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In this episode of the Advanced Selling Podcast, I share my obvious lack of knowledge about my own Catholic faith, you ll hear a first-time ever Kevin Bacon quote, and we dip into the co-video mailbag for a two-part question on what you should do with your sales career.
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Welcome back to the Advanced Selling Podcast, the longest running sales training podcast in sales training podcast history.
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My name is Brian Neal.
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I m Bill Kasky.
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And we are here every week for your sales enablement, as we said last week, right?
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Trying to enable you to be better.
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Is that our new thing?
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Might be.
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We re a sales enablement podcast.
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Maybe we ll get more listeners.
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I don t know.
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We ve got a lot of them as it is.
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We re thrilled that you re here.
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We are on the road, and we are booking now.
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If you would like a very, very unique,
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experience at your next sales meeting, you would be crazy not to ask Bill and I to come out and come speak with you.
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So send us an email or forward it up to your manager, your VP of sales, whoever it is that decides who s coming to your sales meeting.
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I m telling you, it s a great, great thing.
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Listener at advancedsellingpodcast.com.
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Put in the subject line, come see us.
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We are doing a unique thing for a couple of other clients that would be interesting.
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We re actually recording a podcast live.
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And it s a really cool setup, a thing that we can do out at wherever your meeting is.
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We can actually record a live podcast with you as the audience, and then do some training and coaching around that.
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So listen at advancedsellingpodcast.com.
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Come see us, and we ll start the process for that.
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A lot of comments on our sales enablement podcast episode from last time.
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Kind of a charged topic.
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A lot of negative, a lot of negative.
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Why are you guys mocking us in the sales enablement category?
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No, we are not.
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We just think it s a little funny how these terms sneak up on us, and then they re everywhere.
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They are.
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And nobody quite knows what it is.
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And if you don t use the term, you re kind of out.
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You re not a cool kid anymore.
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And then it s funny.
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Well, I m going to start doing this.
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When people throw out sales enablement, I m going to go, hey, real quick, what s your definition of sales enablement?
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Well, I mean.
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Everybody knows.
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Yeah, it s enabling sales.
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Now, do your BDRs use that more, or more of the SDRs, or?
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QVRs and the QBR.
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This is a great, great time to be a salesperson.
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We mentioned that in the last podcast.
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And if you are someone who says, hmm, I wonder what my value is like in the world.
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I wonder what my other options are.
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I want you to check out CenturyLink.
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CenturyLink and Level3 have actually joined forces.
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And as they claim, they are digitally transforming the world, which sounds like a really, really cool thing.
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The New Century Link is hiring sales experts nationwide right now.
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If you re a top sales performer and you want more out of 2018 than you got in 2017, you re sitting there going, man, maybe there s more something different.
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Maybe you ve stagnated in your current territory.
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You want a more high level, high paced
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a technology gig, CenturyLink is the key to ascending your career to record levels.
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Take the first step and visit centurylink.com slash advanced selling and join the talent community there.
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A member of their team will be in touch with you to discuss what the future looks like.
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Go to centurylink.com slash advanced selling and go check it out now.
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You won t be disappointed.
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So you know that Brian and I are giving away little gifts slash treats for those people who send us a great question via voice memo.
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You can send us at listener at advancedsellingpodcast.com.
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We ve got one today.
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We ll call this the Co-Video Mailbag.
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Co-Video is an email video package software that is really good.
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We get lots of comments about it.
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A lot of our listeners have tried it out successfully.
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And if you want to learn more, we ve got a special trial going on right now.
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You can go to advancedsellingpodcast.com forward slash covideo.
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That s C-O-V-I-D-E-O.
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So without further ado, let s hear this week s question.
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Bill and Brian, this is Josh.
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I m one of your listeners here in Chicago, and I want to ask you guys a quick question.
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So I ve been in inside sales, and throughout my experience, I ve been, quite frankly, an underperformer and really struggling.
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And the thing that s directly correlated with why I am, with my struggles, is the fact that I don t believe in the product I m selling.
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I mean, I ve really tried to, I just cannot will myself to believe in what I m selling.
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And the thing is that there are many other reps at the company that I work at who don t have that firm belief or passion for the product, yet they re still performing and doing well.
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And I m sure same is true at many other firms as well, where people can still sell despite not having that passion for the product.
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So the quick question I wanted to ask was, does belief in the product really matter that much, or am I just not cut out for sales?
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Thanks, guys.
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Great question.
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Man, that s a great question.
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He put so much in there, and that s a whole episode series.
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The idea that, do I need to believe in what I m selling to be good at selling it?
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Yeah.
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And have you ever had a job where you didn t really believe fully in what you were selling?
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100%.
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Yeah.
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100%.
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I think most people have.
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Absolutely.
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I had two of them.
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Yeah.
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Same time?
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Two.
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Nope.
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Exactly.
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No.
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Yeah, I had two.
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I had two.
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And one was my own company.
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And I didn t believe in what I was doing, which is why I failed.
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And the other one, yeah, I didn t believe.
