The Sales Evangelist

Today we’re celebrating our country’s independence and the freedom of religion and freedom of speech that we enjoy, but sometimes sellers relinquish their freedoms because of fear.  We discuss challenges like this in the TSE Certified Sales Training Program, how they can hinder our success, and how we can overcome them.    Storytelling  We’re focusing on sales tools this month and one of the tools we’ve discussed is storytelling. We’ve talked about how to tell an effective story and how LinkedIn and other social media platforms can help you share your company’s values.  In my own case, I recently relinquished my own freedom because I worried about what other people might think. Despite the fact that this is our 1,130th episode, I still worry about people’s opinions. You might think I’d be beyond that, but I still worry about my writing and how it will be perceived. I worry that if I write something, it might not sound great.  I worry, too, about the videos I create and whether or not I’ll look and sound good in the video. As a result, I relinquish my freedom to express myself and share my thoughts because I’m worried.    Trolls I appeared on a friend’s podcast recently and I shared my own experiences with content and how it has benefited our audience. Luigi, the host of the Sales IQ podcast, recalled his experience with a troll who was intent on nitpicking his podcast by suggesting that I wasn’t qualified to speak about sales. He claimed I didn’t have enough B2B experience and that I was like many others who were cheating people. Reading that was like a kick in the gut. Despite the fact that I’ve helped hundreds of people, I started to have second thoughts. Our clients have landed promotions and generated pretty decent income, but still I doubted whether or not I should express myself.    Limitations I wanted to pick apart his arguments and defend my experience against his claims that my information was basic to selling. Luigi pointed out that many sales professionals understand the importance of basics now. Together, we realized that this gentleman wasn’t a fit for the things we offered.  Though he told us he had 33 years of sales experience, he’ll likely limit himself because he doesn’t believe he can learn from anyone else, especially those who are younger than him.  I also realized that this gentleman had done this kind of thing before. Experience He didn’t realize that I haven’t listed every single bit of sales experience on my profiles. I have more than 15 years of sales experience between B2C and B2B settings.  Perhaps he also didn’t realize that the fundamental things we share are the key to moving the sales needle. We’ve had clients from Tokyo to Australia, Europe to Canada, and of course the U.S.  I offered to set a time for me to learn about him and him to learn about me. He responded by telling me that I could buy his book if I wanted to learn more about him. I declined his offer to buy the book and suggested a phone call, at which point he said he doesn’t spend money on long-distance phone calls. I offered to have a Zoom meeting but he wouldn’t commit.  The point is that there will always be detractors, but we cannot let them stop us from expressing ourselves. Not everyone will be a good fit for whatever you’re selling. You’ll always have haters.    Content Our content isn’t for people who don’t like it or who don’t believe they need it. It’s designed for people like you and me who are seeking to be better sellers.  We talk a lot about how to generate content for podcasts or for LinkedIn or for blogs, and how videos can help you share content about your industry. The truth is that most of the people who consume your content will contribute to the conversation, and you can shut down your whole operation because of a single person.    Whether you’re in the hospitality industry or the medical industry or the technology space, you can share content with others around you. Curate something you found online or write your own piece and ask others around you to help you improve it.    Independence Declare your independence from fear and from trolls. Go out and share amazing content that impacts people’s lives.  I want you to succeed and it’s why I do what I do. I want you to find more ideal customers and build stronger value in your conversations. I want you to close more deals and declare your independence. Mostly, I want you to go out and do big things.    “TSE Certified Sales Training Program” episode resources Connect with me at donald@thesalesevangelist.com. Try the first module of the TSE Certified Sales Training Program for free. This episode is brought to you by the TSE Certified Sales Training Program. I developed this training course because I struggled early on as a seller. Once I had the chance to go through my own training, I noticed a hockey-stick improvement in my performance. TSE Certified Sales Training Program can help you out of your slump. If you gave a lot of great presentations and did a lot of hard work, only to watch your prospects choose to work with your competitors, we can help you fix that.  Tools for sellers This episode is also brought to you in part by mailtag.io, a Chrome browser extension for Gmail that allows you to track and schedule your emails. It's super easy, it's helpful, and I recommend that you try it out. You'll receive real-time alerts anyone opens an email or clicks a link. Mailtag.io allows you to see around the corners. You can see when people open your email, or when they click on the link you sent. Mailtag.io will give you half-off your subscription for life when you use the Promo Code: Donald at check out. I hope you enjoyed the show today as much as I did. If so, please consider leaving us a rating on Apple Podcast, Google Podcast, Stitcher, or wherever you consume this content and share it with someone else who might benefit from our message. It helps others find our message and improves our visibility. If you haven't already done so, subscribe to the podcast so you won't miss a single episode. Share it with your friends who would benefit from learning more. Audio provided by Free SFX and Bensound.Mentioned in this episode:HubSpot and bluëmago | STUDIOSHubSpot and bluëmago | STUDIOS hubpspot.com/marketers bluemangostudios.com

Instead of pushing your message out to your prospects in hopes that they’ll latch on, sellers can make their message magnetic and practice better selling through storytelling.    John Livesay is known as the “pitch whisperer” because he helps people become compelling storytellers. Plato said stories rule the world, and it’s still true, except 2,600 years later, we have many distractions that he didn’t have.    Push and pull   Pushing your message out to sell a product or service just doesn’t work anymore. The new technique is to pull people in with great stories. John’s work as a storyteller began at an ad agency where he was tasked with creating 30-second commercials for movies. He discovered the need to tell a concise story that made people want to see the movie.    During a stint in Silicon Valley, he competed against IBM and other massive companies to sell technical products. He realized that if you confuse people, they say no. But you can pull people in by telling the story of what the technology does.   His work culminated in a career selling ads for Conde Nast magazine, where he had to bring to life the vision of a particular brand to a particular advertiser so they could see why their brand would resonate with the stories being told in the magazine.      Self-esteem roller coaster   John points to the fact that sellers tend to feel good about themselves only when their numbers are up. When they’re down, self-esteem suffers.    He recognized his sense that he had to constantly push information out, which was exhausting. Even worse, if you’re pushing and trying without getting anything in return, you end up feeling bad about the whole process.    Good storytellers allow people to see themselves in the story, which makes the message magnetic. When you become a better storyteller, people want to take your calls and open your emails. #MagneticMessage    Campfires   The glow of PowerPoint has replaced the glow of campfires, and we often sit in meetings where someone reads to us from a slide. Don’t do that. Nobody wants to be read to. John suggests using a series of images from which you can tell a story.    Stories work because of our right-brain, left-brain way of processing information. If you’re buying a car, when the seller shares how many miles-per-gallon it gets, you cross your arms and prepare to negotiate on price. But if you say, “Donald, let me tell you a story of someone like you who bought this car and how it changed his life,” you’ll pull the buyer into the story.    People buy emotionally and then back their decision up with logic.    Sellers who deal in Ferraris don’t talk about miles-per-gallon. They sell the emotion of driving a sexy car. People buy emotionally, and storytelling is the best way to tap into people’s emotions.    If you tug at people’s heartstrings, they open their purse strings.     Sales outreach   John recently worked with Honeywell on the sales of technical products that keep the air clean inside operating rooms. The team talked a lot about the technology and the specifications and how it was better than what the competition had to offer.    The real story is what happens if the air isn’t clean in the operating room. The patient gets an infection and has to be readmitted for additional surgeries.    Just about every seller has a case study or testimonial of some sort that can form the basis of a good story.    