Chicken Dijon

4 boneless, skinless chicken breasts
1 cup whole milk
Flour
3 Tablespoons vegetable oil

1 Tablespoon butter
1 cup thinly sliced mushrooms

1 ½ cup chicken gravy (I make my own)
2 Tablespoon dry white wine
2/3 cup half and half
1 ½ tablespoon Dijon-style mustard
Salt and pepper to taste

Lightly flatten chicken breasts.

Dip chicken in milk, coat generously with flour.

Sauté chicken in oil in skillet until gold brown about four minutes per side.

Remove and cover to keep warm and drain excess fat in skillet.

Sauté mushrooms in butter about 2 minutes.

Add remaining ingredients.

Return chicken to skillet. Simmer uncovered for about 5 minutes.

Because my family LOVES gravy, I usually double the gravy portion of this recipe.

Enjoy….

When you make a true decision: You honor it regardless of whether other people support it.

When you make a true decision: You honor it on the days when you feel good and the days when you feel bad.

When you make a true decision: You honor it when no one is looking.

Make the true decision today to revisit all of the laws of attraction on a
regular basis.  You will find that indeed, they are contagious. 

“Most people never run far enough on their first wind
to find out that they got a second.
Give your dreams all you’ve got and you will be amazed
at the energy that comes out of you.” 
William James

The Law of Rhythm

The Law of Rhythm is about the natural rhythms that we have and experience in life. The sun rises and the sun sets, there is always a high tide and then a low tide, we get up in the morning and go to sleep in the evening, where there is bad there is also always good. Everything is about some sort of rhythm.

Rhythm actually plays a huge mark into your business, into your marketing and into your sales. The challenge is to understand that rhythm and then get that rhythm to work for us instead of against us. (yet another rhythm!!)

We all have our cycles of ups and downs. I don’t care how successful you are,
there are always your ups in business and your downs in business. When you have a down in your business, your biggest challenge is to understand that period of time and not have this particular cycle envelope you to the point of falling
out of hope for all of your dreams and desires.

You need to understand that because we have natural rhythms in our life, when you are going through a down moment…the rhythm will always be that you will soon start to see the good in your life and in your business. What is necessary to ride a down cycle, is to keep in the cycle until you finally see it start to shift upwards once again. You absolutely cannot quit because when you do the downward cycle has won and you will never see what was waiting for you at the top. Who knows what could have been at the top…possibly your biggest success ever.

Think about some past instances in your business and/or personal life and you will see this law to be true. I know that for me, if I am going through a slump in sales I know that right around the corner I am going to have a huge month. This happens time and time again and as long as you have the faith and you know this to be true, you can weather any storm that might be brought to you.

Think about the economic state that we have right now. It’s not a pretty sight…but it is part of the Natural Law of Rhythm and we know that our economy will become whole again. We cannot give up in this economic state that we are in because if we do, we will never see what prosperity we have waiting for us at the other side of this wave that we are riding. We have seen similar cycles like this happen time and time again.

Life both professionally and personally is all about the ups and downs and now we know that without the bad we cannot have the good…it’s just how we chose to deal with the bad.

The Law of Cause and Effect

The law of cause and effect says that everything happens for a reason. For every effect in your life there is a cause. Thoughts are causes and your conditions are your effect. Your mind and your thoughts are your most powerful tools that you have. It has been said time and time again that a person becomes what they think about most of the time. You are where you are right now, whether it is good or bad, because of your habitual thinking.

Consequently if you change you’re thinking…then you can change your life.

Another version of the law of cause and effect is the law of action and reaction. This law states that for every action there is an equal and opposite reaction. In other words; actions have consequences. The good news is that you get to choose and control your actions. But once you have taken an action, remember that many times the consequences are completely out of your control. Once you have said or done something typically you can never take the original action back. This is why successful people tend to be very thoughtful about what they say and what they do and unsuccessful people tend to not be so thoughtful and may be even careless about their actions and behaviors.

Yet another way of talking about the law of cause and effect is the law of sowing and reaping. This law says, “Whatsoever a man soweth, that also shall he reap”. This law says that whatever effort you put in you will get out; whatever you are reaping today is a result of what you have sown in the past.

The laws of cause and effect, action and reaction, sowing and reaping, are universal laws and principles that have existed since the beginning of time. All success and ultimate happiness both professionally and personally comes by incorporating these principles in absolutely everything that you do. When you do, you will achieve success and happiness at levels seldom experienced by the average person. Isn’t that incentive enough to live these universal laws on a daily basis?

