This attitude pushes them to see opportunities where others don’t. Neither of them will lack a job – they know how and where to find one.
All the good salespeople I’ve met throughout my career are skilled communicators who persuade through conviction and confidence. And so do entrepreneurs because they believe in their company and, if they are good communicators, they tend to be the best first seller of the startup. There may never be another one like him. There may be better people at sales, but it’ll be different.
Many young entrepreneurs don’t have some of the natural skills of salespeople. However, these can be learned – and few people are as tenacious as entrepreneurs.
Important!! I’m referring to the ‘good salespeople’, who keep their focus on what’s important. Those who know to listen to what the client needs. Those who are detail-oriented and organised.
Good salespeople communicate. This doesn’t mean that they talk much, but they ask the right questions, they listen and understand what the interlocutor really means. Salespeople are curious, and so is an entrepreneur. The one looks to solve the client’s needs, the other looks to solve the market’s needs. They both share an objective, the only difference is that one is long-term, the other one is short-term. One’s looking to the present, the other one, to the future.
Salespeople are less strategist, they solve the present. The entrepreneur dreams and transforms.
An important difference between the two is how each one comes to develop their path. While the salesperson comes naturally to the world of sales without having considered it, the entrepreneur feels inquisitiveness from a very young age, even if they finally carry out their project later in time, after having acquired other experiences and knowing the needs that they will solve.
Salespeople are social and very empathetic, which is why they are able to understand the needs of others. In a DISC profile, they usually have a highly developed ‘I’. In fact, they end up as sales reps because they love helping others with their solution, feeling that they have improved the life of that company or people with their sales. They also like to be recognized for it. They know how to interact with people so this is where they feel most recognised.
The entrepreneur can also share these characteristics, but they usually stand out as being creative and detailed, in a DISC he would highlight the ‘D’ and the ‘C’. The entrepreneur plans, but does not expect an immediate reward for their work, nor is it what motivates him. It is perhaps a profile with more heavenly goals, whilst sales reps tend to be earthly. They expect their results to show in the long term and recognition tends to be professional rather than economical – even though the great entrepreneurs are the fortunes of the world.
There are 2 profiles in one, as I said at the beginning, with some skills being more prominent than others. But whatever happens, they always believe that something better may be yet to come and that changes are always for the better. That is why they get up again and again and return to fight battles that seem lost to others.
At Outbound People we’ll help you find your sales rock stars.
Are you looking to hire sales talent? Get in touch.
Want to read more fresh content about the role of an SDR and sales teams? Check out more articles.