Paint a picture   Some sellers use before-and-after pictures to sell their product or service, accompanied by a bunch of facts. There’s no emotion or story.    A good story has exposition and it paints a picture of the work you did with a previous client. It marries the who, what, when, where, and why of a client with the problem you were solving. It demonstrates how much better life is for your client after he works with you.   But you are never the hero in the story. Tell your story so that the client can see himself in your story. It will make your closing very different because the client will want to take that journey with you.    Tell a story with specifics, and be sure to include the drama that happened along the way.    Presentations   Most sellers make the mistake of having too many words in their PowerPoint presentations, and failing to think about what their opening will be. Thanking them for the opportunity to be there isn’t memorable because everyone does it. The fact that you’re excited isn’t what excites your clients.   Whether you’re pitching to fund a startup, to get hired, or to tell people why they want to work with you, use an opening that pulls people in. It’s the most important part of any presentation.    Sellers often rely on ploys like presenting last in hopes that their presentation will be the most memorable, but the best story is going to get the sale. It doesn’t matter what order you present in.    Sell yourself first, then sell your company, and then sell your product or service. Most people skip the first two. Tell a story about yourself, then about the company and its culture, and then how you help other people.    Elements of a story   Don’t just tell the story of how you solved a problem for a client. Paint a picture of the resolution and what the client’s life looks like now.    John recounted a client who was dropped into the Amazon jungle when he was 18 to survive for two weeks as a rite of passage. The entrepreneur shared the story of how his lessons in the Amazon jungle translated into the concrete jungle of entrepreneurship, and he got the funding he was looking for. His investors figured if he could survive in the Amazon, he’ll figure out how to survive here.   Make yourself memorable and connect emotionally with your prospects. It gives you a tool in your toolbox that you don’t normally have.   Three stories   Anytime you’re starting out with this concept, ask yourself these questions:   How am I going to sell myself? Why did I take this job?  What’s the company story of origin? What case study can I develop into a story that people will see themselves in?   Arthur Ash, tennis pro, said the key to success is confidence, and the key to confidence is preparation.   Episode resources   Grab a copy of John’s book, Better Selling Through Storytelling. Text the word “pitch” to 66866 and John will send you a free chapter of the book that has a step-by-step process on moving from invisible to irresistible as a seller.    You’re a savvy salesperson who wants to learn and grow. Check out audible for thousands of titles, plus a free 30-day trial, plus a free book.    If you haven't connected with me on LinkedIn already, do that at Donald C. Kelly and watch the things I'm sharing there. I’m fairly easy to connect with. Just comment on something about my podcast. Send me an email.   You've heard us talk about the TSE Certified Sales Training Program, and we're offering the first module free as a gift to you. Preview it. Check it out. If it makes sense for you to join, you can be part of our upcoming semester. You can take it on your own or as part of the semester group.   If you and your team are interested in learning more, we'd love to have you join us. Call (561) 578-1729 to speak directly to me or one of our team members about the program.   This episode is also brought to you in part by mailtag.io, a Chrome browser extension for Gmail that allows you to track and schedule your emails. You'll receive real-time alerts anyone opens an email or clicks a link.   I hope you enjoyed the show today as much as I did. If so, please consider leaving us a rating on Apple Podcast, Google Podcast, Stitcher, or wherever you consume this content and share it with someone else who might benefit from our message. It helps others find our message and improves our visibility. When you share your experiences with the show, others will read the reviews and give us a listen.   I truly appreciate you and appreciate your reviews and your subscription, and your willingness to tell your friends and anyone you know that's in sales about the podcast. Audio provided by Free SFX and Bensound.Mentioned in this episode:HubSpot and bluëmago | STUDIOSHubSpot and bluëmago | STUDIOS hubpspot.com/marketers bluemangostudios.com

The most financially profitable way to do business is to shift your focus from getting to giving, and by developing a Go-Giver strategy, you’ll constantly provide value and good things will begin to happen.    Bob Burg is a salesman who has written a series of books about the Go-Giver, a parable about the principles behind the kind of success most sellers are hoping to achieve. Through encounters with a series of different people, the main character, Joe, discovers that his focus has been in the wrong place.    Giving too much   Giving means providing value to others. Though it’s typically not possible to provide too much value, begin by determining whether your focus on providing value will set you up to be taken advantage of. There are plenty of people who are takers and who focus only on themselves. They feel entitled to take without giving anything back.    If you’re providing value to someone like that, there’s a good chance things won’t work out.  Realize, though, that there’s no natural connection between being a go-giver and being taken advantage of. Understand, too, that if you’re being taken advantage of, it isn’t because you’re too nice; it’s because you’re allowing it to happen.   Being a go-giver doesn’t mean being a martyr or a doormat. It simply means your focus is on bringing value to the marketplace and to others.    No one will buy from you because you need the money or you have a quota to meet. They’ll buy because they will be better off buying from you.    Focus on value   The only reason people should buy from you is because they’ll be better off after they do. That truth allows the salesperson or entrepreneur to focus on bringing immense value to the marketplace and to the prospect’s life. When that happens, the prospect will prosper greatly.    Money is simply an echo of value. Focus on the value rather than the money. Value comes first and the money you receive is a natural result of the value you provided.    Money is the thunder to lightning’s value. The value comes first. #thunderandlightning   Human nature is self-interested. It allows us to create more human beings.    Successful people deal in truth. They don’t deny inconvenient things, but rather they acknowledge truth and then work within it to make things better.    Start by acknowledging and understanding self-interest. Then put it aside with the understanding that we’re better off dealing with others when we suspend our self-interest. The other person is only going to buy because of their own needs.    Value without attachment   Although people often suggest you should give without expecting anything in return, Bob doesn’t exactly agree with that. Instead, give value without attachment to the result. We want people to expect good things. If you’re in business serving other people, you should expect to profit greatly because you’re bringing value to the marketplace. Just don’t be attached to that result.    Give value because it’s who you are and what you do. When that happens you create a benevolent context for success. You develop great relationships with people who feel good about you. They know you, they like you, and they trust you, and they want to be part of your business.    Develop an army of personal walking ambassadors who will refer business to you.    Starting point   Imagine you decide at this point to change your ways. Start by asking who the people are in your network and what you can provide to them that will help them by bringing value to their lives. Then make a plan for meeting other people that you can develop know-like-and-trust relationships with.    We’re human beings and we’re different types of people. The reason the Go-Giver took off is because it allows you to be yourself. You can be the person who wants to bring value to the marketplace.    Most people choose a certain line of work because they believe in the mission. They believe in what they’re doing. We’re happy when we’re living congruently with our values.    Go-Giver origins   Bob recalls his parents working to make people’s lives better. Then, when he started in sales, he found himself selling a product that offered great value, but he was focused largely on the sales process. Like Joe in the book, he was a seller who wasn’t living up to his potential.    He returned from a non-selling appointment one day to hear advice from a guy in his organization. The typically-silent guy told him that if he wanted to make a lot of money in business, he should establish a target outside of making money.    Target serving others, so that when you hit your target, you’ll get a reward in the form of money. Great salesmanship is about the other person and how he’ll benefit from your product or service.    Economic downturn   Bob heard from a roofer during an economic crisis who recognized that his approach had been wrong. He was trying to save money during the downturn, but he realized that instead of trying to give the least he could for the money, he needed to focus on giving more value.    