The Law of Gender

To understand this law you must understand that there is both a male and female personality in each and every one of us. I am not talking about whether a person is physically a male or female. If a male is a little more “right-brained” he is  coming a bit more from the feminine side (which has absolutely nothing to do  with his sexuality.) As his right-brained personality is encouraged, the  left-side of his brain starts to not be as active as it is not being used. It’s  almost like atrophy to an arm or a leg. When you break your arm and your arm is  in a cast for an extended period of time, its strength is weakened because it  isn’t being used or exercised.

If you have read Eckhart Tolle’s book A New Earth he talks about not being able to bring forth this feminine side of our personality. He says “The suppression of the feminine principle, especially over the past 2000 years, has enabled the ego,
the conscious mind, to gain absolute supremacy in the collective human psyche.
If the balance between male and female energies had not been destroyed on our
planet, we would have not declared war on nature. We would not be so completely alienated from our being, from God.”

Donald Trump, a very masculine, driven and focused individual is incredibly artistic and has many right brained tendencies in conjunction with this left brained prominence. Look at Emmitt Smith in Dancing With the Stars…an incredibly talented dancer, showing his ability to use his right side of his personality as well as being NFL’s all-time rushing leader and a three time Super Bowl Winner.

In my past sales experiences I was always in a male dominated field. It was because of my ability to bring out both sides of my brain, both the female and male dominated tendencies that I was able to succeed in a very competitive field.

We need to try to balance both or feminine and masculine sides of our personality. If you look at very successful people (Donald Trump and Emmitt Smith are just two examples) you will find that they can move between their feminine and masculine personalities seamlessly. They can relate extremely well to both sexes because the have both a healthy creative side to their personality as well as a very focused and business side to their personality, which is the masculine side. Where we get stuck, I believe, is when we don’t feel that we can show either the feminine or the masculine side to our personality.

Let’s face it, in business we need to have relationships with both males and females. Think of where relationships could truly flourish if we would give both sides of our personality the opportunity to develop to their full potential.

There you have it…the revisiting of the Laws of Attraction.  Embrace them into your daily lifestyle. From there only great things will be yours.

Remember…

This is all just a bit of education that you might not have had yesterday…
The more you have….the better your life will become.

 Make it a terrific day,

“Throughout all history, the great wise men and teachers, philosophers, and prophets have disagreed with one another on many different things. It is only on this one point that they are in complete and unanimous agreement. – We become what we think about.”

Earl Nightingale 1921-1989, Author of “The Strangest Secret”

We continually hear things about the Laws of Attraction or the Universal Law but do we really know exactly what those laws are?  Has anyone put them together for you in a succinct manner so you can then start to understand them and study them and embrace them?  Well, this is exactly what I am going to do for you starting today.

You can actually find all of these laws of attraction or universal laws in the
seven major religions of the world.  They are in the Bible, the Koran, the Torah, etc.  Of course in each religion, they are worded a bit differently, but the
ultimate meanings are the same.  These laws have been around for thousands of years, and if you study them, understand them and embrace them as part of your daily living, take action with them and actually experience them you can and will manifest anything you want in your life.

These universal laws are unseen forces that govern everything in the Universe.  Think of the law of gravity.  We live under that law, we know it is there, we understand the law of gravity, but of course we cannot physically see that law.

As Dave Wattles says in his book The Science of Getting Rich:

“You can act in accordance with these laws or you can disregard them but you can in no way alter them.  The laws forever operate and hold you to strict accountability, and there is not the slightest allowance for ignorance…Once a person learns and obeys these laws, he will get rich with mathematical certainty.”

The Law of Perpetual Transmutation

This universal law means that energy is always moving from a non-form to a
form; from the non physical to the physical.  It has been proven with science that the world is like one large body of energy that flashes into and out of “being” in a fraction of a second and this happens over and over again.

Energy in the universe consists of all the knowledge that has ever existed and
ever will exist.  Everything that you could ever want is already out there in the universe right now for you to have.   It is all in one place at the
same time.  As ideas and thoughts start to enter into our consciousness we can perceive something only based on the actual level of awareness that we personally have of that idea.  You cannot have knowledge; you cannot want something that you are not ready to receive, even though the knowledge is actually out there.

What you need to do is allow yourself to think beyond the four walls that you currently allow yourself to be in.  If you stay within the confines of your four
walls you will never be able to realize anything different than what you currently
have.

When you increase your awareness of everything that is in the world, in the Universe, you start to think differently and you allow knowledge to flow in.  The minute you start to perceive a want or a desire in a conscious state, you have started your manifestation process.  As your thought, your dream, your desire starts to take a clearer direction and you start to see it take shape, it actually changes the energy within you and it then moves into a physical form.  That is
the entire process of manifestation in a nutshell.  As long as you have your thought in your mind, you will manifest that thought. This is why it is so very important to monitor the thoughts you have on a continual basis.

