CUTTER CONSULTING GROUP

[E267] Sales Rebellion, with Dale Dupree (Part 2)

January 17, 2024


How do you strike a balance between truly caring for your customers and achieving the business goals?


Sales is about you playing your game for your reasons. It’s about helping individuals get to a better place with your product or service. And it is the toughest thing to get through for people who have either raised themselves in a certain way or been raised in sales in a certain way by managers or trainers that only involves closing the deals no matter what it takes.


Caring for your customers is a term not often heard in the sales process. For most businesses, sales is just a means to an end. Honestly caring about the people who buy what you have to sell is the key to success in sales. Sometimes, to an extent that enables people to buy from somebody else because it is not just a good fit. At the end of the day, caring about their needs first might just lead you to tell a potential customer that your product may not be the best for them or that a competitor’s product might be. 


People don’t care what you know until they know that you care. Before trying to persuade your prospects to buy your product or service, they need to first know that you truly care about solving their problems. It’s more about being genuine and authentic at every step of the relationship you have built with them.


Being on the journey with your buyer, and not in front or behind your buyer, is what makes a difference. When you can start thinking from that perspective, you change the game. And when the game has been changed, it never goes back to anything normal.



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Connect with Dale on LinkedIn


Dale’s Bio:

Dale Dupree was once known as The Copier Warrior and is the appointed Leader and Founder of The Sales Rebellion. He is born and raised in Orlando, FL. Has a sales background that dates back to his childhood as he was raised wandering the halls of his father’s business but has been a full-time sales professional for 13+ years. Founded on March 1st of 2019, Dale now provides sales training and development through his firm, The Sales Rebellion, that challenges the status quo. He is audacious with his outreach, intentional in his sales walk and driven to create a community of sales professionals that cause undeniable curiosity and true impact in their walk with prospects and clients alike by teaching the masses how to choose legendary in their sales career. The Rebellion believes in people over products, community over commission checks, fellowship over negotiations, and experiences over performing a pitch.

Dale’s Links:

https://www.thesalesrebellion.com/

https://www.linkedin.com/in/copierwarrior/

  • Show Transcript

    Jason: Welcome back to the sales experience podcast. Welcome to part two of my conversation with the amazing Dale Dupree. If you haven't checked out part one, listen to all of these episodes, even if it's binging them back. to back. Make sure to catch all of this because he and I are on the same path, the same mission of changing the way that sales is done.


    He has his style. I have my style and I love the similarities and the differences. And I think anything we can do to help anybody in sales be more effective, that's what we're focused on. So here you go. Part two, enjoy


    Dale: most sales people sit around and go, I hit precedence clubs 16 times in a row. And those are their bragging rights.


    I got to be able to be a part of the bigger picture of a man making an impact on a community that will never be the same because of what he did. And


    Jason: I think that is all about legacy and the things that matter the most. And I'm so glad that you shared that story because it's so impactful and people listening to might be like what does this have to do with sales?


    But then you hit it at the end, right? It's about the individuals and helping people and relationships and doing what's right for them. And helping somebody get to a better place with your product or service just with the conversation, right? Sometimes it's, yes, you're selling them something, could be a copier, whatever, a copier is a copier.


    What are you bringing to it as a person? And then how is that more important than the President's Club in your life, right? President's Club, all those trophies, everything can be good. It's important to get some people really focused on that and there's nothing negative. But how does that fit?


    Dale: What is the overall picture?


    Agreed. 100%. So I think that's what sales reps have to ask themselves. Even leaders and managers as well, too. What is my goal? Am I going to be here for 25 years and then check out and my name will be up on the wall for a bunch of people that come in behind me and don't even know who I was and don't even care, or am I going to be somebody that truly impacts the next generations?


    And then people say, who's that? But that's the copier warrior. Let me tell you about that, dude. Cause that's what I look to build. And when people say the name of the copier warrior, I hope that they think of my father and they think of what he enabled me to build for myself that then translated into the company that I worked for that.


    I'll tell you right now, if I would have started there, I don't think they would have ever been like, yeah, I do that. Yeah. I have a personal brand run with it. But since I had already developed it and I had so much success, man, I'll tell you this is a crazy thought. I don't think any of them believed.


