You are a salesperson.

Each person who reads this must understand this important fact.

So you might think you’ve never sold anything in your life, right?

We bet you have and didn’t even realize it. But the reality is that you sell things all the time, but you could use a little refresher?

In the game of technology or business, you have to be able to sell something or you will get lost in this game.

Do you have a business or an idea or concept. Maybe you have a particular skills that make you stand out.

You need to be able to sell whatever “it” is

You may never be the “sales” person, but you have to be able to articulate your idea and sell someone on it. You may simply want to attract a business partner or an investor.

So let’s get started with a three-step process.

Step 1: Ask for What You Want Identify What You Want

Dreams don’t happen by themselves. You have to be willing to ask for what you want. Actually, rewind, you have to know what you want. If you don’t know what you want or need, you may need to do research about your idea, get a mentor to work with before you begin selling anyone on your idea.

For example,

One thing we always advise early stage founders to do is to strategically approach networking events. Go in with a plan of who it is you want to talk to and what exactly you need from potential people in the room. Going in blind and without a plan is almost worthless. Entrepreneurs understand you never know when you will get your next big break, meet the next investor in your company, or run into the future co founder for your idea. However, if you do not formulate and have clear ask then you can miss out on a golden opportunity to change your life.

Step 2. Know Your Worth

In order to properly ask for what you want, you need to understand your worth. When you make a specific pitch of an idea or try to get someone to purchase your service, DO NOT UNDER SELL yourself. I mean, why would anyone want to do this? Oh, we know a few:

1. Uneducated about the market (learn it)
2. You are insecure (STOP it)
3. You depend on them to determine your worth (Now, why would you do that?)

I know that we have all been there. We are so grateful to have a meeting with a potential client or that interview with that company so are excitement and gratitude can cause us to undersell ourselves. (Especially women and minorities have a tendency to undersell themselves). It is good to be humble and grateful for opportunities, but it only hurts you if you undersell yourself. No better investment than the one in yourself. One who consistently invests in themselves should be confident and comfortable to ask for what they want.

Step 3: Nike (Just Do it)  

It’s not that hard, seriously. The more practice, the better you will get at selling yourself. In fact, failing, and then giving it another go will only make you better. Test out different strategies and ideas, and it will help you become a better salesperson. You have to start somewhere. Plus, if you suck, you can only get better, right? Think more glass half full than glass half empty.

Step 4: Refresh and Adapt

Yeah, so this was only supposed to be a 3- Step process but of course you have to run it back.

Why are we even talking about this?

Because in diverse communities we often undersell our ideas and concepts. Have faith in yourself and your thoughts. Of course, some folks oversell themselves, but hey, is that really the worse thing after all?

—

Jordan Sterling

Co-Founder of Silicon Jungle

Also published on Medium.