This universal law is completely freeing to me.  Think about it, everything that you have ever wanted or will want is out there for the asking right this very minute.  All I have to do is perceive it, hold it in constant thought with absolutely no negative thoughts entering into my mind and then be ready to receive this thought.  When you think about it…it’s really very easy, but not so simple.

The challenge that I see so many times is that we are not conditioned to think constantly of all of the good that is truly right in front of our feet.  We tend to gravitate back to what comes more natural for us and that is the negative thoughts, the negative surroundings that we have been conditioned to be a part of and think of on a daily basis.

How many of you get the newspapers on a daily basis?  Negative news.  How many of you watch CNN (constant negative news) Fox News, CNBC, and of the major networks…Negative news…  How many of you listen to news radio…Negative news.  I will admit it is hard to get away from, but..you must if you want to manifest whatever you want to manifest.  You must believe that it is
already yours and it must be the number one thought in your mind each and every day.  Make a dream board to continually see what it is that you want to have.

Surround yourself with only likeminded people.  Make your daily affirmations, write down you goals and your dreams and read them aloud at least three times a day.  Do all of these things to keep your energy on your one specific desire.  When you do this and not allow anything contrary enter into your thoughts…you will receive what you have been thinking about.  It is the law of the universe and these laws cannot be broken.

The Law of Relativity

This is the law where you start to remove size and measurement.  Nothing is good or bad until it’s related to something of meaning to you.  Nothing is rich or poor until you compare it to something else.  When you say that something is too expensive, what are you comparing it to?   When trying to understand the law of relativity, what we first need to understand is in reality nothing is good or bad, it’s just the way it should be. It’s when we decide to compare ourselves or our situations (whether we’re in dire straits or going well) that discontentment sets it.

The law of relativity states, if we practice relating/comparing our situations to something worse off than ourselves, then we’ll always be happy and feel blessed. However if we practice relating/comparing to those “perceived” in our own mind as being better off than we are, then we could possibly be quite miserable at times.

We must learn and understand that everything is relative compared to something else.  You might be looking at a new car and you might think that the car that you are looking at is either smaller or larger in compared to another car.  You have to compare it to something.  In truth the car just “is” It’s neither big nor small.  What if you didn’t have anything to compare the car with?  It would just be the car…

One of the challenges within the Law of Relativity is the concept of money.  You might say that is just too much money, right?  What you need to wrap your mind around is that the universe does not understand size.   To the universe, $1.00 is just the same as $1,000,000.00.  If you ask for the money, it’s yours.  The key is that you have to accept it; you have to receive it, which is the stumbling block for most people…not the size.

In business you probably use this universal law constantly and many times incorrectly.  You might say that you cannot do something because you don’t have the time to do it.  Remember that time is relative.  You don’t have enough time in compared to what?  You might make another statement saying that you cannot do something because you don’t have enough money.  Again, money is relative and what are you comparing your lack of money to?

Remember, nothing is good or bad, big or small, ugly or pretty until you relate it to something.  So, if you feel that you have to relate your situation or things to
something, my suggestion is to relate your situation to things that are much worse in comparison and your situation will always come out on top.

The Law of Vibration

To vibrate means: “to move backwards and forwards, to oscillate, to shake, to quiver, to swing, to waver, to cause to quiver.”

Everything in the universe vibrates at a different rate or frequency.  A person’s body vibrates in certain frequencies and so do their thoughts. Your thoughts control your emotions and your emotions control the frequency of the body.  Most people are being lead by their emotions, but it’s their thoughts that control their
emotions.  When you experience an emotion without a current thought, you then trigger an old thought that is linked to that emotion.  It is after that thought
that has been triggered that you then get to experience the emotion and it then
changes the frequency of the body.

Almost instantaneously as you begin to think about something, that thought, that vibration is sent out to the universe and it resonates with other like frequencies.
As your thought resonates with the like frequencies, it brings it right back to you, almost like a boomerang effect.

The big challenge is that most people switch their thoughts so many times during any given day that by the time things start to head back to them, they have already changed their thoughts on to something different and what that person wanted to originally manifest, passes right by them because that person is no longer on that frequency or thought.  Doesn’t that make sense?

The big key is to maintain the same or similar frequency/thoughts all of the time and do it without effort.  This is then you will start to see your thoughts manifest themselves right in front of you.  How do you keep the same thought, the same
vibration all of the time?   You do this by focusing on your gratitude and by living your desire each and every day.

