This comprehensive checklist integrates all the key lessons from Frank Bettger’s “|How I Raised Myself From Failure To Success In Selling.” Use it as a daily guide, a training tool, or a periodic self-assessment to ensure you’re implementing the timeless principles that transform sales results.
🔥 Cultivating Enthusiasm
Daily Practices
- Practice physical enthusiasm: speak louder, move energetically, smile genuinely
- Dedicate time to product knowledge development (minimum 15 minutes)
- Review customer success stories to remind yourself of your product’s value
- Focus on how your product/service solves real problems
- Start each day with your personal “enthusiasm ritual”
Weekly Practices
- Reserve a specific day for preparation and planning (like Bettger’s Fridays)
- Track your activity numbers and celebrate progress
- Practice your sales presentation with a colleague for feedback
- Join or participate in public speaking opportunities
- Review your schedule to ensure it’s creating “zest” rather than exhaustion
🔍 Understanding Customer Needs
Before Each Sales Conversation
- Research the prospect’s likely challenges and priorities
- Prepare open-ended questions designed to uncover needs
- Plan how to help prospects recognize what they truly want
- Identify the potential “key issue” for this prospect
- Create a strategy to incorporate customer participation
During Each Sales Conversation
- Ensure the prospect does 70% of the talking in the first half
- Ask “Why?” when hearing objections
- Follow up with “In addition to that, is there anything else?”
- Practice attentive listening without interrupting
- Look for the “key issue” and focus the conversation there
- See things from the customer’s perspective
- Involve the customer actively in the presentation
🤝 Building Trust and Confidence
Building Self-Confidence
- Follow your knowledge development plan consistently
- Practice your sales presentation until it feels natural
- Maintain detailed records of all sales activities
- Review your metrics weekly to identify patterns
- Prepare thoroughly for each sales meeting
Earning Customer Trust
- Never exaggerate product benefits or make false claims
- Acknowledge product limitations openly when relevant
- Speak well of competitors when they come up
- Have testimonials and references ready to share
- Present yourself professionally in appearance and materials
- Show genuine interest in the customer as a person
- Ask about how they started in their business
- Follow through on every promise, no matter how small
Making Strong First Impressions
- Be transparent about who you are and your purpose
- Come right to the point about why you’re calling
- Ask if now is a convenient time to talk
- Position yourself as solving problems, not just selling
- Use appointment selling when possible
- Treat gatekeepers with honesty and respect
🎯 Closing Sales and Building Resilience
Closing Effectively
- Prepare a concise summary of key benefits
- Invite the prospect to participate in summarizing when possible
- Ask “How do you like it?” after presenting
- Welcome objections as buying signals
- Identify and focus on the most important issue
- Have paperwork prepared with the prospect’s name already filled in
- Mark signing spots with an “X”
- Place papers directly in front of prospect when asking for commitment
- Ask confidently for payment with the order
Maintaining Resilience
- Calculate your “batting average” (conversion rate)
- After rejection, write down one thing you learned
- Maintain your “success journal” of progress and wins
- Focus on your current 13-week improvement area
- Set and track daily non-negotiable activity goals
- Remember that “failures mean nothing at all if success comes eventually”
📈 Post-Sale Success
Following Up
- Make courtesy calls shortly after purchase
- Offer help or service proactively
- Ask satisfied customers for referrals
- Follow up on referrals within six minutes when possible
- Show appreciation for leads whether they convert or not
- Report results to those who provided referrals
- Check in regularly with valuable information
- Remember: “If you take care of your customers, they’ll take care of you”
🧠 Weekly Reflection Questions
Take 15 minutes each week to reflect on these questions:
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What aspects of my sales approach generated the most enthusiasm this week?
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Which customer conversations revealed the most valuable insights through questioning?
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How did I build trust in my interactions this week?
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What objections did I encounter, and how effectively did I address them?
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How am I applying the law of averages to maintain perspective on rejection?
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What specific improvement am I focusing on this week, and what progress have I made?
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How have I strengthened relationships with existing customers?
🌟 Frank Bettger’s Core Principles
Keep these foundational insights top of mind:
- “Finding out what people want, and helping them get it” is the essence of selling
- “When you show a man what he wants, he’ll move heaven and earth to get it”
- “Enthusiasm is, by far, the biggest single factor in successful selling”
- “The best prospects are the ones who object”
- “Selling is the easiest job in the world if you work it hard—but the hardest job in the world if you try to work it easy”
“The real test is: do you believe it, not will the other person believe it?” - Frank Bettger
Print this checklist, keep it visible, and review it regularly to ensure you’re implementing the timeless principles that transformed Bettger from failure to remarkable success in selling.
This content represents my own analysis and interpretation of concepts from Frank Bettger’s _How I Raised Myself From Failure To Success In Selling. For the complete experience and the full depth of these ideas, I highly recommend purchasing and reading the original book.