    My numbers when they looked at my dad's books, I don't think any of them believe I think that they were like, yeah, this is daddy's little pet and he does what daddy says within the first fiscal year of me of us getting bought. So we got bought at the end of 2012. I spent the next Three months, basically finishing my year, which technically I hit a million dollars because I was at 880,000 with my father, and then I wrote another 150, but I never counted it.


    I was like, I wrote it eight. When people ask, what'd you write this year? I would say, either I said 150, or I would say eight 80, right? But then the next year, I was at the top of the leaderboards. In 2013, I was the number one rep. I won all the accolades, the trips. I won the offshoot stuff for the next 30 days.


    If you do these 10 things and the reason that I was beating everybody and winning was not because I was driven and motivated by stuff and that I wanted to have my name up on that wall. It was because my father gave me something so much bigger to look forward to in my sales walk and I crave the human interaction and I crave the ability to be able to challenge myself because I'm an athlete as well too.


    When someone would say in the next 30 days do this. I wasn't just calling up random customers and getting it done. I was calling up people that I had built a relationship with and had been working alongside of for quite some time and earning a space at the fireplace with a glass of whiskey with them.


    Something more intimate than just selling them a copier. And that's why copier sales to me was so much bigger than just the box, as they like to say, because it was a window into a more intimate, romantic relationship with people from a platonic standpoint. But I don't think we use the word love enough anymore, either, bro.


    I loved my prospects. I loved my clients. I loved my dad. I loved the company that he built and developed over 29 years. And I loved the men that he sold to. Even with the things that I didn't agree with inside of the company or the couple of heads I butted with, I love those people too. Even if I talk smack about them sometimes, I do it out of love.


    I do it because I hope that they have a better life, more than anything. And when you can be that, when you can start thinking from that perspective, you change the game. And when the game has been changed, it never goes back to anything normal or the same.


    Jason: Couple things as you're talking about it, the first thing, I know you well enough to know over the last year and a half since we first talked, is that all of this and what people hopefully are hearing, is that it's not about you beating everyone else, it's not about you beating something else or like some kind of outside external goal, it feels to me like it's all just a game you're playing with yourself, right?


    It's you versus yourself and what can you do and what can you sell and who can you impact. It's not about, I'm going to go beat Charlie because I just want to be the best and I need my name at the top. It's about you playing your game for your reasons.


    Dale: Yes, a hundred percent agreed that I had a lot of demons to overcome in my walk.


    I had a lot of things that I needed to get past even, and struggles that I even had to this day that I have to fight. And so every moment was the challenge to myself of, will you hear the call and will you heed the call? And so it's the concept, number one, of being willing. All right. Are you willing, but number two, can you trust yourself?


    Do you love yourself enough to trust the decisions that you're making? Even if they lead to something bad, do you then beat yourself up? Or do you say it's okay because I trust you and I know that this will lead to something bigger. It's about not allowing failure to be something negative in your life.


    It's about not allowing somebody walking into your office going, Hey, I see your 10, 000 behind the leader of this thing to affect you from the perspective of, Oh yeah. Let me show you, but to sit back and say, man, that's exciting. Good for them. I know how much that means to them. I know how much it means for them to beat me.


    Just like I knew what it meant for me to beat other people at some point, because it was about this. It was about me. It wasn't about them. It was about, can you do it, dude? Are you capable that's a big piece of the puzzle in life in general. But when you're young and you just get into sales and you hear about the 30, 000 commission check held 150, 000 commission check, you're like, huh?


    Yeah. That's not a thing. I'll never have that. Those are the types of thoughts. they go through your head, especially after that first cold call that you make when someone picks up the phone and you're like, Oh my God, I got a decision maker and you start scrambling your words and fumbling on everything and get hung up on and you think, Oh my God, I can a never call this person again.


    B. I'm ruining my reputation. C. That sucked. D. I never want to do this again. You go through this whole entire opposite of what the affirmation should be of sales, and it's because of the way that we live our sales life, right? We set ourselves up for that failure because all we're focused on in that call appointment, close something appointment, close something.


    What about just connecting with people at the beginning? What about sitting back and saying my first call cold call is not going to be good. I have a Chloe Ravina. She's one of my students and she's working in Melbourne, Florida at a company, a local company and her first cold call. I said, listen, if you start messing it up, just tell him what you're doing.