The Law of Polarity

The Universal Law of Polarity asks us to look at life in polar aspects of extremes.   White against black, evil against good, hot against cold, the inside and the outside.  Let’s face it, some of the hardest lessons we ever learned in life were difficult to go through.  Yet we survived our tests.  We endured. Every time these endurance tests involved the Universal Law of Polarity, and we do become stronger from these tests of opposites colliding.

We are able to grow in ways nothing else could have prepared us for because of the Law of Polarity. Experiencing the good as well as the bad helped us after the lesson.

Developing an understanding and respect to accept whatever shows up in our lives, we are able to learn that everything comes together for good. We may not be able to see this greater “good” immediately, or even later, upon reflection of going through something we never wished to experience. But we learned to accept it as being for something better in the long run.

We can still experience wealth, abundance, peace, love, happiness and the whole spectrum of positive experiences that life has to offer us if we ask for it. We do not need to go through hell to get to heaven. But the fact is that many of us do find ourselves in a hell. The Law of Polarity asks us to learn from it and move on.
The Law of Polarity is to keep the energy in your life flowing in the right direction. Chose to slide “up” the pole of Polarity, choose to think on the positive end of the pole instead of the negative.  You know that there are two sides, choose the
end that is going to serve you and your goals rather than not.

These are the first four Laws of the Universe.  Take them and incorporate them into your daily life.  Make them a daily habit.  These laws when used will not fail you, but you need to study them, take action on them and make them a part of your daily life.

Remember…

This is just a bit of education that you might
not have had yesterday.
The more you have the better your life will become

Every December Bill and I host the Army/Navy game party…Go Army…Beat  Navy.  It’s a tradition in our house.  Bill and his younger brother who happened to go to Navy trade phone calls throughout the day and sadly, in the end usually Navy is victorious and his brother claims bragging rights for the next year.

Although each year as of late we hope for a change in the outcome…The menu never changes:  homemade hoagies and the best chili recipe I have ever come across.  My sister even loves this recipe and she hates chili.  A friend asked for the recipe, entered it into a chili contest and won!  This just might be the last chili recipe that you will ever need to find.

I usually triple (at least!!) the recipe.  Hopefully there are leftovers because I freeze it in bags and pull the chilliout for Super Bowl weekend.  Start early a night or two before.  I like letting the chili sit as the flavors blend in nicely.

Enjoy the best chili you have every eaten!

2 tbsp Olive Oil

1 lb ground sausage
1 lb ground hamburger
1 lb cubed steak.  I use something like London Broil

8 small to medium garlic cloves, minced
2 cups of water
2 tbsp ground cumin
2 tbsp chili powder
2 teasp dried oregano
1 teasp salt
1 teasp cayenne pepper

3 (6-ounce) cans of tomato paste
2 teasp sugar

3 ½ cups diced fresh tomatoes
3 ½ cups finely diced onions
3 ½ cups finely diced red pepper

3 (15 oz cans) black beans drained and thoroughly rinsed
½ – ¾ cup chopped fresh cilantro
3 cups beef stock or broth

Grated cheddar cheese, sour cream, chives, corn bread as
toppings.

Heat olive oil in a large pot over medium heat.  Break the ground sausage and ground hamburger up before putting into the hot oil.  Once broken up sauté until golden brown…about 3-5 minutes.

Add the cubed steak and minced garlic and sauté an additional 7 minutes.

Add 2 cups of water and then bring to a boil.

Add the cumin, chili powder, oregano and cayenne pepper.  Reduce the heat, cover and let simmer for about 15 minutes.

Add the tomato paste and sugar and simmer for an additional 8 minutes.

Add the diced tomatoes, onions and peppers and simmer until the vegetables are tender.  This takes between 30-50 minutes depending upon how many batches you are doing at one time.

Add black beans and cilantro to the chili.  If you don’t like a heavy cilantro taste,
gradually add.  Add the beef stock or broth a cup at a time until your chili is thinned to your desired consistency

Have sour cream, extra sharp grated cheddar cheese, corn bread and chives in dishes to serve with the chili.

This best chili recipe can be made a day or two ahead of time.  My husband likes it best when it has had a day to really settle in with all of the flavors.

Go Army…Beat Navy and make it a terrific day.   

Take Responsibility of your own actions. It is right out of the Secret, and The Law Of Attraction. Everything that happens in your life is a direct result of your thoughts and actions. If you think negatively about a situation, then negative results will start to pop up in your life. You cannot blame someone else for your thoughts. You have complete and utter control over all of your thoughts.

