7 Minutes to Better Selling Podcast - S2 - Ep.2

Thank you

Welcome, everybody, to Season 2, Episode 2 of the 7 Minutes to Better Selling Podcast

For those of you who don't know, I'm your host, Colin Lake. I'm also the president and founder of Developing the Next Leaders

So Developing the Next Leaders is a firm on a mission to help salespeople

sales executives, sales teams, sales organizations, love what they do. And you say, well, how do you do that, Colin

We help people be better at connecting with and communicating their value with their clients

because we've learned that when you're really good at something and you're really able to help people solve for their issues

you tend to be in love with your career. You never feel like you're working

And so from a logistics perspective, although we say we're the seven minutes of better selling podcast, we are about, say, eight to 12 minutes on a live conversation

And then we go back to the editing floor, pull out the pearls of wisdom, and we put that out for all the world to see

So today we have a recap show. And I have my good friend, Simon, the podcast producer, showrunner, and altogether excellence in things digital and creative

So, Simon, thanks for joining us. Hi. Thank you so much, Colin

That was a very good introduction. Thank you. And I'm all, you know, I always love these ones

I mean, it gives you and I a chance to talk, you know, like on this level versus, you know

like the other like logistic stuff that we tend to talk about more often. So again, thanks for spending time here

Yeah. Thanks for the invitation, Colin. And congratulations for your season two. I mean, I know it's very challenging to be consistent

This is probably your episode number 31 or 32. So you have been doing absolutely great

And everyone loves this podcast. So I'm not going to take a lot of your time because I see you have some of the absolutely amazing people from the sales ecosystem in past three to four episodes

And to start with, you recently had Jason Mangler, who talked about how you can go to the next step and how you can take your team to the next step

Right. Would you like to add and do a quick recap from that episode? Yes. So Jason Mangler is the head of sales for Sartorius

Sartorius, they have an extraordinarily interesting business model, and Jason leads the sales team

So Jason and I are longtime friends. I've known him for 25 plus years, and he has done some amazing things in the sales world, in a number of different places in the sales world, but specifically with technology

And so he does a really, really good job at getting sales teams to believe in something that they wouldn't have or couldn't have otherwise

So I think a lot of Jason Mangler So one of the things that he talked about we had a few different points to the discussion But one of the things he talked about is how do I get a client to take the next step in the sales process And so that of course plagues the sales industry today Like

how do I get people to, instead of telling me it looks good, they'll take a look at it

how do I get them to the next step? And so he said two things. The first thing he said is

you have to understand their current financial situation. Like, do they have the capability

to move forward in the process. And so that has lots of meanings depending on what you sell

And the first meaning it has, you truly do have to understand their financial situation

But bigger than that, his bigger point was you have to understand what ultimately motivates

someone to take the next step. And many times we think our product is what's going to help them

make that next step. We think because our product is better than the current one they're using

or they don't have a product and they need our product, but that's not really the issue. The

issue is do what you do or what you have solve for the things that they actually care the most

about. And so that leads to point two, what Jason said is once you understand a financial situation

then you have to help them understand how it does in fact benefit them. And he said something

really noteworthy. And the point was, Simon, he said, you can't tell them what you think is most

important, meaning you need this because you have to say to them, why do you think you need this

And how would it impact you? And if you did use it, like, how would that make you feel

And when people are starting to answer those things and talk about those things

that's when you ultimately have the platform to help them take the next steps and help them

you know, maybe use your product to use a salesman's terminology. So I thought Jason did a

wonderful job. I don't know if you remember that call or that podcast specifically, but I thought

those points on how to help people take the next steps are really good. So first one is understand

like where they are in the process and understand what they need to see, what they need to believe

in order to take the next steps, not you telling them what to do

Wow. Absolutely. Great. Summarize, Scott. And one thing that I'll take away, and I'd like to note from this summary

is that you said you have been friends with Jason for 25 years. That's probably when I was born

All right, now let's move to the next podcast that you did with Tim

which was a really long one. And he talked about how you can take away

from any of the discussions that you get in, right? What are your thoughts from Tim getting on the podcast

Well, Tim's another guy I've known for a very long time. Don't tell me at this time

Yes. Tim has been a mentor of mine for years. Interestingly, he was my boss for a long time

And then through like professional changes and things happening in people's lives and careers, he then worked under me

I was at a different firm and he worked under me. And I would tell you, one of the great things about Tim Seifert

and I didn say this in that conversation is he was as influential and as inspirational as my boss or my leader as he was when he was reporting to me What a wonderful thing to say about someone and something I admire so greatly about Tim But two things from Tim First thing he said is I stand on the shoulders

of giants. Tim leads a Fortune 500 company. He leads the entire sales and distribution effort

for this company. He may even have a thousand people reporting up to him. If not, it's like