    Tell him where you're at. Be honest. And she did. She started messing it up and she goes, Oh my God, I gotta be honest. This is my literally first cold call ever. I'm surprised you didn't pick up the phone. She sold that deal and she's with a marketing agent. It was a 46, 000 package. And anybody in a marketing agency is listening right now is yo, that's very nice.


    Jason: One thing I've seen is that salespeople worry about only being able to win if they use manipulation, tricks, tactics, and hard closes. So they end up struggling to close deals. Make their quota or earn the kind of money that they want to make. If this sounds like your current situation, or maybe you want to make more money in sales without feeling like you're selling, then my upcoming book called selling with authentic persuasion will help in it.


    I'm going to take you on a journey to transform from order taker to quota breaker. If you're ready to become an authentic persuader, crush your goals. And create success in your sales career. Then go to Jason cutter. com again. That's Jason cutter. com and pre order the book today. It's about that authentic piece, right?


    And this is the toughest thing to get through to people who have either raised themselves in a certain way or been raised in sales in a certain way, right? By managers or trainers. Is that prospects and prospective customers, clients, those kinds of people, they want to work with somebody who's true and authentic and real and cares.


    And they want to buy, people want to buy, they need help. If you're selling, let's say like your past or even her, selling marketing solutions, that company, if it's going to help them, they want it and they want to work with someone they can trust. And the best way to trust somebody is to know what kind of actual person you're dealing with.


    I would say most of the time people freak out if somebody's too perfect. I don't know if you've ever had that in your career, but I have to watch out for that all the time. If I'm too perfect and too slick and too smooth. I gotta be careful cause it'll freak people out, right? Cause their defenses will go up.


    Dale: Agreed. And I think that comes down to the psychology of interactions with people, especially first interactions. And that typically that person has burned them at some point in their life. Too good to be true concept, right? And it's a very viable argument as well too, because it is in existence. The snake oil salesman is a real thing.


    The slick talking politician that works their way to the top is a real thing. And then all the things, the trouble that come along with it too. Those are things that a lot of people stay away from. They don't want anything to do with. So it's a very good statement and a very valid point. We need to talk about these types of things more in sales.


    People tend to just ignore it because at some point they hit a crossroads where they can tell a little white lie and they don't ever want to be in a position where they can't do that. Because it might lose them the sale, right? It might cause them a 10, 000 commission. Where they could've just, eh, yeah, it'll do that.


    And then in their mind thinking, they'll never try to do it anyway, so it doesn't matter. But then one day they try to do it, and they're like, I thought you said it did this. Oh gosh, I, man, I must've mis You must've misheard me. I didn't say that. It's such a dark hole, right? It really is, what you bring up on that point.

    But I think That's why people typically tend to stay away from talking about it because they want to be able to use it as a backup at some point.


    Jason: Yeah. And it's interesting earlier, you were talking about loving your prospects and loving people and us not using that word as much, especially in business, in sales, tell me your thoughts about.


    I've had times where I've talked to somebody, wanting to sell them, it's a perfect fit, they need what I have, I've done everything I can, they haven't bought, and I feel like I've failed them, and I care about them so much, I feel bad that they didn't buy.


    Dale: Yeah when I hear all that, one of the things I like to go to is, have you ever had someone in your life that you loved?


    That you just couldn't get to the place that they needed you to be. You couldn't quite do what it was that they were asking of you. You tried, but you didn't quite get there. Did they come back to you and say, I don't love you anymore? Did they come back to you and say, you suck. And furthermore, for us. As the sales professional sometimes it's out of love that we allow people to buy from somebody else in the first place, right?


    And I shouldn't say allow like we enable people to buy from somebody else in the first place It's out of love that we sit back and say we clash a little bit or we have a different personality or My product ain't gonna do what you need it to do to the extent that you want it. And even though you love me and like me, even I'm not going to take advantage of that.


    That's what true love is. True love is the backseat. True love is not the leader that's out in front

    taking credit for everything or the one behind driving the results. True love is the person that puts their arm and clasps it against the one right next to them and says, I'm on this journey with you. So being on the journey with your buyer and not in front or behind your buyer, being on the journey in general in life.