Take  responsibility for those thoughts. Make your thoughts center only around the positive. Once you start to incorporate only positive thoughts in to your daily
routine, you will be amazed at what you will start to attract into your life.

Don’t blame others for situations that happen to you. Take responsibility for your actions and your decisions. You have no control over anyone else but yourself. You have no control if someone you work with did not complete their portion of project by deadline. You have no control if someone cuts you off at an intersection. But, you DO have control on how you handle those situations. Handle them positively. What will handling them negatively result to you? More negativity?

If you are not taking responsibility for everything that you do, you might ask yourself if there is anything that you fear by taking responsibility. Why would you not be willing to take full responsibility for every aspect of your life? Think about that question for a while if you are blaming other people for situations in your
life.

Successful people take responsibility for EVERYTHING they do and  EVERYTHING that happens to them. Taking responsibility gives you the power for success at any level. 

Take Action. “Don’t judge each day by the harvest you reap, but by the seeds
you plant.? Robert Louis Stevenson, 1850-1895; Essayist, Poet and Novelist. 

Do you think that farmers automatically have a huge and profitable harvest? Do you think that Bill Gates just woke up one morning and was the richest man in the United States? What about Oprah Winfrey? She was not born into money, fame and power…just the opposite as a matter of fact. Why, then, should you expect to be any different?

EVERYONE has to sow seeds. Everyone has to take ACTION. Granted, some of us have a little bit more planting before we can reap the rewards of our efforts, but if you take persistent, consistent, daily ACTION, I promise you, you will reap whatever harvest that you desire.

Life and its incredible rewards are all about the seeds you sow each and every day, the action that you take each and every day. But, the key is to plant your seeds and take your deliberate action..each day. If you are one to plant your seeds and take action only periodically, then don’t expect your harvest to be abundant. You need to plant your seeds and cultivate your seeds consistently, persistently, each and every day; that is if you are looking for a huge and profitable harvest at the end of season.

My challenge to you today is for you to go out and plant your seeds, then cultivate those seeds each and every day. You will be amazed at the harvest that you will eventually reap…

May you reap exactly what you sow.

Be willing to take risks. This is an incredibly crucial to your success. No risk; no reward, as the saying goes. Keep in mind, however, taking risks doesn’t necessarily have to be risky.

Read that statement again, taking risks doesn’t necessarily have to be risky.

Do your due diligence in decisions that you are making. Make sure that you are educated in what you want to do. By doing your due diligence and becoming educated in whatever you are about to embrace, this then gives you the confidence to know that you are making the correct decision for you. You have all of the information in front of you to make the most informed and educated decision that you can.

When most people get stuck and then they play the blame game (Secret number Four) and claim that they have been scammed once again, is when they haven’t done their due diligence. They haven’t done their research for a particular opportunity or situation. If you haven’t been educated, done your research and done your due diligence, why would you expect anything other than a positive outcome? Taking some risk is the necessary for success, but when you have all of the information sitting right in front of you because of your research; the risks
that you do take are not all that risky.

Go, be prepared, take your educated  risks and become incredibly successful.

Stick to It until you succeed. Most people ultimately fail because they quit too soon. Set your goals and commit to taking consistent and persistent action each and every day. If you do this each and every day and not quit when the going gets a bit tough, the end result will be your success.

Post your goals both short term and long term and stay focused on your dreams until they become your reality. Do not let yourself take diversions to your goals and do not quit.

When the temptation is there for you to hang up the towel, ask yourself “What if…” What if you hadn’t quit, would your business be that huge success that you had planned for? What if you hadn’t quit, would I have been able to retire early? What if you hadn’t quit, would you still be at that JOB that you really hate? You never want to live by “What If’s,” so don’t. Stick with it and in the end you will see an amazing rainbow that was build just for you.

So, that is it. The Sales Tips to The Seven Secrets In Selling Strategies as I see them. Pretty simple, don’t you think? So why isn’t everyone incredibly rich and successful? It is positively amazing to me how very few people are willing to go out, put forth the effort required to master these selling tips, and take the action necessary to get from where they are to where they want to be.

Don’t be that person.

Go out and master each one of these selling tip “secrets”. Execute the simple daily self disciplines.  When you do the levels of success to you are unending.

Go and make it a terrific day.

Buffalo Chicken Dip is one of our favorite tailgating and party recipes and I know it will be one of yours as well!!  Tonight the Bears are playing Detroit on Monday Night Football…Are You Ready For Some Football??!!

