The Difference Between a Salesperson and a Professional Salesperson

As you may already know, I lit­er­al­ly grew up in the paint­ing indus­try. Over the decades (includ­ing 20+ years as an adult work­ing and observ­ing behind the scenes), I have seen my fair share of sales­peo­ple sell­ing mil­lions upon mil­lions in paint­ing projects each year. 

On the oth­er hand, I have also seen what I would call ​“order-tak­ers” — those who remain aver­age at best when it comes to sales.

Many of the under­per­form­ing order-tak­ers are real­ly not sales­peo­ple at all. Before I go much fur­ther, I should clar­i­fy that I’m talk­ing about mem­bers of the sales team who work for a con­tract­ing com­pa­ny that has goals of at least $750,000 to 1MM a year (for each sales­man). In order to hit or exceed a mil­lion dol­lars in sales each year, a paint esti­ma­tor needs to move way past being just an order taker. 

He or she needs to be a sales professional. 

I have also seen sales­peo­ple who can eas­i­ly sell upwards of $2MM a year. One of the rea­sons is because their com­pa­ny is well known in the indus­try and has a pletho­ra of qual­i­ty sales leads giv­en to the esti­ma­tors. Con­verse­ly, even this seem­ing­ly suc­cess­ful sce­nario could still be a case of sim­ply tak­ing orders and work­ing in mediocrity.

This all works well in a sol­id econ­o­my when leads are not that dif­fi­cult to come by. It’s a frag­ile sys­tem, though, and if there is not a good prospect­ing plan in place by each indi­vid­ual sales­per­son, there will inevitably come a time when sales will be a lot more dif­fi­cult to close. 

So, What’s the Dif­fer­ence Between a Sales Pro­fes­sion­al and an Order-Taker?

It’s actu­al­ly pret­ty simple. 

The pro­fes­sion­al sales­per­son is dri­ven, ambi­tious, and goal-ori­ent­ed. This indi­vid­ual will move heav­en and earth to prospect, sell, and nur­ture his or her prospects and cus­tomers for life. 

A dri­ven indi­vid­ual does not give up until the sale is won or lost. He does not allow his sales pipeline to have dozens (or even hun­dreds!) of pend­ing bids just col­lect­ing dig­i­tal dust. 

This pro­fes­sion­al focus­es on hit­ting and exceed­ing goals — plain and simple. 

This dri­ven pro­fes­sion­al sales­per­son also com­mits to using a CRM. It might not be the most amaz­ing CRM on the mar­ket, but he (or she) always has a next step in the sales cycle. He does not rely on his mem­o­ry but on proven sys­tems to sell. 

How about that order taker?

Well, he/​she just relies on his com­pa­ny to send him enough leads to keep him busy, and thinks he can be suc­cess­ful if he is giv­en 15 – 20 bids a week. If he gets that, he’ll hit his sales goal. If the mar­ket­ing depart­ment fails to get him the leads that week, it’s their fault. ​“I didn’t hit my sales goals last month because…” 

This type of sales­man is not a prospec­tor. He waits for some­one to reach back out to him to let him know he is ready to move for­ward with a project. This sales­man is there to take the order, sell the job, and wait for the next prospect to line up and sign up. 

Can an Aver­age Sales­man Change?

Yes! I believe peo­ple can change, and that an aver­age sales­man can become a pro­fes­sion­al, dri­ven sales­man. It is easy to lose hope quick­ly in an under­per­former, and it is even eas­i­er to fire some­one who is not hit­ting their goal. At the same time, it is extreme­ly dif­fi­cult to go on the hunt look­ing for that incred­i­ble sell­er. Those indi­vid­u­als are hard to find because, well, they’re suc­cess­ful, and that means that they’re like­ly not look­ing for anoth­er job. 

If you want to find and hire a pro­fes­sion­al sales­per­son who, right off the bat, will hit $1.5MM+ a year with lit­tle or no super­vi­sion, you’ll have to find cre­ative ways to reel him or her into your organization. 

While there’s noth­ing wrong with look­ing for that incred­i­ble catch, you can still work on help­ing your aver­age sales staff achieve the next lev­el, both for their sake and yours. Admit­ted­ly, this will take a lot of work on your part if you are the own­er or manager. 

You will have to have reg­u­lar meet­ings, goals, and sales train­ing for your sales­peo­ple. You will have to help your sales staff move past being just aver­age order tak­ers, and empow­er and grow them into sales professionals. 

Ready for a Sim­ple Tip?

A sim­ple way to start is to ask your sales team to read cer­tain books on prospect­ing and sell­ing. You might even read them togeth­er and dis­cuss. If they’re dis­in­ter­est­ed or non-com­mit­tal, you might have some­one on your hands who isn’t will­ing to do what it takes to be a pro­fes­sion­al sell­ing machine, and is sim­ply com­fort­able with being average.

If you can grow them into a suc­cess­ful pro, you’ll have a com­mit­ted, proven team mem­ber whose eth­ic will ben­e­fit them AND your orga­ni­za­tion as a whole.