MMS #85 - Fresh Perspectives: A New Era of Sales with Victoria Jimenez

[00:00:00] Welcome to Mastering Modern Selling, relationships, social and AI in the buyer-centric age.

[00:00:08] Join host Brandon Lee, founder of Fist Bump, alongside Microsoft's number one social seller

[00:00:13] Carson V Heady and Tom Burton, author of the Revenue Zone and co-founder of Leap Smart.

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[00:00:35] backstage pass to today's business landscape. This is Mastering Modern Selling, brought to

[00:00:40] you by Fist Bump.

[00:00:49] Hey everyone, welcome to episode number 85. We're getting up there. Man, we gotta be

[00:00:55] 100 before we know it. Of Mastering Modern Selling, I'm Tom Burton here today with

[00:01:01] my other awesome co-host Carson Heady. Hard Carson, great to have you back. Brandon

[00:01:07] You went in one door and Brandon went out the other. Brandon is out traveling and I think

[00:01:13] he's in Palm Springs, as a matter of fact.

[00:01:15] He is. Yeah, we were like ships passing in the night. I was in Atlanta yesterday and

[00:01:18] he wasn't there.

[00:01:19] I know. What's the nerve of him?

[00:01:22] I know. I make the time to go to his fair city and he's not even there with the

[00:01:27] red carpet.

[00:01:28] I know.

[00:01:29] We'll get him to make it.

[00:01:30] He'll have to make up for that for sure.

[00:01:34] We have another awesome guest, Victoria Jimenez. Victoria, welcome to the show. This is gonna

[00:01:41] be pretty interesting, Carson, as Victoria is not our usual guest where we either have

[00:01:49] sales luminaries and consultants and we have actual practitioners. She's a practitioner

[00:01:55] but she's been a practitioner at the University of Texas, correct? In Dallas on the sales

[00:02:02] program there. She's gonna take us through today and I strongly encourage if you're listening

[00:02:08] live, if you have any questions on this because this is very unique, what she's gonna go through,

[00:02:14] gonna take us through her whole curriculum, what she did, her internship and kind of

[00:02:18] where that's a letter and how that all relates to the future of modern selling.

[00:02:23] Victoria

[00:02:24] Sweet. Well, thank you all so much for allowing me to come in and join the

[00:02:29] party here. I'm always watching y'all's podcast and keeping up with y'all, Brandon, Carson,

[00:02:35] Tom. I'm following y'all on LinkedIn so I know what y'all been doing. But yeah, thank

[00:02:42] you so much for just allowing me this opportunity to be here.

[00:02:46] Absolutely. This is exciting. I think as we were kind of prepping for the episode,

[00:02:51] really exploring how common it is that Victoria hears like, my goodness, I wish they had

[00:02:56] had something like this available when I was in school and how this is becoming more and

[00:03:02] more burgeoning in colleges today. Victoria was sharing that there's now in the hundreds

[00:03:08] of universities that are offering this kind of curriculum. So I think I'm very fascinated by

[00:03:14] what's being taught and Victoria shared some stuff with us as we prepped that was very

[00:03:20] intriguing about frankly things that I think we should be applying right now as sellers

[00:03:25] and sales leaders. So buckle up, audience.

[00:03:28] That's right. So Victoria, why don't you start from the beginning? And maybe even before going

[00:03:34] to University of Texas, what motivated you to go do the program? How did you find out about it?

[00:03:40] Have you been interested in sales your whole life? Tell us a little bit about your journey

[00:03:45] and how you got there.

[00:03:47] So I've been exposed to sales and I think a lot of sales leaders will agree with me on this.

[00:03:53] But I've been exposed to sales my whole life. I started very young. My mom was in sales.

[00:03:59] She sold a modeling, an opportunity for children to get into modeling with Barbizon when I was

[00:04:08] very young. So I was her little tag along, running around with her on those events. And

[00:04:14] then Girl Scout, I got to sell all the cookies, of course.

[00:04:20] Of course. And so sales has really just been a big part of my life, all my life.

[00:04:27] And even through food service, I see a direct correlation between being in food service and

[00:04:34] being in sales. There's a lot of similarities when it comes to your own responsibility for

[00:04:41] how much money you're going to make and how many tips you're going to get at the end of

[00:04:45] the night. So when I went to school, I started at Collin College. General business degree still

[00:04:54] wasn't totally sure where I wanted to go with it, but I knew business was going to get me

[00:04:57] in the door anywhere. And took about a year off after my associate's degree and decided,

[00:05:04] you know what? It's time to go back. I can't wait any longer. So applied for the University

[00:05:10] of Texas at Dallas, got in. And it really took off from there. My business program, my degree

[00:05:20] program that I was a part of, it requires you to take an intro to sales class. So that

[00:05:25] was my first dive into sales in academia. So that's where I really learned, you know,

[00:05:33] sales isn't this slimy stereotype that everybody really thinks it is. It's an opportunity to

[00:05:41] make a change in other people's lives and just help people find solutions to the problems

[00:05:48] that they may not even know that they have. So I found a lot of interest in that discovery

[00:05:56] stage that needs analysis. I think that's probably my favorite part of the sales process

[00:06:02] is just uncovering everything that may potentially be a problem or could currently be a problem

[00:06:10] as well.

[00:06:11] Wow. Very healthy viewpoint on a lot of things. And I don't know that it's all that common.

[00:06:19] When you first got to University of Texas, did you know you wanted to go into the sales

[00:06:23] program or were you going into their business program? And then you found out more about

[00:06:27] the sales program when you got there?

[00:06:30] Probably the latter. I wasn't total, again, I wasn't really sure where I wanted to go.