Buffalo Chicken Dip

3 large boneless chicken breasts; cooked.  (You can either boil them or bake the.  I bake them with a chicken spice rub to give it a bit of extra flavor.  If you boil consider adding some chicken bouillon cubes to the water…again to add a bit of additional flavor!)  After cooling a bit shred the chicken.  I use a cheese grater to shred the chicken with.  Do not just cut into small pieces or cube.  The end result for this Buffalo Chicken Dip is just not the same.)

16 oz softened Philadelphia Cream Cheese
½ cup Bleu Cheese Dressing (I use more as I LOVE Bleu Cheese!)
½ cup Ranch Dressing

9 oz Hot Sauce (any hot sauce will do.  Some like Pete’s; we usually just get  Frank’s Red Hot.  I will say that I don’t put in a full 9 oz.  I usually go with maybe 3-4 or so oz.  Start slight and build up from there depending upon how hot you want to make your dip)

1-2 lbs shredded extra sharp cheddar cheese (again depending upon how cheesy you want it.  I usually grate at least 1 ½ lbs of extra sharp cheddar cheese to pile on top of the dip.  Don’t be skimpy!!)

Mix everything but the shredded cheddar cheese with a beater.  Add pepper and garlic salt to taste.

Spread mixture in a 13 x 9 inch dish then top with the grated cheese.

Bake 30-40 minutes at 350 degrees.

Serve with pita chips, toasted baguette rounds (below), tortilla scoops, crackers…etc.

Toasted Baguette Rounds

1-2 loaves baguettes

Cut baguettes about ¼ inches thick. Brush each side with olive oil. Sprinkle with parmesan cheese a bit of freshly ground pepper.

Place on a greased cookie sheet and bake at 375 for about 4 minutes
on each side.  Watch carefully so not to overcook them.

Enjoy this Buffalo Chicken Dip recipe.  I always look forward to the leftovers to
treat myself to a mid morning or afternoon snack!

Go Bears!

The selling tips that I am about to share with you are just the basic steps that successful, professional salespeople and entrepreneurs have been making their daily MOO (Methods Of Operation) for centuries. The following “secrets” are the attributes of high-achievers.and everyone can embrace them. They aren’t difficult to execute, you simply need to make them a daily practice. Once you do, everything and I mean everything can and will be yours.

Believe That You Can. You Must have the mental attitude for success. You must truly believe that you are as capable for success as the next person. You must have the confidence and the belief that you and your products or services are the very best. If you don’t believe that from the very core of your sole, then it would be my suggestion to find something else to sell. If you don’t believe that your product is the solution to people’s problems, your doubt will come across the instant you start to talk to a prospective customer. There are a few things that might be able to help you:

First, you need to be the master, be the expert of your product. You must learn your product inside and out. When you do, you will have absolutely no fear in talking about your product. Learn your product and how it can benefit your prospect like you know the stats of your favorite baseball team, or the ingredients of your favorite recipe. You should be able to talk about your product/service in your sleep. This is what makes the top sales people the top sales people. They are the experts in their field and prospects see them as such.

Many years back I had my annual review with my sales manager and the VP of Sales. My numbers were good enough to be in the top ten of the company, but what they really loved about my performance was that I was one of the top experts of my product in the company. I knew my products inside out and my customers knew that I did. They viewed me as the expert and that is why they
constantly ordered from me time and time again. The key is knowing and owning
your products.

You must also have confidence in your company. Your company is the organization that should be supporting you in all of your endeavors. Again, if
you don’t have the confidence that your company is standing behind you in all
that you do, that doubt will seep out.

Many times, people want to see the entire package. That you, the product and the company are going to be around to service and support them for a long time. Learn who the top management is in your company. If you have the opportunity, speak with them on occasion.

Learn the financial’s of your company. Learn as many details about your companyas possible. This doesn’t mean that you are going to make it part of your sales
presentation, but knowing this information gives you the confidence in your
company and therefore in yourself. It is all about gaining the confidence in
your products, your company and in yourself.

Does this take time and a bit of effort? Of course it does. Sales, while not difficult, is a discipline and with discipline takes some learning and studying. Do this up front and you will then have the key to unlimited earning potential.

Have the right associations. How successful are the people that you associate with? I am sure you have heard of the old adage: who you hang around is who you likely will become.

Guess what…it’s true! 

Knowing this, why wouldn’t you hang around with people who you aspire to be? Hang out with successful people. Network where their best prospects and customers go. Join the right local associations. Position yourself for success. Most importantly, have at least one mentor. I have several. You don’t have to personally know your mentor although if you can find a mentor locally, all the better!