It didn’t necessarily mean spending more, but rather creating a better experience. His business took off as a result.    Technology has leveled off the playing field. We live in a commodity-based society which isn’t necessarily bad. It does mean that you must distinguish yourself. If you sell a widget that your customer can’t distinguish one from the other, it will always come down to price. If you sell on low price, you’re a commodity. If you sell on high value, you’re a resource.    Communicating value   There are likely hundreds of way to communicate value, but Bob boils it down to five elements of value.    Excellence Consistency Attention Empathy Appreciation   To the degree that you can communicate these things to your customer, that’s the degree to which you take price and competition out of the picture.    Begin with leadership, and with a leader who is totally committed to make this part of the culture. Anyone can lead from anywhere but culture trickles down from the top. If the leader invests in this and gets buy-in from other leaders, it becomes part of the culture.    Bob Chapman of Barry-Wehmiller wrote a book called Everybody Matters in which he recalls running a profit-focused company. Though there is nothing wrong with profit, it must be sustainable, so it must be the result of the value you provide. Bob attended the wedding of his best friend’s daughter, and the father of the bride made a toast. He acknowledged that the groom was marrying a treasured daughter. Bob took that same concept to his business.    Barry-Wehmiller has thousands of employees, all of whom are someone’s treasured sons and daughters. When the economic downturn emerged, rather than lay off any one employee, they came together as a company and traded work days. They stopped putting into the company savings account until the crisis was over. The corporate family came together in a crunch.    Heart level   Herb Kelleher of Southwest Airlines understood the concept and he restructured the organization to focus first on allowing employees to thrive, learn, grow, and have fun. His team had a higher sense of purpose in their jobs.    As a result, the team takes care of the customers and the customers take care of the shareholders.    Until you know there’s a problem that needs to be fixed, you’ll never take the steps to address it.  Be willing to shift your focus.    When Bob’s business partner sends a sales letter, he makes an effort to take the “I,” “me,” and “we,” out of the letter. We’re self-interested human beings and we write in terms of how great we are and how great the product is.    We aren’t denying self-interest. We’re acknowledging that you have to work at placing  your focus on others.    Episode resources   You can find Bob’s podcast, The Go-Giver Podcast, at his website. You can also grab samples chapters of his books before you buy them. Consider subscribing to his list to get a copy of a written resource called Endless Prospects.    The Go-Giver way teaches you to build relationships with solid step-by-step information.    Connect with me at donald@thesalesevangelist.com.   Try the first module of the TSE Certified Sales Training Program for free.   This episode is brought to you by the TSE Certified Sales Training Program. I developed this training course because I struggled early on as a seller. Once I had the chance to go through my own training, I noticed a hockey-stick improvement in my performance.   TSE Certified Sales Training Program can help you out of your slump. If you gave a lot of great presentations and did a lot of hard work, only to watch your prospects choose to work with your competitors, we can help you fix that.    Tools for sellers   This episode is also brought to you in part by mailtag.io, a Chrome browser extension for Gmail that allows you to track and schedule your emails. It's super easy, it's helpful, and I recommend that you try it out. You'll receive real-time alerts anyone opens an email or clicks a link.   Mailtag.io allows you to see around the corners. You can see when people open your email, or when they click on the link you sent. Mailtag.io will give you half-off your subscription for life when you use the Promo Code: Donald at check out.   I hope you enjoyed the show today as much as I did. If so, please consider leaving us a rating on Apple Podcast, Google Podcast, Stitcher, or wherever you consume this content and share it with someone else who might benefit from our message. It helps others find our message and improves our visibility.   If you haven't already done so, subscribe to the podcast so you won't miss a single episode. Share it with your friends who would benefit from learning more. Audio provided by Free SFX and Bensound.Mentioned in this episode:HubSpot and bluëmago | STUDIOSHubSpot and bluëmago | STUDIOS hubpspot.com/marketers bluemangostudios.com

Sometimes sellers trust too much of our sales process to autopilot, and we lose sight of the fact that even the best sales tools can’t replace you.    We get distracted from the things that matter most and we miss out on opportunities or ruin relationships because we forget the importance of the most important component of the sales process.    Sales tools   Sales tools help us promote or sell a product. They could include CRM, which helps us sell by allowing us to track information. These tools may help us understand more about the prospects who are working in the organizations we’re pursuing.    Tools might include your email account, your LinkedIn Sales Navigator account, your BombBomb account, your cell phone, or your Hubspot tools. There are countless tools you can take advantage of that will help you promote or sell your products more effectively.    Sometimes I rely so heavily on those tools that I effectively take myself out of the cockpit. I’m unable to guide the sales process because I’ve trusted my tools to automate it.    Where to automate    Automation without oversight can leave room for errors.   While it’s good to use tools like prospect.io to automate your outreach, the problem emerges when we fail to personalize the process. If we set up generic emails and then blast them to hundreds of different people, you won’t get the results you’re seeking. People can immediately sniff out bulk outreach.    If you rely on it, you’ll discover that very few people read your emails and even fewer responded. You may even discover that some unsubscribed from your communications.    On the other hand, if you use merge tags to personalize your messages and you focus on a specific industry and you address a specific problem that this industry faces, you can create a message that speaks directly to that industry.    Reaching out    While I’m emailing these prospects, I’ll also reach out to them on LInkedIn via an invite, and I’ll comment on some of their relevant content. I’ll also use personal phone calls as well as text messages or possibly even Twitter.    Unlike the generic situation which was devoid of my personal involvement, this option leaves room for my own personality. The prospects have a chance to interact with me in different settings because I’m actively involved. I’m present, and I’m overseeing the process.   People want to be treated personally.    Don’t lose focus on the human side of your connections. Make sure to differentiate yourself from the competition.    “Sales Tools Can’t Replace You” episode resources   You’re a savvy salesperson who wants to learn and grow. Check out audible for thousands of titles, plus a free 30-day trial, plus a free book.    If you haven't connected with me on LinkedIn already, do that at Donald C. Kelly and watch the things I'm sharing there. I’m fairly easy to connect with. Just comment on something about my podcast. Send me an email.   You've heard us talk about the TSE Certified Sales Training Program, and we're offering the first module free as a gift to you. Preview it. Check it out. If it makes sense for you to join, you can be part of our upcoming semester. You can take it on your own or as part of the semester group.   If you and your team are interested in learning more, we'd love to have you join us. Call (561) 578-1729 to speak directly to me or one of our team members about the program.   This episode is also brought to you in part by mailtag.io, a Chrome browser extension for Gmail that allows you to track and schedule your emails. You'll receive real-time alerts anyone opens an email or clicks a link.   I hope you enjoyed the show today as much as I did. If so, please consider leaving us a rating on Apple Podcast, Google Podcast, Stitcher, or wherever you consume this content and share it with someone else who might benefit from our message. It helps others find our message and improves our visibility. When you share your experiences with the show, others will read the reviews and give us a listen.   I truly appreciate you and appreciate your reviews and your subscription, and your willingness to tell your friends and anyone you know that's in sales about the podcast. Audio provided by Free SFX and Bensound.Mentioned in this episode:HubSpot and bluëmago | STUDIOSHubSpot and bluëmago | STUDIOS hubpspot.com/marketers bluemangostudios.com

