MMS #95 - Authentic Sales Strategies: Bridging Passion and Purpose with Liz Wendling

[00:00:00] Welcome to Mastering Modern Selling, Relationships, Social and AI in the Biocentric Age. Join host Brandon Lee, founder of FistThum, alongside Microsoft's number one social seller, Carson V Heady, and Tom Burton, author of the Revenue Zone and co-founder of Leatsmart.

[00:00:19] As we explore the strategies and stories behind successful executives and sales professionals, dive in to business growth, personal development, and the pursuit of excellence with industry leaders. Whether you're a seasoned executive or an aspiring leader, this podcast is your backstage

[00:00:35] pass to today's business landscape. This is Mastering Modern Selling, brought to you by FistThum. Oh look at this perfect, perfect timing! Look at this guy. Hi, guys, everybody. Welcome to Mastering Modern Selling and I just totally forgot.

[00:01:00] I think we're wet episode 95. 94, Norr's probably going to send me a message and tell me what it was, but... We're in the matter. We finally got Liz here. I don't care what number it is. It's

[00:01:13] number one for all I care. We're in the matter. When Liz was sharing that she's been on your show a couple of times, you know, Chris and I have never been a guest on your show.

[00:01:23] There's a reason for that. Let's do it, man. Any time. Look at all of everybody. Thanks for joining us. Thank you. It's been fun. We're in fun. Well, 95. 95. Thank to Norr. Yeah, so we have episode 95.

[00:01:40] We as Liz Wendling, joining us, and we're talking today about authentic sales strategies. And I expect we're going to have a really good conversation and I know YouTube go back sometime together. So, Liz, why don't we start by, you know, Tom's not here. I guess I should

[00:02:00] mention that, which is why I'm fumbling around the intro because this is not one Tom's job. So, Carson, welcome. I get you here at least today. Yeah, absolutely. You got all you need. We're

[00:02:12] good. That's it. Liz, welcome. Welcome to the show. You want to tell us a little bit about yourself about your background and your journey. I know you're, you know, your, your coach, your trainer, your speaker, your kind of all-thing sales, and you're the founder of the sales clinic.

[00:02:29] So, tell us a little bit about yourself. She doesn't know all the words and hilarious. Okay. Well, I'm permission to then be authentic in myself. Please. So, I've been in sales

[00:02:41] for about 30 years in some capacity or another. All the way back from when I had my first sales job and I lived in work to New York City over 30 years ago selling fitness memberships. And

[00:02:53] I got fired from that job because they sent us to sales training school where we learned how to sign the contract, get the deal. Do what you have to do to get the deal done. And behind closed doors,

[00:03:06] I was doing the complete opposite. I was talking to people like humans. I was pretending like they were my mom and dad or my sister. And I was doing a total opposite. Yet, I was the top sales

[00:03:17] person every month for four straight months. And when I told my boss what I was doing, I came clean and just said he's like, what do you, how do you get it? You're doing so well. What's in you that's

[00:03:28] different than my other, they were four other sales guys that I trained with. And I came clean and just said I'm barely doing what you taught me to do. And I'm just treating people like people and

[00:03:40] a lot of other dialogue went on. But he basically said to me, get your shit and get out of here in your fire. And 30 years ago, I realized you were you're leading. And so I left and I was so

[00:03:55] bummed and upset and sad thinking, oh my god, I was doing woo! And I was closing sales and people and they were so happy with me. But as soon as they found out that I was doing something completely

[00:04:06] different, which I didn't even really know what I was doing. I didn't have a process 30 years ago. I just knew that I was doing what I would have like somebody do to me or to treat my family

[00:04:17] member that way. So fast forward 30 years and in between, I've been refining and tweaking and learning and changing things around in the sales process. That not only align with me, but also align

[00:04:31] with my clients. The kind of clients who hate to sell don't want to sound like a sales person, but they know they want to connect with people on a level that makes them stand out and not look

[00:04:41] like a commodity. Excellent. Well I appreciate that start that introduction. I want to say hide a bug-written or at least a low-ha to bug-written. Thanks for joining us Bob and Jeff Leisure. And I like this. I like this already, the comments are already getting good. Imagine that.

[00:04:58] Treat people like humans not sales quotas. It's funny as it resonates so much because I remember in my very first sales job. I've talked a lot about how I became an accidental sales person.

[00:05:08] I thought I was going into a customer service role. It was very scripted. You know, the 12 people in my training class, only two people made it out because everybody else retreated to a previous role that they had been because they didn't want to do it. It was hardcore,

[00:05:20] one-caw, closed sales. And I let the entire division in sales by far. I mean we're talking like people with sell three, four, five deals a day. I was doing like 30. But I got written up

[00:05:32] because I wasn't following the script and I didn't try to sell this. Like I remember vividly it was like this 95-year-old woman, this full massive phone package. I only sold her this $4

[00:05:45] service that she had never had in my view. Ever. She'd never had a service ever on her phone. And I managed to land this service but I got written up. Now, a day later, I did it their way,

[00:05:57] my sales plummeted. They removed the plan. So I won in the end. But I think it's amazing, Liz, to think about now, until a story like that, it catches people off guard because I think

[00:06:08] we'd come a long way in embracing authenticity and unique approaches to sales. Not all the way. Because that's not always true. Come a long way in embracing authenticity. What do you think that is?

[00:06:22] Well, authenticity, I'm sure there's a lot of people are already rolling their eyes about that. That's a word that gets tossed around these days like confetti and it's almost Liz. Sorry. I mean, oh, that's an angel. Okay, that's okay. It's losing its steam and even I don't know.