You can mentor with experts through going to their seminars and following their writings and on line courses. You can mentor with people through various mastermind groups; you can even mentor with people through various chat rooms that are out on the Internet. Regardless, you need to find a mentor that is going to help you through the peaks and valleys that sales can and will bring. Your mentor can be a great sounding board to ideas that you might want to launch. And, your mentor should be someone you aspire to be.

Plan for your day. When you plan for your day…you plan for your success. I cannot stress to you how important it is for you to plan for each and every day. If you don’t, you will get to your office, not really know what you are going to do for the day, make a bunch of busy work for yourself, take no real action in your business and before you know it, it’s time for dinner. I see this scenario happen over and over again.

Get yourself a Palm Pilot (OK…so I date myself!) or something similar. Most systems have a To Do List built into their software. Start there. In one category, write down all of the actions you need to take for your business that day. Write down everything that you can think of. If you need to take an action or follow up with something a week from now, make note of it and mark it for that particular day. Make sure that you write down all of the people you need to call and follow up with. You should make another category for your personal To Do List as well.

In creating these To Do lists, you can then see, each day, exactly the action steps that you need to take on any given day. Again…dating myself, but I still print out my to do lists and take them with me throughout the day, so I know that I am accomplishing everything that I need to do on any given day.

As you finish up one task, then delete it. I love deleting my accomplished items immediately because I feel like have accomplished something, plus I like seeing that my list is getting smaller and smaller. If you are a person that doesn’t know where to start with their list, pick your top 3 items that you put off doing for as long as possible and do them first. When you get those tasks out of the way, the rest of your day goes more smoothly, and you’re not constantly thinking in the back of your mind about the tasks that are probably you’re most important things to do, but for whatever reason, you put them off.

If you have absolute deadlines, you need to make sure that those tasks are accomplished before anything else. Do not be a procrastinator! It only gets you in trouble when you are trying to juggle so many projects at one time. Just take action, complete the task and move on. You will feel so much better about yourself and your ability to get your actions steps done. And because you
are constantly taking action, you are working yourself and your business into
an incredibly successful enterprise.

Some days you may have a few items that you just did not have the time to get to. Don’t get overwhelmed by that. Life happens and there are times when you just don’t get everything you hoped to get accomplished in a given day, completed. Mark them for your To Do list tomorrow and make that task a top
priority.

Finally, as you are cleaning up your desk, ready to stop work for the evening, take a look at what your To Do List is going to look like tomorrow. By doing this it prepares you for how busy your day might be and you can start to think about how you might want to organize your priorities. But more importantly, if you look at your To Do List before you retire for the evening, those thoughts will be with you and you can subconsciously think about the actions that you are going to take for tomorrow. I find this especially useful when I am writing or doing something that I need some inspiration. Many times going to bed with that thought or question on how to do something helps me subconsciously come up with solutions to the questions I might have.

Plan for Success..Go now and set up your plan schedule. It will keep you get and keep organized (another topic for another day!) and you will never again be at a loss for what to do when you begin your day.  

Ok…so I believe that I have given you enough to think about for the time being.  Check back within the next day or so and I will have the rest of the “secret”selling tips for you and remember….

All of this is just a bit of education you might not have
had yesterday…

The more you have the better your life will become.

Go and make it a terrific day!

1/2-1 lb bacon, diced into bite sized pieces
1 or 2 medium pototatoes, peeled and cut into  1/2 in pieces (I use baking, but russet or Yukon are fine as well)
1 cup finely chopped onion
3/4 cup finely chopped celery
2 small bay leaves
2-2 1/2 cups frozen corn.  (if you have frozen some corn from the summer…this makes this recipe all the better!)
1 can creamed corn
1 1/2 cups Chicken stock or broth
2 cups whole milk

Saute bacon until crisp and brown in a large soup pot.  Transfer bacon and drain all but about 3 tablsp from the pot.

Add diced potatoe and chopped onion, celery and bay leaves to the pot.

Saute over medium heat until the vegetables start to soften, about 5-7 minutes.

Add the milk, frozen corn, creamed corn and the chicken stock or broth and bring to a small boil.

Reduce the heat and simmer until the potatoes are tender.  About 10-15 minutes.

I serve with the bacon bits on the side, sharp grated cheddar cheese and crusty bread.  Salt and pepper to taste.  As with most soups and chili’s you can prepare this soup a day or so ahead of time.  Sam loves the left overs when she comes home from school or practice.

Happy cooking…

I think that sales just might be the most feared of all professions there are. Either you are fearful of the aggressive, overbearing and totally unprofessional sales person or you are fearful to become that sales person…or maybe you fear both!

