Sales and Cigars | Unlocking Elite Sales Strategies with Gunter Wessels | Episode 194

[00:00:00] [SPEAKER_03]: with Helix Sales Development in your host of Sales and Cigars. Today's episode was a lot of fun.

[00:00:07] [SPEAKER_03]: I'm talking to a guy with a PhD in sales. The first time I've ever talked to somebody with the PhD in sales,

[00:00:15] [SPEAKER_03]: and he had some great insights on our culture. He has some great insights on what makes up sales elite sales people.

[00:00:23] [SPEAKER_03]: He's done the research. He has a freaking PhD. We have a great conversation as a lot of fun. Gunter and Vessels with Liquid Smart.

[00:00:32] [SPEAKER_03]: Go grab a cigar, go grab a cocktail, and get ready to enjoy another impactful episode of Sales and Cigars.

[00:00:55] [SPEAKER_03]: So, Gunter, welcome to Sales and Cigars. I appreciate you taking some time out of your schedule to help on our conversation.

[00:01:03] [SPEAKER_00]: Well, I again very much appreciate your time, Walter, and love the topic. Love the context as well.

[00:01:12] [SPEAKER_00]: It was a really good smoke. It was a nice way to recount how we might have been winning or sometimes losing that day.

[00:01:21] [SPEAKER_03]: You can play the cigar either way. Right? Sometimes we don't even need a reason. That was a good.

[00:01:27] [SPEAKER_03]: That's right. So, and we had an interesting conversation a few weeks ago that kind of, you know,

[00:01:38] [SPEAKER_03]: I expand to dissipate this and have some fun.

[00:01:42] [SPEAKER_03]: But like let's start off, is there a book that you, that you gift a lot that you reread or that you really think highly of that you want to share with the audience?

[00:01:56] [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, you know, I get to interact with entrepreneurs, business leaders and a lot of sales people on a regular basis.

[00:02:06] [SPEAKER_00]: One of my favorite books that I give away is actually it's probably when you may or may not have heard of, but it's the 22 immutable laws of marketing by our reason Jack Trab.

[00:02:16] [SPEAKER_00]: And part of what spoke to me early on when I read that book was it was extremely clear and very well researched with clear examples.

[00:02:26] [SPEAKER_00]: And it finally showed me how marketing works and really filled this idea that there's a, there's a fundamental order in a way that things work that we can rely on.

[00:02:36] [SPEAKER_00]: And if we learn it really well, we can influence properly and we can win and make more money and then enjoy all the success that comes with that.

[00:02:46] [SPEAKER_00]: There earlier book actually by our res call position is actually a master work on how to launch a product but it's written as a marketing book on positioning.

[00:02:56] [SPEAKER_00]: And just one of the earlier grades and my favorite sales book is by defaults lake called the best seller that's one of the very few people of red, but it defaults laid did the work.

[00:03:07] [SPEAKER_00]: I mean I read all this exigless stuff and all of those things actually re-read a bunch of that stuff when I had to do it for qualitative and quantitative analysis from my dissertation on elite salesperson behavior.

[00:03:21] [SPEAKER_00]: So it was really you know get to I get to enjoy this stuff that I enjoyed and hopefully understand a little bit better.

[00:03:31] [SPEAKER_03]: That that sales book I'm going to have to go that I haven't it's one that haven't read the positioning you know the mind.

[00:03:43] [SPEAKER_03]: And and 22 immunobloss but with those help me with is really understand how marketing and sales is sort of like a venn diagram right and and that that overlap.

[00:03:58] [SPEAKER_03]: Is bigger than what either side really wants to recognize negative congruence between those words that persuasion clarity about who we're talking to.

[00:04:44] [SPEAKER_03]: There's trouble.

[00:04:44] [SPEAKER_03]: And so we're going to talk about the words to do the persuasion and do the selling and they don't.

[00:04:50] [SPEAKER_03]: It's really the business owners responsibility to make sure that we give them.

[00:04:55] [SPEAKER_03]: Here's how we talk about our product here's why these are the problems that it solves this is the questions that resonate with our our customers.

[00:05:06] [SPEAKER_00]: And if we leave that up to chance kind of time to screw it up is it this is we're going to hopefully win at our market share because that's what we should be winning at.

[00:05:16] [SPEAKER_00]: And it's our base of the right.

[00:05:19] [SPEAKER_00]: But yeah, there is there's a lack of art I think is your you're pointing out here.

[00:05:26] [SPEAKER_00]: So I mean, I have a PhD in marketing so let's if we want to talk about how we how nerdy you can get with marketing amongst the very few.

[00:05:36] [SPEAKER_00]: And I mean, I got an MBA in marketing liked it so well worked and then went back and got a PhD and it was really.

[00:05:44] [SPEAKER_00]: I don't know what it was I think really stubbornness more than more than anything else but nonetheless during this process.

[00:05:55] [SPEAKER_00]: I learned a lot about where marketing thinks it can out sell sales and I also lived the tribe of salespeople who says we're a sales lead organization we're going to go take the you know take this hill.

[00:06:09] [SPEAKER_00]: And and there are definitely organizations out there that have a personality or a dominant says being more marketing dominant brand led that sort of stuff real.

[00:06:19] [SPEAKER_00]: And my sales deal making that sort of thing.

[00:06:22] [SPEAKER_00]: But I don't see them swimming equally fast in the same run or same market in some markets high touch markets for example, you know, you're going to have to have a very strong sales team because it's a sophisticated risk filled by.

[00:06:36] [SPEAKER_00]: It's a hard to market all that risk away because the trust that you engender when you make a relationship or someone will sales interaction.

[00:06:45] [SPEAKER_00]: That's what it's worth is to mell you're at that fear so that the trust can allow them to buy.