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I believed in the company.
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And I believed in what the company was stood for and what they were like.
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I did not believe in the product, not because I didn t believe it worked.
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I just didn t have any gumped not at all.
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You weren t passionate.
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Yeah, right.
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I had nothing bought.
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I didn t buy into it.
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Yeah.
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I think we ve got to accept, though, that
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We can be representing a great company with a product that works, getting a fair price in the market.
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It actually does work for the customer.
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And we cannot believe in it.
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Not because we think someone s lying or cheating or stealing about it.
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It s just that we don t have any passion for it.
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I think we ve got to say to ourselves, it s OK.
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Go find something you re passionate about.
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And I think, this is getting a little into the answer here, that some people can and some people can t.
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There s a continuum there, right?
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Some people have the ability to say, I m in sales, and this is what I sell, and it s the way that I pay for my lifestyle and my family, and that s all that matters to me.
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And so fine.
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Some people can t live that way.
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They just can t move into it that way.
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So we are going to address that.
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Now, we had another email, correct, that kind of
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Or we can do these separately?
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We did.
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Let s do them separately.
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Let s do this one.
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I ve just got a couple of things for him on this, and then we can move on.
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Well, I think it s a great question, because it begs the question of, can I improve my skills to become?
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He said, I don t know if I m cut out for sales.
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And I know we ve got the belief issue over here on one side, but we also have the skill situation.
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And whether he believes in the product or not,
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Are you going to be able to embrace and adopt the skills needed?
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And I think you ve got to ask yourself the question is, what are the 10 to 15 skills that you need to be good at for this product, for the company you re with now?
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Again, forget about passion and belief.
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Just decide how good are you.
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Be rigorously honest with your assessment.
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So if one of the skills is reaching out and calling people,
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I don t personally, I don t like doing that.
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I mean, I don t know if I m bad.
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I just don t like doing it.
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So I m going to rank myself really low in that skill.
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But if that s 90% of prospecting, it s not going to be cut out for that.
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It s beautiful.
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Well, that s very great.
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That s everything.
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That s almost everything.
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We don t need any more.
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But I got a couple.
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Josh, I would encourage you, and everyone else listening too, I would encourage you to change the question you re asking at the end.
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You said, am I cut out for sales is the question.
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What I d have you change the question to is, am I drawn to sales?
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And am I drawn to sales at this place?
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And am I drawn to sales in this way?
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Because the cutout makes it sound like there s some sort of secret sauce skill, like Bill just talked about, that requires some weightlifting and toughness.
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And you can t get in.
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You got to pay all that stuff.
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And I think that s a myth.
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You need to look at, am I really drawn to what it is, why it is, and how it is?
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And if you look around for things that you re drawn into, you ll absolutely find the right place.
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Versus like, man, am I cut out for this here?
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You know what I mean?
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Filter it out.
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So change the question a bit.
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What am I drawn to?
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Am I drawn to helping?
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Am I drawn to being the guy?
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Am I drawn to freedom?
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All those things will help you find the right place.
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I like that.
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better than what am I cut out for?
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Exactly.
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Because that implies that once you re cut out, you re cut out.
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Exactly.
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And if you re not cut out, I m just not cut out for that.
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Yeah, it s very binary that way.
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Yeah.
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No, that s really good.
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I like the, what shows up for you as you look at the landscape of potential clients and products and vendors and potential employers, what draws you to them?
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Yes.
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That s really.
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Every move someone makes is some combination of moving away from something else and to a new thing.
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And I m a big fan of asking yourself, what are both of those things, and then weighing on the things that you re drawn to versus the things you re running away from.
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Really important.
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Okay, I ve just got one more and then we ll go to our second one here.
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If there are other people in the firm who you say are doing well, why don t you take them out to dinner and interview them and find out what there is about this that really appeals to them?
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It could be that there s something secretive that you haven t figured out yet that really could help you get passionate about this.
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I love that.
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I cannot be passionate about the product, but if I m passionate about what it does for the customer or the fact that it solves a problem for the customer, that in and of itself and alone could help me
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and you d be passionate about it.
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But maybe you re not looking at it properly.
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Maybe there s some people around you who are.
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And you look at them and say, well, there s mercenaries.
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I mean, they d sell anything.
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But maybe there s something deeper that you just don t know.
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So interview people around you who are good at what they re doing now with your company.
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See if there s anything there that you re missing.
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I love it.
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Love it.
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OK, so we re going to move on to the second question.
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Yeah, let s do that.
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This is a two-part series in one podcast.
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I love that.
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And thanks to our friends, again, advancedsellingpodcast.com slash co-video.
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Yes.
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Because it s all part of the co-video mailbag.
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Absolutely.
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This is from Arvid, I believe.
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He says, I ve been following you for a couple of weeks now.
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Yep.
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And I enjoy the valuable advice given.
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Maybe this can lead to one of your shows.
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I m currently part of a sales dev team as a BDR, reaching out to target accounts.
