Thoughts, and a Question…

Thinking more and more about business and prospecting, building or growth if you would, and how many ways there are to do it.  More than I can cascade here, obviously, but everything stretches from one principle.  Conversation.  And, genuine, heartfelt conversation at that.  No intention to convert, or sell, just knowing the person, knowing them better.  Right now, I’m calling, from a list of existing prospects.  Now, calling already has the not so much assumed but anatomical and definite insinuation of sale, or at the very least marketing.  I’m doing my best to just de-charge the call.  Call to say hi, and check in.

What do you do, when prospecting?  Do you call?  And if you do, how do you approach?

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Number coincidences, with the times in the article, and the word count being 529.  Today is speaking to me, telling me to break from wine’s fuckwit industry and only be and write here.

3:26PM.  First deal closed, today!  I’m celebrating and rejoicing a bit, but I’m very much tempering it.  Have to “keep the party going”, as I said in an email.  Made a couple calls, now to make more.  Haven’t done much else but make sure everything is in order for this transaction.  Nothing on books tomorrow but a couple calls.  Will be on phones but the aim is creative… creative approaches to conversations and interactions, creative ways to prospect.  One guy I met said to write down as many people as you can, that you know closely and well and not so.  Don’t look at people as prospects, look at them as people, people you want to get to know.  The literary approach… get to know their story and narrative.  The literary approach I have with wine will even more prove useful and relevant in this business.  Writer in a tech office… of course, of course!

Eating PB&J wife made me, just now.  Tired a bit after workout, but not to a degree with impedes my motion’s place and application.  New ways to speak this company, what it does and what it means, more than the simple list of products and services.  That’s certainly part of it, but it’s NOT the entirety.  This sales teaches me that I need to even more break any mold or template.  Not that I’m sticking to one, but write more post-it’s that define Sonic, that speak and SHOW Sonic.  How can I catalog and list, or even post what I’m thinking right now, after this first sale and after a Senior Account Exec told me I NEED to be in front of people.  She called my speaking eloquent and strong, and being on the phones is absolutely NOT the only path to what I’m after.

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Day 9.  About conviction, about defiance, about all of us finding what we’re searching for.  Coltrane playing me and eased track.  Didn’t record my spoken word piece yesterday.  Was distracted by that bottle of Inspiration Syrah, the quiet of the house, and thoughts of writing about the wine industry.  When in my office, I see such a book taking shape, in not much time either.  Citing everything from the ridiculous pay, to the overwhelming focus on anything but get wine, to patterns and posturing from those patterns.
A truck passes me on 128.  Hate typing on my phone, but this is what I have currently.  Hoping for a day not at all busy.  Not at all preoccupied with the winery making its number for the month, but more my sanity, my sentences, this project and others.
This week in the office, I’m going to loudly and communicatively accelerate all movements and sights.  Why can’t I be the highest selling AE in my first year?  There is no law or rule or policy prohibiting such.  Actually, Sonic is the atmosphere that enables and emboldens such a progression to take place.  Whatever we do for work, we need not only make it our own, but have it teach us and be a measure of effort.  We should always seek to against ourselves compete.
Bed early tonight.  Wake at 5, 4 if you can.  At the end of 100 days, there will be a visual of such altitude, such attainment.  If I’m not the highest earner, I’ll have shocked everyone with what I’ve done.  Make calls, SET APPOINTMENTS…. just say hi.  Forget about return, certainly immediate return.  That’s a foot shot, I’ve learned, and an error the wine industry continues to seemingly want to make.  And I e never figured out why, why they expect such instant transaction and metrics ascension.  I’ve given up trying to learn, now focusing on my Sonic story and sense of new sense and story, character.
This writing spot, little spacious and sizeable inlet, used to write here in 2012 as I mentioned, and later in 2017 when working at the Foley camp.  Now, story is different.  Not at all fearful to question and defy regularity and policy, not that I was before.  But Sonic has shown me that one idea can prove purposeful and provide a purpose which pervades till your final day.  Such is now, such is me, such is my poetic and newly purposed immediacy.
What do I want from the day.  Peace.  Ideas for this week.  Ideas on growth, branding and rebranding but more than that…. CHARACTER.  Story.  Life.  Revolution.  Start acting like a revolutionary, I said to myself and some other people at Sonic a few months ago.  Today…. watch.  And won’t do so with malice or a burn-bridge intent, but to have my identity known.  For all in contact with me, not just for me.  If I’m not making sense I apologize….. you’ll see what I mean, shortly.

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Not a matter of correcting,

but designing. And if you’ve stayed or parted from the design, you put yourself back in it. Don’t scold yourself. At all, much less excessively. Go back to your sight and self-promise, actuating your fire and story. Collect, breathe, calm. There’s another scene soon to start.

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Minutes before team gets here.  Selling everything like I do wine, I tell myself about something I have approaching.  Selling should never be selling as I’ve noted in the past, in recent entries and if not then recent writings.  Genuine, present, connected communication.  Telling the story while listening to someone else’s narrative and deeply considering that.  An interaction but more.  More rich and textured talk.  Thinking of how the wineries I’ve worked at in the past, and other jobs, how their intention and focus on the sale, on conversion, is far too obvious.

I’ve now elected to embody new motion, a new beat for the purpose of building business and selling.  And that is to do anything but. Talk to people, meet them, know them better than I know what I’m representing.  Wine is life, and I sell life, if anything.  How incredible it is to be here, PRESENT, and with the opportunity to know people, know what they want, help them get there… to their There.

Not many people like to be sold, or want to be.  They want to be happy, they want to enjoy the moment, the conversation.  That’s my focus, their enjoyment of the interaction.  Still developing these notes, but I am developing them and playing with approaches and methods of doing so.  So…. Off into the Field and day, where I put such to practice.

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