    And that moment is what really makes a difference. My dad used to say this. He used to say, the most important thing is what we do when the door is closed, not what other people can see. That's true love. The idea of sitting back one day and saying, what if I just wrote the check anonymously, instead of trying to get some kind of recognition for it and being okay with that, because we know the impact that it'll make on somebody else and seeing the impact that it'll make is much better than being recognized for it.


    Jason: All right, that's it for part two. Again, make sure to subscribe so you can catch episodes every single day. And I will see you tomorrow for the third installment of my conversation with Dale. That's it for another episode of the sales experience podcast. Thank you so much for listening. If you find yourself on iTunes, can you leave the show a rating and a review?

    It helps other sales people and sales leaders find the show and please subscribe to the show and share episodes you find valuable with anyone you know in sales. Help me on my mission of changing the way sales is done. And if you're ready to work together, go to Jason cutter. com. Again, that's Jason cutter.com.


    To find out how I can help you or your company create scalable sales success. I will see you on the next sales experience podcast episode, and keep in mind that everything in life is sales and people remember the experience you gave them.


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By Jason Cutter February 19, 2025
What does it take to build the ideal Sales Experience? Why does it even matter? Maybe you think you already have one. You are a professional sales ops leader. You have put everything you can in place to help your salespeople sell more. You have optimized the processes so that your sales team can focus on one thing – selling. But I promise – even if you think all of that is true, it’s not. The Reality: No Perfect Sales Experience Exists I have never seen any company or team with the ‘ideal’ Sales Experience and operation. And to be honest – I have never built one successfully. Why would I admit that? Because the ideal Sales Experience is aspirational and business, teams, processes, and customer needs/desires are constantly changing. So as soon as you put new processes in place, something else needs to change and evolve. The Scalable Sales Success Iceberg In my Scalable Sales Success Iceberg – there are 24 categories that, when built out, create a scalable sales machine – where you can add in an input and get way more output. I would love to see companies have all 24 categories set up and running optimally. But that’s not even possible – because, as I mentioned, things are always changing. Focusing on the Biggest Levers Here is the key – to build the ideal Sales Experience takes focus on the biggest levers. The ones that, when pulled, create the biggest and best results. There are many processes and systems that you can put in place – but those are going to get you a few percentage points of improvement. Instead of putting it all in here, I want to make you a special offer. Email me at jason@sellingeffectiveness.com with your mailing address, and I will mail you the book that I co-wrote with Nick Glimsdahl called Reasons Not To Focus On The Sales Experience. It will be your starter guide, facilitating the creation of your ideal Sales Experience.
By Jason Cutter February 18, 2025
The Numbers Game Mentality is a Losing Strategy Sales is no longer a “numbers game.” You cannot succeed, long term, by focusing on volume of activity. Making a million dials, sending a million emails, knocking on a million doors (the first two are way easier than that last one) is a scorched earth strategy that will sink your business. You can’t out-dial a bad sales process. It will lead to even more bad online reviews. You can’t out-email a terrible sales funnel process that requires people to jump through poorly planned hoops. You can’t out-knock your way past slimy tactics and bad products/services. The Danger of the "Every No Gets Me Closer to a Yes" Mindset The whole “every no gets me one step closer to a yes” mentally is dangerous. That mindset and strategy assumes that it’s a numbers game. That the only thing that matters is finding the right person who will buy from you. Potentially, no matter what you even say – they are just ready to buy. Not only will this destroy any online reputation you have it will also wreak havoc on your team. It is the fastest and best way to burn out your team. It will lead to a revolving door or hiring, training, and quitting as people realize how unfun the game is you have built and how hard it is to be successful. It will also feel like a mismatch – very few people (and hopefully even less over time) are long-term excited about the business model of calling 500 people a day in hopes of making a few sales. If It’s Not a Numbers Game, Then What Is It? It’s quality over quantity. [Now…note – it does take a certain quantity of activity to fill a sales pipeline. So I am not saying that your sales team can just sit and wait for people to fall into their pipeline with money in hand.] It’s about the Sales Experience. It’s about your team ensuring that they are providing the right and best experience for that potential customer – in a way that sets them up to get into the buying mood and mode. All that matters is the Sales Experience. How can you support your team in terms of the quantity of activity to fill a pipeline, and then the quality of interaction that leads to sales? What Does an Ideal Sales Experience