[00:06:51] [SPEAKER_03]: You have to reduce the fear and we have to help them see that the other side of fear is the thing that they've been missing and that they desire.

[00:07:03] [SPEAKER_03]: It's sort of that you know, escape the fear and and believe that you're going to get to that promise land.

[00:07:11] [SPEAKER_03]: And and you I think you you talk about it in a way that's it's really complicated but it's really simple to sometimes it's more marketing.

[00:07:22] [SPEAKER_03]: If you got a B to C product that's really got to get out there and you're looking for that shell space that market space.

[00:07:28] [SPEAKER_03]: You really need to have the marketing dead on and then you've got to sales people that don't screw that up.

[00:07:34] [SPEAKER_03]: Continue that story and then you know the other way around where the marketing is is less than we're talking about the brand and then sales people got to go take the help.

[00:07:45] [SPEAKER_03]: But it's usually someplace in the middle and and often it goes back and forth.

[00:07:51] [SPEAKER_03]: And what I've noticed is that marketing and sales are playing nicer in the sandbox these days they're not pointing fingers quite as much and I.

[00:08:03] [SPEAKER_03]: And you curious as your thoughts on this but there's more data now.

[00:08:08] [SPEAKER_03]: There's more real data where the information is there to know what needs to be tweaked in a very short period of time.

[00:08:18] [SPEAKER_03]: That's right.

[00:08:18] [SPEAKER_03]: If we if we know what it look and what to look.

[00:08:21] [SPEAKER_00]: Well, I mean, and I come from the B to B medical devices space and I started out in distribution and work my way up into devices diagnostics and other space.

[00:08:33] [SPEAKER_00]: But you know, we were selling into hospitals or reference labs or other places and these are you know large consequential decisions.

[00:08:43] [SPEAKER_00]: And what it taught me was.

[00:08:47] [SPEAKER_00]: Well, frankly the amount of value I can add is a sales person is bound by the amount of risk that the customers taking during this purchase.

[00:08:57] [SPEAKER_00]: If this is a very low risk purchase for them having me around as a sales person is not going to add a lot of value.

[00:09:04] [SPEAKER_00]: But if there's a lot of risk for them and their department, their organization you know, you name it then having a sales person around becomes extremely valuable to that client.

[00:09:16] [SPEAKER_03]: If the understand the value that they're selling and know how to communicate that to.

[00:09:27] [SPEAKER_00]: That would definitely help.

[00:09:29] [SPEAKER_00]: But I mean, what we see is that you know many times we have, you know, despite our best efforts the customer convinces themselves of the product.

[00:09:38] [SPEAKER_00]: And this is one of the risks between future advantage benefit types of selling because you're like, oh, imagine if you will and we're telling you all about this sort of stuff where you know we find that in professional selling especially high ticket, you know, consequential be to be stuff.

[00:09:54] [SPEAKER_00]: You have to have a pain dominant logic in the way that you go about pursuing the deal.

[00:10:00] [SPEAKER_00]: And that, you know, we need to have a compelling reason to act usually a problem that we need to solve it's a pain point that is going to cause enough people to move.

[00:10:09] [SPEAKER_00]: So that dominance of a pain point and searching for the pain point reminds us as salespeople that hey, it's not about how amazing and wonderful and great and R&D and me me me me us.

[00:10:22] [SPEAKER_00]: It's about that customer's motivation and for that reason we're always going to need salespeople so long as people perceive risk.

[00:10:31] [SPEAKER_00]: And there's a transaction around that we're going to need someone to be in there to help them through that process.

[00:10:36] [SPEAKER_00]: Because I think I would be able to do it.

[00:10:39] [SPEAKER_00]: Maybe who knows?

[00:10:41] [SPEAKER_03]: Down the road, maybe but it's going to have to be much more generative than what it is today.

[00:10:49] [SPEAKER_03]: I'm not worried about that.

[00:10:54] [SPEAKER_03]: And it'd be an invasive, it's a good tool for us to help us write better maybe and research better faster.

[00:11:02] [SPEAKER_03]: But if we haven't, like you said, created compelling reasons and create an urgency because if there's no urgency they're not going to, they're not going to move.

[00:11:11] [SPEAKER_03]: It's the same thing that's been for 30 years.

[00:11:16] [SPEAKER_03]: The big shift is that the buyer in many cases is farther along the buying process as they have more information.

[00:11:26] [SPEAKER_03]: Now, if you walked into a dealership in the 60s, the buyer called, they had all the data.

[00:11:33] [SPEAKER_03]: Now, I had the last car I bought. I called the, what do you that owns the dealerships and said hey I need this car described it.

[00:11:43] [SPEAKER_03]: He said give me a day.

[00:11:44] [SPEAKER_03]: He called me in the sitting in the lock.

[00:11:46] [SPEAKER_03]: They're good up.

[00:11:49] [SPEAKER_03]: You know, because they because it's all there.

[00:11:54] [SPEAKER_03]: Back then, they needed us so we didn't have to work this hard.

[00:11:56] [SPEAKER_03]: But I think today, we if we're not providing value, we're not providing and talking to the right people and helping them see the sales problems because it's rarely about money.

[00:12:09] [SPEAKER_03]: And that's right.

[00:12:10] [SPEAKER_03]: You have to share showing our why you have to show how, but they need to know that their life is going to be better in some capacity.

[00:12:20] [SPEAKER_03]: I'll have time.

[00:12:22] [SPEAKER_03]: I'll have less risk or they'll they'll save or make money.

[00:12:28] [SPEAKER_03]: But where it really comes down to changing something for them, they have to believe it and that takes the takes a minute.

[00:12:36] [SPEAKER_00]: Well, one of the cool things about being a salesperson is if you can master the number one attitude and this one is actually research based in terms of its power.

