A few days ago I was thinking about my business, doing some calculations.

If I gather twenty business cards and call them all, I should be able to get ten on the line, and of the ten, I should be able to set three appointments.

From the three, I should close one.

So, it should take twenty prospects to close one deal, I told myself.

This exercise is called, doing the math of success, and every experienced salesperson does at least a version of it.

But there is a sneaky, insidious word, smack in the middle of this thought flow:

Should.

Should isnt a factual term, and you wont find it in a text on logic, either. Mathematics doesnt speak in terms of should, and salespeople are to be cautioned about its misuse, as well.

Should is actually a normative word, a moralistic term, as in, all good children should say please and thank-you, or I really should change my oil next week. Should pertains to desirable and undesirable, good and bad, right and wrong.

The problem in telling ourselves that we should earn one sale from calling a list of twenty prospects is it sets up an expectation that is more than a probability. If we miss, and we dont get one, we tell ourselves something is wrong.

This adds an unnecessary charge to our experience, a form of condemnation. Good salespeople, or at least competent ones, we tell ourselves, should get one in twenty.

But what if you get one in forty? What, then?

Are you cursed, in a slump, or a lousy salesperson?

All we know, factually, is it takes you 40 to get one, so for each sale you want to close, put 40 prospects into the calling cue.

Thats reality, and should has nothing to do with it!