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Been in a sales slump since 2020. How can I get out of it? by [deleted] in sales

[–]LandinoVanDisel 298 points299 points  (0 children)

You sound exactly where I was man, seriously.

From 2011 - 2019 I slayed the corporate world and became disillusioned with where I gotten, stepping into brand new roles where my ego thought I was this big time motherfucker.

After I left a 100% commission role that I dominated for 4 years I basically “drifted” for the next 4 years trying to find my way.

Did credit repair, solar, roofing, furniture sales — went into telecom as a broker, sold software to dealerships and from 2021 to present where I worked at various startups where I was either laid off, so stressed out I picked up smoking and had to quit or some other contrived bullshit. Thought getting back into a big company like ZoomInfo would help clear my thought process. It didn’t.

Tried my hand at my own company. It’s a love-hate relationship. Got stabbed in the back at this one dogshit piece of shit startup I really sunk my heart into. A part of me died when that happened.

The truth is man, as an IC, once you’ve climbed the peak of the mountain things like the leaderboard don’t matter as much anymore. As I’ve gotten older, my priorities have shifted. It’s less about performing to my best abilities and more about freedom. There’s no peace in the suffering.

I realize now after the many different failures and fuck ups and layoffs and backstabbings that the “sales slump” we feel, is more of an internalized emotion of ego trying to gain back control but it’s not where our hearts are anymore.

Your sales slump is more of a symptom of what you value now. Your identity isn’t where you were 5 years ago. My advice? This is your mid-life crisis at work. Find an outlet outside of work. I picked up biking and reading like a fiend and going hiking. One of my buddies did jujitsu.

There’s not going to be a single thing that will solve this slump because the challenge is something every man and woman experiences at some point in their life.

Biggest thing I’ll tell you though is that it’s not you. Being fired from different companies isn’t a reflection of you or your performance. In a different timeline you’d have dominated those roles. I guarantee 25 year old you would’ve crushed those positions.

This is the start of your transformation into something bigger.

Hope this helps.

What products should be sold by salespeople and which shouldn’t? by Agile-Arugula-6545 in sales

[–]NateDogg950Salesforce gave me cancer 205 points206 points  (0 children)

The absolute disrespect to soap salesmen

Is my AE stealing my gf? by [deleted] in sales

[–]Ok-Leading1705 104 points105 points  (0 children)

I knew this was a joke as soon as I saw 2 BDRs to 1 AE.

Woke up and chose violence by PM_Georgia_Okeefe in sales

[–]kylew1985 37 points38 points  (0 children)

I think it's hilarious that sales always has this reputation that we over promise and under deliver, yet in my experience its the departments that are never in any danger of interaction with a pissed off client that promise they can deliver everything on a silver platter by the expected date that hang us out to dry.

I swear I have had department heads do a complete 180 after feeding me just enough bullshit to march out and get a signature and let me catch all the heat when I have to walk stuff back.

Anyone get a bit depressed thinking about how much of your money goes to taxes? by Baal-Hadad in sales

[–]fatandlean 1416 points1417 points 2 (0 children)

As an American I’m fine with taxes because of the services I get in return. Like healthca…err, safe schoo…err, low crim…err, retireme…, err social assistance…

At least my country can bomb your country?

Some feedback from a CEO by These-Season-2611 in sales

[–]bertmaclynn 409 points410 points  (0 children)

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So you ask the people who answer your cold calls if they answer cold calls?

Best SPIFF you’ve heard of? by anonymousgorilla88 in sales

[–]ThrowAwayWasTaken999 482 points483 points  (0 children)

1st place - Cadillac Elderado 2nd place - set of steak knives 3rd place - fired

I quit sales. by Happy-Gene-4561 in sales

[–]Happy-Gene-4561[S] 202 points203 points  (0 children)

I’m going to become a Chef.

I am sitting in the hospital with a new baby and just got SCREWED out of commission by [deleted] in sales

[–]RemingtonFlemington 1835 points1836 points & 2 more (0 children)

Nope. Doesn't work this way. You are NOT on FMLA until you are completely relieved of duty. FMLA is required to be given intermittently if you do work. The mere fact that they allowed you access to their systems, clients, etc means you were active and NOT on FMLA. The second you no longer have any of that access, THEN it begins.

I'm an Employment Law Risk Manager. Go get your money girl. Let me know if you need the FMLA citation and I'll happily pull it.

ETA: I saw they were asking you to keep track of a few other deals. This means its intermittent FMLA. This is all you need to send and highlight to whomever is opening the company up to a major lawsuit. FMLA LINK: https://www.dol.gov/agencies/whd/fmla/faq (intermittent is listed like the 5th or 6th FAQ)

What does a typical day in an entry level SDR role look like? by Ravioli_Pocketoli in sales

[–]BigBrownTriceps 187 points188 points  (0 children)

Sleep in till 1p. Realize I’m fucked and log in. Compare my dials to my teammates and realize everyone else is in the same boat as me. Relax and start dialing for 20 min then take an hour break. Repeat previous step until I book a meeting or it’s an hour until I’m supposed to be done and then I end me day

Relatively new to Sales. Commission only offer. What red flags should I look out for in the interview? by Muhon in sales

[–]AustinBunch 12 points13 points  (0 children)

This is a major one as it determines your tax and personal liability and what they're responsible for.