[00:12:46] [SPEAKER_00]: You have this attitude, you're going to have the most successful in terms of productivity attitudes in a sales context and that is being curious.

[00:12:55] [SPEAKER_00]: If you if you're able to affect a positive curiosity and purposefully explore your customer situation asking them questions, they begin to convince themselves.

[00:13:06] [SPEAKER_00]: And really, I mean, the masterful salespeople just ask a series of questions and the customer begins to connect the dots for themselves.

[00:13:14] [SPEAKER_00]: And I can do that even better if I've got a very well informed client.

[00:13:20] [SPEAKER_00]: In fact, that client by being more I want one of these in the hands of a salesperson if there is risk with this, we can definitely add value because of the development and the maturity of your ask.

[00:13:36] [SPEAKER_03]: It's really I love the fact because I talk about curiosity as a mindset, talk about skepticism as a mindset.

[00:13:46] [SPEAKER_03]: You know, and bring in a little empathy because once that person realizes how.

[00:13:51] [SPEAKER_03]: Up and off they might be or how much they need something.

[00:13:56] [SPEAKER_03]: You can't use that as a weapon, you got to have the little empathy for their situation.

[00:14:01] [SPEAKER_03]: That it all starts with being curious and if you're not really interested in learning about their problem and interested in learning about if you're really going to be a good fit.

[00:14:12] [SPEAKER_03]: I mean, I'm looking to disqualify so right and I go about it.

[00:14:18] [SPEAKER_03]: You know, I want to sound nurturing but at some point it's like it doesn't seem like this is a fit.

[00:14:25] [SPEAKER_03]: Are you right? What are you talking about?

[00:14:27] [SPEAKER_03]: If I need this in like oh.

[00:14:30] [SPEAKER_03]: Why did I think that? Well, I don't know, but then then who's selling out with them.

[00:14:36] [SPEAKER_03]: But it takes some effort that curiosity to get you there.

[00:14:39] [SPEAKER_03]: I'll show I love that part of it.

[00:14:41] [SPEAKER_03]: We talked a little, you know, mindset is really critical and I agree that curiosity is a big piece of that.

[00:14:48] [SPEAKER_03]: But you have a three season.

[00:14:52] [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, there's three thing, you know, I do.

[00:14:56] [SPEAKER_00]: I've been traveling a lot as part of my work and then I get to survey real America from the ground all over the different place.

[00:15:03] [SPEAKER_00]: And a while ago I was beginning to lose my hope and I said there's really three seas that are wrong with America.

[00:15:10] [SPEAKER_00]: The three seas in order are.

[00:15:14] [SPEAKER_00]: Crocs when people wear crocs outside that means that they've given up.

[00:15:19] [SPEAKER_00]: The next one is communist. We are definitely a capitalist society and we believe in surplus value.

[00:15:24] [SPEAKER_00]: We do not believe in the value of work as the generator of value.

[00:15:30] [SPEAKER_00]: And Kardashians.

[00:15:32] [SPEAKER_00]: And I think that's probably the, you know, almost the self evident problem with America.

[00:15:37] [SPEAKER_00]: But, you know, for a while there we almost caught up with them.

[00:15:41] [SPEAKER_00]: I think we actually did for a minute and then they started up again and now we're trying to keep up with them again.

[00:15:47] [SPEAKER_00]: But, you know, I sell these things to joke because it really underlies a much more serious criticism of what we're seeing in that.

[00:15:56] [SPEAKER_00]: People have given up on how they look, how they interact or how they appear in many, many contexts.

[00:16:02] [SPEAKER_00]: And if we understand communication communication is the overwhelming minority is verbal.

[00:16:09] [SPEAKER_00]: It is very much appearance, your movement, your tone, your tonality or attitude in those things.

[00:16:15] [SPEAKER_00]: So, Crocs are not to be worn outside of the garden or maybe, you know, by kids.

[00:16:19] [SPEAKER_00]: I think that's okay. But if you're wearing Crocs, that's a problem.

[00:16:24] [SPEAKER_00]: You're not paying attention to things that really matter around you.

[00:16:27] [SPEAKER_00]: So, the communist, you know, is where people find merit in working instead of solving problems and making things better.

[00:16:36] [SPEAKER_00]: One of the fundamental tenets that we have in our capitalist ideas that we can create surplus value by being better at doing things.

[00:16:43] [SPEAKER_00]: That means that when we're really good at doing things, we're not doing a lot of things, but we're earning a lot of money.

[00:16:49] [SPEAKER_00]: That is how we deploy capitalism, intellectual capital and all of those things. And in sales, this is especially the case.

[00:16:57] [SPEAKER_00]: Some of the most successful salespeople do not look like they're breaking a sweat because they are doing things on pace.

[00:17:02] [SPEAKER_00]: And they're very, very strong in their sense of urgency.

[00:17:06] [SPEAKER_00]: But then Kardashians, you know, and this narcissism that has been really nurtured out there where people feel like every feeling that they have deserves attention.

[00:17:17] [SPEAKER_00]: I believe that feelings are important and people should be able to share them. But at the end, that tends to become a low interest rate environment situation.

[00:17:28] [SPEAKER_00]: When things are a little bit more serious, your feelings don't become nearly as salient.

[00:17:33] [SPEAKER_00]: And that's one of the luxuries I think we have, but it's also a staunch reminder of, you know, are we actually attending and talking about the things of matter?

[00:17:43] [SPEAKER_00]: Much of the time I find it, we, well.

[00:17:46] [SPEAKER_00]: We'll talk about Kim and Kanye.

[00:17:50] [SPEAKER_03]: Yeah, there's so much there where we kind of explored this in our sort of a pre call.