Look Like? What does that look like – the ideal Sales Experience? It’s when your team understands that the potential customer they are speaking with only cares about themselves. They don’t care about the salesperson, your company or the product. They are only focused on themselves. It’s when the Discovery/Empathy portion of the conversation is the most important part. Does your team realize that everything after Discovery – when done right – is just a presentation of the solution? It’s the fact that when you combine the parts of the Authentic Persuasion Pathway (Rapport + Empathy + Trust + Hope + Urgency) that the assumptive close is all you need. If your team is having to ask for the sale they are doing sales wrong. And don’t confuse earning the right to close with asking for the sale. The Sales Leader’s Role in Creating a World-Class Sales Experience Your job as a sales leader is to ensure your team understands that the only thing – above all else – is the sales experience they provide to each potential customer. That customer knows that they have the power and the feeling of unlimited choice. Which means they will decide who to give their money to based on the experience they have with buying from a company. How can you shift your team away from the numbers game mentality to actually providing a world class sales experience to each and every person they speak with?
By Jason Cutter February 17, 2025
The Abundance of Options Today we all have lots of options. While writing this I could speak into my phone and order whatever I want. I can get food delivered before I finish writing this article. I could get a TV delivered to my door before I wake up tomorrow. When someone wants to buy something, they are armed with as much information as they want to access. They can research, read reviews, and watch videos about a product or company. The Shift in Power to the Buyer Because of this, the power balance of sales has shifted away from the salesperson and company to the buyer. Knowledge is power – and they now have all the knowledge they want. With knowing that they have ultimate choice of what to buy (internet and globalization has led to the ability to order anything you want from anywhere…so you are no longer limited to the stores you can drive to and what they have on hand), it means that everything is a commodity in their minds. Nothing is unique or special. Everything is interchangeable. Does the Sales Experience Even Matter? So, this means the sales experience doesn’t matter anymore. There is no reason to put effort into the sales process, the conversations with potential customers. No value in spending time trying to ‘help’ people – since they just view products, salespeople, and companies as interchangeable. You are not special, so there is no benefit in caring. They will walk into your store, and they will decide what they want. They fill out your online for, and they decide if they answer when you call and how the call will go. They walk up to your event/booth, and they decide how the interaction will go and if they want to listen to your elevator pitch. They will let you know if they are interested in moving forward. They will let you know how they want to buy. So, like I said above, there is no real value anymore in the sales experience. Or could it actually be valuable? Is it possible that all that matters IS the sales experience? If people feel they have ultimate information and control of the buying process, how do they decide on what to buy and who to buy from? When I search on Amazon for a product type I have never purchased before, how do I pick? When I want to go shopping for garden supplies for the house, how do I pick where to go? When I need to buy a new fridge, who will I hand my money over to? The cheapest place with terrible service? The place with reasonable prices and great service? The Sales Experience Shapes the Decision I choose based on the sales experience that I will receive. With everything else being equal, I (and I believe most people) will select the place to shop at or the products to buy online based on the experience I receive. To me all that matters is the experience. While I am trying to buy something. Once I receive it – ensure it does what I need it to do. With the feeling of unlimited choices, it can actually be harder now to buy something that in the past. People get into analysis paralysis more often. Which means that for consumers to buy something new they need help. They need a professional salesperson. They need a sales experience that matches their expectations. They want a guide who will help them make the right decision for them, with an experience that goes above and beyond what more people receive any more when they walk into a store, call a company’s toll-free number, or visit a website and have to fill out a form. If you want to succeed in sales – the only thing that matters is the sales experience you provide.
By Jason Cutter February 13, 2025