The sales landscape is always changing but by gathering insights from other sellers we can determine how to handle major challenges when selling.    Brandon Bruce is co-founder of Cirrus Insight and he’s going to address how to we can get out of our own zone, where we focus exclusively on ourselves and our companies, and seek opportunities to interact with other people.    Evolving sales   The world of sales is constantly evolving. One of the challenges Brandon sees with sales right now is an unspoken push that exists. Because there are a bunch of companies at the growth stage, and a bunch of companies just starting out, there’s a tremendous amount of energy in the sales industry.    There’s a premium on hitting numbers. Everyone is hustling and trying to find a way to build a better mousetrap. On the negative side, sellers might be hyperfocused on closing deals so that they forget to prioritize the personal connection. Because connections take time, and sales reps get antsy, we sometimes try to speed things along.    We don’t want to close a deal next month; we want to close it this month.    Brandon believes there’s a happy medium to be found. We must work to focus on building sustainable relationships even while we focus on making our numbers.    Long-term success   Companies that focus too narrowly on numbers will likely struggle to achieve long-term customer success. The customers won’t stay as long because the deals were one-time kinds of relationships. It’s easier for customers to walk away when the customer doesn’t know us well.    Brandon remembers buying a countertop, a one-time purchase, from a company that worked to develop a relationship with him. They were struggling to find exactly what he wanted, until they discovered an unused countertop in a storage area. It was exactly what he needed, and it was something a previous customer decided against using. And the company sold it to him for 50 percent off.    He calls it a great selling experience because they listened to his needs and they thought about how they could best help him. And even when they had a chance to make more money off the deal, they sold it to him at a great price.    Even though he won’t be in the market for a countertop anytime soon, they created an evangelist in him. If anyone should ask where to buy a countertop, he’ll absolutely recommend that company.    They closed a deal, they moved product, and they build a sustainable relationship.    Evangelizing   We should probably remind ourselves to focus on doing the right thing, and sometimes allowing ourselves to take the easy option. We’re tempted to feel like we should push a little harder, but sometimes we can take the easy deal that leaves the customer feeling satisfied.    Every now and then, take the deal that the customer can say yes to immediately. You might leave a little on the table, but everyone feels good moving forward. #Evangelizers   Your customer will become an evangelist for your company. You might have missed a chance to get a little more from them, but because you gave them more, you’ll have the opportunity to earn more from them.    Building customer relationships benefits your long-run philosophy.    Raving fan   I joined an organization that gave its sellers to the book, Raving Fans, as part of its onboarding process. It helped us understand the value of customers who bought our solution and then stayed with us to upgrade and buy more later.    It’s valuable to have a customer who likes your product and who will promote you on social media and leave you reviews. A raving fan might take you to their next three jobs, or mention you on their podcast.    It has less to do with building a predictable sales machine and more to do with building a fan base who is passionate and who might do unpredictable things.    Reaching out to prospects   It’s getting harder and harder to reach prospects, and sellers use a variety of tactics to do it.    Ecommerce has gotten huge, and statistics show that buyers have done a tremendous amount of research before they engage in the sales process. Despite that, there’s still room for a lot of outreach and prospecting. But how can we bridge that gap if we have buyers who are already doing a lot of the work themselves?   Begin by making it really easy for your customers to have a conversation. Brandon’s company puts its calendars on the website so that customers who want to schedule time with them can immediately see what is available. Once they schedule a time, it will automatically appear on the company’s calendar. It’s buyer-driven versus seller-driven.   Prospects come to them more often now asking for a demo. Meeting them part-way helps to bridge that gap.    Another option they use is the ability to place bulky slides in a web portal and then provide a link to it instead of putting the slide in an email. It’s useful because they can click on it and view it online. They don’t have to worry about malware or about a bulky attachment loading too slowly.    They also get real-time analytics about their slide deck: they know which slide people are most interested in, and where they abandon the slides. The team can then offer to follow up with a demo.   Meeting halfway   Brandon calls the process meeting halfway, which he said is how the best sales always happen. It’s a buyer saying, “I’m ready to buy,” and a seller saying, “We’re pretty interested in selling to you.” It creates a partnership where everyone brings something to the table.    Persuade by sharing insights. Many people have a distaste for sales because they perceive it as a seller trying to trick a buyer in buying something he doesn’t need. But that’s not selling. That’s trickery.    Sales is an art and not a science. It can’t be reduced to an algorithm, at least not yet, because it involves nuanced decisions as part of the relationship. In his own case, the company was looking to make a purchase, but the VP of marketing was skittish because the company wasn’t pushing for the sale at all. It left her with the sense that they don’t really want their business.    The art results from trying to find the right amount of positive pressure to get the deal closed. It’s figuring out what your buyer needs and wants to hear, telling them, and moving the conversation forward.    Email outreach   Email outreach is difficult and it has gotten harder over the lifetime of Brandon’s company. As with any trend in technology, as more and more people come on board with automation, there’s simply more volume. Those on the receiving end are overwhelmed by it, and it’s hard to overcome the spam filters. It’s difficult to break through.    Short emails work the best; perhaps two or three lines long with single sentence paragraphs. It must be super easy to read at a glance because people don’t tend to read deep content.    Clearly state what you do and provide a link or two. Make it very easy for the user to click and say, “I want to learn more.” They’re much simpler than the newsletter-type emails that are rich in image and video. Google and other filters often knock those out. It’s a simple, text-based email with an intriguing subject.    Recognize that vanity metrics might get you a 100-percent open rate, but they don’t drive conversations, and conversations drive sales.    Consider asking other people in your industry for feedback. Brandon likes to send ideas to other tech founders and ask if his ideas seem insane or totally off-base. Because it’s a very giving community, people often write back to offer thoughts and ideas.    Keep the excitement   Sales will always be a hustle. It won’t ever be easy. It’s a nice idea to think that you can create some kind of machine that will keep the money rolling in, but it isn’t realistic. We must keep putting our heads down, hustling, and meeting the customers halfway. Make deals that are easy to say yes to and that leave your customers feeling confident about the decision.    Let your audience know that doing business with you is easy.    “How to Handle Major Challenges When Selling” episode resources   If you’d like to connect with Brandon, you can email him at brandon@cirrusinsight.com, or you can find him on LinkedIn.    Connect with me at donald@thesalesevangelist.com.   Try the first module of the TSE Certified Sales Training Program for free.   This episode is brought to you by the TSE Certified Sales Training Program. I developed this training course because I struggled early on as a seller. Once I had the chance to go through my own training, I noticed a hockey-stick improvement in my performance.   TSE Certified Sales Training Program can help you out of your slump. If you gave a lot of great presentations and did a lot of hard work, only to watch your prospects choose to work with your competitors, we can help you fix that.    Tools for sellers   This episode is also brought to you in part by mailtag.io, a Chrome browser extension for Gmail that allows you to track and schedule your emails. It's super easy, it's helpful, and I recommend that you try it out. You'll receive real-time alerts anyone opens an email or clicks a link.   Mailtag.io allows you to see around the corners. You can see when people open your email, or when they click on the link you sent. Mailtag.io will give you half-off your subscription for life when you use the Promo Code: Donald at check out.   I hope you enjoyed the show today as much as I did. If so, please consider leaving us a rating on Apple Podcast, Google Podcast, Stitcher, or wherever you consume this content and share it with someone else who might benefit from our message. It helps others find our message and improves our visibility.   If you haven't already done so, subscribe to the podcast so you won't miss a single episode. Share it with your friends who would benefit from learning more. Audio provided by Free SFX and Bensound.Mentioned in this episode:HubSpot and bluëmago | STUDIOSHubSpot and bluëmago | STUDIOS hubpspot.com/marketers bluemangostudios.com