[00:17:58] [SPEAKER_03]: It just, I'm sure that pisses off a lot of people.

[00:18:02] [SPEAKER_03]: And I'm not perfectly fine with that.

[00:18:06] [SPEAKER_03]: And I saw, I saw shirt the other day and I literally walked up to the guy. I was in an airport and I'm like, I love the shirt.

[00:18:15] [SPEAKER_03]: Where to help you get it.

[00:18:17] [SPEAKER_03]: And it said, I am easily offended by someone who is easily offended.

[00:18:29] [SPEAKER_03]: And I just like, you're just like awesome.

[00:18:34] [SPEAKER_03]: Because it, I mean, feelings are important.

[00:18:38] [SPEAKER_03]: But it's not the driver of our, of our behavior, of our behavior.

[00:18:46] [SPEAKER_03]: We should be thinking about, and not trying to destroy somebody's feelings and we should be respectful about for God's sake.

[00:18:54] [SPEAKER_03]: Just because you have it feeling doesn't mean that, you know, are you offended?

[00:18:59] [SPEAKER_03]: Okay, understand.

[00:19:00] [SPEAKER_03]: You have, well, let's go.

[00:19:03] [SPEAKER_01]: I'm good.

[00:19:04] [SPEAKER_00]: To your point, well, to better, I carry a little bit farther, especially with professional salespeople,

[00:19:08] [SPEAKER_00]: because our job as influencing professionals is to invoke an emotional response in our clients.

[00:19:16] [SPEAKER_00]: Usually a recognition of a pain point or a problem increases fear.

[00:19:21] [SPEAKER_00]: Usually, you know, the lack of some sort of thing you're aspiring for, it will increase your greed or desire or positive effect even.

[00:19:31] [SPEAKER_00]: But when you're, when you're busy motivating someone to buy, you know, making a difficult decision.

[00:19:37] [SPEAKER_00]: We're piling on emotions.

[00:19:40] [SPEAKER_00]: But, you know, how you feel about yourself is not information for everybody.

[00:19:46] [SPEAKER_00]: It's information for you.

[00:19:48] [SPEAKER_00]: And learning how to interact with others feelings is something we're looking for with salespeople, because,

[00:19:54] [SPEAKER_00]: I mean, a really great salesperson usually somebody that's got this need for acceptance and this need for consensus, right?

[00:20:02] [SPEAKER_00]: They want you to like them and they're likable, and they want you to get along with them.

[00:20:07] [SPEAKER_00]: And the acceptance and consensus works really well, especially if it's like, look what we've made, I want you to agree with me that you should buy it.

[00:20:13] [SPEAKER_00]: That works just add opportunity and there they go.

[00:20:19] [SPEAKER_00]: The problem with that is it is a little bit volatile, and it's not conscious.

[00:20:25] [SPEAKER_00]: I'm not actually in command of what I'm doing.

[00:20:28] [SPEAKER_00]: And as a professional salesperson, I need to start beginning to have command or purchase on my emotions that need que think that we talk about.

[00:20:38] [SPEAKER_03]: I think that's important.

[00:20:42] [SPEAKER_03]: I think we have to be aware of what we're doing, but I'm looking for somebody to be emotionally involved in the conversation, right?

[00:20:51] [SPEAKER_03]: And I don't care if there's excited and if they're excited it usually makes me nervous.

[00:20:59] [SPEAKER_03]: But it's a motion.

[00:21:00] [SPEAKER_03]: I want to tell you about a project that I started called Sales Velocity.

[00:21:05] [SPEAKER_03]: It's a weekly email that comes out early on a Monday before the shit hits the fan.

[00:21:11] [SPEAKER_03]: And what is it?

[00:21:12] [SPEAKER_03]: It's just sales tips, it's for that business owner that CEO that sales leader is looking for a little tip that kind of inspired them for the week and idea that they might be able to try to implement.

[00:21:23] [SPEAKER_03]: It's very simple. It tells a bunch of stories about me, things I've screwed up along the way, some successes.

[00:21:30] [SPEAKER_03]: All you have to do is go down into the show notes and click on the sales velocity link and you can sign up and you'll pop in your email on Monday morning just once a week.

[00:21:40] [SPEAKER_03]: And then at the conversation with the guy this morning that he was like really upset.

[00:21:45] [SPEAKER_03]: And he was angley.

[00:21:47] [SPEAKER_03]: And he was explaining to me what he was angry about.

[00:21:49] [SPEAKER_03]: I wanted to say things that we were talking about.

[00:21:51] [SPEAKER_03]: And he was like, I don't understand this thing if you're talking about it.

[00:21:54] [SPEAKER_03]: So he just kind of like was drilling into this thing.

[00:21:57] [SPEAKER_03]: You can angry when you're driving your car and somebody flips a lot.

[00:22:04] [SPEAKER_03]: He's like, well, I'm usually the one flipping people off.

[00:22:07] [SPEAKER_03]: I'm like really.

[00:22:09] [SPEAKER_03]: It seems like you get angry and really dig in to a lot of things that might be in consequential.

[00:22:16] [SPEAKER_03]: And you know, so he started to come out of this anger thing once I recognize it because I'm like, you're that's fine.

[00:22:25] [SPEAKER_03]: I'm not asking you to agree.

[00:22:26] [SPEAKER_03]: I'm just telling you what it means.

[00:22:29] [SPEAKER_03]: And it seems like you're picking the flesh it out of the pepper but that's your right.

[00:22:36] [SPEAKER_03]: And what does that mean?

[00:22:37] [SPEAKER_03]: I'm like, what are you about something that doesn't really don't need to worry about?

[00:22:41] [SPEAKER_03]: If it's important, then don't do it.

[00:22:43] [SPEAKER_03]: If it's not, then do it.

