Selling Yourself

A guest post by Josh Scafe, Account Manager at Find Touch.

As the account manager over here at Find Touch, I interact with a lot of people throughout my week. And something that has been coming up quite frequently in my conversations over the past couple weeks is the role that sales plays in our daily life. Obviously, as the account manager here I cannot avoid selling, and sometimes it is true that companies or services or even people can sell themselves without even really trying, but I find that this is the exception and not the rule. Sales and selling is an important part of succeeding in life.

As an account manager, I need to sell potential clients on our services here at Find Touch, as a student I need to sell my professors that I have learned the course material and can present my thoughts clearly and critically about what I have learned. When I think about it, I even had to sell my significant other that I wasn't a bum and that she should date me. So really, when I think about it, sales and selling permeates some level of our daily interactions.

Sales are imperative to the interview process, without selling one's self to a potential employer, the chances of acquiring a job are impossible. In addition, businesses must sell their services, and therefore it is impossible to escape the role sales play for people who would not normally consider themselves to be salespeople. I have heard frequently that therapists are attracted to massage therapy because it is not a traditional career path and that by some extension of massage therapy's non-traditional career values, that massage therapists won't have to engage in any traditional sales techniques. I think that this is simply not the case. Sales is built into our lives and we sell ourselves all the time whether we know it or not. Not being conscious of this, and therefore doing a poor job of selling oneself, is detrimental to one's career, even when we pursue a non-traditional career path.

When I speak of sales, I mean building a certain level of trust between two people. Building a certain level of trust is key to any successful transaction or a relationship in general. If you cannot sell yourself to another person during in-person interaction, whether that be an interview, a massage session or a sales call, then that other person has no reason to want to see you again or do business with you. Let's face it, sales plays a larger role in the massage industry then most therapists or patients would ideally like to see, but running from the fact that sales is important in our professional relationships is naïve.

Therapists can take the same ideas from massage and apply them to sales. This involves listening, honesty and patience. This is how I try to do business, and I find that when I accept that sales is a part of my everyday activity, the pressure is relieved from acknowledging that I can be who I am and still be an effective salesperson, that by really listening, and by having clear intentions and by being honest with myself and others, I begin to see past the idea of "sales" and see each interaction as a chance to build a relationship with someone, to leave a lasting impression.. As professionals, we sell ourselves everyday! By acknowledging this and preparing for it, we can succeed at becoming successful salespeople and human beings.