Why do women love money but hate sales?
Equal pay, equal funding, freedom to make choices about our own bodies. All key feminist issues. I have one to add: selling with confidence.
Despite 14 million businesses in the U.S. being women-run, only a tiny 2% ever hit the $1 million mark in annual revenues (it’s 6% for men). There are a few key reasons that the gap exists, and at the top of that list is the fact that most women never learned how to sell.
Even worse, we are fine with that.
Many women small-business owners tell me, "I hate the selling part," or “I like working with clients and customers, but the sales part is super hard for me. I try to just let the product/service sell itself.”
Here is the problem with that: sales is business and business is sales.
So, if you are in business, you are in sales.
But selling is not something most of us were socialized to embrace. We’re raised to believe that selling is “aggressive” or “pushy.” Or even worse, we’ve absorbed the idea that talking about money isn’t feminine.
Just look at who is teaching sales. Google “sales techniques” and watch the endless scroll of bro marketers and sales gurus. Men also represent close to 70% of all sales professionals and earn the high salaries that go along with that. Across industries, saleswomen earn 62.5% less than what their male counterparts do.
So while men are growing their businesses, building sales teams, and earning top dollar, many of the women we talk to here at Million Dollar Women still think of sales as “pushy,” “icky” or “sleazy,” and even that they are “out of integrity”when selling.
We are leaving so much money on the table.
This is why I have started teaching sales to women small business owners. Even after selling $32 million of products and services, I initially felt uncomfortable because I, too, had been socialized that sales is pushy and didn’t want to be associated with that. It took me months to say I am a scaling coach and sales trainer. In fact the program we launched to teach women to sell doesn’t have the word sales in it -- so more women will take it!
Ironically, many women actually have skills that allow them to sell better than men. According to a Forbes report, 74% of customers are likely to buy if they feel they are heard. Women, with high emotional intelligence and great listening skills, can not only bring in sales but also build a loyal customer and referral base. However, getting the meeting and getting the deal are not the same.
A lot of selling is about risk-taking and being confident. Girls Who Code and Moms First founder Reshma Saujani points out in her TED Talk: Boys are taught to be brave, while girls are taught to be perfect and cautious. She believes we should “Teach girls bravery, not perfection.”
Sales isn’t neat or perfect. It involves hearing a lot of “nos” and getting comfortable with rejection. It’s also about owning your worth, sometimes being zealous to get a deal done, learning to negotiate, and talking about money — all areas where traditional socialization of women doesn’t serve us.
Just as women are now claiming more seats in investing and in board rooms, it's time to reclaim sales as something women don’t just do begrudgingly, but brilliantly.
Here are six steps to help you excel at selling:
Shift Your Mindset: View sales as an opportunity to help your client or customer rather than just a transaction. If you are doing it right, sales should be a “do with” not a “do to” experience where you are asking good questions, uncovering pain points, and finding out if you are a good fit to work together.
Build Relationships: Focus on building long-term relationships rather than just making a quick sale. Women are naturally good at this — we tend to have lifelong friends. Networking, following up, and showing genuine interest in your clients’ needs can create loyal customers who return and refer others to you.
Leverage Your Strengths: Use your strengths in empathy, listening, and collaboration in sales conversations. By truly understanding your customers’ needs and working with them to find solutions, you can create a more positive and effective sales experience.
Cultivate Confidence: Confidence is key in sales. Practice your pitch/script, anticipate objections, and be prepared with answers. The more you practice, the more natural it will become.
Track Your Wins: Keep track of compliments from past customers and results you have gotten in a note on your phone or a Google doc for easy reference and to boost your confidence.
Seek Support and Training: Getting sales training can help you with the more difficult parts of sales, such as overcoming objections or closing.
With just a few weeks of sales training, here is what a few women small-business owners had to say:
“I’m like a totally different person than I was two weeks ago! I just closed a $30,000 deal.” –Mia, founder of a digital analytics agency
“We have done in the past two weeks what it previously took two quarters to do in sales!” —Erin, founder of a SaaS company
It’s time for women business owners to embrace sales. I hope, in 20 years, we will look back and say, “Remember when women thought selling was somehow unfeminine?” It will seem as outdated as girdles, home economics, and rotary phones. Until then, forward this article to a woman small-business owner who is leaving money on the table!