[00:22:46] [SPEAKER_03]: But it's just like flipping a guy off on the road.

[00:22:49] [SPEAKER_03]: It really doesn't accomplish much.

[00:22:51] [SPEAKER_00]: But there's a reward mechanism there and there's actually quite a bit of dopamine that gets kicked off with that kind of reaction.

[00:22:58] [SPEAKER_03]: But then you start chasing your tail.

[00:23:00] [SPEAKER_03]: I mean, yes, physiologically you're being rewarded but does it get you someplace that's a value?

[00:23:06] [SPEAKER_03]: Because I kind of look at the wisdom in that regard.

[00:23:11] [SPEAKER_03]: Yeah, he's an asshole.

[00:23:13] [SPEAKER_03]: That's okay.

[00:23:14] [SPEAKER_03]: He's entitled to be an asshole sometimes.

[00:23:16] [SPEAKER_03]: That's fine.

[00:23:18] [SPEAKER_03]: But it doesn't get me someplace and it's like control would go back to the emotion.

[00:23:23] [SPEAKER_03]: I get to control what I get upset about.

[00:23:26] [SPEAKER_03]: You get to control what you get upset about but you can't tell me how to think.

[00:23:30] [SPEAKER_03]: And you can't tell me that if I say that triggers you and you're okay.

[00:23:38] [SPEAKER_03]: But in turn the channel.

[00:23:40] [SPEAKER_03]: Yeah, go away.

[00:23:42] [SPEAKER_00]: But it's a side of God given freedom.

[00:23:45] [SPEAKER_03]: But in the sales context, I want that emotion there and I don't care which way it is.

[00:23:51] [SPEAKER_03]: Once they're moving, I can I can navigate.

[00:23:54] [SPEAKER_03]: And if they're just sitting there like, you know, the pendulum sitting at six o'clock.

[00:23:59] [SPEAKER_03]: Now I feel like I got to talk them somehow to get them to move.

[00:24:04] [SPEAKER_03]: So I love that the crock statement didn't really go there.

[00:24:10] [SPEAKER_03]: The thing for me is, when somebody shows up to a meeting.

[00:24:17] [SPEAKER_03]: We're in a baseball hat.

[00:24:20] [SPEAKER_03]: In a class A office building in a conference.

[00:24:23] [SPEAKER_03]: And I'm sorry, maybe I'm just a little passionate.

[00:24:29] [SPEAKER_03]: But you know, it's just a billionaires.

[00:24:34] [SPEAKER_03]: No, and I don't care.

[00:24:37] [SPEAKER_00]: Well, I mean if they're a billionaire then they're trying to make a point that says, I'm so rich.

[00:24:41] [SPEAKER_00]: I don't care otherwise they're just saying, I don't care and therefore what I'm going to be doing here is not going to be as worthwhile.

[00:24:48] [SPEAKER_00]: And that is the unfortunate vicarious liability you take for wearing a hoodie like Mark Zuckerberg.

[00:24:55] [SPEAKER_00]: Make sure your dress is on point, on purpose as an influencing professional, right?

[00:25:02] [SPEAKER_00]: And there are these folks out there.

[00:25:05] [SPEAKER_00]: They have a very high baseline motivator for utilitarianism.

[00:25:10] [SPEAKER_00]: That means, you know, at their maximum, they become coin operated.

[00:25:13] [SPEAKER_00]: They only do things for money.

[00:25:14] [SPEAKER_00]: But they very much see that, you know, they want to return for their time.

[00:25:18] [SPEAKER_00]: They're talent, their attention, their effort and everything and the bigger the return, the better.

[00:25:24] [SPEAKER_00]: Hence, let's not just work harder. Let's work smarter.

[00:25:28] [SPEAKER_00]: One of the things I did when I was pursuing my PhD was to come up with a topic that I could live with for a while.

[00:25:36] [SPEAKER_00]: And so I studied elite salespeople in what makes a salesperson a high performer over time.

[00:25:40] [SPEAKER_00]: I created a model for it in a measurement scale and then they let me go.

[00:25:46] [SPEAKER_00]: But what I found about elite salespeople is there's no real, so-soil economic predictor.

[00:25:55] [SPEAKER_00]: There's no real gender, age, no real intelligence coordination.

[00:26:01] [SPEAKER_00]: I mean, there is a threshold that I think you have to be able to bounce your checkbook and be relatively smart.

[00:26:08] [SPEAKER_00]: But elite salespeople, first thing they do is they work hard because it takes effort to break through and everything.

[00:26:15] [SPEAKER_00]: The second thing they do also captain obvious is they work smart.

[00:26:19] [SPEAKER_00]: They're able to qualify better than ordinary salespeople.

[00:26:23] [SPEAKER_00]: And this is one of those things we look at sales forces with all the time.

[00:26:27] [SPEAKER_00]: The optimism that you're trying to take out of your forecast is also fixable in your qualification thing.

[00:26:33] [SPEAKER_00]: You might be pursuing things you shouldn't be pursuing.

[00:26:35] [SPEAKER_00]: So qualify better, qualify qualified, qualify.

[00:26:40] [SPEAKER_00]: Just that they qualify, boost versus.

[00:26:43] [SPEAKER_00]: Exactly.

[00:26:45] [SPEAKER_00]: And your productivity goes up.

[00:26:47] [SPEAKER_00]: The third attribute that elite salespeople have is that other ones know is that they fill gaps in their portfolio.

[00:26:54] [SPEAKER_00]: So many times you might be selling something that is in the future will be coming alive, but it's not there yet.

[00:27:04] [SPEAKER_00]: It hasn't been approved yet.

[00:27:06] [SPEAKER_00]: These guys were great at selling another piece of equipment in there that they could roll off and then prepare for the next one.