The Balance of Effort in Sales The blogs this week have been about the other person going most of the way. Whether it’s a prospective customer and your salesperson, where the salesperson truly can’t want the deal or make most of it happen for that customer to truly be successful. On the path for that prospect to becoming a customer, they should go at least 51/49. Whether it’s your team and their manager, the manager can’t want the team to succeed more than the team actually wants it for themselves. It’s not scalable for the coach (manager) to run on the field every play to win the game for the salespeople. What about sales ops processes and systems? What about the tools available to the sales team and the ones that are classified as sales enablement? In a reversal of philosophy, I believe the sales ops processes should go 90, the team should only have to go 10. Why Do We Need Salespeople? Let’s start where it matters – what is the point of having salespeople? I know many owners question the need and desire to have salespeople. They are hard to manage, tough to deal with, always want more money (potentially for doing less work and closing less deals), and are very resistant to change. Of course, that is a generalization. Of course, there are salespeople who don’t check those boxes. However, having worked with a lot of teams in a lot of industries, that generalization isn’t completely wrong or unfair. So if there is even a small part of that which is accurate, why would we even mess with the messiness of having salespeople? Of needing to employ and manage humans? The Human Element in Sales We need them. That’s why. Even in 2025, AI and technology has not successfully replicated the requirements of sales – which is about helping a human (prospect/customer) make the right decision and move outside of their comfort zone to buy something new. It still takes your human (salesperson) to persuade that other human. It’s why I say all the time that its not B2B, B2C, Retail, SaaS, etc. – it’s H2H. Sure, people can buy something online or even in a store without speaking to someone. But if it’s a considered purchase where there are options and decisions to be considered – it still takes a human being involved. That means ultimately your human (salesperson) has one job, and one job only – persuade the right prospective humans to buy. Minimizing Distractions for Salespeople Everything outside of that mission, task, focus is a distraction that takes away from their highest and best use. Imagine if we had a surgeon who had to prep the room, prep the patient, schedule the surgery and meetings, and do all the parts of the surgery themselves. Nope – they show up for the surgery and do what they do best. Then they take off their gown, gloves, and walk away to get cleaned up and move on to the next thing. Your goal as a sales ops leader is to support the team with systems and processes that allow them to focus on the one thing you need them for. The human part. It would be amazing if they could show up, talk to people, and make sales happen. Of course, there is more that they (and any professional) need to do before, during, and after the sales conversation. But your goal is to minimize all that. Every hour that your salespeople aren’t selling or doing sales-related activities, they aren’t moving revenue forward. The Ultimate Goal of Sales Ops What processes can you put in place that go 90 percent of the way, where the salesperson can do the last 10 percent? An example would be building an email campaign that runs automatically, and when the right people reply, the salesperson gets involved in getting that person from email to phone call. Another example would be your CRM serving up people for the salesperson to call – leads or anyone in the sales pipeline flow – with all the backstory, research, data, intel needed for them to review it then take action. What can you put into place that takes away as much distraction and effort from your sales team such that they can focus on the one thing you need to focus on – other humans?
By Jason Cutter February 12, 2025
The Danger of Doing Too Much as a Sales Leader Alright – so maybe they don’t need to go 90. In true servant leadership mode, you would go way more than 10% of the way to your team. But you have to be careful, as a sales leader. The inclination might be to do it all for them. To help them close their sales. To make excuses for them to your leadership as to why they aren’t closing more sales. Especially considering the very high likelihood that you are a sales manager because you were a great salesperson in the role that you are now managing. And there is a slight chance that you are a player-coach…so you are leading and selling. This can make it really tough not to want to run out on the field to win the game each time. But that doesn’t scale. That doesn’t lead to increased results. You can only sell so much as one person. Creating a Culture of Ownership So, you need to have people on your team that are coming to you. What does that look like? The pinnacle is a salesperson who doesn’t close a deal, comes to you right away and asks for feedback. They want some critiques as to where they could have done things better, different that would have led to the desired result – a closed sale. That takes a healthy level of ego by a professional who has the ultimate growth mindset. They know there are always ways to improve. They want to improve. And they are willing to risk their ego (and the internal, protective, primal part of our brain that doesn’t want to risk our place in the tribe) by asking for feedback that could be negative. Whenever you can, encourage that type of response. Ensure that the team knows that the team itself, and you as their leader, is a safe space – where the goal is to improve, grow, win and that everything done to support each other is done in that mode. They truly have to feel safe to share their mistakes and to get support in learning how to do more, better. Feedback That Drives Growth Part of this takes team and individual meetings that are actually filled with positive support. That doesn’t mean it’s always positive, motivational fluff. It’s not even about the shallow strategy of the feedback sandwich. Its about being