[00:06:35] The degree plan that I was a part of it gave me a lot of opportunity to look into different

[00:06:42] avenues of business and see where what areas really resonated with me and my personality

[00:06:47] and where I could see myself, you know, making an impact with an organization in

[00:06:52] the future. Then when I started the intro to sales class, that's where everything really

[00:06:58] opened up for me and where I said, you know what? This is it. This is where this is where

[00:07:04] I belong. And so the intro to sales class was a requirement for my degree plan. But

[00:07:11] after the rookie preview, rookie preview competition that they have at the end of

[00:07:16] that semester, that's where, you know, it was in my hand. The ball was in my court at that

[00:07:22] point. And I said, you know, I'm going for the advanced class. I'm going to learn more.

[00:07:26] I'm going to dive deeper and I'm going to see where I can really take this.

[00:07:31] I got so many questions. So, Toria, talk to us about the curriculum and even like

[00:07:36] a CliffsNotes version of like, what were some of the big things that you learned?

[00:07:41] I hear congratulations are in order that you're going to be starting here in a

[00:07:45] sales role very, very soon. You got the offers to congratulations there. How are you

[00:07:51] planning to approach your first sales role based on what you've learned?

[00:07:56] Well, I find that the most effective approach is the humanistic one. So instead of

[00:08:04] seeing a title, you know, seeing a CTO or a CIO, a director and feeling

[00:08:11] intimidated by that title, just approaching people as people. And that's where

[00:08:17] LinkedIn comes to play. That's where you get the opportunity to really see what

[00:08:22] these people care about, see what those CEOs are worried about or looking into

[00:08:27] what groups they're a part of. And that's where you get insights into what's

[00:08:33] at the top of mind for these people and how can I reach out and how can I

[00:08:37] help?

[00:08:37] I love that you said that. And here's a special reason why I get to spend a lot

[00:08:44] of time with salespeople, some that are very seasoned, some that are very early

[00:08:48] in career. And I will tell you that, you know, and I was actually just this week

[00:08:53] with several C level executives. And I know why, you know, we sometimes get

[00:08:58] intimidated by the title. I will tell you, I put pressure on myself in those

[00:09:03] situations because I want to make sure I ask the right things or I say the

[00:09:06] right thing. But the human element is so critical. And especially when I spend a

[00:09:10] lot of time with sellers, whether they've been doing it for 20 years or they've

[00:09:14] been doing it for 20 days, that is often a commonality. It's an uncomfortable

[00:09:19] muscle and it takes practice. We have to get good at having those

[00:09:23] conversations and the way you just described is the best way. Being able

[00:09:26] to go out to LinkedIn, being able to go out to their website and heck, now

[00:09:30] we've been being able to feed some of that information into AI models like

[00:09:34] chat GPT and have it help you arm you with questions that you might be able

[00:09:38] to ask that person, knowing them on a personal level and what really makes

[00:09:42] them tick and what motivates them and what brought them to their

[00:09:45] organization because I would imagine they have something that is a passion

[00:09:49] project or a charter that's important to them. All the way to really

[00:09:53] understanding, you know, what came out of their earnings report, what's

[00:09:56] top of mind for that organization. Knowing that going into those

[00:10:00] conversations but keeping them based in humanity is so important. I love

[00:10:07] that you said that. Tell us more about the curriculum, you know, as far as

[00:10:11] like how is it structured? What are some of the other key lessons that

[00:10:16] really came out of what you were talking?

[00:10:18] So something I really enjoyed about the program was how it was

[00:10:23] structured because it wasn't, you know, open this textbook, read this

[00:10:27] PowerPoint, take all these notes, take a test. There were no tests in the

[00:10:33] sales program. It was all based on practice. So, you know, role plays

[00:10:37] every single week. There's a competition for both the intro students

[00:10:43] and the advanced students. So for intro students, you know, you're

[00:10:48] preparing all semester long. You're learning Salesforce. You're getting

[00:10:53] hands on knowledge. You're doing trailheads and you're learning how to

[00:10:58] sell Salesforce. You've got a buyer that you get the script or you don't

[00:11:03] get a script but you get the, you know, the key elements of what this buyer,

[00:11:11] you know, is facing in their organization and you need to be able

[00:11:15] to identify, all right, well, Salesforce does this, this and this.

[00:11:20] So these solve problems X, Y and Z. And being able to, you know, convey that

[00:11:27] message effectively go through that needs analysis, you learn the sale

[00:11:31] cycle, all in preparation for a competition at the end of the

[00:11:35] semester. And the competition was probably my favorite part. Honestly,

[00:11:41] super intense. Everybody in the program is trauma bonded.

[00:11:44] And so, you know, you're going through, you have 15 minutes to come in, do a

[00:11:55] needs analysis, you're building rapport, you're doing a product demo and

[00:12:00] you have to close. And so, you know, that's intent that's so intimidating

[00:12:10] for somebody who has never been exposed to sales in a real life situation.

[00:12:15] You have to know your product. You have to be able to identify and, you

[00:12:20] know, make those connections.

[00:12:24] Hey, before you, before you go any further, I want to clarify

[00:12:28] something because I think this is super important. So what I heard you

[00:12:31] say is, first of all, your sales training the training you went through,

[00:12:36] they use Salesforce CRM as kind of the product that you were trained on to

[00:12:40] go sell. Is that correct? That is. So you are being trained on B2B, I'll

[00:12:46] call it more enterprise sales. I mean, this isn't going and selling some SMB

[00:12:50] simple little product or even consumer products. This is a B2B

[00:12:54] enterprise sale doing CRM that you're now being trained on. Is that

[00:12:59] accurate? Yes. And was the entire program based around that? Or did

[00:13:05] they say, okay, here's your strategy for doing more enterprise sales? And

[00:13:09] then if you're selling smaller ticket items, or was it really focused

[00:13:12] around kind of the bigger ticket enterprise sale like a sales

[00:13:15] forces? It's focused around the enterprise sales level.