[00:27:12] [SPEAKER_00]: So they would take ownership of this sales activity in their accounts and sell their accounts.

[00:27:19] [SPEAKER_00]: A lot of different brands of equipment so that they can control the transaction and thereby control the account.

[00:27:25] [SPEAKER_03]: They're growing through by three right.

[00:27:28] [SPEAKER_03]: Exactly.

[00:27:29] [SPEAKER_03]: The gain share of all it in the pound.

[00:27:31] [SPEAKER_00]: So they're not afraid to color outside the lines and create a solution that may or may not be there.

[00:27:37] [SPEAKER_00]: And that leads to the creativity in terms of problem solving and that.

[00:27:43] [SPEAKER_00]: The elite salespeople also are in tolerant of obstacles.

[00:27:47] [SPEAKER_00]: Like any salesperson would never be, you know, told no for this in that.

[00:27:53] [SPEAKER_00]: But the story I tell in this was a real story about a sales rep that was one of these guys.

[00:27:58] [SPEAKER_00]: And he put a deal together with a city for 150 trucks. So he's selling trucks.

[00:28:03] [SPEAKER_00]: So it's a fairly decent size deal.

[00:28:06] [SPEAKER_00]: And then was all in the bag and then the city called him up and said,

[00:28:09] [SPEAKER_00]: All money has to be frozen.

[00:28:12] [SPEAKER_00]: There's a new thing has to be environmental.

[00:28:15] [SPEAKER_00]: So he said, well, we can make a natural gas.

[00:28:19] [SPEAKER_00]: And now you're environmental.

[00:28:21] [SPEAKER_00]: So boom, now the deal is going to happen again and little happened faster because there's new money.

[00:28:24] [SPEAKER_00]: He's running laps around and he gets a call back again says deals off.

[00:28:28] [SPEAKER_00]: We have no place to fuel this stuff.

[00:28:32] [SPEAKER_00]: So he decided he might need to work for a minute.

[00:28:34] [SPEAKER_00]: He called up the gas company and he called up a couple of fuel integrators.

[00:28:38] [SPEAKER_00]: And he had the gas company build fueling stations for these trucks and sold 170 trucks.

[00:28:47] [SPEAKER_00]: So nobody would have told him he was a bad rep for the guy's saying it's cancel because of his priority will get to it later.

[00:28:53] [SPEAKER_00]: Nobody would have told him, oh well, you suck because we'll never place the fuel with.

[00:28:59] [SPEAKER_00]: But he just filled the gap anyway and got to sail done anyway.

[00:29:03] [SPEAKER_00]: So that's that kind of pioneering mentality that comes in for obstacle intolerance.

[00:29:08] [SPEAKER_00]: I'll cut the tree down. I'll make a new path.

[00:29:11] [SPEAKER_03]: I love the obstacle and tolerance, right?

[00:29:14] [SPEAKER_03]: It's a great way to like, there's a way to make this work.

[00:29:19] [SPEAKER_03]: And I just have to I have to be creative.

[00:29:23] [SPEAKER_03]: I look at the entrepreneurial thinking.

[00:29:31] [SPEAKER_03]: I remember I got fired at a company as there a couple of months and there was a deal that I thought that I would have to go out of bounds within the company structure.

[00:29:44] [SPEAKER_03]: And I went to the, went to the corner office and said bus, you know, what's the, what are the boundaries here?

[00:29:51] [SPEAKER_03]: And he's like, what do you mean? I'm like, well, how many of what the boundaries are?

[00:29:55] [SPEAKER_03]: You know, in terms of me doing this and that.

[00:29:57] [SPEAKER_03]: And he was, is like, why do you want to know?

[00:30:00] [SPEAKER_03]: I said, somehow it's going to go out of bounds.

[00:30:03] [SPEAKER_01]: It's going to be nice.

[00:30:04] [SPEAKER_03]: I want to know.

[00:30:07] [SPEAKER_03]: First one in this room telling you I went out of bounds.

[00:30:11] [SPEAKER_03]: I was like, wouldn't it be easier?

[00:30:14] [SPEAKER_03]: Not quite a balance.

[00:30:16] [SPEAKER_03]: And I'm like, yeah, but I wouldn't be as effective.

[00:30:21] [SPEAKER_03]: So he gave me the parameters like that he needed to understand.

[00:30:25] [SPEAKER_03]: And then I went and you know, didn't I did the thing go find the integrators and go find the natural grass.

[00:30:32] [SPEAKER_03]: And I, you know, but to me, it's like, tell me no, and it'll get done.

[00:30:39] [SPEAKER_03]: Yeah. Tell me you can't happen. And like, you know, that happened for me the first time.

[00:30:46] [SPEAKER_03]: That my high school guidance calls.

[00:30:49] [SPEAKER_03]: Freaking useless.

[00:30:50] [SPEAKER_03]: I don't know if you can't teach, I think they make you a guide.

[00:30:55] [SPEAKER_03]: And he's like, you know, and I was.

[00:30:58] [SPEAKER_03]: I think it was 25, 26 out of 100 and some kids in my graduating class.

[00:31:04] [SPEAKER_03]: And I'm not super smart. I'm just dumb sales guy, but I'm not an idiot.

[00:31:11] [SPEAKER_03]: And I said, you know, I'm applying the University of Michigan.

[00:31:14] [SPEAKER_03]: He's like, yeah, that's a bad idea.

[00:31:16] [SPEAKER_03]: Why is it a bad idea?

[00:31:18] [SPEAKER_03]: Things like you're not going to get in.

[00:31:21] [SPEAKER_03]: Like why?

[00:31:23] [SPEAKER_03]: Yeah, you know, new college kid, blah, blah, blah.

[00:31:28] [SPEAKER_03]: So I applied to one school.

