The Eat What You Kill Mentality: How to Become a Sales Carnivore and Stop Waiting for Handouts

What’s Up!

Sam Taggart here — the force behind D2D Experts and your partner in all things sales. I began selling as an 11-year-old and have now spent 17 years in the trenches. Knocked at curb painting, magazines, home security, solar — you name it, I’ve sold it door to door. And in all those years, all those industries, one truth has never changed: the reps who eat are the reps who hunt. Period.

I wrote a whole book about this called Eat What You Kill. Today I want to break down the core framework — the Carnivore vs. Herbivore mentality — so you can look in the mirror and figure out which one you are right now. And more importantly, how to become the predator your income deserves.

Carnivore vs. Herbivore: Which One Are You?

There are two types of salespeople in every company. The Carnivore wakes up knowing that if they don’t go out and hunt, they don’t eat. They aren’t waiting for leads. They aren’t refreshing their CRM hoping marketing dropped something in their lap. They grab their shoes, their iPad, and their pitch, and they go create their own pipeline.

The Herbivore sits at the office waiting for the phone to ring. They check their email. They scroll social media. They “prepare.” They attend meetings about meetings. And at the end of the day, they’ve done everything except the one thing that actually makes money: talking to a potential customer face to face.

My question is this: which one sounds like you? Don’t hedge. Don’t say, “Well, I’m kind of both.” No. You’re one or the other. And if you’re honest with yourself, you already know the answer.

Trait	🦁 Carnivore	🐄 Herbivore
Pipeline	Creates their own — forces the funnel	Waits for inbound leads or hand-offs
Morning Routine	Out on doors by 9 AM	In the office “preparing” until 11 AM
Response to Slow Day	Knocks more doors, stays later	Blames territory, weather, or leads
Relationship with Rejection	Fuel — uses it to get sharper	Fear — avoids it at all costs
Income Ceiling	None — eats as much as they kill	Capped by whatever falls in their lap
Identity	“I am a hunter. My income is my responsibility.”	“I’m doing my best with what I’m given.”

Activating Your Prey Drive

In the book, I talk about something called your Prey Drive. It’s borrowed from dog training. Some dogs see a squirrel and they take off like a rocket. Other dogs see the squirrel and just watch it run by. The difference isn’t training. It’s drive.

Here’s the thing — and this is where it gets good. In humans, Prey Drive can be BUILT. It’s not something you’re born with or without. It’s something you develop through repetition, discipline, and environment. There are three ways to activate it.

Force the Funnel: The Carnivore’s Pipeline Strategy

Let me break down the D2D Formula: Reps × Opportunities × Closing Percentage = More Money. Simple, right? Most reps try to improve their Closing Percentage. They study closes, memorize objection handlers, role-play all day. And that’s great — closing matters. But if your Opportunities number is small because you’re only knocking 20 doors a day, even a 50% close rate only gets you 10 deals.

The Carnivore approach is different. They FORCE the funnel. They maximize the Opportunities variable by being on doors more hours, knocking more doors per hour, and creating follow-up systems that re-engage previous contacts. They don’t hope for opportunities. They manufacture them.

Metric	🐄 Herbivore Pace	🦁 Carnivore Pace	Difference
Doors/Day	20	45+	+125%
Close Rate	15%	15%	Same
Deals/Day	3	6.75	+125%
Deals/Month (20 days)	60	135	+75 deals
Revenue (at $2K/deal)	$120,000	$270,000	+$150,000
Annual Take-Home (at 15%)	$18,000/mo	$40,500/mo	+$22,500 per month

Same skills. Same product. Same close rate. Different volume. That’s the Carnivore advantage.

The Identity Shift That Changes Everything

Here’s the most important thing I’m going to say in this entire post, so don’t skim this part. The gap between average reps and the top 1% is NOT about skill. It’s not about product knowledge. It’s not about having a better territory or a cooler iPad case. It’s about IDENTITY.

The top 1% don’t see themselves as employees. They see themselves as hunters. Business owners of their own territory. CEOs of their own career. They’re not waiting for their manager to motivate them. They’re not waiting for a better comp plan. They’re not waiting for anything. They’re already out there killing it because that’s who they ARE.

So let me ask you — and be honest. When you wake up in the morning, do you see yourself as a hunter? Or do you see yourself as someone who’s “trying to make it in sales”? Because those two identities produce wildly different behaviors. And behaviors produce results. And results produce income. It all starts with how you see yourself.

10 Key Takeaways

Go Hunt

The single biggest transformation I see in reps who go through our training isn’t a new pitch or a new close. It’s the moment they stop seeing themselves as someone who “does sales” and start seeing themselves as a hunter who eats what they kill. That shift is worth more than any script I could give you. Because when the identity changes, everything else follows. The effort. The consistency. The results. The income.

So today is the day. Not tomorrow. Not Monday. TODAY. Go out and hunt. Not because your manager told you to. Not because your rent is due. Because that’s who you ARE.

There’s more where that came from. D2D content is here to help you take your sales game to new heights. FULL SEND.