[00:06:43] I mean, I talk about the word but it's not something I lean on anymore. And but obviously we all have to be authentic. But many times people will just say, be authentic. Just show up in the

[00:06:54] authentic. Just get on a sales call and be authentic. And that's the stupidest advice you can give to someone because what does that even mean? How do you be authentic if you don't know yourself? If you don't truly understand how you're coming across, how you're communicating,

[00:07:10] how your words are landing on people, how your approach is even resonating with someone. Just be yourself is really bad sales advice. And that's to say, oh, I'm oozing authenticity today. Maybe I'll close the sale. No, you still need a process. But it's the authentic piece has to

[00:07:29] come from truly knowing yourself. And I always tell people if you call me and have to and say to me, I want to learn how to be authentic or I want to learn authentic sales strategies.

[00:07:40] I tell them, I can't teach you how to be authentic. You either are you're not. You have to be that in yourself. And you have to do the work that pulls that out.

[00:07:50] One of the one of my favorite topics that we've talked about is kind of your passion around the sales language that we use. And when we're connecting with potential buyers, with prospects,

[00:08:01] with customers, making it about them instead of what we want to do. And what I love is just the very direct and candid feedback that you give in this space. The last time we talked about

[00:08:16] this was probably about a year ago, but I'd love to get kind of your current state of the state when it comes to what's working, what's not, and what are still some of the biggest mistakes that we're making. We're trying to get that meeting.

[00:08:32] Great question. There's three parts there. So what's not working is what's happening all over the place, whether it's in my inbox, your inbox all over LinkedIn are those bad poorly written sales

[00:08:45] messages that are written at someone, not to someone, that actually feel like you wrote this at me, not to me. There's nothing in there that would make me want to lean in and get to know you.

[00:08:58] Absolutely nothing. So that's the first thing. What is working is a little more personalization and having it land, feeling like you're writing to someone that you know. And that language could be different in every single industry. But it's taking time to scale back a little bit, messages

[00:09:17] that are a little shorter, not 17 paragraphs in my LinkedIn inbox telling me how great you are. All the wonderful things that you can do for me and how fabulous you are and how much I suck

[00:09:28] because I don't have a 14-figure business. And that is not how to get anyone's attention. And so that's working, not working, and then what are some of the things that get in the way,

[00:09:39] and that's what you just said at Carson is the language we're using. And I have probably 30, 40, 50 pieces of content on words when it comes to someone even asking for the meeting saying,

[00:09:51] I would love to get on your calendar. I'd love to set up a time to talk to you. I'd love to find out more about your business. And these are the very people that say, I don't want to be self-serving.

[00:10:01] I don't want to be one of those salespeople. So what I'll do is I'll show up and be self-serving and one of those salespeople by telling someone what I would love to do to them versus inviting

[00:10:12] them to a conversation. When you say to someone, I would love to get on your calendar. The person receiving that is saying, sure you would, you're trying to sell me something, delete. So

[00:10:23] that's just one of many examples but think of the energy when you get an email that says, I would love to find some time in your calendar to tell you how great I am. The energy that

[00:10:33] comes out, that's writing at someone not to someone, there's no invitation. That's a command, not a request. So stop commanding that you get people's time and start requesting their time and give them enough inside that email that makes them want to give you that time.

[00:10:50] Love it. Don't tell customers that you'd love to explore synergies. synergies should just not be a word you ever use anymore, right? Yeah. That's on the pain and the less for LinkedIn.

[00:11:03] Yeah. Good. Where is, where is? When you keep that going, I'm very intrigued by it. I mean, so you talked to the beginning. The title of this is around bridging passion and purpose. You've talked a lot at the beginning about people just getting to know themselves and do

[00:11:19] the work. And now you're talking about the way that we communicate with them. I want to hold up there because there are many environments where salespeople are actually encouraged to do the work and get to know themselves so that they can show up authentically or is it

[00:11:39] kind of an oxymoron that we're telling them, hey, do the work, know yourself, speak well, get to know them, invite them into things or whatever. And yet too often the environment they're in doesn't really allow that or encourage that. Right. I have to agree with that.

[00:11:56] It's a little bit of a mix bag. Some companies do want to touch on the mindset and really dig in deep to find out, what are you saying to yourself before you even on a call with someone?

[00:12:08] What do you tell yourself every day when you go to work before you even show up? Here we go again, another crappy day. I haven't closed to say it in a month, but what's another month? And it's

[00:12:18] what happens up here is really what you wind up manifesting outside. So yes, there's some my companies that do mindset stuff. But for the most part they just say, just be authentic. You know

[00:12:29] what to do, you have your scripts. Just go for it. Have a great day. You're smart. You can handle this. And it's all that pectoral crap that does nothing for anyone. So what they're left to do

[00:12:40] is to try to figure out, okay, then I'll just be authentic. And here's what happens when you say you're going to be authentic but you're projecting something else. And you can think you're

[00:12:52] showing up authentic and going, no, I'm about the customer. I really do want to help people but yet your sales process doesn't reflect that. So you're saying one thing and doing something different. For example, someone might say, I'm not trying to sell you anything. I'm just here

[00:13:10] to help you make an informed decision or I don't sell I serve. My goal is to inform you not sell to you and the worst offenders are those serving and selling comments. I'm not a sales person,

[00:13:23] I serve. I'm here to serve you, not to sell you and I call BS on that big time because too many people try to separate serving and selling when they are so darn intertwined. It's impossible.

[00:13:36] They're two distinct activities in a sales process and closely related but they are different. You cannot separate it out. You can't say to yourself, look at me, I'm serving. Oh, now I'm

[00:13:48] going to do a little selling. So I tell people to think of selling and serving as the equivalent of inhaling and ex-haling. So inhaling constantly without ex-haling will kill you and serving without

[00:14:01] selling in your business is going to kill your business. So you can't do one without the other and I use the example of an infinity symbol where it doesn't end. You can't tell. It's always

[00:14:14] moving and you can't tell where it stops and where it starts. So sales is that selling and serving is a fusion of that and it's a continuous loop making it impossible to go, oh no you're serving.