[00:13:20] Okay. That's really, really interesting.

[00:13:27] Many folks, it's amazing because that's not an easy sale. You

[00:13:31] know, I've been in cloud and technology for years and SAS for

[00:13:35] years. And to really master that, I love how everything that you said as

[00:13:40] well, Victoria is really grounded in the fundamentals because at the end of

[00:13:44] the day, that's where I think a lot of sales people can go awry is lack

[00:13:49] of ability to execute the fundamentals. Kind of the way that you

[00:13:53] approach that process, multiple times you said things about the

[00:13:56] process and the needs analysis, how you kind of diagnose the

[00:14:02] problem in the situation, but that knowing your product is key. Like, I

[00:14:06] mean, while this is a different mold like Tom said, a different type of

[00:14:11] episode, it's very poignant because you know, of how you're getting very

[00:14:16] grounded in all of the fundamentals. What obviously sales has

[00:14:21] changed a lot, you know, over, you know, the last five, 10, 15, 20

[00:14:26] years for very different reasons. A lot of times it's technological

[00:14:29] advances and you know, the way we meet our buyers where they are. Also, the

[00:14:33] way buyers are informing themselves and staying informed. What if any, if

[00:14:38] anything, how is social media addressed in your class as a tool or even

[00:14:45] just as a presence in sales?

[00:14:47] So social media specifically LinkedIn, you know, there for both classes,

[00:14:54] you have to have a specific SSI score on sales now.

[00:14:59] You know,

[00:15:01] intro, I believe it was you had to be above 25, 30. Okay. Um, but then the

[00:15:10] advanced class, you had to be above 60.

[00:15:12] Wow. That's quite a jump.

[00:15:15] Yeah. And they, they teach, they teach everything. So, you know,

[00:15:19] you're learning how to use the CRM, of course, Salesforce. And then

[00:15:24] you're learning how to balance LinkedIn sales navigator, to

[00:15:29] identify your prospects, to really keep up with trends and to be able to

[00:15:35] identify triggers.

[00:15:38] I love that. And when you say triggers, so we, you know, we talk

[00:15:41] about this sometimes on this show, like what would be some of the ones

[00:15:44] that, that you see as a trigger that you would want to react to as a

[00:15:48] salesperson?

[00:15:50] So in reference to my internship at GTN, you know, I was reaching out

[00:15:56] to top tech leaders and seeing if there was any opportunity for any

[00:16:03] staffing services. And so the sales triggers that I kept an eye on

[00:16:08] were primarily like funding, you know, open hire or open roles,

[00:16:14] if they were even actively hiring, or if they were in a hiring

[00:16:18] freeze. And then also through sales navigator, I paid attention to

[00:16:23] you know, where these new hires were coming from, what

[00:16:26] organizations they were leaving to join, you know, my prospect.

[00:16:35] So back to the, and one of the things I think you pointed out is

[00:16:40] you spend a lot of time learning Salesforce, right? Not

[00:16:43] because to use it as a user, well, maybe to use it as a user,

[00:16:46] but also to sell it to really be able to sell that. Kind of

[00:16:51] going back to Carson's question, what were the, I guess, the key

[00:16:55] elements that in the program that were taught? Like what are the

[00:16:58] fundamentals like really understand your customer or your

[00:17:01] prospect really understand the product you're selling? Sort of

[00:17:05] what were the foundational elements that we're really

[00:17:08] focused on in that in that program?

[00:17:12] So of course it was, you know, Dr. Dover wrote a book. So the

[00:17:17] advanced program, that was primarily it piggybacked off of

[00:17:23] the fundamentals that he teaches in this book. So you know,

[00:17:27] not being that pushy salesperson showing up relevantly,

[00:17:32] you know, not just talking to anybody but being able to explain

[00:17:36] why you're reaching out to somebody specifically is really,

[00:17:39] really important. And I think that, you know, by using that

[00:17:46] tactic, you're so much more likely to see success in sales.

[00:17:52] Instead of just spraying and praying, as they call it. So

[00:17:57] avoiding spray and pray was a big fundamental, you know,

[00:18:00] understanding your product, of course. And then basic business

[00:18:05] acumen was a very big part of the program. You know, being

[00:18:09] able to identify why do businesses care about certain

[00:18:14] things? Why are new tools necessary for certain businesses

[00:18:19] and what problems can arise if these tools aren't implemented?

[00:18:26] I see a huge opportunity here, Tom. I don't know about you,

[00:18:29] but we need to get Brandon Lee on as an adjunct professor.

[00:18:34] Victoria, I'm curious too, like I just have so many questions

[00:18:37] about the, you know, first of all, you know, we talk to

[00:18:41] salespeople sometimes and they make comments like, oh my

[00:18:44] gosh, you know, we're going to be replaced or our jobs going to

[00:18:46] change because of AI and all of these types of things. Obviously,

[00:18:50] if we're growing teaching sales in school, it ain't going

[00:18:55] anywhere. So I can do take some solace in that for sure. I

[00:18:58] think the great salespeople will always find a need because

[00:19:02] of what you just said, that ability to really go in,

[00:19:04] understand clients at a deeper level and create a

[00:19:07] relationship and earn that right to be a trusted advisor. Are

[00:19:11] there any ways that artificial intelligence was talked about in

[00:19:15] the course, you know, just kind of some of its implications and

[00:19:18] sales, ways to use it to be more effective? I'd love to get

[00:19:21] your thoughts on that.

