This episode of the My Favorite Mistake podcast features a very special guest, Merit Kahn, a sales expert, business speaker, Certified Emotional Intelligence Expert, and CEO of her sales training company, SELLect Sales Development. She has trained, coached, and consulted entrepreneurs and sales teams for more than 20 years—and she’s also a stand-up comedian!
About My Favorite Mistake Podcast
In his podcast, My Favorite Mistake: Careers & Business, Growth & Lessons Learned, Mark Graban discusses creating a culture where it is safe to talk about mistakes! Sharing these stories leads to continuous improvement, and it’s so much more beneficial than blaming others or beating ourselves up.
So, do you make mistakes at work and in business? Of course, we all do—but how do we learn from them? On this podcast, you’ll hear executives, entrepreneurs, and other successful individuals discuss their “favorite mistakes” and what they learned from their experiences—whether that be avoiding making the same mistakes again or turning those apparent mistakes into positives.
Merit’s Favorite Mistake
Merit shares her “favorite mistake” story about a time when she took the wrong approach with a sales prospect. Early in her career, Merit learned a new sales tactic, the Negative Reverse Selling technique. However, she was so immersed in obeying the method and following the rules that it ended up completely disconnecting her from the moment.
Oddly enough, this particular technique involved negatively answering prospects’ questions—even if it was a positive comment! Merit was more concerned with reporting back to her sales trainer than she was about the actual conversation that was taking place.
Unfortunately, she didn’t listen to the prospect, answer their questions appropriately, or help them solve their problem in any way. It was a costly mistake, as she did not get the deal, even though her solution was a perfect match for the prospect. Luckily, she reflected on the experience shortly after and distinguished for herself that it’s never a good idea to be so concerned about perfecting a technique at the expense of really being present in a conversation.
Ready to learn more of Merit’s insights into sales training and development? Set up a meeting with her now!
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