[00:31:32] [SPEAKER_03]: I took a my example.

[00:31:34] [SPEAKER_00]: I'm going to worry.

[00:31:35] Yeah.

[00:31:36] [SPEAKER_03]: And I got in, I wouldn't get in today.

[00:31:41] [SPEAKER_00]: But I did most of the schools I got into wouldn't let me in today either.

[00:31:44] [SPEAKER_00]: That's one of the benefits of doing it this way.

[00:31:47] [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah. Well, I'll round it off this way because the final attribute of elite sales people is not just being intolerant to obstacles and

[00:31:55] [SPEAKER_00]: the work and hard work and smart filling gaps.

[00:31:57] [SPEAKER_00]: Is it elite sales people and very much industry growing, you know, industry leaders maintain monitor and continuously grow their personal credibility and use it mercilessly inside and outside the organization.

[00:32:14] [SPEAKER_00]: They care about their reputation and maintain it.

[00:32:17] [SPEAKER_00]: And the only way to lose top talent like that is to undermine them.

[00:32:22] [SPEAKER_00]: They're by destroying their only asset the credibility and they will walk.

[00:32:26] [SPEAKER_00]: That just walk because it is pure destruction to sit there and say, you said this now, you said this.

[00:32:34] [SPEAKER_00]: Why which one of these two was a lie?

[00:32:37] [SPEAKER_00]: As an elite sales person, somebody who moves markets, my word is my bond and my reputation matters most.

[00:32:43] [SPEAKER_00]: And so elite sales people are very careful about their reputation that are easy to spot.

[00:32:49] [SPEAKER_00]: Very well known for being successful.

[00:32:51] [SPEAKER_03]: I love that your your your you kind of picked the.

[00:32:58] [SPEAKER_03]: You put the things that are intangible isn't the right word, but they're the underlying things that make a sales person successful.

[00:33:07] [SPEAKER_03]: You got to have the skills and learn how to do certain things, but if that takes you to the level of elite.

[00:33:14] [SPEAKER_03]: You can be good and you know, you can be above average because you know there are 6% with our research at 6% of sales people are elite.

[00:33:27] [SPEAKER_03]: And there's 14% that are good.

[00:33:32] [SPEAKER_03]: Okay, another 20 that's above average if you're liberal about average.

[00:33:39] [SPEAKER_03]: The rest of them.

[00:33:43] [SPEAKER_03]: Don't even learn more.

[00:33:44] [SPEAKER_03]: You're your team.

[00:33:45] [SPEAKER_03]: Right, so when we're looking at people, we want that at top 25%.

[00:33:52] [SPEAKER_03]: Right, that you know it's hard to get us that elite because they're they're happy.

[00:33:59] [SPEAKER_03]: Something bad as to their reputation had to be sell leader somebody's asking them to strain their integrity.

[00:34:07] [SPEAKER_03]: Or they're cop that changed.

[00:34:10] [SPEAKER_00]: So one of the questions that always pops up around this is okay, you got his measurements scale for elite sales people.

[00:34:15] [SPEAKER_00]: Is it a trait or is it a state?

[00:34:18] [SPEAKER_00]: Is it the they've been born this way or can you turn them this way?

[00:34:24] [SPEAKER_00]: The answer is it is a behavioral state.

[00:34:26] [SPEAKER_00]: It is a very sophisticated routine of behaviors learned over time by these people, but they're nothing from a learned and various industries that that's kind of how it's.

[00:34:35] [SPEAKER_00]: It's a very simple work.

[00:34:36] [SPEAKER_00]: But it is definitely a state so sales people and sales managers can take heart you can be a ring maker.

[00:34:44] [SPEAKER_00]: The problem with it is you can have to work really hard.

[00:34:47] [SPEAKER_00]: You also have to work really smart.

[00:34:50] [SPEAKER_00]: You have to fill gaps in your portfolio, you're going to have to overcome obstacles and drag people to the sales sometimes.

[00:34:56] [SPEAKER_00]: And you're going to do this in a time when you are actively building your reputation continuously and testing it all the time.

[00:35:03] [SPEAKER_00]: It's hard work and that's why the pays the medium bucks.

[00:35:07] [SPEAKER_00]: I'm going to love that.

[00:35:09] [SPEAKER_03]: I love that.

[00:35:12] [SPEAKER_03]: That definition because I really think it it hammers the.

[00:35:16] [SPEAKER_03]: The elite concept of what we should be striving for and and I think people can if they have the desire and a commitment to get there.

[00:35:24] [SPEAKER_03]: They can they can do it, but it is.

[00:35:27] [SPEAKER_03]: It is hard work and you want to excel at anything it's hard work.

[00:35:31] [SPEAKER_03]: So there's a there's a couple things that want to cover I want to cover how people get hold of you to talk more about this but you got a working on.

[00:35:42] [SPEAKER_00]: A book.

[00:35:43] [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, books called turning fear into fuel and it's really a thoughtful and pretty well disclosing.

[00:35:55] [SPEAKER_00]: Journey through how you can activate what is you know at deeper and deeper levels driving and motivating you.

[00:36:04] [SPEAKER_00]: So that you can have a life that is uncomplicated and joyful.

[00:36:10] [SPEAKER_00]: Now it's a business book but the one of the key things to remember is, you know if you see a salesperson looking at you.

[00:36:19] [SPEAKER_00]: Is that joy in their eyes or is there a little fear there?

[00:36:22] [SPEAKER_00]: What are they afraid of? Everybody's afraid of something and depending on what it is we can turn it into fuel and make them go faster.

[00:36:31] [SPEAKER_00]: Awesome.

[00:36:32] [SPEAKER_03]: When do you see that being out on the street through people could go?