[00:19:22] Yeah, so when I was in the advanced program, it was really

[00:19:26] when AI was gearing up, you know, chat, GBT was still a new

[00:19:30] thing. Everybody was hyped about AI. Professors were

[00:19:34] trying to figure out how to maneuver it so that they could

[00:19:37] tell if students were using AI to write papers or anything

[00:19:40] like that. So sales program, we used AI all the time chat,

[00:19:47] GBT actually graded our role plays. It was kind of a pilot

[00:19:51] project. So we had weekly role plays, two to three role

[00:19:55] plays a week that we submitted in based off of, you know, our

[00:20:00] prompts and we were gearing up to talk to prospects to see if

[00:20:05] any companies, you know, could see benefit from partnering

[00:20:08] with the sales program as a recruiting source. And so those

[00:20:14] role plays, we put the trans we used chorus and so we pulled

[00:20:19] the transcripts off of chorus, and we fed it into chat, GBT

[00:20:24] gave it the rubric for grading and, you know, asked it, alright,

[00:20:30] based off of this transcript, based off of this rubric, give

[00:20:34] me a score and identify areas where I can improve, give me

[00:20:39] suggestions on, you know, how I can word things to be more

[00:20:43] effective or to communicate more effectively. AI was just a

[00:20:47] major part of our projects.

[00:20:49] That's game changing. I mean, you know, I remember, goodness,

[00:20:53] gracious, I'm going to say this back in the day when I had

[00:20:55] to listen to calls from salespeople. And, you know, what

[00:20:59] I love is the way that AI is being integrated into this

[00:21:02] process, you know, you'd have to go in and listen to a call and

[00:21:05] somebody didn't evidently interrupt you. And it's a, you

[00:21:08] know, 10, 15, 20 minute call, and you've got to score it and

[00:21:11] grade it. And I mean, it took a lot of time. And now the

[00:21:14] ability to rapidly analyze, especially even based on that

[00:21:18] rubric, how, you know, a call would score relative to these

[00:21:22] and then giving you prompts on how you can improve your

[00:21:25] process. Yeah, I think I say this to salespeople all the

[00:21:28] time and sales leaders all the time, shame on us

[00:21:31] collectively, if we're not finding the ways to leverage AI

[00:21:35] to do our job better and to find ways to get closer to our

[00:21:39] customers. So I love that you pulled that off.

[00:21:42] You know what I find really interesting about this Carson, and

[00:21:46] it does tie back because in Victoria, don't let me put

[00:21:49] words in your mouth. But what I'm hearing you say is, I

[00:21:52] don't, I don't when I listen to you, I don't listen to

[00:21:54] what if I would have thought of sales training, right? If

[00:21:57] someone says to sales training, I would think of

[00:22:00] something. But I'm not hearing you say those things, what I'm

[00:22:03] hearing you say is, you went through training on really how

[00:22:06] to understand products and what you're selling. You

[00:22:09] understood went through training on how to build

[00:22:11] relationships and how to have a human element. And then the

[00:22:15] part that you had mentioned about, you know, like really

[00:22:18] understanding the business part of it, you were learning how

[00:22:22] to communicate like an executive, right? If you're

[00:22:24] going to communicate to an executive, then you should

[00:22:28] learn how to communicate in a way that an executive cares

[00:22:30] about. None of that is really sales per what a lot of people

[00:22:36] you started off with a slimy definition of sales. Nobody

[00:22:39] this is there's no, this isn't about coercion or how do I hit

[00:22:43] somebody 50 times or like, you know, all the numbers game or

[00:22:47] I don't hear any of that. I really hear fundamentals of

[00:22:50] business. And what's interesting Carson is that if you get

[00:22:55] good at this, right, you can then write your ticket all the

[00:22:58] way up the ladder up into the I mean, this is C suite material

[00:23:03] that you have here.

[00:23:05] Understanding process and having C level acumen at that

[00:23:11] at that stage, you know, I think back in like how long it

[00:23:15] took me because there weren't a lot of people that invested

[00:23:18] the time or even really had the ability to train some of

[00:23:21] those things, you know, when we had sales training, if

[00:23:23] they pay somebody to come in and they give some rah, rah

[00:23:26] motivational speech and they were not in our industry, they had no

[00:23:29] idea like how to practically apply it to what we did. And then

[00:23:33] there was no follow up training. So it's like everybody goes

[00:23:35] back to their comfortable ways of mediocrity. But what I love

[00:23:39] about what Victoria is articulating is that it

[00:23:41] sounds like some forward thinking in the now colleges are

[00:23:47] training people now early stage to understand the

[00:23:52] foundation of what it takes to be successful in sales. And I'm

[00:23:57] I mean, that gives me that gives me hope for the sales

[00:24:00] future.

[00:24:02] Yeah, I mean, to me, it's teaching you how to be successful

[00:24:04] in business. Sorry, go ahead, Victoria.

[00:24:06] Oh, yeah. And I think that's exactly what Dr. Dover had

[00:24:09] in mind whenever he developed the sales program. He saw the

[00:24:13] way that sales used to be. And he saw all the

[00:24:17] challenges that, you know, new sellers were facing and said,

[00:24:23] you this needs to change and develop this whole sales

[00:24:27] program. And it changes every semester, they just changed the

[00:24:30] format for rookie preview. And now instead of a one day event,

[00:24:33] it's a two week period where, you know, students are being

[00:24:37] able to do their role plays. It's in smaller groups, you

[00:24:44] know, and then they're being able to have face to face

[00:24:47] contact with the different partners to ask those questions

[00:24:51] and say, you know, what's challenging about this role? What

[00:24:54] do I need to know now to be ready by the time that I

[00:24:57] graduate?