I have found that for most people, the negative feelings surrounding
how to sell is really about the number one fear there is:  No, not spiders or snakes (although snakes is my # 1 fear!!)

The reason people say they could never learn to sell is not because they are not capable of being a professional sales consultant, it is because they are afraid of the rejection that they perceive sales brings. Most people are afraid of the word No and they are afraid of the thought of Rejection. 

So, let’s talk about the word No and the feeling of rejection, put it into context and move on to learning how to sell and how to sell successfully.  Once I share with you The Seven Secrets to Selling and you truly understand what the word No really means, there will be no stopping you!

Early in my sales career I had a wonderful mentor and one of the first things he did was sit down with me and talk about the words No and Rejection. He knew, like I now know, that this feeling of rejection is the maker and the breaker in ones’ professional sales career. What he taught me never left me and to this day, and because of him,  I never feel rejected in my sales career.

So, what do we do as successful professional sales consultants?  We sell products and services to those people who need and/or want our products and services.  It is really as simple as that. We sell Solutions to people’s perceived Problems. If they don’t have a problem or a need, there really is little reason for our solution, right?

Why do people by Band-Aids? Not because they are so cool to have in the closet. People buy Band-Aids because they need to protect a scratch or a cut. Take the weight loss industry. People buy shakes and pills not necessarily because they taste terrific and that they are overly convenient to have around, but because by using these products, they are hoping to become thin and be able to fit into the a beautiful dress for their 10 year college reunion.

Successful sales people sell Solutions to people Problems. But the challenge to this equation is timing. Not always are we presenting the correct solution to the correct prospect at the correct time. That is when the word NO comes out and the feelings of rejection start to build.

But consider this..No doesn’t mean No forever.

On average..it takes Eight No’s to turn into a yes. When you hear No, what your prospect really means is that No..Not at this time.

It is all about the timing. They may not want your solution to their problem when you are speaking to them. They may not be able to afford your solution to their problem at the time you are speaking with them, they many not think that their problem is big enough at the time of your conversation. There could be a million reasons why your prospect said no, at the time of your conversation, but NONE of the reasons for being told No are personally because of you. They are saying No to the timing, not to you and many times not to your product or service. There is absolutely no reason why you should feel rejected by their inability to say yes at that particular time.

Doesn’t it feel great to realize that the No’s that you have been receiving are Not because of you?

Where so many sales reps fail is when they hear that dreaded word No, they say OK, put their tail behind their legs and walk away, never to be heard from again to that prospective customer. I’m screaming to you; don’t be that sales rep. You will lose out on so much business, and it will possibly be the biggest reason why you will not be the superstar that you have every right to be.

Now, I am not saying to stalk your prospect, to become insulting to them, or to badger them until you finally wear them down.  That is certainly not how to sell
professionally.  You want to gently, subtly, but consistently remind them that you are out there and are ready to serve them whenever they are ready. This can be done through many different kinds of media today; crafting letters, e/mails, faxes, phone calls to name a few. If there is something new about your product that your prospective customer should know, send them an update and then follow up with a friendly phone call.

Other ways to be in front of prospects without giving them the feeling that you are going to pounce on them like a hungry lion is provide them with information that might be useful for them, but is associated with your product. For example, say you are selling a product that helps people with their carpal tunnel syndrome. Your prospect has told you no… (Not right now) You can keep in touch with them by sending them articles from medical trade journals about carpal tunnel syndrome, you can send studies that your company does on your product, and there are reports done by the government that might be an interesting read for your prospect to understand their condition better. You are sending them educational material to help them with their decision when the timing is right for them to finally say Yes .

Can you see the power of what you are doing? You are becoming their friend…their expert to what their problems are. You are becoming their solution, not just your product.  Now that is how to sell and how to sell successfully.

I have had people call me back up to a year later telling me that they are finally ready to buy from me!! The timing is right for them and we move forward effortlessly. They didn’t feel “sold” from me keeping in touch with them; they didn’t feel pressured every time we had a conversation. I just continued to feed them pieces of information on a periodic basis so they wouldn’t forget about me. I continued to give them pertinent and interesting updates on the company, on improvements to my product, and information in general that I thought might help them understand their problem a bit better.

So, now that you better understand the words No and Rejection, and you realize it isn’t You that they are saying no to and it usually isn’t your product, it is because of the timing we can move on to How to Sell Successfully; The Seven Secrets to Successful Selling 

But I will save that for another post…Be on the lookout and remember…

This is just a bit of education that you might not have had yesterday.
The more you have the better your life will become.

Make it a terrific day…