It’s Great to Be Grateful
Joe Girard was great at selling cars. He’s listed in the Guinness Book of World Records as the “World’s Greatest Salesman.” For 14 years he worked at a Chevrolet dealership just outside of Detroit, Michigan.
Just take a look at his stellar record:
- During his 14 year career, he sold 13,001 cars.
- On his best day, he sold 18 vehicles.
- During his best month, he sold 174 vehicles.
- In his best year, he sold 1,425 cars.
- By himself, Joe Girard sold more cars than 95% of all dealers in North America.
What was the secret to his success? Gratitude. Joe Girard was genuinely grateful for each and every customer he had. And most importantly, he worked really hard to never lose touch with any of them.
Within a few weeks of selling a car to someone, Joe would call them to thank them for the sale. During that call he would ask how the car was running. If things were going well, he’d ask for a referral. If there was a problem, he would get it fixed. Then ask for a referral.
Every month, year after year, Joe sent all his customers a hand-written greeting card. Inside he wrote a simple message. He was careful to never include anything that could be seen as salesy. Instead, he would share an anecdote, news story, or birthday greeting. Joe knew his customers would need a new car one day and he wanted to keep himself top of mind.
Recently I came across a book called, A Simple Act of Gratitude by John Kralik. The book is about a guy whose life was a complete disaster. He was miserable, broke, and overweight. While he was out hiking in the hills of Los Angeles on New Year’s Day, John had an epiphany. He decided he needed to find a reason to be grateful every single day. So he set a goal to write one thank you note a day for the next year.
As a result of writing handwritten thank you notes, over the course of one year, taught John some excellent lessons. He learned to value all the good in his life and became a more positive person.
When you adopt an “attitude of gratitude”, you attract like-minded people into both your personal and professional life. I believe gratitude is such an effective tool because it helps develop trust and loyalty. As the Launch4Life team loves to say, “People do business with those they know, like, and trust.”
There’s an old saying that if you’ve forgotten the language of gratitude, you’ll never be on speaking terms with happiness. With that in mind, perhaps we need to see each day and each new client as a gift. Every day is a new day to be grateful for all that we’ve learned or all we have yet to learn.
Steve Jobs knew what his “time” clock was. He worked with his team for the necessary transition. He also created new apple products that could be built and used long after his demise. We don’t always have the knowledge of how much time we have.
Practice, Practice Practice! No matter how good a speaker or conversationalist you are, we need to practice. Have daily conversations with your “Wilson” like Tom Hanks in the Castaway movie. At least he doesn’t talk back and is attentive. Practice talking to yourself in the mirror like the Queen in “Snow White”. This will help you improve your body language – gesturing and facial expressions. My favorite practice for a workshop is talking to myself while I am driving. Thank goodness no one thinks I am a nut case. They just think I am on the phone.
Last and most important thing to do for yourself – when your event or interaction is all over, acknowledge yourself for doing a great job. Then, reward yourself by going to that “quiet” place that allows you to recharge. Take note of how long you can be “out” before you need to recharge. It may be just a “mental” garden, but you know where you need to go.
Sometimes we don’t understand what was said, or we don’t understand their facial expressions. What am I, a mind reader???Family is one thing. Even if we have fights we all love each other. We will have a few tears, maybe even some angry words, and then we hug, and say “I love you”. We make it all better. We forget the bad memories and come back for the next family reunion.