[00:14:27] Oh, now you're selling. So this BS that people tell themselves that I'm not selling, I'm serving. Yet they show up with the energy of either a servant who gives away everything or you turn into a

[00:14:40] sales person. So again, here comes back to that authenticity piece of it, you don't know yourself and you can't catch yourself in a sales conversation where you're making it about you or you making it about that. Well, you've hit on something really important earlier, Liz about

[00:14:55] you know, it falls on the sales leadership a lot of times to set the tone and make sure that we're not giving those meritless empty pep talks like you've got to arm folks with the tools but

[00:15:08] also got a model to behavior that you're expecting and a lot of times within sales, service. It's all about articulating the value that you bring. One of my favorite lines of yours is cut the fluff and you said something earlier about, you know, getting to the meat

[00:15:30] being brief, be brilliant, be gone. However, you want to spin it. I was one of those people in ice-mitted years ago that I would write this big long, amazing email to this senior executive

[00:15:42] and I found myself on the back on how articulate I sounded it. This is guaranteed to get a reply. And what I've learned is that I get the most response rate when I send something that's maybe

[00:15:54] two sentences. That's right. You get to the point very quickly. You don't make it about yourself and you show up unique and stand apart from the noise. What are your thoughts on that?

[00:16:05] Absolutely, and you leave out the crap and the flopp which is an opportunity. Well, I hope you had a great weekend. I hope this email finds you well in all that junk. When you put

[00:16:16] that in an email to someone you don't know it causes them to roll their eyes and go here we go again another self-serving salesperson. Here we go again. Does do I really think that you tapped out an

[00:16:28] email really hoping that I had a fabulous weekend doubt it doubted. So now you've already put me on alert that you are just trying to butter me up to sound me something. So when you say,

[00:16:39] I hope you had a great weekend and then you go right into a sales pitch you're doomed when you start doing that. So that's part of that fluff. It's get to the point. Leave that crap out

[00:16:49] because no one believes it and especially when you don't know someone or hardly know someone when you start out with language like that. And here's where again that serving and selling. I'm not trying to sell anything. I hope you're having a great weekend. That's what's going through

[00:17:06] the prospects ahead. They might not be able to articulate and say to themselves, I sure don't like when someone sends me an email with that in there but something viscerally is happening in their body and they're like, who is this clown? And so try writing an email without

[00:17:22] that garbage in the front and if you absolutely, your ego is so big that you have to put that in there, put it at the end. That's what I tell my clients. It's a good, it's like training wheels. If your

[00:17:34] ego's that big and you have to say, hope you had a great weekend, jam and at the end because chances are they're not going to read your email anyway if it's at the beginning. Put it at the

[00:17:43] end. Be nice. Do something different. But remember this is you trying to serve not sell and this people can get in trouble with this because when you do more serving than selling or you

[00:17:56] do more selling than serving, you create an imbalance with yourself and the client. And no one can figure out what the heck's going on. They don't like me. I don't like them. There's this weird energy

[00:18:08] and you're disrupting the rhythm and the harmony of a fabulous buying experience and getting to know someone. And when you serve and don't sell, you can fuse the crap out of people. If all you do is

[00:18:24] serve, serve, serve than you are causing resistance because people are wondering, okay, why are you serving me so much? Why are you being so nice? This doesn't feel right. You have to figure out

[00:18:36] your blend and you can only do that when you know yourself. Great, brando, we need to do an episode on like the greatest cardinal sense of sale. There's so many. One of sales and one of personal branding

[00:18:49] and throw it together and call it a best of. Amazing. There's a couple of great ideas, 95 episodes then. Yeah, takes us a while. Liz, we had an origin then and I wanted to get here and I don't know

[00:19:06] if this is the best spot to put it in but I don't want to miss out on it. The consultative and the client-centric approach, I think it's another one. We've talked about a lot of cliches already today.

[00:19:21] Some of the cliches that we put in our emails or whatever, they hit that spam filter and people have a gag reflex and they don't even pay attention to the rest of it or the one that I love as somebody

[00:19:31] because you know what, I'm not a salesperson. I love to serve. That's the biggest cliche that tells me you're here to try and sell me as much as you possibly can. That's right. It's so overused

[00:19:41] and it causes peat that gag reflex that you saw. It really does. Unless you mean it and prove it and show it on such a level that I could feel that you are here for a different reason then

[00:19:54] and only then will I give you the time to date and very few people can do that unless again, go back to themselves because you can't say one thing and do something different. Yeah,

[00:20:03] not get away with it anyway. So the client-centric approach, it is another term that gets thrown out but what exactly is it and why is it really truly so important and most teams say they do it

[00:20:17] and don't? And I see this again as this like beautiful red thread that moves through a conversation and client-centric means that you create, when you have a good connection, it creates a comfort

[00:20:32] and then that comfort starts to build a little trust. That trust then reinforces some of the value that's being translated and talked about and then that value is what people start leaning into when they're ready to buy from you because you've pulled that red thread through your conversation

[00:20:52] and you're creating what needs to be created in a really good, deep, robust sales conversation where there's something there. I'm not talking about just somebody who is interested in your product when some or service, when they step up, there's a real interest but it's pulling that thread

[00:21:08] and making them feel comfortable and yourself comfortable as well but it's also being able to poke the bear a little bit as well and not being afraid to just don't want to be nice all the way

[00:21:19] through. I think sometimes you have to be not nice in the sense of where you have to push a potential client and say, you know, I'm feeling a disconnect here, you're, you mentioned this but now you're

[00:21:31] saying this and I can't, I don't want to continue the conversation until we address that. I'm not going to sit here and just be nice when that's not what people are getting on the phone with me

[00:21:40] for. They're, they want to robust conversation to find out if there are problems big enough, why enough deep enough and costly enough to fix? That's good. Hey Liz, Bob, Bob had this comment on here. I'd love to hear your take on for a lot of these issues are

[00:21:59] unique to the hypercapitalistic US way of selling. Do you think that's accurate? That it's just here in the US? Mm-hmm. Heck no, I have clients in Austria and one in Holdon, she's in the Cayman Islands and then I worked with a firm,

[00:22:20] a law firm and wanted. Not at all. They're saying the same thing. Hope you do in well. They might not say it the exact same way but they're putting in the BS and the junk in the trunk right

[00:22:29] in the beginning. So it's really not. Oh no, they don't follow up too. I know you've got some thoughts there too. We've got a lot of just really wonderful ways of following up with customers like,

[00:22:42] hey, checkin' in and making sure we're still aligned. What do we need to get red of and what do we need to bring in in order to effectively follow up with customers and be truly client-centric?