If you’re not already harnessing LinkedIn to develop a consistent stream of quality leads, you’re missing out on more referrals, possible testimonies, and a powerful prospecting tool.    Mike Jones owns and operates a local Sandler Training franchise where he works with sales leaders and salespeople in those cultures to develop nontraditional ways of prospecting and selling. He has the privilege of seeing best practices and working intimately with sales culture. He loves the experience of moving between industries and geographies to see what the consistent themes of success are.    Utilizing LinkedIn   Sellers must take advantage of LinkedIn, but many people use it wrong.    They often don’t understand LinkedIn’s power to get to the right person. It’s difficult to connect with the right person, but LinkedIn gives people the ability to determine who they need to be talking to.    There is power in connections. If you aren’t using it to find the right people in the organizations you’re connecting with, you aren’t using it to its full capabilities.    There’s two kinds of prospecting.    Active prospecting, which includes developing daily behavioral metrics about how many conversations you want to have, how many appointments you want to have, and how many existing clients you should be reaching out to. Activity always precedes outcome. If I can dial in my activity and monitor it and compare it to a monthly revenue goal, that allows me to make strategic behavioral changes. Whatever outcome you’re seeking, you have a system perfectly designed to give you that outcome. If you want a better outcome, analyze what you’re doing from a behavioral standpoint in order to achieve that outcome. It’s a form of prospecting that provides real-time decisions, and it gets immediate results.    Passive prospecting doesn’t provide immediate results. If, for example, you work 250 days a year and your prospecting system requires you to send out 10 emails, either directly to a prospect or a contact in LinkedIn, asking for an introduction. Over a year, that’s 2,500 prospecting attempts every year. In today’s business culture, it works and you’re missing an opportunity if you aren’t seizing it.    Thinking about now   Sometimes, as sellers, we get so focused on the now that we forget to focus on the future. In the early days of my sales career, I was guilty of it, too. Every phone call you make doesn’t have to result in an immediate close.    We may even make the mistake of prospecting to convince people, and that creates a lot of pressure. Instead, identify what kind of prospect is in front of you.    There are four distinct mindsets that prospects have.    They have a need they know about.  They’re comfortable and they aren’t making any changes. They are willing to make changes in order to have a better return on investment. They’re arrogant.    We can only help number one and number three. Numbers two and four will communicate with a salesperson differently. Instead of trying to convince, try to determine which of the four you’re dealing with. It will help you understand whether they’re open-minded about it.    Prospect’s mindset   Don’t give up too early. When a salesperson reaches out to a prospect, they’re trying to change the prospect’s mindset and alter what they believe.    Be consistently persistent. Develop a cadence that falls somewhere between “I’m bugging someone” and “I’m ineffective.” Prospecting takes time and sellers must stop looking at their monthly revenue as the barometer for success. We do it because we think that’s how the game needs to be played.    Realize that your individual metrics and your revenue are important, but you don’t get a pass on your prospecting simply because you hit your revenue. Failure to prospect will impact you months from now. You must manage your calendar to make sure you can service the people you're selling as well as your future prospects.    LinkedIn content   LinkedIn is a huge tool for marketing and it’s designed to help people think and share different ideas and insights.   You must give to get, and you must be a giver. Life is an open book test and we should be cheating off each other. #give   When we look to give back, we’ll get stuff in return. The more you give, the more the people who want your help will come to you.    If you’re a giver and you’re prospecting, you’re giving so much great information. They’ll keep coming back to you.    Introductions   Many salespeople don’t do enough to leverage their connections in order to get introductions, which is probably a better word than referral. Probably 20 percent of your clients will provide an introduction without being prompted to. They like to connect people.    At the same time, there are probably the same number who don’t like doing it. The 60 percent in the middle will do it if someone asks them to. We just have to become proactive and make it part of our process.   The best time to ask for an introduction is when the prospect realizes that he got his value and he’s happy. If you’ve already found a process that works, don’t change it. But if you aren’t having success asking for introductions, wait until the buyer realizes what they have in value.    It also probably depends on the type of product you’re selling.    Team behaviors    Figure out what behaviors your team should be doing and build some healthy accountability around those things. It’s easier to coach people who have individual belief systems and business acumen. Based upon metrics, you can give unique instruction to each person.    Make sure to have a direct line to the decision maker in the company you are pursuing, and build it around a story. In other words, figure out a common connection to the person you’re trying to connect with and use that. That connection is much more likely to be successful than cold outreach will.    Don’t wing it. Use your KPIs and other metrics to get prepared. Good sellers won’t sabotage their efforts or be lazy. They’ll want to do something that will help them earn more money.    Finally, get your life “why-dialed in.” Figure out why you get out of bed in the morning, because that’s your source of power. If you don’t have your life “why-dialed in,” you’ll go through the motions and it will be mundane and boring.    Evaluate your patterns and habits. Are you getting the habits and outcome that you’re looking for? Sales is a purposeful, predictable event. If you’re serious about what you’re doing and how you’re doing it, you can track and measure your output and change it.    “Harnessing LinkedIn” episode resources You can find Mike on LinkedIn or you can connect with Sandler Training by The Ruby Group. Visit Sandler Training to connect with someone in your own area.    If you haven't connected with me on LinkedIn already, do that at Donald C. Kelly and watch the things I'm sharing there.   You've heard us talk about the TSE Certified Sales Training Program, and we're offering the first module free as a gift to you. Preview it. Check it out. If it makes sense for you to join, you can be part of our upcoming semester. You can take it on your own or as part of the semester group.   If you and your team are interested in learning more, we'd love to have you join us. Call (561) 578-1729 to speak directly to me or one of our team members about the program.   This episode is also brought to you in part by mailtag.io, a Chrome browser extension for Gmail that allows you to track and schedule your emails. You'll receive real-time alerts anyone opens an email or clicks a link.   Take advantage of a 30-day free trial, including a free book of your choice, at audible.com/tse. I hope you enjoyed the show today as much as I did. If so, please consider leaving us a rating on Apple Podcast, Google Podcast, Stitcher, or wherever you consume this content and share it with someone else who might benefit from our message. It helps others find our message and improves our visibility. When you share your experiences with the show, others will read the reviews and give us a listen.   I truly appreciate you and appreciate your reviews and your subscription, and your willingness to tell your friends and anyone you know that's in sales about the podcast. Audio provided by Free SFX and Bensound.Mentioned in this episode:HubSpot and bluëmago | STUDIOSHubSpot and bluëmago | STUDIOS hubpspot.com/marketers bluemangostudios.com