real, honest, and empathetic – meaning “I see you are here, I know you want to be there, I will help you get there – even if its hard and it means saying hard things.” It should never feel mean or abusive or like an attack. But you can give some really direct feedback that will sting that ego I mentioned, but the person will know the intent behind it. The second part is hiring this type of person. Hiring people for the team that wants to win, grow, succeed. And they know that you don’t get better by being coddled, sheltered, or protected. You want people who don’t like the thought of perpetually living safely in their comfort zone. And they are excited about the opportunity to be a part of a team that pushes everyone, empathetically, outside of their comfort zone. Are You Leading or Just Managing? If you find yourself as a leader having to push your team, or going to them most of the time, or most of the way mentally – then they see you as a manager not a leader. They see you as someone who manages them, pushes them, and wants them to do things they don’t want to do. I have written some blogs here that go into what your role should be – as a leader, not a manager. Pulling people along with you, inspiring people, and supporting yourself with a team of people who want to win. Not just those that want to show up, do as little as they can and hopefully go unnoticed (yet – complain about not making enough money and how the comp plan isn’t fair, or the leads are bad, or their schedule means they can’t be successful.) Make sure your team knows that they need to come to you – at least 51/49. They should be asking for help, guidance, training, feedback, and support more than you are having to push it down onto them.
By Jason Cutter February 3, 2025
If you have seen the movie Hitch, then you know the scene. Will Smith’s character (Hitch) is trying to coach Kevin James’ character (Albert) on how to finish out his upcoming first date. He is giving him pointers, one being that if his date fumbles with her keys at the door, it could mean she wants a kiss. So Hitch wants to see if Albert knows what to do – for a good night kiss. Hitch gives him the advice “you go 90 percent, and then wait for her to go 10%” which Albert then asks “wait for how long?” Hitch: “as long as it takes.” Albert leads in, Hitch is holding back to see if Albert will wait, and then Albert goes all the way and gives him a kiss. Hitch gets upset, and says “You go 90, I go 10 – you don’t go the whole 100%.” The Sales Analogy Kissing our prospective customers is not acceptable (just ask HR!). But the concept is the same. You don’t want to ever make 100% of the effort for your prospective customers. You don’t want to be the one who is doing all the work. Fundamentally, it is not good practice to want the deal more than the other person. When you go your 90, you need to wait – as long as it takes – for the prospect to go to their 10. And I would say that you want to go somewhere between 10-49, in reality. How Successful Sales Professionals Balance Effort Successful sales professionals know how far they have to go to meet the prospect where they are, while also knowing how much effort the prospect needs to put in to show they are committed. Where most salespeople get in trouble is they get desperate. They want the sale (kiss) more than the other person and they go the full 100%. Of course, persistence is important. And you won’t get what you don’t ask for (although…if you have followed me for any length of time, you will know I am very against having to ask for the sale). But you also have to ensure that your prospects actually want what you are selling. And they want it for their reasons and their motivations. They are driven to pursue your production option(s). They must go 10, 40, 60% of the way to you. The Pitfall of Chasing Your Prospect Just like courtship and relationships – if you find yourself chasing and one-sided-pursing the other person then it means you want it more than they do. It also means they own you. You are essentially begging them for the relationship – convincing, manipulating, begging, bribing, persuading your way forward. Which means they consciously and/or subconsciously know that they are in control. Because if they say no, you will keep pursuing and offering solutions. In sales – that looks like a salesperson who is calling, emailing, stalking a prospect – making offers, offering discounts and trials, and trying to find any way to make deal work. They are going 90-100% of the way for the prospect, not requiring them to go anywhere towards the agreement. This will end terribly. If they do decide to buy – taking the discount, free trial, taking the sale bait – they will not be happy (since they weren’t bought in for their reasons), they will look for reasons confirming why they didn’t really want to buy anyway, and they will know that they own you. Your company will have to convince them on a regular basis to stay in the relationship. The Right Balance for Customer Ownership You fundamentally need that prospective customer to come to you. Not 100% where you are just an Order Taker. But potentially 51% of the way – so they want it more than you. The more you can get them across that 50/50 threshold, the more they will be a satisfied customer. But remember – at 51/49 – they still need persuading, they still need to understand the value of your product for where they ultimately want to be in their life/business, and they still need your support. They lean in the right amount, you lean in the right amount = sales magic!
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