[00:22:55] Oh, I just really enjoy talking. I know. I know what you're doing. It likes me up. Well, every one of us probably today maybe have good have received five or 10 emails that say I'm just following

[00:23:10] up, just touching base, just reaching out and just checking in and they're making this big grand announcement of the activity that they're already doing. First of all why do you have to announce it? I'm just checking in and following up and it's always followed up with the weakest

[00:23:25] weakest net sentence which is usually just wanted to see the had any questions about the proposal I sent you last week. Like, like, I don't know. I could ask you a question if I have one and I don't

[00:23:37] know that you're following up with me because I didn't respond to you and this is your only way in my inbox now. Just wanted to touch base to see if you got any more information about A, B, and C.

[00:23:49] And it's the push. It feels like a push in the sales conversation. Not not. I'm trying to move here. I am again, can we push this forward? I have a quoted of make I got babies to feed and I

[00:24:02] have a mortgage to pay. I'm coming in and I need to get something from you to let me know where I stand. Versus having a conversation about follow up before you even send your first follow up message. So

[00:24:16] first thing is get rid of following up touching base reaching out checking in anything that sounds like a big grand drum roll of an activity that you're already doing. Get to the point, shorten sweet and the reason why you're getting back to someone but also a conversation.

[00:24:33] If you're in a meeting with someone, now 20 years ago we used to teach, get the meeting right then and there. Book and book another meeting. That's not bad advice but just booking a meeting

[00:24:45] does not mean that you're moving the process forward. So I like to teach people to talk about while they're in the meeting. What does it look like who's connecting with who? How are we,

[00:24:56] how is what does this look like? Maybe even saying look, I'm not the type of person that follows up endlessly with someone after a conversation like that. You and I made a connection,

[00:25:06] identify this, this and this, how would you like to continue our conversation? What does that look like so that we respect each other's time that I respect your inbox that I respect your decision

[00:25:20] making process? Let's talk about it and then I get to put that in my email. It's phenomenal. No, I think a lot of times people follow me and they don't know exactly what to say.

[00:25:38] Don't give me wrong. Obviously mentioned the quota, the babies to feed but there's also fire breathing managers over their neck that it's like where's the deal? And so I think sometimes

[00:25:50] sellers just fumble with what to do next. And I think the key element is if you've actually built a relationship with this customer and you can very respectfully reach back out and say hey,

[00:26:02] you know as we mentioned, I've got resources aligned. I am targeting this date for our prior conversation but that's changed I need to know because obviously let these resources go

[00:26:13] or whatever the case may be and to your point shorts week to the point but it's kind of the and respectful because short and sweet is respectful. You don't have to butter it all up. I know

[00:26:25] you're busy and want to keep bothering you. I know you have a lot going on, you have a lot on your plate and they butter this stuff up but all it does is sound like you're apologizing for

[00:26:36] doing your job and that's just does not land very well. I feel like we should all be keeping a tally though. I'm going to have to go back and rewatch this episode of every one of these

[00:26:47] sins that I have done at some point in my career because let's be honest we've all said this garbage at some point. Yeah, I think the point of today is get rid of it. It's not working.

[00:26:59] Right. If by some change you locked into getting a response this way, Kudos to you with the odds were probably one and a hundred and if you perfect your message you're going to get a lot better

[00:27:09] response. Absolutely and again always going back to that serving and selling energy when you show up with servant energy think of a server in a restaurant. What can I get you? Oh you need more water.

[00:27:21] Oh you dropped your phone, it'll be right back and you have this more like giving energy but it's awkward giving energy. It's not a beautiful exchange of energy so sometimes people take

[00:27:34] serving way too far and they show up as a servant not a professional equal and there's a big difference from I'm just serving you. I'm not selling you versus hey wait a second we've been

[00:27:47] talking about this for a long time. You and I are professional equals we have a great report now and if we've had great conversations you can talk to someone not at someone so oftentimes

[00:27:59] that servant energy puts you in a needy or a less than position like your follow up messages and just touch and base but that decreases your credibility and diminishes your value in the eyes of

[00:28:14] prospect because you're communicating I'm just here to serve you. I'm just here to do anything up and over backwards I'll jump through hoops I'll bend over into a pretzel I'll stand on my head

[00:28:27] for you because I'm just here to serve and this may shock a lot of you but potential clients don't want to just be served they want alignment from a professional who's authentic and kind and strong

[00:28:39] and purposeful. They want a conversation between two business equals so selling and serving is about leading and moving selling and serving is about leading and moving people into action and hopefully

[00:28:53] take action with you. It was we've said a lot of like what you shouldn't do and I get then I'm thinking it's carcassings you said earlier I'm thinking some of the sins I've done like oh yeah

[00:29:06] I sent that like hey hope you're doing well got things what are some examples of how we can do it differently get get it's a little tactical and tangible. So let's say you're getting rated tap out an email

[00:29:20] and you want to say I hope you're doing well or you're it's a prospecting email and you want to say hope you had a good weekend I hope to see mail find you well all that stuff I want people to stop resist

[00:29:31] if you have to type it out any race it that's fine but think of where you would start your message the net very next line so think would you say in our last conversation hey Bob you and I spoke

