In sales you are being measured on results that you don’t have direct control over.  

Compare sales to a software developer, project manager and software architect. In these roles you are empowered by the organisation to build, organise or design. You have the ability to escalate matters if you don’t receive help from those required to support you...

However with sales you could work very hard doing good activities (phone calls, meetings and proposals) and still completely fail! 

To make real progress you need to be successful with all the following:

1. understand who your ideal ( or awesome) customer is. 
2. connect with a large pool of these prospective customers. 
3. develop the ability to communicate your value proposition and build a relationship of trust.  
4. the insights (or empathy) for what each customer is seeking to achieve and use this knowledge to position your product effectively - otherwise known as closing.