Many sellers have a tough time with outbound sales, so we’re spending the month of June focused on the topic, and today we’re specifically addressing the fundamentals of sales outreach.   Wes Schaeffer entered sales in 1997, covering stocks, bonds, retail, real estate, and high tech. He decided that, since sales was crazy and uncertain, he’d bet on himself. He laid the foundation for The Sales Whisperer, where he helps people with sales training.    Outbound struggles   Too many sellers mistakenly believe that outbound is dead. That cold calling and email are dead. The truth is you simply have to do a little bit of homework.   You have to choose who to lose. You can’t help everybody. #IdealCustomers   Some people would say that because everybody drinks water, if you sell water, everyone is your prospect. But some people are content drinking water out of a hose. Not everyone will spend money on your stuff.    Client selection is important. You have to figure out who’s going to buy your stuff and who isn’t.    The number of people who are ready, willing, and able to buy what you sell right now is in the single digits. If, for example, you just bought four brand new tires for your car, it doesn’t matter that you’re having a 50-percent-off sale.    Follow a script   Now that you know who you’re going after, what will you say? Will you fall into the trap of not following a script because it feels unnatural?   The Rock has made over $60 million a year by regurgitating scripts. He makes it his own and he makes it believable. The truth for all of us is that we’re living on a script.    I once talked in a presentation about seeing the band Chicago and about the fact that they play the same 20 songs in the same order at every single show. What would happen if they decided to just wing it every now and then?   That’s not what professionals do. Professionals practice things until they can’t get them wrong. You could wake them out of a stupor, hand them a guitar or keyboard, and they could play any song perfectly.    Practicing skills   Look at Tom Brady or Lebron James or Tiger Woods. I guarantee you they are still practicing. Are you willing to practice the little bitty things? How do you open? What do you say? How do you title your emails? How do you build interest?   If you sound like everybody else, I’m going to treat you like everybody else. The only way I can differentiate between you and everyone else that sounds like you is on price.    Think of the phone calls you get from an autodialer. They’re nice because they streamline things, but when people hear the long pause while it’s connecting to the first available person, they are completely uninterested. Then they mispronounce your name and you’re done.    Diagnose the problem   Wes recommends at least five emails in any outbound process. He also pointed out the distinction between frequently-asked questions and should-ask questions. FAQs can be written out and sent in an email. The should-ask questions allow you to differentiate yourself. These are the things the prospect doesn’t know.     Understand your product and the situation of your prospects well enough to know what issues might arise. Our goal in prospecting is to ask a question that our prospect can’t answer.    Doctors do the same, and it’s why we trust them. When they take the time to diagnose the problem, we trust their prescription.    Ask questions   How are you generating leads? What trends are you seeing? Is it becoming more expensive to run ads? How is your team performing? Do you experience ups and downs?   Spend some time on your should-ask questions.    We’re all too close to our own offerings. There’s an adage that says you can’t read the label from inside the bottle.    Outreaching sequences   Timing matters in outreach, and that’s why you need multimedia multi-step followup sequences. You need a success story about a prospect in your niche. You need a case study or a video testimonial. And then you’re off and running.    Dripping a prospect is a little like dating. When you continue coming back to your prospects, they eventually decide that there must be something good about your offering.    You have your target market or your dream 100. It’s worth persisting because eventually something is going to happen: a machine will break or the competition will miss a delivery. Maybe an employee will quit or they will have their own quality issues.   Start early, stay late   Remember that whatever you can measure you can improve.    Jeffrey Gitomer speaks about gold calling because he says there isn’t such thing as pure cold calling in B2B. You’re most likely to reach people by phone. You can do direct mail and other things, and they may work.    Executives and decision-makers get to the office early and they stay late. Since I’m a west coast guy, I start calling the east coast about 2 p.m. when the assistants and receptionists have gone home. Same with the lunch hour. The hourly people take their breaks while the boss keeps working.    Be strategic about your calls. Use LinkedIn to find information about your prospects. Where did they go to school? Do they have a recent article? The research demonstrates that you did your homework. It differentiates you from your competition.    Little things add up. Trust the process and have a process.   “The Fundamentals of Sales Outreach” episode resources   Connect with Wes at thesaleswhisperer.com. You can find his social media links and his phone number there.    Connect with me at donald@thesalesevangelist.com.   Try the first module of the TSE Certified Sales Training Program for free. This episode is brought to you by the TSE Certified Sales Training Program. I developed this training course because I struggled early on as a seller. Once I had the chance to go through my own training, I noticed a hockey-stick improvement in my performance.   TSE Certified Sales Training Program can help you out of your slump. If you gave a lot of great presentations and did a lot of hard work, only to watch your prospects choose to work with your competitors, we can help you fix that. The new semester of TSE Certified Sales Training Program begins in April and it would be an absolute honor to have you join us.   Tools for sellers   This episode is also brought to you in part by mailtag.io, a Chrome browser extension for Gmail that allows you to track and schedule your emails. It's super easy, it's helpful, and I recommend that you try it out. You'll receive real-time alerts anyone opens an email or clicks a link.   Mailtag.io allows you to see around the corners. You can see when people open your email, or when they click on the link you sent. Mailtag.io will give you half-off your subscription for life when you use the Promo Code: Donald at check out.   I hope you enjoyed the show today as much as I did. If so, please consider leaving us a rating on Apple Podcast, Google Podcast, Stitcher, or wherever you consume this content and share it with someone else who might benefit from our message. It helps others find our message and improves our visibility.   If you haven't already done so, subscribe to the podcast so you won't miss a single episode. Share it with your friends who would benefit from learning more. Audio provided by Free SFX and Bensound.Mentioned in this episode:HubSpot and bluëmago | STUDIOSHubSpot and bluëmago | STUDIOS hubpspot.com/marketers bluemangostudios.com

Many sellers assume that experience makes them good at building valuable relationships, but there’s an art to tactically leveraging relationships to land your biggest customers.   Zvi Band is the co-founder and CEO of Contactually, a relationship-oriented CRM designed to help businesses build and maintain relationships with their networks. He was an introvert in college who hardly ever left his room, but that was before he discovered that relationships would be his best asset. He is the author of the book Success is in Your Sphere.   Sharpen your tools   Zvi recognized the need for Contactually because he would connect with people and then lose track of them and miss the opportunity. It wasn’t that he was doing a bad job. He was simply so focused on working hard for his existing clients that he lost touch.   To measure the strength of your network, he recommends opening any social media tool and considering whether your network would come to your side if you asked for something simple like $20. Then, if you truly believe your relationships are your most important asset, what are you actually doing to nurture those relationships those won’t pay dividends next week but might in the coming months or years?   For most people, the answer is, “Not too much.”   Tactically leverage relationships   The goal should be to build and nurture personal, authentic relationships without any necessary plan or intent. Then, they’ll call us when they’re ready to buy. Or if we call them, they’ll pick up the phone.    The problem is that sometimes, we aren’t necessarily sure who is important in our relationships or what our goals are. We must begin by figuring out what we’re trying to accomplish. Are you trying to increase the number of referrals? Increase your close rate or your repeat business? Looking for an entirely different job or different career steps?    Clearly identify your goals and then develop everything else to ladder up to those goals.    Always take a step back and ask what you’re really trying to do.    Nurture opportunities    If you’re going to conferences and meetings, you’re likely trying to nurture the opportunities that emerge there. But rather than connecting with everyone there, determine who is there and who you should be working with. For Zvi, that intentional decision shifted who he engaged with when he went to those events.    The worst thing we can do is walk in with a set of business cards and have conversations that will never turn into anything real for either party. Those business cards get lost in the washer and you’ve wasted time that could have gone to people you could truly serve.    Once you’ve identified who you want to connect with, develop a cadence to make sure you’re staying top of mind. Follow their social media and watch for news about their company. Don’t be afraid to tell your connections that you’re simply working to stay in touch.    Value and service   Don’t assume follow-up is most important. Focus on value and being of service to someone. The best way we can get what we want in life is by helping others get what they want. That way, as soon as the moment comes where your contact needs what you have, he’ll immediately think of you.    When Zvi was nurturing sales opportunities with large brokerages, he wasn’t necessarily trying to pitch them on the value of software. Understand more about the prospect’s business. Work to understand challenges and identify other existing customers who experienced the same issues.    