500, 800 people reporting up through him. He has a monster job. And he says, I got here as I stand

on the shoulders of giants. He says, I'm constantly paying attention to the people who came before me

and who did it before me and asking them if they were back in my shoes today, what would they be

doing to better their people? And Tim's always thinking that way is how do I better my people

If I better my people, then like my job gets so much easier

So I thought that was really, really good. And then the second thing Tim said is we have to change our relationship with hard

And Simon, what he meant specifically is like a lot of times we think things are hard, like calling a client who might hang up on us

We think that's hard to do. And what he was suggesting is in the grand scheme of things, that's not really that hard to do

You know what I mean? Like getting told no over the phone isn't that big a deal

And so if we change our relationship with that, we'll tend to approach the situation with a lot better of an attitude

Like I come in this with a big smile, expecting the best. And the best happens more often when you go into that versus I'm nervous

I'm afraid I'm going into this fearful that they're going to hang up on me. And then that actually comes to fruition. Like the worst happens because I expect the worst

And so Tim said, if you change your relationship with heart, like things that you perceive to be hard to say, you know what? I don't have to do that. I get to do that. And if I get to do it

I go into it with this positive attitude, this like sense of enthusiasm, Simon. And then I bring

that to the equation and people tend to do the things that you're asking them to do, which is

maybe meet with you or take the next steps to pull back into Jason's conversation

So I just, I think the world of Tim and I was really grateful for him spending all that time

Yeah, that's absolutely great. And just in case you want to go ahead and watch all that podcast, you can go to this

delvingnextleaders.com slash podcast, and you will find all the episodes over there

Now that brings me, Colin, to our final recap of the episode. That is by Kevin

Kevin did the new season for you and he inaugurated the new season and he was talking about how

you can go and sell here yourself, right? And how to be motivated to win each day. That was a really

good episode. And how would you like to summarize that? Simon, I think we'll have to talk about this

offline, but I think that is the highest watched episode we've ever done. Really? Yeah, I'm pretty

sure that's what, and that's already, you know, that's the most recent one. And I believe it's

the one that's been most watched or most downloaded and viewed. And what's so interesting about that is, as you progress, as you do 30 plus episodes

you tend to build a follower base So you expect that to some extent But I really love what we doing in season two And so and thanks to you for all of the direction on this one But season two on on selling yourself the hardest person to sell is is me Like I have to convince myself to do

these things every day in order to be a really successful salesperson. And so Kevin came on

Kevin is my nephew. And Kevin is a he's in recovery. He had a bout or difficulty with

drugs and alcohol in his life. And he was in a very, very difficult spot. And he has come from

literally the bottom of the of the barrel, all the way up to a wonderful place in his life where

he's married, he's expecting a child, he's got a wonderful position for a large insurance company

a global insurance company, and he's doing great things for them. His clients love him. His friends

love him. He's really in a wonderful place. And the thing that he said, Simon, you just referred

to it, is he says, I have to win each day. Every day I wake up, I say, what do I need to do to win

today? How cool is that? Like, I just have one thing on mind, win today. And he says, you know

to wake up. First thing, I'm grateful. I'm thankful for a list of things. I list those things. That

puts me off on a really good step. And I'm really setting myself up for a position of things that I

need to do in order to win today. He says, don't be afraid of failure. Don't be afraid of failure

Be afraid. Be afraid of winning in things that don't matter. Wow. How freaking good is that

Simon, don't you love that? Don't be afraid of failure. Be afraid of winning at things that

don't matter. And so that's this idea of like, how do I win today? Then make sure, okay

what's that list look like? Is it in fact the stuff that's most important? And what things am

I doing to execute really well in that? Don't worry about failing at them, but worry about just

succeeding at the things that really, really matter. So I thought Kevin was a wonderful guest

so well prepared, so articulate and sharing his story. And I was grateful for him getting us kicked off in season two

And Simon, by the way, that reminds me. We were supposed to have Jimmy Pomerantz today, Jimmy P

those who were dialed in and expecting him. As many of you know, on the east coast of Florida

they're getting a big storm. That big storm has put Jimmy in a position where he can't get on the call

He let me know last night. So we wish Jimmy well and his family well and make sure his house is safe

So he'll be on in a couple of weeks and I'll look forward to that. So Simon, what else do we have in terms of wrap up thoughts

And then we'll let the listeners go back to their day and get them to sell them the way they need

I think the very first thing to note is definitely is this season two that we have been talking about

And also that we have started streaming this episode also on LinkedIn. So we get another at least five to six thousand people joining us today

That's a new thing. If you're joining us LinkedIn for the very first time, you can find all the past podcasts that have dropped in the banner

having said that I think Colin that's all we have to wrap and I'll we'll see in about a couple of

more weeks yes Simon thank you for spending some time with us everyone thanks for spending

all of your valuable time with Simon and I and Simon you want to do it in unison good telling everyone