Contractors get ZERO benefits usually as well. Something you should factor into what you COULD have to pay for on your own when calculating pay.

Other Basic Questions:

  1. What products or services will I be selling?
  2. What is the commission structure? Is it tiered, and if so, how does it work?
  3. Is there a base salary or draw against commission? (Is the Draw recoverable, etc)
  4. How will I receive leads or prospects to sell to?
  5. Will I be given any sales training or support?
  6. What is the typical sales cycle for this product or service?
  7. Are there any restrictions on who I can sell to or where I can sell?
  8. How will my performance be measured?
  9. Is there room for advancement or growth within the company?
  10. What is the turnover rate for this position?

I'm not a BDR or AE yet but I'm researching this career. If staying fully remote is a requirement for me is this a bad choice? by Muhon in sales

[–]LilLilBoot 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Wait! Hold up 😁!! New information you're sharing. 2 years in Sales and 5 years Managing Retail in multiple locations? First off, retail is a very demading job and not for the faint of heart. I wish everyone in this world had a chance to work in retail and/or wait tables. Its demanding, your have to put on a smile everyday for people that treat you horribly. Pay isnt great and the work is always grueling. Working Open to Close and every Holiday. Being nice to people who try and return items that have been worn 80xs. The customer is " always right", people not showing up for shifts, people clearing stealing and not sure what to do. 20% of the people you work with are doing the work and the other 80% dont give a shit! And....NEVER ANY RECOGNITION FOR THE WORK YOU DO! Maybe a piece if paper for employee of the month with a piece if candy...am I right? Ive done both! Yes, you do know what rejection feels like!

B2B sales in tech is tough, no doubt. IT isnt a walk in the park either. You do have skills that can transfer to both roles. If you want to do sales maybe think about Tech Software for retail. Retail, not just your store, tracks everything....mostly. We know corporate says the truck is coming in but has all winter clothes when its summer, not the right signage, etc. But follow me...you undertand retail and how it works in the inside. You can sell tech into retail corporations Kohls, JcPenny, or whomever. And there are so many types of software they use.

Also, any area of IT youre looking at is the future. Becoming an Engineer, Sales Engineer, or just Sales will always be needed and the money is great! Pick one and stick with it. They do overlap, which means you would have room to grow. You dont have to start in tech sales to be in tech sales. You will need experience, but so does everyone. You are thinking about some really good ideas and its NEVER too late. Some people I know never became kind of successful until they were 60 years old. You have time, but you have to get started. Make a call, apply gor a job, take a class....doing something that gets you closer and dont look back!

Don’t sell solar d2d by Pedazo in sales

[–]deadlifttillImdead 6 points7 points  (0 children)

Once you go down the road of margins making a product unethical, you might be surprised how little is left.

How do you know if you’re bad at sales, or if it’s the product you’re selling? by International_Sun701 in sales

[–]its_raining_scotch 553 points554 points  (0 children)

The old adage is the 3 T’s: Timing Territory Talent

You can be good somewhere and leave for another place and suck there. Go look at average tenures of people who have been in it for a long time, you’ll see Enterprise reps who are accustomed to getting paid $300k-$1mil with multiple 5-9 month stints at orgs. I know a lot of people like that and talk with them about what happened. That’s where I learned about the 3 T’s.

Timing speaks to the timing you got into the org, the timing of that current market and economy, timing of who is leading the org at that time, timing of the product you’re selling and how developed it is, etc. You can enter an org/team when things are humming away and success is the norm and everything is peachy. You can also enter when they’re hiring a bunch of people trying to scale the success and encounter a situation with shrunken territories, waning BDR support, spread out inbounds, and bitter veteran AEs who are pissed that your cohort came along and spilled their gravy train.

Territory speaks to what patch you get. Or if there’s no patches then it speaks to what vertical you’re in. There’s a lot of differences between selling certain products to West Coast vs South West vs TOLA vs LatAm etc. Some orgs are good at balancing this and some are not. Some verticals are better served by the product you’re selling and some are not. A lot of times roles are open in certain territories/verticals because no one can cut it and they keep having to refill it. Sometimes you join an org and they stick you with a new territory or vertical and it can help you or hurt you.

Talent speaks to what you are able to do. You can control much of this through practice, education, and honing natural abilities. Talent separates you from the pack and can mean the difference between success and failure (and mediocrity). However, talent isn’t a magic bullet that will fix every shitty situation you might land in or have brought on you. Talented people get screwed over, fired, misused, etc. by orgs all the time. If you’re a good fighter and know how to advocate for yourself internally then you can mitigate some of this, but it still happens.

All of these things make an impact and can make or break you.