[00:29:46] three weeks ago regarding XY and Z that's like what Carson said get right to the point and hit the target right out of the gate people are reading their emails sitting at red lights they take it

[00:29:57] into the bathroom they're doing it they're walking through an airport reading their emails they don't have time for the fluff anymore they just don't so get to the meat and get to the reason why you're

[00:30:08] connecting with them so a prospecting email get right to the point you don't even have to say I'm sorry to barge into your inbox you're barging into my inbox and you are bothering me but if you

[00:30:19] say something great I'm going to listen to you so don't use language that makes you feel good for doing the job even higher to do stop using language that diminishes your credibility and start

[00:30:34] taking control of your messages and get to the point and think of speaking to someone not at someone and would you answer an email that you sent to someone so that's one example is getting to the

[00:30:46] meat of the message and we talked about stop saying I would love to get on your calendar I'd love to meet with you I'd love to find out more about your business I talk endlessly about this one because

[00:30:57] this is where a lot of people get tripped up at the end of a really good email they say I would love to get on your calendar if this is something you're struggling with I'd love to show you how we can

[00:31:08] help well I said earlier that is a command our demand that is not an invitation into a conversation and let's say you're cold calling and you're having a conversation or maybe even a cold email

[00:31:21] the I would love is all about you think about how you could make a collaborate collaborative and invite someone in what are your thoughts on how do you feel about are you free next week to

[00:31:35] grab some lunch and have a conversation around what's your schedule like don't tell them what you would love to do to them and bite them into a conversation so they will fall in love with you

[00:31:46] and you don't have to use the ill word in any of your messaging keep that bad bill word out of sales messages and really the bottom line is it's not that the love word is bad it's just that

[00:31:59] it's overused it's so abused it pushes people away it's so self-serving that it doesn't move the conversation along so what these people who say no one ever gets back to me I send email after

[00:32:13] email and I can't get anybody to schedule an appointment with me and all I have to do is say send me your last three emails and I do a deep dive into what what did you say and I scratch my head because

[00:32:26] so many of them sound like everyone else they're not unique they're not the only people using the love language there's a lot of people dropping albums all day long yeah feel free to tell

[00:32:38] your customer hey I love that you just sent me that purchase order listen don't I love to ask about is you know you said love version I know I did for purpose in your coaching business list what

[00:32:51] talked to us about the transformation that you see so to your point you just made the comment that you know hey I'm not getting results but it's sending me what you're sending your customers and

[00:33:02] I'd love to hear kind of a from too you know what are you seeing and how's that evolution I tell sellers all the time a lot of times it's not a massive overall of your process that's

[00:33:13] required to have exponentially better results a lot of times it's small tweaks might be a few words here and there it might be going from a three-pair graph email to a couple of sentences it's

[00:33:24] it's working smarter and doing things that show up with value and what I loved about what you said too is about when we're reaching out to customers some of these things that we've all done these

[00:33:36] sins if you replace them which is smarter statements I'll point out a value story of why a customer should want to meet with me right the value that I think I can bring and then please let me know

[00:33:49] your availability this coming weeks so we can align yeah you know that's simple and it's that's going to be a good response rate and every industry is different so I work with interior designers

[00:34:00] family law firms bankruptcy law firms all the way to CPAs financial planners but the theme is they're all selling their invisible service all invisible so everyone starts to sound the same every process looks the same every initial consultation looks the same so oftentimes I will

[00:34:21] secret shop I'll be I'll be hired to secret shop a company so for example I work with a couple of family law firms around the country that they hire me via zoom and if they're here in

[00:34:32] Denver I do it in person I have a fake diamond ring that I wear and I literally will sit and pretend I'm going through a bankruptcy or got to DUI or was hurt in an injury accident or I'm

[00:34:45] looking for a divorce and I scrutinized their process because for me there's nothing like catching someone in the act of doing what they're doing nothing like it they say they're doing this

[00:34:57] but really it's showing up this way so that for me is one of my favorite things to do I feel like I must have been an actress in a past life but that's for me to be able to get in the moment

[00:35:08] with someone who's just doing what they do every day and then I could report back to where the gaps the holes and the issues are and articulate it in such a way and give them an example of how this

[00:35:22] might be different I have 99% track record of getting hired and a hundred percent track record of no one ever said to me I knew you were fake I knew I knew you weren't a real client because

[00:35:34] I take on the persona and the mindset somebody in that exact process and there's no way anybody would think they're being secret shop so that's the most ideal situation that I work in when

[00:35:46] they're hiring me to do that or if they call me on the phone and say look we don't know where to start we don't know what's broken oftentimes I'll do a mock consultation or a mock conversation or a

[00:35:57] mock sales process with someone and I want to hear what you say how you say it I want to see your emails I want to see what you're sending to prospects and that I do like a business MRI and then in my

[00:36:09] sales clinic I do MRIs and CAT scans of their business I want to take it through machine I want to see what's working what's not where you're tripping up and then the transformation is

[00:36:21] being able to like you said Carson little tweak here it a little tweak there it's like going to the eye doctor is this more clear or is this more clear and that's where the training starts it's

[00:36:33] working on the things that are clearly broken fixing some of the neat things that need a little refining and putting it together in a way that works for that industry that company that

[00:36:44] law firm and there's continuous follow up after that with me I don't just train and leave they are tethered to me through another year of having me basically on staff as their coach that someone says

[00:36:58] I was doing great for the last couple of months and I don't know what's going on typically people fall back into bad behaviors we all do but it's really nice to have a coach on standby who says

[00:37:10] let's fix that I just I got what's wrong and then going there and just it's like going to the doctor and you or the chiropractor and you get a little crack at your back off you go you do not

[00:37:22] need me for the rest of your life you need me to come in there do an MRI and a CAT scan figure out what's wrong and then put it back together in a way that actually creates a transformation

[00:37:33] and feels good to the person using it they have to feel good and I give permission to all of my clients if something is off if it doesn't feel good leaving your lips then let's figure out