Work to show your prospect that you aren’t simply trying to get a dollar. You’re trying to build a successful relationship that will ultimately benefit both of you.    “You can have everything in life you want, if you will just help other people get what they want.” -- Zig Ziglar   Technological age   Technology allows us to connect with so many different people, but the problem is that it does the same for everyone else. That means your customers are being flooded with other ideas and messages. We have to find a way to build personal, authentic relationships.    Realize that being a nice guy isn’t enough to produce business opportunities for you. People have to know what you’re looking for.    Zvi recalls that he was looking for a CPA recently and one of his friends mentioned that a guy they know well was a CPA. Though he knew the guy well, he wasn’t aware that he was a CPA. Make sure your audience understands the skills you bring to the table.    Relationships assets   What strategies are you willing to put in place to grow this relationship asset? After all, these assets are just like the dollars in our bank account. We can invest in the asset. It can go up or down. We have to put strategies in place to make sure we’re growing that asset.    There was a time when “always be closing” was the mantra. Now, though, our role has switched to a subscription based business so it isn’t just about selling. It’s about building and nurturing a relationship. Reputation matters and referrals matter.    If a company brings on a customer that won’t result in a successful relationship, that’s bad for everyone involved. We aren’t just trying to get a deal; we’re trying to get a partner. #SalesPartner   Capital strategy   The best thing you can do is ensure you have time to build relationships. That can be as simple as blocking time in your calendar to build relationships. You don’t respond to email or text during that time. You nurture authentic relationships with people who aren’t at the top of your inbox.    Consistent. Establish a strategy and do it regularly.  Aggregated. Collect all your relationships in one place like CRM or spreadsheet. Prioritizing. Identify which relationships are most relevant. Investigate. Gain intelligence into your relationships.  Timely. Make sure you’re staying in touch over a certain amount of time. Adding value. Don’t simply follow up.  Leverage. Do whatever you can to make it simple.    The CAPITAL strategy ties them all together with a bow. It allows us to understand how all these parts connect together.    Long-term numbers   Avoid the temptation to focus solely on numbers. If you’re going to think about them, focus on long-term numbers. Look at touch points and engagement to make sure your reps are staying on value and touching base with clients.    Nurture those relationships to stay top of mind.    Relationships are our most important asset so ask yourself what you could be doing today, tomorrow, or next week to develop that asset.    “Tactically Leveraging Relationships to Land Your Biggest Customers” episode resources    Check out Zvi’s book, Success is in Your Sphere and hare it with another relationship professional that would benefit from it. All proceeds from the book’s sale go to charity.    If you haven't connected with me on LinkedIn already, do that at Donald C. Kelly and watch the things I'm sharing there.   You've heard us talk about the TSE Certified Sales Training Program, and we're offering the first module free as a gift to you. Preview it. Check it out. If it makes sense for you to join, you can be part of our upcoming semester. You can take it on your own or as part of the semester group.   If you and your team are interested in learning more, we'd love to have you join us. Call (561) 578-1729 to speak directly to me or one of our team members about the program.   This episode is also brought to you in part by mailtag.io, a Chrome browser extension for Gmail that allows you to track and schedule your emails. You'll receive real-time alerts anyone opens an email or clicks a link.   Take advantage of a 30-day free trial, including a free book of your choice, at audible.com/tse. I hope you enjoyed the show today as much as I did. If so, please consider leaving us a rating on Apple Podcast, Google Podcast, Stitcher, or wherever you consume this content and share it with someone else who might benefit from our message. It helps others find our message and improves our visibility. When you share your experiences with the show, others will read the reviews and give us a listen.   I truly appreciate you and appreciate your reviews and your subscription, and your willingness to tell your friends and anyone you know that's in sales about the podcast. Audio provided by Free SFX and Bensound.Mentioned in this episode:HubSpot and bluëmago | STUDIOSHubSpot and bluëmago | STUDIOS hubpspot.com/marketers bluemangostudios.com

Sellers are programmed to take advantage of outreach to generate opportunities, but it’s important that we don’t forget to ask for the referral.    We understand the importance of cold calling and cold outreach, but that’s doing things the hard way. We do it over and over again without ever considering whether it’s the best way.    This is a reboot of an earlier episode of The Sales Evangelist, but it's an evergreen topic. Asking for referrals always makes sense for motivated sales professionals.    Cold calling   I would never suggest you shouldn’t use cold outreach or cold calling to connect with your prospects. I do it myself and I’ve generated great opportunities that way. But it isn’t the only way to generate them.    Sometimes we forget to ask for referrals. So as a sales pro, how can you remember? What else can you do to remind yourself to take the easy route to generating business?    Put it on your calendar. Just as you block off time on your calendar for prospecting and cold outreach, set reminders to ask for referrals.    Create a habit   Create a weekly goal to generate three referrals per week. If your goal is to get three referrals per week, even closing one of those referrals will change your results. Once you institute the habit of generating referrals, you’ll establish a pattern of one deal per week that closes. And that’s if you’re not particularly good at it. If you’ve taken our TSE Certified Sales Training, you could possibly do even better.    You can build on that habit and that improvement. That will amount to more money for you and your organization.    If each of those deals amounts to $10,000, you’ll generate $40,000 a month. If you’re responsible for $80,000 a month, then half of your business will come from referrals. If you’re currently not generating any, that’s a pretty great increase.    Accountability   Salespeople don’t necessarily like accountability. Do it anyway. Tell a coworker or sales leader your goal. Join our Facebook group and tell someone your goal.    Accountability is important. When I worked as a sales rep, I shared my current projects with my sales manager. She saw that I was motivated and proactive and I eventually got better opportunities than other people on the team.    If you share your goal with your leader, he or she will certainly follow up to help you stay accountable. If you’re an entrepreneur working internally at an organization, you can benefit from the same kind of accountability.   Set calendar invites   Establish specific times in your schedule when you’ll pursue referrals. Just as you set time to prospect and pursue inbound leads, set time for referral prospecting. Set 30 minutes each day to reach out to your clients for referrals.    It’s such an easy task that most of us won’t do it. We’re programmed to do things the hard way; to pick up the phone and dial. These simple projects can gain us business, but referrals don’t always happen naturally.   You must ask for the referral.    “Don’t Forget to Ask” episode resources   Connect with me at donald@thesalesevangelist.com.   Try the first module of the TSE Certified Sales Training Program for free. This episode is brought to you by the TSE Certified Sales Training Program. I developed this training course because I struggled early on as a seller. Once I had the chance to go through my own training, I noticed a hockey-stick improvement in my performance.   TSE Certified Sales Training Program can help you out of your slump. If you gave a lot of great presentations and did a lot of hard work, only to watch your prospects choose to work with your competitors, we can help you fix that. The new semester of TSE Certified Sales Training Program begins in April and it would be an absolute honor to have you join us.   Tools for sellers   This episode is also brought to you in part by mailtag.io, a Chrome browser extension for Gmail that allows you to track and schedule your emails. It's super easy, it's helpful, and I recommend that you try it out. You'll receive real-time alerts anyone opens an email or clicks a link.   Mailtag.io allows you to see around the corners. You can see when people open your email, or when they click on the link you sent. Mailtag.io will give you half-off your subscription for life when you use the Promo Code: Donald at check out.   I hope you enjoyed the show today as much as I did. If so, please consider leaving us a rating on Apple Podcast, Google Podcast, Stitcher, or wherever you consume this content and share it with someone else who might benefit from our message. It helps others find our message and improves our visibility.   If you haven't already done so, subscribe to the podcast so you won't miss a single episode. Share it with your friends who would benefit from learning more. Audio provided by Free SFX and Bensound.Mentioned in this episode:HubSpot and bluëmago | STUDIOSHubSpot and bluëmago | STUDIOS hubpspot.com/marketers bluemangostudios.com

