What we can learn from great salespeople (w/ Colin Coggins)

How to Be a Better Human

TED

Self-improvement, Education

4.2 • 1.3K Ratings

🗓️ 29 May 2023

⏱️ 32 minutes

🔗️ Recording | iTunes | RSS

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Summary

Selling products, ideas or even yourself is a task that can feel daunting, or maybe even a little uncouth for some people. But Colin Coggins, author and adjunct professor at USC’s Marshall School of Business, believes that anyone can learn the skills needed to sell anything – and that you already have more “sales” experience than you think. Colin shares why he believes that the best salespeople defy the expectations of what society thinks of as a successful salesperson, how self-awareness can help you achieve your goals and why learning the art of selling could teach you a lot about life in general. For the full text transcript, visit go.ted.com/BHTranscripts

Transcript

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0:00.0	Ted Audio Collective.
0:02.0	Audio Collective.
0:04.0	You're listening to How to Bea Better Human.
0:10.0	I'm your host Chris Duffy. When I was in elementary school my friend
0:15.2	Ben and I used to hold these joint sidewalk sales where we'd sell all our old books
0:18.8	and toys in between our apartment buildings on the street and it was our New York City version of a garage
0:23.6	sale so we were trying to make a little bit of money sometimes we'd have
0:26.7	lemonade but mostly we were selling used books and toys and about five minutes
0:31.0	into any of these sales a a pattern would become very, very clear.
0:35.5	Ben was a master haggler and salesperson.
0:38.2	Despite being at most 10 years old, Ben could consistently manage to convince adults to pay a higher price or to buy an extra toy for their kid that maybe they weren't even considering.
0:48.0	Me on the other hand, I was not a master haggler. I was constantly throwing in extra books for free. I was trying to convince them to
0:56.4	take the books even when they didn't want it. You like the Ramona books?
0:59.4	Oh you're gonna love this series. Please you gotta try it. Look I'm gonna give it to you for free try it out I insist I had a lot of happy
1:05.7	customers and I also had a disconcertingly light money jar and guess what today I am still
1:12.0	very bad at sales.
1:13.2	I often underprice myself or don't reach out to someone who might hire me or book me on a show because
1:17.9	I'm worried about bothering them and maybe that's you too.
1:21.1	Well today's guest Colin Coggins thinks that we all need to
1:25.0	redefine sales and realize that it is a skill that applies to all of our lives.
1:29.2	Colin teaches a course on sales at USC and he's the author of a new book, The Unsold Mindsette.
1:35.2	Here's a clip from Colin on how he got started on this path.
	...

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