermarket. Don’t take the trolley, take the small thing so it can buy just enough stuff that’s going to be heavy for you so you won’t feel like you want to eat more stuff inside.

 So this are the process that can implement into place. And most of the time people forget about this and they focus on the results and therefore a lot of people are unsuccessful due to the fact that they’re focusing on the wrong things or I want to become successful, but they’re not willing to do the job or they are not focusing on the process and they think about it. Dreams are free, goals have a cost. So are you willing to pay the price to reach the goal?

Terence: Yeah. Yeah. And I mean, using the the fitness analogy is like a lot of people will say, yeah, I want a six pack at the start of the year. They go to gym for two or three months at the start of the year and then it doesn’t work. They give up, but you know, they don’t understand that it’s actually a whole process they need to continuously work on in order to get the result. Similar to smells, right? It’s a process you continuously refine and keep improving on. Right?

Aaron:  Exactly. If you want to get good in sales or any other thing, the fact that you want to do is all the process, all the hatchet I have to go through, nobody sales, nobody sees. Getting six packs is easy. And that is why when people get six packs, right? Isn’t it a value that you get? That’s five. Six packs are so valuable. That’s why a fit body is so valuable because of all the hardships that we go through to do it. 

So being good in sales, why, when you’re good in sales, people tend to want to deal with you and give you bigger deals because they value that your time. Good. That that at the sales because it takes a lot of hard work to get there. And for me to be good here today, I have to spend so much time researching on my own learning and investing on myself, you know, going to mastermind things that people tell me my mom would tell me they don’t understand, Hey, you know, why do you have to go and invest 20, 30, 40,000 on certain people? They were going to scare me for your money, but they don’t understand it. 

That’s the process that we have to go through and willing to do it right. So when you go through the process, just like going to the gym, that analogy, that fitness one, now if you focus on the process that you need to do, let’s say for every single day you want to do, I just want to complete 50 sit ups, no matter if it’s a good formula or I want to complete 50 sit ups with good form. Mm hmm. Right. That is my process that I want to go through, and I incorporate it into my calendar, into my schedule, into my to do list. And every single time, a block of time for it, I can almost guarantee you if you never fail to do it. Not by motivation, because I don’t believe in motivation. Only belief in discipline. 

All right. If you have the discipline to continue on, even though it’s a bad day, that’s a discipline. I don’t care how I feel. I go into it. That’s the discipline. You focus on doing that. You will get the results of a byproduct as a byproduct of that particular process. And that’s the realization that I have, right? That makes me change everything that I do in terms of breaking out due process and focusing on the process that I need to do. 

And if you keep on focusing on the process that need to do, they will be certain results that will show you don’t even have to chase the result. The result will come to you. And that’s how counter intuitive it is. And many people are focusing on the wrong things. I want to I want to get fit. I want to get slim. I want to get to 20 kgs. But they’re not focusing on the process.

Terence:  Hmm. So true. So true. That’s a good paradigm shift for salespeople to take into account.

Aaron: Absolutely. Even even not for salespeople. I think for a lot of people, it will be helpful as well to have the paradigm shift to you want to get to the results, you want to get success, focus and find out what the process is and focus on the process. And chances are it’s way easier to find out about the process. Why?

Terence: Yeah.

Aaron: Let’s look at successful people and what they do learn about their processes. Talk to a couple of people.

Terence: Yeah. Other people have done it before. Why reinvent the wheel, right? 

Aaron:  And they’re not smarter people than you. Yeah. They’re not putting people in me. I’m not smart. I’m a C+ student.

Terence: Yep.

Aaron: Right. Is this that we have some revelation on certain knowledge gap that we have. So this to me, right? There’s no money gap. There’s only knowledge gap. Because once you have the knowledge, if you’re willing to learn, we’re willing to invest in in flexing the muscle of a brain to learn it, then you will actually have the knowledge gap that will reach you from where you are to where you want to be.

Terence: That’s awesome. Yep.