 We’ve all encountered price wars against the lowest bidder, but today we’re going to talk about how you can stand your ground, protect your margins, and earn the price that you’re worth and how that will help you grow your business.   Chris Perry works with Market Sense, a Sandler Training franchise, that helps business attrackt, assess, hire, and on-board world class sales people.   Great ideas   There are lots of great ideas in the world. Many businesses have built things that they are excited about and proud of, and eventually others notice that they are making a lot of money doing it. So they jump into the game.   Suddenly options exist where they didn’t before, and consumers, whether they are B2B or B2C, don’t know how to differentiate between them. Many of them fall back to the cheapest option.   If we fall into that trap, the buying process becomes all about price, and we’re forced to trade dollars for deals. We must cut our prices, and that’s a slippery slope. It’s also a great way to go out of business.   Consumers will treat you like a commodity if you allow them to.   Money mindset   Attitude makes a big difference in this scenario, because the salesperson’s mindset plays a huge part in price. Human beings are trained to seek deals and discounts. Chris’ company runs a lot of assessments on salespeople and they’ve discovered a lot of what they call money tolerance issues.   We all grow up with different relationships to money, with some of us believing it’s rude to talk about it. Others are taught to pinch every penny, while still others believe there is always more money available. Whether it’s conscious or not, we have a bunch of recordings playing in our heads. Those recordings impact our money conversations.   If, for example, a seller grows up believing it’s rude to discuss money, he’ll be less comfortable talking about it. He’ll likely wait until the last possible moment to address cost, because he assumes the prospects are uncomfortable talking about it, too. Waiting until the presentation to discuss price can be a recipe for disaster for sellers.   Sellers who believe that $500 is a huge purchasing decision, but who are selling $50,000 solutions, will be nervous about the price discussion. They’ll sweat a little extra, and the prospects will see that anxiety and they’ll assume the seller doesn’t believe in the product. They might also perceive that there’s room to negotiate price.   Recognizing value   The key is to change the way you perceive your value so you don’t undersell yourself or your product. If you do, you’ve already lost before you even get started. You must believe in yourself and your product.   The truth is that it’s hard to change someone’s mindset. People won’t generally understand their worth simply by listening to a podcast, no matter how good it is. Chris recommends that you begin by acknowledging your mindset. Figure out which relationship you have with money and then leave it in the car.   When you go on a sales call, your relationship with money shouldn’t matter. Focus instead on the prospect and figure out her relationship with money. That’s the conversation that matters.   Behaviors   There are many aspects to behavior: having a goal, developing a plan to accomplish the goal, and establishing activities that get you to those goals. But with regard to budget discussions, we must be more consistent in knowing when and where to discuss pricing.   We’re typically mentioning it too early, before we’ve helped the prospects understand the value, or too late, when they’ve already got some idea of what they should be paying. Many sellers are winging this aspect of their sales process.   Have a plan. Develop milestones for your sales process. Have an idea of things you have to check off before you move to the next step. If you could establish just a bit of organization, if you could figure out the key steps in your sales process, you could map it out and figure out where the budget discussion should fall.   Then stick to your guns. Don’t allow the prospect to pull you into a discussion you aren’t ready to have yet. Many people routinely argue that the prospect is always right, so we must follow where they lead. Your role is to help your prospect, so you have to explain that it’s irresponsible to sell something or provide a quote without understanding what he needs.   Sales conversations   In a world where prospects see all alternatives as basically the same, with price as the only differentiator, the one thing that remains within our control is how we sell. Our sales conversations make a huge difference. If we’re doing like many reps and choosing the “showing up and throwing up,” option, dumping features and benefits and then giving a price, we’re missing an opportunity.   Differentiate by slowing down and asking good questions. When the prospect asks for price, push back a bit in a compassionate, professional way. Ensure that you want to make sure you’re both a fit before moving forward to price. The prospect will appreciate your effort to understand his world.   Pricing objections   In a scenario where you aren’t the cheapest option, what should you do? This is likely where most sellers could use a little help. We know our product or service but we don’t know the prospect’s world. But the prospect is evaluating us on how we fit into their world.   In that sense, the prospect is best equipped to resolve those objections. We have to ask the right questions to get to that discussion.   So once we’ve run our sales conversation, asked the right questions, sought to understand the prospect’s world, and talked a little bit about budget, it’s important to acknowledge the issue of price.   “Hey, Donald, you know, I've really appreciated the opportunity to talk with you about your world and how our services might help, but we've got a problem. My guess is you're probably going to be talking to other folks to see how they might help as well. I get it. I'd probably do the same thing. The problem is if you compare us on price, I can almost guarantee we're going to be the highest bidder. So my question is for you, if you were me, would you still put together a quote?”   If they agree to a quote, ask this: “What do you need to see from someone to compel you to pay a premium?” Now we’re figuring out what the prospect needs to see to make it worth paying more. Chances are the prospect hasn’t thought about this before, so now he’s selling himself on value.   If the prospect says no to a quote, then you can acknowledge that perhaps you aren’t a fit, but you can still ask what the prospect would need to see in order to make a decision based upon something other than price.   Continuing the conversation   Now, whatever the prospect says, you’re continuing the conversation. If they need on-time deliveries or fantastic customer service, you can continue the discussion. You’ll move from being an order-taker to a problem solver. You’ll also sound confident in your discussion because you aren’t desperate.   These things won’t work if you don’t believe in your product or if your pipeline is anemic. Having a full pipeline cures most ailments. If you don’t absolutely need this deal, your technique can be a lot stronger.   Don’t try to do this on the fly. Sit with your manager or someone on your team and practice this stuff. Practice fielding tough questions. Practice handling pricing objections. Practice handling conversations where the prospect immediately asks about price. If you do, when you find yourself in thoe scenarios, it’s second-nature rather than something you fumble through.   “Protect Your Margins” episode resources   Sandler Trainers are worldwide, so you can always look for a local office to help you. If you’re in Austin, connect with Chris at their website, ms.sandler.com. You can also connect with him on LinkedIn to see the videos and articles he shares there.   If you haven't connected with me on LinkedIn already, do that at Donald C. Kelly and watch the things I'm sharing there.   You've heard us talk about the TSE Certified Sales Training Program, and we're offering the first module free as a gift to you. Preview it. Check it out. If it makes sense for you to join, you can be part of our upcoming semester. You can take it on your own or as part of the semester group.   If you and your team are interested in learning more, we'd love to have you join us. Call (561) 578-1729 to speak directly to me or one of our team members about the program.   This episode is also brought to you in part by mailtag.io, a Chrome browser extension for Gmail that allows you to track and schedule your emails. You'll receive real-time alerts anyone opens an email or clicks a link.   Take advantage of a 30-day free trial, including a free book of your choice, at audible.com/tse. I hope you enjoyed the show today as much as I did. If so, please consider leaving us a rating on Apple Podcast, Google Podcast, Stitcher, or wherever you consume this content and share it with someone else who might benefit from our message. It helps others find our message and improves our visibility. When you share your experiences with the show, others will read the reviews and give us a listen.   I truly appreciate you and appreciate your reviews and your subscription, and your willingness to tell your friends and anyone you know that's in sales about the podcast.   Audio provided by Free SFX and Bensound.Mentioned in this episode:HubSpot and bluëmago | STUDIOSHubSpot and bluëmago | STUDIOS hubpspot.com/marketers bluemangostudios.com