Low hanging fruit…

I was in a sales training session recently; the sales trainer kept using the phrase "low hanging fruit”.  He was referring to where sales reps could "easily find" sales.  That same phrase was used during a new product roll-out session I also attended recently.  It seems like new product roll out meetings, sales training sessions, team rallies all now include reference to finding the low hanging fruit. 

In my day, we called it a "bluebird".  When a deal unexpectedly landed in our lap that we closed without much effort, it was a bluebird.  I don’t remember bluebirds being referenced in sales training sessions or product roll-out meetings though.  I do know relying on bluebirds or low hanging fruit to make your quota is the quickest path to looking for your next job. 

Will Kenton wrote in Investopedia about the origin of the term low hanging fruit and its adoption in modern business and sales circles (link). 

Lindsay Kolowich Cox affiliated with HubSpot (primarily a marketing automation platform) offered this in her blog: 

A "bluebird" is a sale that came seemingly from nowhere or with unexpected ease. A sales rep might say, "Fortunately, a bluebird flew right in at the end of the quarter, helping me reach my goal." 

She goes on to suggest, that bluebirds are probably responding to marketing campaigns. 

I don't know if this easy path encouragement is the result of today’s social media pundits; the converging of sales and marketing disciplines; generational; or what.  But it seems I now hear low hanging fruit as if it has become a new selling strategy vs. merely a stroke of luck. 

I ask you, do you benefit often from easy, unearned, outcomes in your profession?  How are we all doing with our lottery purchases?  I suppose everybody has benefitted from a bluebird on occasion, but certainly not frequently enough to build a career on, let alone making the mortgage payments month in and month out, true? 

If my experience and opinions are closer to the reality of average working men and women in the sales profession, then who is continuing to spread this appeal to go forth and seek low hanging fruit? 

Can it be originating from people on the fringe who are "involved" but not "committed" to producing results?  You know the old saying about the ham omelet – the chicken is involved, but the pig is committed. 

Perhaps it's common for folks to under-appreciate the time and effort others have invested to master their trade.  Harry Beckwith reminds us things are usually not that easy: 

A woman was strolling along a street in Paris when she spotted Picasso sketching at a sidewalk café.  Not so thrilled that she could not be slightly presumptuous, the woman asked Picasso if he might sketch her and charge accordingly. 

Picasso obliged.  In just minutes, there she was: an original Picasso. 

"And what do I owe you?" she asked. 

"Five thousand francs," he answered. 

"But it only took you three minutes," she politely reminded him. 

"No," Picasso said.  "It took me all my life." 

Suffice it to say that every time I hear someone directing me to where they believe I should easily find a sale, I wonder why - if capitalizing on "low hanging fruit" was so easy – this person isn’t taking on a sales quota, moving to a commission-based compensation plan, and going after said fruit themself? 

Now, where’s that bluebird when I need one… 

GAP 

When life gets tough we could get a helmet… or… we could leverage the peace and share the power of a positive perspective.