[00:37:45] something that does because every time you say it you'll trip over those words I want to feel as though it was custom made sales language just for your business I like that because

[00:37:55] a reality is lose you've got to get a pass that comfortable way of mediocrity or comfortable way of failing you know I think even if you believe that a way of doing something is better than what

[00:38:07] you're doing it doesn't feel right it's like new muscle if you do it five times and you don't necessarily get the result you wanted right out of the gate I've seen so many people go back to

[00:38:17] their comfortable way of failing because it feels better yep that's why I believe that if you work out of way guide up sales rep years ago that well I'm to put my team it was funny story because

[00:38:29] there was a manager that I competed with all the time and this manager actually recruited this person but didn't want them on their team they wanted on my team and they were not performing very well

[00:38:43] and so I sat down with this person and we in essence constructed a script that I made sure it was in this person's voice they felt comfortable with every word that was coming out of their mouth

[00:38:53] the first quarter they made Fortune 500 in your face other manager but what I love about that is that your point they've got to feel good about it you stay you get them past those jitters

[00:39:07] yep of wanting to go back and revert to the comfortable way of failing so that they can be smooth sailing something I want to get your take on as well is because we talked so much about sales

[00:39:17] language and the importance of leveraging the right language and modern selling right now AI is all over the place you know people are leveraging AI to write emails to could create outreach for

[00:39:30] customers yeah we've been linked in post and first off how do you stay ahead of all that noise and stand out but second how do you recommend actually leveraging it as you're looking to make your messaging

[00:39:45] better it will be about the prompt first of all is to ask it leave out the fluff and the BS like hope you had a great day because chat GPT is famous for saying hello as well hope you had a good

[00:40:01] weekend famous for that so what's happening is now AI is now teaching people to use that crappy language whereas sales trainers use to teach people to use that crappy language you're top security for you

[00:40:15] so AI is doing me wonders because people are say I could have written this email and so it's sounding a lot like the crap that's already out there so and I believe that's because all that

[00:40:28] stuff is out there and that's all it's just being duplicated there there is no different language a lot of different language out there in the sales world and that's why this comes into that

[00:40:38] customization knowing yourself asking yourself what I talk like that what I send a message that sounds like that and I'm for all for using AI for lots of different things but if you are using AI

[00:40:50] and not tweaking it or toning down the message or lighting it up a little bit or adding your player or putting a little humor in it that reflects who you are then you are bathing and switching

[00:41:02] someone you're sending a message they get you on the phone and they're like who is this done? Where really is this person this doesn't even sound like the message I just received you're

[00:41:11] creating a disconnect right out of the gate so use it but use it and make sure you you in part yourself into that you make sure you're showing up in those messages or outreach or whatever you

[00:41:23] using it for and I've seen a lot of posts on this that AI has a lot of language that everyone uses for example you know in today's modern world and however and let's delve into certain there's a

[00:41:38] lot of same language so you're giving yourself a way that I I didn't write this message to you I wrote it at you the minute you start doing that you're done. I love that you said that because I will

[00:41:50] tell you like I'll use AI to help you write messages to cross-fecks often but I may get like a three-payer graph output and I'll take that one sentence that was like perfectly aligned to their

[00:42:02] website or their recent you know earnings statement or whatever it was and I'll hone in on that one piece and cut out the rest. So it's a use it to make you better. Yes that's that is true that's

[00:42:14] really the bottom line make you better use it because it's there and it isn't going anywhere but use it to take what you have now and ask it to make you a little more professional maybe a little more funny.

[00:42:26] Maybe you're thinking you have to be super buttoned up and professional in your writing when in fact the opposite is proving to be true a little humor a little joke a little emoji something that

[00:42:39] lightens it up a little because so many people are tired of the message that's coming at them constantly we all wake up to a filled inbox on an email and I'm LinkedIn in everywhere else and how is

[00:42:53] anybody going to decipher a message that should be written read by them that's coming from you to everyone else who looks exactly the same sounds the same whose flavor is the same it's a bunch of

[00:43:05] vanilla emails in a vanilla inbox and and then people wonder why I can't close any sales so that's yeah that uniqueness of course when we had a John Seela gone about everything to go and talking

[00:43:21] about using humor in the sales process and the messaging or in the cold call process and comparing his stand up to it that was really good and Liz before we wrap up you know we add on our

[00:43:34] agenda to talking about aligning a personality with their sales style can you speak a little bit of that because I think so often it's just easier for sales leaders to be kind of cookie cutter one

[00:43:48] size fits off here off you go smack them on the back side and say go get them tiger whether it's a sales leader that's working with the team and trying to help individuals discover their

[00:44:00] personality figure out their voice and align it with the sales process or it's a producer that's in a role that they're just like I've got to make this my own how do you how do you speak

[00:44:11] to somebody about that like what's that process look like? I like to have their attorneys or their sales team try it out test a message right it out in the way that you want to write it forget what

[00:44:26] you're being taught forget the scripts that are there and test things out right it and see how you feel say it and see wow that actually I like saying that better than this or oh that sounds more

[00:44:40] like me than the stuff I've been saying so go into test mode and allow people to tap out a couple of emails or write a few scripts with their personality and who they are infused into that

[00:44:54] and then if it needs a little refining that's fine I was just working with a criminal defense uh law firm here in Colorado Springs and I was secret shopping this man and he dropped to the F bomb

[00:45:07] within the first two minutes of me secret shopping in and he used it all the way through but he could get away with it at a big beard he was a big guy and he was like fierce looking and at first I was a

[00:45:19] little taken back but toward the end of the consultation I thought all right we could work with this I didn't like that it was all the way through and he wasn't really risk I didn't feel like there was

[00:45:30] a lot of respect right out of the gate but we worked with that and I said could you say it this way instead of that way and right out of the gate could you do this instead of that maybe say to someone