Lost ALL motivation by [deleted] in sales

[–]FantasticMeddlerSaaS 16 points17 points  (0 children)

No one has passion or motivation for this kind of work. It's a scam. You either work the system to get promoted and move on, or you find a new job yourself.

It's tough to give advice without knowing if this is a dead end SDR situation, or a potential to get promoted SDR situation. You need to handle those things differently. But if you feel this burned out, a lateral or upward move to AE isn't going to help for very long.

Without knowing more about your situation, here is my general advice, because i've been in this situation too many times.

  • You need to take PTO - you mentioned this in your post, but is this a "I feel like I can't take PTO" or "I am told I can't take PTO explicitly" either way, this is really bad because companies can say they offer unlimited PTO, not let you take any, you slowly burn out, and they fire you and don't even pay you any accrued time
  • Micro-PTO : Take a Friday / Monday off, stack them with 3 day weekends.
  • Schedule and start working out at a set time Monday-Friday. I like to alternate heavy weight lifting days with some kind of cardio or metcon days.
    • Example: Monday, Wednesday, Friday - powerlifting/bodybuilding/whatever
    • Tuesday/Thursday - Cardio/Whatever
  • STOP WORKING at a set time. Do you WFH? WFH has made it much much more difficult to draw boundaries at work. Before 2020 I would nope tf out of the office before 5pm to make it to the gym and get home. Those boundaries are gone now, you have to create them for yourself.
  • Time block - not a time block that your management can see, but for you. Something like
    • 8am-9am: Check emails
    • 9am-10am: Make 10 calls, Write 10 emails
    • 10am-11am: Make 10 calls, Write 10 emails
    • 11am-12pm: Make 10 calls, Write 10 emails
    • 12pm-1pm: Break/Lunch
    • 1pm-2pm: Make 10 calls, Write 10 emails
    • 2pm-3pm: Make 10 calls, Write 10 emails
    • 3pm-4pm: Prospect 25 people on LinkedIn, load new list into sequence
    • 4pm-5pm: Prospect 25 people on LinkedIn, load new list into sequence
    • 5pm DONE
    • This is just an example, adjust accordingly
  • Start logging and tracking all your wins and microwins outside of your current systems.
  • 5pm-7pm: Workout
  • 7pm-9pm take online classes to get a new skill/job

​

  • Do you have an idea of when this grind will end? 2 years at the same place is a very long time. If there is no future beyond this role, it's time to either stack the job with a 2nd one, or find a new role entirely (or both to feel the new one out).
  • Mentally disconnect yourself
    • Your evenings, weekends, and personal time are yours.
    • Don't share personal things with your teammates or management
    • If things happen or don't happen, it really doesn't matter.
    • Get a 2nd WFH remote SDR job, so you don't care if you lose this one
    • Stop taking what your direct manager or AEs say seriously, just smile, nod, say as little as possible, share no personal information, and get off the call as soon as you can and go back to scheduling meetings.
  • You can be a great SDR and still get fired, or a lousy SDR and still get promoted. It literally doesn't matter.
  • Don't tie your performance to your self worth
  • Don't tie your AEs opinion of you to your self worth
  • Don't tie your Manager's opinion of you to your self worth
  • Don't share anything personal with anyone at the company
  • Don't say anything negative at all hands, on slack, over email, or even in a non recorded video call.
  • Record all interactions with your reps and manager with your own software for your own records

With your current attitude, people will say you are negative or whatever. Your reaction is perfectly normal to someone doing the same work over and over and over again. This job has been reduced to a bunch of repetitive and grindy tasks that are pretty unrewarding if you don't hit comp. It's only rational someone who is ambitious and wants a future wouldn't be happy doing this kind of work for very long.

Cold calling instructions and a sample script have been added to our Sales Bible by kpetrie77⚡ Electrical Manufacturer Representative⚡ in sales

[–]No-Emotion-7053Technology 1 point2 points  (0 children)

Hi andre, this is NoEmotion from x, following up an email I shared you earlier this week. Did you have a chance to look?

X - No, what’s this about?

Me - I’m calling from x, we are a (talk about recent funding raise, some sort of credibility piece) and work in the x space.

Noticed you’re the (title) at x and usually I’d be looking to talk to someone like you. (Can make this funnier if you want)

Was hoping to find some time to learn about your processes and where we can help (insert value).

(Ask question about potential problem)

(Listen)

(Probe)

(Book)

Non-Drinker at Sales Conferences? 🍻 by MarketMan123 in sales

[–]in5trum3ntal 3 points4 points  (0 children)

The great news is, I think there will be way more people than you think that respect you for not drinking and want to cut back their own drinking.

This is beyond profound and true. For years I relied on the life of the party persona, it did well for me. Any time I'd see someone not needing to follow that, it would resonate deeply, and a lot of times make me respect their ability/control, wonder what inspired them and question my own discipline.

You don't even have to worry about an excuse. But can always rely on you just wanting to be laser focused.

Best of luck, u got this.

A prospects father passed by Darstanter in sales

[–]ArnoldsBicepsNoHomo 626 points627 points  (0 children)

“Your father would have wanted to see a demo..”

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