[00:24:58] You mentioned something else when we were prepping,

[00:25:00] Victoria, about the regular I think they were weekly like

[00:25:03] win loss meetings. Tell us more about that.

[00:25:06] That was also a really big part that I loved about the

[00:25:09] sales program and that I hope to see in my future career,

[00:25:14] you know, with this organization that I've accepted

[00:25:17] an offer from and then also, you know, further down the line as

[00:25:20] I grow is every single week at the end of the week, you

[00:25:25] know, we would sit in our groups. We had assigned groups

[00:25:28] for five people. And we're actively selling in the sales

[00:25:33] program. We're trying to find new new partners or, you

[00:25:38] know, scholarship opportunities with alums. And so we're

[00:25:43] going around and sharing what went well this week, what

[00:25:47] didn't go well this week. And through conversations with

[00:25:52] our peers, we're able to identify and say, you know, I

[00:25:56] didn't even think about doing that. That is a great way

[00:25:59] to try and start a conversation with a total stranger.

[00:26:03] And, you know, we're going over outreach techniques,

[00:26:09] scripts, conversations, questions that to ask. And

[00:26:15] we're identifying ways to lead the conversation to our end

[00:26:19] goal.

[00:26:20] I love that. And everybody listening watching, you

[00:26:24] should implement that today if you don't already there's

[00:26:26] so much value in the best practices sharing the time

[00:26:30] spent, you know, really gelling as a team. But also,

[00:26:33] you know, I can tell you just having done this for the

[00:26:36] majority of my career, I always wanted to know if

[00:26:38] somebody was doing something better than I was or they

[00:26:40] were performing in a metric or there was a great

[00:26:42] learning from a win or a loss that I'm taking that

[00:26:46] knowledge and I'm assimilating that into my arsenal.

[00:26:48] You know, I didn't get to be successful in sales by

[00:26:51] going at it on my own. It was all about how can I

[00:26:54] take all these perspectives and learn from

[00:26:57] everybody around me. I think that's fascinating. And

[00:27:00] Victoria, just a little bit like if you don't see the

[00:27:03] you know, what you want to see in a future team,

[00:27:07] bring it to the team. I've always benefited from

[00:27:09] that too. You know, you can be the change that you

[00:27:11] want to see in these team dynamics and those are

[00:27:14] the types of things that'll make you stand out as

[00:27:15] a seller and as an individual contributor. They'll

[00:27:17] help your career tremendously because you're

[00:27:19] very able to increase the impact that you can have

[00:27:21] on your team and on your organization by

[00:27:23] sharing best practices. That is what helped me

[00:27:26] ultimately write my ticket. It's taken every bit

[00:27:28] of the last 10 years, but it's given incredible

[00:27:32] momentum and I know that you will be very successful.

[00:27:35] I also am curious, since you're spending time

[00:27:38] with a lot of aspiring sales people and you're

[00:27:42] studying sales, I'd love to hear any like what

[00:27:44] are your favorite sales movies, sales books,

[00:27:46] sales podcasts? What are you consuming to

[00:27:49] sharpen the ax and stay at the pulse of sales?

[00:27:55] Well, I'm always looking into new podcasts, of

[00:27:57] course. I follow Mastering Modern Selling.

[00:28:01] So on my Spotify list, I've got you all

[00:28:02] favorite it. And then I've got to give

[00:28:06] props to the sales innovation paradox by

[00:28:09] Dr. Dover. Dr. Howard Dover. I'm not allowed

[00:28:12] to call him Howard because I haven't hit my

[00:28:13] hundred thousand dollar mark yet, but

[00:28:19] I gotta meet this guy. Oh, he's awesome.

[00:28:23] Brandon, I think he's been trying to get him on

[00:28:24] the show. I think we'll get him on the show.

[00:28:26] This sounds good. Yeah. He's close with Brandon.

[00:28:29] We really should. I love it. Let's do it.

[00:28:32] Then also, you know, we during the sales

[00:28:35] program in the advanced class, we got to read

[00:28:38] parts of revenue architecture by Jocko.

[00:28:43] That was that was a dense read.

[00:28:45] It's on a master's level reading list.

[00:28:49] But we had access to a couple chapters that

[00:28:54] we reviewed every single week.

[00:28:56] You know, that's where a lot of the business

[00:28:57] acumen came from was from revenue

[00:29:00] architecture by Jocko.

[00:29:02] So I have to know if there's a master's

[00:29:05] of sales class out there where our curriculum

[00:29:08] where I could become in essence a doctor of sales.

[00:29:11] I might be a next aspiration for me.

[00:29:14] Dr. Dover does teach a master's class.

[00:29:17] OK. But that might be what gets me to go back to school

[00:29:23] do it. Master's of sales. It's never too late.

[00:29:28] Yeah. And then, you know, Matt Dixon, Jolt Effect.

[00:29:31] Love Matt. He was on the show.

[00:29:33] Yeah. Jolt Effect changed the game for me.

[00:29:35] I mean, here's the thing like I've been doing this a long time.

[00:29:37] And I mean, I would what I love about this, Victoria, is that there's

[00:29:41] there's content like that that's out there that's being written

[00:29:43] that still, you know, changes my entire perspective.

[00:29:47] And I love the fact that you and your classmates are being exposed to that.

[00:29:51] And you'll go out and you'll sell responsibly, which I think is amazing.

[00:29:57] Absolutely. And I love the way you said that.

[00:29:59] That's how I should have worded it initially, is we were learning to sell responsibly.

[00:30:03] Yeah. Well, and if you learn how to sell responsibly, I mentioned before,

[00:30:07] you have a lot of a great career path.