[00:45:41] look I don't believe in talking BS I know you're here you got to do you I last night we need to talk about what's going to happen for the rest of your life if you don't get you should together right now

[00:45:51] you could talk like that if that's who you are but yeah then if I have a family law turnies starts doing that in a call no but this guy infused his natural way of talking to people re-refined it

[00:46:04] and it actually made him even better it made people like him even more because he wasn't so right out of the gate in your face and so that's where that comes in where you can be who you are

[00:46:15] but you want to temper it and look at it and see how it's landing and it fits working so what I hear is test test yes cry let's see how it feels it's like like new pair of shoes

[00:46:27] you got to wear them a little bit to see if they like practice yeah sellers should practice too absolutely and it can be done that's the beauty when I see firms at the end of our training

[00:46:40] say oh my god everybody is so happy because they're they're being themselves they're authentic like that's what they're actually using the word authentic in the right way because it feels good

[00:46:51] to them it sounds like them it comes out of them as if it was truly them creating this language because most of it was created by by them together we do that but I like to pull it out do you

[00:47:02] like this or do you like this could you think about saying it this way instead of this way to get the best impact and then they go try it and then they report back or we tweak it and modify it

[00:47:13] but yes that takes time but so does losing a whole lot of business take a lot of time to do so you're either losing business and it's costing you a fortune or you pay to get the training

[00:47:25] to tweak it in such a way where you get to use it for the life of your business you have the choice keep losing money or invest in the solution one I think it's a tip for our sales leaders out there too

[00:47:36] because you know I think sometimes we get so married to it's got to be done this exact way or it's got to be done my way and we don't give our teams sometimes to at least the cart launch

[00:47:46] to be able to try some things you know I've been firm believer everybody has earned the right to be in the role they're in and if I hadn't had managers in my life that it had at least

[00:47:56] green lit me to be able to do things the way that I felt they needed to be done I wouldn't have had the success I've had and I think sometimes because of micromanagers or maybe poor managers

[00:48:06] that haven't been trained that you know there's no malice intended right we failed to give our teams the opportunity to try well said Liz you have a business diagnostic MRI or way to assess

[00:48:24] and and realign your sales tactics you tell us a little bit about that and how people could and actually use that in their own sales teams it's done for me so I do the full diagnostic

[00:48:37] I'm the doctor on the practitioner and I'm sorry give us a little bit about that process I think you you were explaining a little bit when you go in and seek or chop and things like that but

[00:48:47] what are what are some of the other like nuggets that will come out of that if somebody saying hey we might need to go do one of these diagnostic processes what are some of the outcomes that can

[00:48:58] come out of it some of the things that so even surprise me sometimes is we find gaps and a big gap in a hole in their process where wait a minute you're waiting this long to get back to someone or

[00:49:11] how old on they just you just talked to them yesterday and you're already sending this what if you did this instead of that so it's it's the I have this I don't know where it came from but I can

[00:49:23] actually go to a company or a law firm and almost see their process and I feel like I know the right questions to ask so it's it's getting in so deep and looking at the process and how it

[00:49:34] flows and figuring out do we need to pull something out or put something in something missing do we need to tweak this do we need to scale back on certain things but it's so unique to every

[00:49:45] single company because everything I do is customized I don't have cookie cutter there is no one size fits all I spend a lot of time with a client when they hire me and so it's a little bit

[00:49:56] of getting under inside their business so not only doing a secret shop but then also doing all those mock consultations conversations send me 20 of your past emails and I can get in there

[00:50:08] and get a flavor in a baseline of where they're at and where we need to where they say they want to go and how we get there it seems like your intuitive nature pleasure 30 years experience doing

[00:50:22] it is where the sweet spot is like you can you find it but it's really hard to just point somebody in that direction like correct that combination of your intuition and an experience

[00:50:32] it helps identify it I would tell people though right now tested for yourself right now go back and look at the last 20 emails you said do they sound like everyone else do you drop the

[00:50:43] are you saying I'm sorry to bother you I hope this email find you well is there fluff in there that can be taken out can you be more direct this would be the stuff I would be looking for

[00:50:54] if you sent me 20 emails go test it for yourself and watch what happens but be careful of this don't think that you can have the same mindset I say a crappy mindset and an amazing sales

[00:51:05] process you can't they both have to be aligned so don't think that you could just take out the L word and you're going to magically transform your business you've got to infuse that mindset and skill set together where you're aligned with the messaging that you're putting out

[00:51:21] and not just saying fine I'll take out the L word let's see if this lady knows what the he's talking about and you do that with a crappy attitude nothing's going to happen so first work

[00:51:31] on you before you even said that email and then make any kind of switch yeah it's all going to be in the spirit of like honing and mastering your craft yeah really literally the same sales play

[00:51:42] to the same set of people and had like 10 acts that are response rate because I tinkered with the formula just a little bit the shorter email is looking at more direct into the point

[00:51:55] cut out graphics and fluff and I got you know 90 replies as opposed to 10 like like Bob's little suggestion here that's a good one count the ratio of i and we to you in your emails

[00:52:10] to grab yeah I think I even have a video on my LinkedIn about that where it's like I want to tell you this I'd like to share a little bit of that I have something you and it's appalling

[00:52:21] how many times people use the i word in their messaging and it's subtle in a way isn't it right like it's easy to write messages like that you're talking about the fluff it's easy to say hey I

[00:52:32] hope you had a good weekend and I have this and I have the i mean it's kind of easy and for a lot of people it's it's almost intuitive like well I'm explaining to them or I'm trying to teach

[00:52:43] them or explain something to them but when you pause a little bit and you look at yourself like like to use a word like do you know what it's like to be on the other side of you okay get on the

[00:52:53] other side of this and receive it and see where all the pitfalls are and go oh wait I could cut off that fluff I can direct to the point that's about me not about them let me rewrite it it doesn't

[00:53:07] make much but as you I like what you keep saying it's really getting into that and I know this is a big one for Carson it's that mindset around what you're really doing when you've got

