Sherpa Co-Founder and Chairman David Smith wrote a book and it’s finally here – It’s About Time!
It’s About Time! chronicles David’s personal journey in senior living sales and describes how he developed Prospect-Centered Selling®, a transformative technique for making meaningful connections with prospects and driving higher occupancies.
Back to Where It All Started
David shared It’s About Time! with residents of The Gatesworth, the vibrant and thriving senior living community he and his partners built. Here are their reactions after reading the book.
An Excerpt from It’s About Time!
90 percent of our senior living prospects not only lack the desire to move, but they also perceive moving from home as something to avoid or certainly postpone. At best, moving is almost always a “plan B” option. In this context, the buying and decision-making process is out of sync with a transaction selling process. For these higher-functioning prospects, making a decision to move anywhere is a highly emotional, nonlinear, very personal and primarily irrational process.
In reality, senior living sales counselors are asking prospects to consider a sea change. We are asking people to redefine themselves, leave their current role identities behind, and start writing one of the last chapters in their lives. We are not just selling a new apartment with communal facilities and on-site services and care. What we are really trying to sell is a life change. It’s not a small change but a fundamental redefinition of the self.
The key to more effective sales results with any complex, emotion-laden sale lies in how we overcome this critical prerequisite by realigning with the buyer’s emotional decision-making process. Successful conversion of more higher-functioning senior living prospects has to do with confronting and untangling emotional resistance to buying before trying to sell solutions.
You can get your copy of It’s About Time here, available in paperback and hardcover, or as an ebook and audiobook. We would be grateful if you contributed an Amazon review. It’s just one or two sentences that would make a big difference in helping spread the word about the importance of empathy and connection in senior living sales.
“This is a must-read for anyone looking for an inspired sales culture!”
– Melinda Stowe, Amazon Review
“Those with aging parents will find this book a godsend and surprisingly anyone who works in marketing long term, heuristic sales will find it invaluable.”
– Lynn Chang, Amazon Review