[00:30:09] But if you want to go the entrepreneur or the startup route,

[00:30:12] there is nothing more foundational than knowing how to sell responsibly.

[00:30:17] Right. I mean, companies that get off the ground,

[00:30:20] generally, obviously they have to have a good product.

[00:30:22] But if they have a good product, most of them don't know how to sell

[00:30:26] responsibly and actually a lot of startups right now are

[00:30:29] have raised a lot of money and had a lot of venture funding

[00:30:33] are burning up because they really didn't learn to sell responsibly along the way.

[00:30:38] So just an awesome foundation.

[00:30:41] Take this.

[00:30:41] Hires people out of Dallas, by the way.

[00:30:43] So if Victoria's got any classmates that are looking for jobs in Dallas,

[00:30:48] give me a call. I'd love to meet some people.

[00:30:51] I have a few in mind.

[00:30:52] I'll have to send you their information.

[00:30:54] I want to meet the responsible sellers out there that are fearless

[00:30:56] that want to go and talk to sea levels and understand the sales process.

[00:31:01] That sounds amazing to me.

[00:31:02] And that's that's another lesson learned, I think, for our audience today

[00:31:06] is that, you know, old hiring managers like me

[00:31:10] want to meet people that understand process

[00:31:13] and also have that acumen to be able to talk to the C-suite,

[00:31:16] understand needs analysis.

[00:31:18] If you've been trained right,

[00:31:20] you know, it's very likely that you're going to jump in and have success.

[00:31:23] Just stick with it.

[00:31:25] I'd love to hear too, Victoria, you know, how

[00:31:28] what would you say are some of the biggest take aways as far as like

[00:31:31] lessons learned around losses or objections and things of that nature?

[00:31:36] What did you take away from the class about those types of experiences?

[00:31:40] Because they're inevitable.

[00:31:41] Oh, absolutely.

[00:31:43] You know, you're going to hear a lot of notes before you hear yes.

[00:31:46] So I think the biggest the biggest lesson of all is always resilience.

[00:31:51] You know, you don't push.

[00:31:54] Don't push your limits too far to where

[00:31:58] you lose sight of the mission.

[00:32:01] But you need to be able to continue to push through, you know,

[00:32:04] no matter how many knows that you hear, there's always going to be a yes somewhere.

[00:32:08] And as long as you're identifying the right ICP

[00:32:12] and doing due diligence and understanding your customer or your prospect,

[00:32:17] you'll get that yes eventually.

[00:32:21] So take us through your internship

[00:32:25] because you did actually did an internship here.

[00:32:27] Kind of where did that fit in the curriculum?

[00:32:29] And I know you're wrapping up what in June is your graduation

[00:32:32] or graduating even before then sooner than later, right?

[00:32:35] I actually graduate on Monday.

[00:32:38] That's sooner than later. Yeah, that's yeah, really.

[00:32:42] Yeah, so I actually I met GTN through the sales program.

[00:32:48] They're a big partner with UTD and, you know,

[00:32:53] they have all these networking events for the sales program

[00:32:56] and you're able to see all the opportunities that are laid out in front of you.

[00:33:01] All you have to do is pick.

[00:33:03] And I picked GTN and GTN was a great experience.

[00:33:08] IT staffing, you know, staffing in general is a really, really hard market for a seller.

[00:33:15] There's so many different avenues that businesses can take,

[00:33:18] but there's also a lot of advantages to using a staffing firm.

[00:33:21] You get access to a very niche candidate pool, you know, and

[00:33:29] the the staffing firm or at least GTN,

[00:33:32] I can't speak for all of them, but GTN, you know, they're the middle man

[00:33:38] between the hiring team and the CTO.

[00:33:41] They're able to identify who is going to be the most qualified candidate

[00:33:46] who's going to get the job done, stay with the job and improve their business overall.

[00:33:54] I love the fact that you throw yourself into the challenging as well.

[00:33:58] You didn't do some cakewalk program or internship.

[00:34:02] You really wanted to throw yourself into the one that's going to help you cut your teeth.

[00:34:05] That's smart.

[00:34:07] Yeah, that's what happened.

[00:34:09] Follow-up episode.

[00:34:11] We need to schedule her for about a year out or six months out.

[00:34:14] And I'd love to hear the learnings.

[00:34:16] She'll probably be a CRO somewhere.

[00:34:19] Could be. I might be working for it by that point.

[00:34:23] But what happened then?

[00:34:24] What was your role at the internship?

[00:34:26] Like what was your job?

[00:34:27] What did you do?

[00:34:27] How did it then apply what you learned?

[00:34:30] How did you see the continuity, I guess, between what you were doing in the academic world

[00:34:34] and in the real world?

[00:34:37] The role at GTN, I was a business development representative.

[00:34:41] So I was doing all the cold outreach, trying to find,

[00:34:46] searching the prairie lands for new clients

[00:34:50] to join the team at GTN so that we could help them fill roles

[00:34:55] that were critical to the success of their business

[00:34:59] or be able to identify gaps in their hiring process

[00:35:03] to get them those better candidates that don't want to wait two, three weeks

[00:35:09] just to find out if they made the cut or go through 17 interviews

[00:35:14] and do 17 different projects.

[00:35:17] So we were able to...

[00:35:19] I was able to see the other side of the table.

[00:35:22] And that's what I took.

[00:35:24] That's a lot of what I took from that internship

[00:35:27] was just instead of being on the interview side of the table,

[00:35:33] I got to see the other side of the table

[00:35:35] and see the whole entire process that goes into hiring

[00:35:38] that top quality candidate.