[00:53:18] to get in your own head sometimes like I wrote a column an organizational column like 20 some odd years ago and my editor literally came back to me in circle every time I said the word

[00:53:30] I and it was in it burdens but a lot of it was that I want to make sure you guys know or you know I would thank you for X-Bwisey yep you know what's funny that was 20 years ago but still in my

[00:53:40] head every day and it's like I purposely when I'm writing email oh the word I or many times you're not a little patient of it yes here's another one when you say to someone I thoroughly

[00:53:56] enjoyed our meeting yesterday it's all about you it's not about the other person so you start right out of the gate talking about yourself I enjoyed our conversation so I call those language landmines word bombs and phrase grenades and if you're putting language landmines it's going to blow

[00:54:17] up in your face so watch your language landmines word bombs and phrase grenades because they will kill your business they will blow it up you take them out and watch what happens to you and your

[00:54:27] bottom line take a little word to got the f-word follow up so many more yeah it reminds me of we've we haven't talked about these as much lately Carson but some of the key words that we've said

[00:54:40] are the key phrases for this modern selling approach and one of them was go slow to move fast I just trying to encourage people slow down we know you got all this pressure but when you slow

[00:54:51] down you pick things up pretty quickly and go I don't need that and I should refrase that just slow down a little bit that's brilliant because you're doing the activity anyway why not take an

[00:55:05] extra five seconds before you hit the send button and see if this is a message that I would respond to is does this sound like me is this how I wanted to land on the other person so if you don't want

[00:55:17] to take those five seconds then you better get used to hearing a lot of nose hearing a lot of excuses why they went with someone else you're too expensive we're not doing this right now we're

[00:55:26] going to put this on hold you are doing this to yourself and many times it's you that's doing this not the other person yeah it's hard to hear but it's the truth yeah take those five extra seconds

[00:55:39] because you push people away when you don't take the time to craft that message that really sounds like you and feels like you and lands in the way that you intended to yeah you know what I like

[00:55:50] about this and unless I say this with with praise and respect what you're saying is very logical it it's it's simple I know this why you're in a job because it's simple but people make it very

[00:56:05] complicated and confusing and they try to get too quick and that's why you have job security what you do but it's also it's very logical it's very someone just slowed down think about the way

[00:56:16] this would be received and is that really the message and the tone and the way you want to position yourself yeah if not take the five minutes to redo it and then guess what then the one you do in

[00:56:28] an hour it'll be better because you took five minutes right now to make that one better and it just is that escalating effect but it all has to start from that mindset of cause what's it

[00:56:41] like to be on the other side of me can I do this better yes perfect I always ask my team like are you 100% satisfied or even 90% satisfied with your current results all up and if you're not

[00:56:56] why are you so married to them that you refuse to change your process in ways like this it might make you better comfortable failure as you call it and oftentimes people will say

[00:57:10] sales is a bad word or I hate to sell especially in my world with the people I work with I don't like to sell sales is gross to me and I don't want to do that I would rather market it market my

[00:57:21] services than sell my services and when they say I don't want to sell or I don't like how I feel I don't like that sales conversation again they're making it all about themselves so what

[00:57:34] if you took the attention off of yourself and said I hate to sell and you had a conversation with someone else without you take yourself out of it it's about the other person when you say I hate

[00:57:45] to sell and I don't want to do it and you give yourself permission to avoid it it's a bad excuse not to do the work learn the skills master the craft so you hide behind the stigma because it gives

[00:57:58] you permission to not have to go out there and test what does work out sorry but it's the truth because I see it every day stop giving yourself permission to be bad or mediocre can't out there

[00:58:11] and bust open and try some things out see what's working for you but first you have to be able you have to want to get out there and shift a little bit and stop going back and saying that sales

[00:58:22] is bad or nothing works or cold calling doesn't work you keep saying that stuff and you give yourself permission not to do it yeah well this this has been great I appreciate your your passion

[00:58:35] around it I like your direct approach I appreciate everything that you said before we wrap up the somebody wants to find you and talk with you how is the best way for them to do that they can

[00:58:46] go to my LinkedIn at listwinling.com or just my website is live I'm sorry LinkedIn is listwinling but my website is listwinling.com perfect all right you can get an ob's comment up in the

[00:58:59] chat that's one sale I can never make bye I'm not even the greatest salesperson in my family unfortunately yeah I don't win that between between wife and five kids I don't ever really win that

[00:59:13] argument I'm gonna win out of my own if I need to go grab something for lunch during the work day or something there you go or my birthday for five years yeah even then I could get are

[00:59:27] you sure you want to go there and we do that last year oh no you're right no I just said that I don't really want to go there not all influence and persuasion that's what I'm selling is not a

[00:59:40] bad thing it's the only way you're gonna stay in business so love it enjoy it wrap your head around it do it well and stop pretending that it's the hardest thing you do in your business it's not when

[00:59:50] you do it well if you're not selling and you're not closing business it means you're the problem and it's solvable you know Carson and Mark Hunter is like I was a horrible salesperson at first

[01:00:10] and we all worked yeah so alright well Carson we're at the hour we told Liz we're gonna be about 40 minutes we know you know newer laughed at me when we came up with gold nuggets I mean you just

[01:00:24] turn the faucet off when it's pouring gold for one of our rappers up and say bye to everybody absolutely Liz always a pleasure thank you to the audience for being with us today

[01:00:36] and until next time everyone happy modern selling bye everybody thank you for joining us today on mastering modern selling if you enjoyed this episode don't forget to subscribe for more insights

[01:00:55] connect with us on social media and leave a review to help us improve stay tuned for our next episode where we will continue to uncover modern strategies shaping today's business landscape learn more about fist bump in our healthier service at getfissbumps.com

[01:01:10] mastering modern revenue creation with fist bump where relationships social and AI meet in the biocentric age