[00:36:36] [SPEAKER_00]: I'll book it on the street next year we're on the first to second quarter we're going to be linking on our LinkedIn pages and that sort of stuff.

[00:36:46] [SPEAKER_00]: Best place to reach me is on LinkedIn or triple w liquid smarts plural.com liquid smarts.com or goonter g when TER.

[00:36:56] [SPEAKER_00]: Wessels W. S. S. E. L. S. There aren't too many of us.

[00:37:00] [SPEAKER_00]: I'll leave some of this kind of.

[00:37:05] [SPEAKER_03]: I've met a few adventures in my day.

[00:37:09] [SPEAKER_03]: So I would really encourage people to go check out the website.

[00:37:14] [SPEAKER_03]: I love those four principles of elite.

[00:37:21] [SPEAKER_03]: We could have this conversation with definitely go check out the LinkedIn page.

[00:37:27] [SPEAKER_03]: I'll have it in the show notes. Click on it.

[00:37:30] [SPEAKER_03]: Dig in.

[00:37:31] [SPEAKER_03]: Consider if you have any additional questions.

[00:37:34] [SPEAKER_03]: Last question for me, Gantelle is the any relationship with cigars past or present.

[00:37:40] [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah my father was an ophthalmologist and actually did some work with a state department and he was living here in Tennessee.

[00:37:48] [SPEAKER_00]: Or just moving here to Tennessee.

[00:37:50] [SPEAKER_00]: And he got to go Cuba to do teach them how to do is surgery and they go to carry them around.

[00:37:56] [SPEAKER_00]: And they just loaded him up with Cuban cigars.

[00:38:00] [SPEAKER_00]: And so he came back with what was allowed by the state department as your carry on limit for all kinds of fresh Cuban cigars.

[00:38:08] [SPEAKER_00]: And that in these thing out like father Christmas gave me a beautiful box of Monte Christos and a beautiful box of Romeo and Juliets.

[00:38:18] [SPEAKER_00]: And I mean, I want to see that that was my first kind of branded experience with a smoke like a real smoke.

[00:38:29] [SPEAKER_00]: And I traded those for a whole bunch of other things and so now I like a Dominican or Tour of Fuente, Robusto or something like that and the good smoke is a great way to sit in tell stories and hear some wisdom.

[00:38:42] [SPEAKER_03]: I love it. I love great story. How long ago was that.

[00:38:49] [SPEAKER_00]: That was still.

[00:38:53] [SPEAKER_00]: We did that would be yeah in the 90s.

[00:38:56] [SPEAKER_00]: It was it was in the 90s.

[00:38:58] [SPEAKER_03]: Yeah, I'm curious you're in Tennessee.

[00:39:03] [SPEAKER_03]: What had it?

[00:39:04] [SPEAKER_03]: I'm going to see.

[00:39:07] [SPEAKER_03]: cigar guys.

[00:39:09] [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, well actually there's quite a bit of I mean, especially here in the the flyover West.

[00:39:18] [SPEAKER_00]: There's a there's a cool streak of of exor is around and there's cigar bars and wine bars and all that sort of stuff.

[00:39:26] [SPEAKER_00]: There's one just down the road that's a cigar club.

[00:39:29] [SPEAKER_00]: You can join quite a few guys on this shopping mall will sit up a human door and then you can go smoke inside there and that sort of stuff.

[00:39:41] [SPEAKER_00]: But yeah, and then in Nashville, a lot of guys who made money on some healthcare stock or some crypto stock or something like that or some Taylor Swift song are buying tons it.

[00:39:57] [SPEAKER_00]: And I'll nichey types of cigar work in the in the National area.

[00:40:02] [SPEAKER_03]: Some of those in Nashville didn't see a lot of cigar shop that I was pretty much in the.

[00:40:07] [SPEAKER_03]: I've been frankly.

[00:40:09] [SPEAKER_03]: Okay, that's why we didn't get we didn't spend time frankly.

[00:40:14] [SPEAKER_03]: All right, just I'm always curious is to have different states.

[00:40:19] [SPEAKER_03]: Make it difficult to have a cigar and sometimes it's the state sometimes it's the state sometimes it's the

[00:40:27] [SPEAKER_03]: municipality California is all jacked up for different reasons, but San Diego.

[00:40:33] [SPEAKER_03]: And San Diego you can there's a bunch of cigars and you can sit out and have a cigar in a cup.

[00:40:41] [SPEAKER_03]: And you can't smoke on the beach.

[00:40:45] [SPEAKER_03]: I actually got a cop come up to me on the beach. I was watching the waves and seals and came up to you know, you can't smoke there.

[00:40:59] [SPEAKER_02]: Yeah, I am.

[00:41:00] [SPEAKER_00]: Seems like it's capable.

[00:41:02] [SPEAKER_02]: I think what you mean is you don't want me to.

[00:41:06] [SPEAKER_02]: Here's a tip never argue with the cop smoke and cigars on the beach.

[00:41:11] [SPEAKER_00]: I I do recommend compliance with law enforcement whenever whenever they're nearby.

[00:41:18] [SPEAKER_00]: Yeah, he was a he got a little bit of my humor.

[00:41:22] [SPEAKER_03]: But he was he was not very.

[00:41:25] [SPEAKER_03]: I was compliant.

[00:41:27] [SPEAKER_03]: I got out.

[00:41:29] [SPEAKER_03]: Thank you we this was fun really appreciate it.

[00:41:32] [SPEAKER_03]: Good luck on the book.

[00:41:34] [SPEAKER_03]: When that when that launches maybe I have to be back and we talk a little bit more about the book.

[00:41:38] [SPEAKER_00]: I'd love to. I'd like to thank you so much for your time.

[00:41:42] [SPEAKER_03]: Appreciate it.