[00:35:41] So I was doing a lot of cold outreach, which

[00:35:45] of course I had some experience in in the sales program

[00:35:48] just reaching out to recruiters and things like that for partnerships.

[00:35:54] But this was an opportunity for me to really see what I got

[00:36:00] and use use all the tools that the sales program had given me

[00:36:05] to build that business book for GTN.

[00:36:11] And I assume you were using LinkedIn and phone and email

[00:36:13] and a combination of things to kind of build relationships.

[00:36:17] Yeah, I used Fist bump.

[00:36:19] I used sales navigator LinkedIn, Zoom info.

[00:36:24] They have their own CRM system.

[00:36:26] So I got to learn that. That was fun.

[00:36:27] I always love learning the new tech.

[00:36:31] And how long was the internship?

[00:36:34] It was three months.

[00:36:35] I was there from January to May.

[00:36:37] OK, so how did you do?

[00:36:40] I did really well.

[00:36:41] I learned a lot.

[00:36:42] I learned a lot about myself.

[00:36:45] I think that's the biggest learning curve was, you know,

[00:36:49] coming to understand where my limits are

[00:36:54] and how to push those limits and how to grow as an individual

[00:36:58] and be able to handle the stress of a sales job,

[00:37:01] be able to handle that rejection

[00:37:02] and be able to just keep pushing through.

[00:37:07] Awesome, awesome.

[00:37:08] So you're graduating on Monday.

[00:37:11] You've accepted a job in June.

[00:37:15] So you're all ready to go.

[00:37:16] So you'll have a month or so off and you're ready to go

[00:37:18] and get right back into it.

[00:37:21] Yep, give me some vacation time.

[00:37:23] Time to get my head to stop spinning.

[00:37:28] Enjoy it now.

[00:37:29] Enjoy it.

[00:37:31] So generally, and I know, you know, obviously.

[00:37:35] You're going to be in training

[00:37:37] and you're going to be getting a lot of different resources

[00:37:39] and things of that nature.

[00:37:40] But how are you thinking about going to market

[00:37:43] in your sales job?

[00:37:44] And maybe even how did you approach?

[00:37:46] You know, you mentioned that there was a lot of, you know,

[00:37:49] white space, green field in the, you know,

[00:37:52] even in your internship role.

[00:37:54] How do you kind of think about going to market?

[00:37:56] What's your, you know, how do you,

[00:37:57] how do you roadmap out

[00:37:59] how you're going to go after the people

[00:38:00] that you contacted, et cetera?

[00:38:03] So I always start with,

[00:38:06] I start big and then I narrow it down.

[00:38:08] So I start with organizational.

[00:38:11] You know, what does that company do?

[00:38:13] I understand their business.

[00:38:15] What customers they need to reach out to.

[00:38:18] And then I narrow it further.

[00:38:20] So I compare it to what we do.

[00:38:23] So for GTN, you know, we're in staffing.

[00:38:25] So it's specifically in the technical space.

[00:38:29] And so I narrowed it down to, okay,

[00:38:32] well as long as these people have an IT team

[00:38:35] and they do something technical,

[00:38:37] then who's in charge of the people

[00:38:42] who are doing that technical work?

[00:38:44] So CTO, C-suite, CIO, CISOs.

[00:38:49] And I take it two different routes.

[00:38:51] So I go after the C-suite, you know, big fish.

[00:38:56] And then I also take it the HR route.

[00:39:01] Who are my recruiters?

[00:39:02] What does their recruiting team look like?

[00:39:04] Do they have technical recruiters on board already

[00:39:06] that know the tech industry and know the tech lingo?

[00:39:11] Or do they not?

[00:39:13] And that's an opportunity.

[00:39:15] So if I'm able to identify with GTN specifically,

[00:39:19] if I was able to identify whether there was already a bridge

[00:39:22] between their hiring team and their technical team

[00:39:25] and their CTOs, then, you know, that's an opportunity.

[00:39:32] I love it.

[00:39:32] I mean like just the little things

[00:39:34] like that you can go out to sales navigator

[00:39:36] and you can go to an organization

[00:39:38] and you can look at keywords

[00:39:40] and you can understand like what types of roles

[00:39:42] that they have or what type of background they have

[00:39:44] and then go into their LinkedIn and looking at their profile.

[00:39:48] The other thing too, like, you know,

[00:39:49] the ability to leverage AI.

[00:39:51] You know, one of the things that I've been doing recently

[00:39:53] and I'm tinkering too, like that's the fun thing

[00:39:55] about this is when there's new technological advances

[00:39:58] like how you understand the tech.

[00:40:00] Like Victoria, I hope you realize

[00:40:03] that a lot of the things that you said today,

[00:40:06] you know, you get it.

[00:40:08] And I hope our audience that's watching like, you know

[00:40:10] because I know that there's sellers

[00:40:12] that have been doing this for 10, 15, 20 years

[00:40:14] that probably don't get it the same way you do.

[00:40:16] I know I didn't, you know, at stages in my career, right?

[00:40:20] So, but like tinkering with the tech

[00:40:22] and to be able to go out to something like chat GPT

[00:40:25] and basically say like, you know,

[00:40:26] you can copy in an organization's about us

[00:40:31] and you can copy in a person's LinkedIn profile

[00:40:34] and then you can say how can my organization,

[00:40:37] you can name the org or you can paste in

[00:40:39] like things from your own website or whatever it is,

[00:40:42] like write me some talking points,

[00:40:44] write me an outreach email.

[00:40:46] Now it's not ready to run on its own.

[00:40:48] That's why we need great salespeople

[00:40:50] that can use the tech and then responsibly use it

[00:40:53] to try to get the meetings.

[00:40:55] But I mean, there's so much at our fingertips right now

[00:40:58] and I love that you were so grounded in process

[00:41:00] but also using all of these ways to go out

[00:41:02] and reach out to the right people with the right message

[00:41:05] and talk to them like a human being.

[00:41:07] Like this is so refreshing.

[00:41:10] I'm glad you feel refreshed.

[00:41:13] I'm inspired today.

[00:41:15] He's ready to go back to school.

[00:41:16] He's gonna be a plumber.

[00:41:17] I am, I am.

[00:41:18] I wanna be a doctor of sales.

[00:41:20] I want people to have to call me doctor.

[00:41:22] Doctor, doctor Carson.

[00:41:23] I like Dr. Carson.

[00:41:24] That's a nice ring to it.

[00:41:25] Yeah.

[00:41:26] Yeah.

[00:41:27] Well, Victoria, thank you.

[00:41:29] This has been very, very, very, as he said,

[00:41:31] and it's inspiring, refreshing and insightful.

[00:41:34] I think it's a great example

[00:41:36] of what we talk about as modern selling.

[00:41:38] It's very refreshing to see that this is happening

[00:41:41] with young people in school.

[00:41:42] That's really refreshing.

[00:41:45] Carson, I was funny as you were talking.

[00:41:46] I was like looking back going,

[00:41:49] my sales career has been more through startups

[00:41:51] and tech companies versus the larger companies like you

[00:41:54] but still sales, right?

[00:41:56] You still have to,

[00:41:57] and the training I had

[00:41:58] and what if you wanted to call it sales training

[00:42:02] and all that compared to what Victoria went through

[00:42:04] is like, man, I would have had some of that

[00:42:06] in your age, I don't know.

[00:42:08] It could have been a lot different results

[00:42:11] and a lot faster.

[00:42:13] So you're very fortunate.

[00:42:14] I agree.

[00:42:16] Victoria, anything else that maybe we didn't touch on

[00:42:19] that you think is especially pertinent

[00:42:22] for this conversation?

[00:42:25] I see an immense value

[00:42:28] in what you've articulated today

[00:42:29] and I hope that everybody watching and listening

[00:42:31] is able to just even realize and revisit.

[00:42:35] What's your process?

[00:42:36] How are you thinking about going to market?

[00:42:38] How do you take a big picture strategic view of what you do

[00:42:42] but also how you reach out

[00:42:43] and how you meaningfully engage with your target customer?

[00:42:47] And then not shying away from people because of title.

[00:42:51] You outlined some really great elements today

[00:42:55] but anything else that you think's pertinent

[00:42:58] from your class or your experience?

[00:43:02] I just think overall,

[00:43:04] anybody who's thinking of getting into sales,

[00:43:07] no matter where they may be in their journey

[00:43:10] or in their career journey,

[00:43:12] if you're happy to talk to people

[00:43:16] and you love to solve problems

[00:43:18] and you like a good challenge

[00:43:21] and you're competitive, just do it.

[00:43:24] Get into sales.

[00:43:25] It's a great way to take control of your own income.

[00:43:29] That's something that really appealed to me

[00:43:31] and just with that correlation

[00:43:33] with my food service background.

[00:43:35] And it's never always just be a sponge.

[00:43:38] There's never a cap on how much you can learn,

[00:43:43] especially in sales.

[00:43:46] Unbelievable.

[00:43:47] Dr. Dover should make a recruiting ad

[00:43:51] for students featuring what you just said.

[00:43:53] That was...

[00:43:55] Well, we'll give him this episode

[00:43:56] and tell him he can use it for a loyal deal.

[00:44:00] You can probably get extra credit

[00:44:01] for showing that you know the material in this way.

[00:44:04] So, well done.

[00:44:06] Thank you.

[00:44:07] I feel good about it.

[00:44:08] If somebody wants to connect with you on LinkedIn,

[00:44:11] where can they find you and what your LinkedIn handle

[00:44:14] or any other places you'd like people to connect with you?

[00:44:18] Yeah, so I keep all my professional connections to LinkedIn.

[00:44:23] If they wanna find me on Facebook later,

[00:44:25] then that's fine.

[00:44:27] They're gonna find a lot of pictures of cats.

[00:44:29] Cat's an art.

[00:44:34] But yeah, LinkedIn is where I keep all

[00:44:36] of my professional connections

[00:44:37] and I'm always happy to set up a coffee chat and introduction.

[00:44:43] I just love learning about other people's stories

[00:44:45] and how they got to be where they are

[00:44:47] and where they're trying to go

[00:44:48] and identify where I can help in that route.

[00:44:52] Okay, well, I recommend connecting.

[00:44:54] And yeah, I agree, Carson.

[00:44:56] We'll have you back in a few months here

[00:44:58] and we'll be very interested to see

[00:45:00] how your new chapter is evolving and what's happening.

[00:45:05] And somehow I think you're gonna probably be promoted

[00:45:07] by the next time we're on the,

[00:45:08] I don't know, that's my prediction, but we'll see.

[00:45:12] Ah, three months, I might be in a new spot.

[00:45:16] Could be running Microsoft sales, you never know.

[00:45:18] Yo, watch out, Carson.

[00:45:21] Hey, I welcome that.

[00:45:22] We're always looking for talent, so.

[00:45:26] All right, Carson, any final words before we sign off?

[00:45:29] No, just this was amazing.

[00:45:31] Victoria, thank you and for our audience.

[00:45:33] Until next time, happy modern selling.

[00:45:37] Thanks everyone.

[00:45:44] Thank you for joining us today on Mastering Modern Selling.

[00:45:47] If you enjoyed this episode,

[00:45:49] don't forget to subscribe for more insights.

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