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I m about to join our BDR advancement program to be prepared to transition from sales dev into sales, working on my own projects instead of just doing prequel and handing over to the evil sales guy.
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He didn t say that.
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Now, as there are opportunities to work both in new business and client sales, and me being a bit unsure about which direction to take, how would you go about finding out if your character and talents are better placed in new biz or client sales?
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This is great.
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I m sure there s no one-size-fits-all, but I d appreciate what questions I should ask myself to really figure myself out, or is it best to start one and see how it fits?
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All the best from you, K. Arvid.
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Good.
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Very good.
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Great question.
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So it s very similar to what Josh had.
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This was more, he s got a choice now.
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Does he go into new, I assume he means new sales means brand new prospects, and client sales means client service, but you re still selling more to your client base?
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Yeah, the way that I would understand that is that the first level that he s in is like literally pounding phones, cold calling.
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Gets a lead or a demo set up and passes it.
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He wants to get out of that.
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So he wants to get out of the front and maybe into this more sales, you know,
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part of it, but there s sometimes more pressure on that other end for closing.
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So, I ve got a couple things here.
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May I?
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Yeah, go ahead.
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Yeah, so the first thing I wrote down is know thyself.
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Yeah, you know what?
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Both of my answers are kind of biblical.
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I just noticed that.
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Ooh.
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Yeah, and I m not really, you know, Catholics, we don t read the Bible at all.
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No, you re not at all.
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We just kind of show up and hear the readings.
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Like, where d those come from?
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Like, exactly, they re actually from a book.
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Anyway, we just lost half of them.
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You look in the pocket of the backs.
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There are no Bibles in the Catholic Church, I promise you.
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There s one up on this stage.
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There s one, he s got it.
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Anyway, know thyself, know thyself, know thyself.
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Assessment tools are everywhere.
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Bill and I use one called a Hogan, Hogan, H-O-G-A-N.
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There s probably someone that you can get to work with you with a Hogan
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tool, or if you want to email one of us, maybe we can do that for you.
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Hogan s a great tool to help you figure this out, what motivates you, what buckets you need filled in a role.
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There are others like predictive index, disk profiling, lots of profiles.
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I would also recommend that you might spend a little money here and think about hiring a career coach.
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There are lots of people that do this for a living that will assess you, and then they also have
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their own life experience, they ll tie both of those together and say, here s some help for you.
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It s going to cost you a little money, but it might well be worth the time.
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So think about that, ways that you can know thyself, use assessment tools, and perhaps a career coach.
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I love the career coach idea.
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I think this is a perfect time for it, because he likes the company.
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He knows he wants to stay.
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He s down to two positions.
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And the career coach will also help, will probably run a test.
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Yeah.
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And we ll have some thoughts on it.
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Almost always.
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Yeah.
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Well, this is I kind of have the same issue here I had with Josh and that is I think I d go talk to people who are in those positions now and have them tell you specifically what skills they use to get their job done and get a job to get it done well, and so
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If you re on some kind of a plan or path for excellence, Arvid, I think you have to say, well, what s the path for excellence for a sales, a new salesperson?
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And what s the path for excellence for client service?
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And they re probably different.
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And until you know what that path is, and by path, I mean,
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What does that person need to be good at?
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How do they become good at that?
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What s the time frame?
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Does it take them five years?
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Does it take them a long weekend?
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How do you become better at those skills that these two people, one from client service and one from sales, have said, this is what it takes.
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That s good.
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This is what it takes to be successful.
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I find that
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And I don t know if you find this, Brian, but in my client base, the best salespeople rarely get asked, what is it that makes you good?
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They just never get that question.
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And they re sitting around, and they re thrilled to tell you.
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And everybody knows who the best are.
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Absolutely.
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Yeah.
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Yes.
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And you know what s, so this is, you know, hanging around in the NFL.
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It s not that way.
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People are always asking.
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the people that are ahead of them or above them, what about this, what about that?
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You see peer-to-peer coaching going on all the time.
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Officials, or coaches, or everybody.
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All the above.
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All the above.
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They re all calling their friend, talking to each other.
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It s a really cool learning thing to have a peer-driven coaching thing that s not official.
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It just happens.
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Yeah.
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Because they re all trying to teach.
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So they re not in their own, they re not doing this.
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Totally, yeah.
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Even though they may compete next Sunday or sometime in the future.
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Correct.
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They re still a network to talk about things.
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The affinity of the group is stronger than the affinity of... Yes, it s really good.
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My last biblical quote of the day.
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Ecclesiastes assures us that there s a purpose.
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Please don t make this the last one.
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Ecclesiastes assures us that there s a purpose, a time for every purpose under heaven.
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I got that from the movie Footloose.
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It s a quote from Kevin Bacon.
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Not from the Bible.
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Not from the stage.
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Not from the stage in the Catholic church.
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The Catholic stage.
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Yeah.
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But I would ask everyone, this is for both of these gentlemen, what are the other options?
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What are my other options?
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So as both of you are asking a very linear, like I said earlier, binary question, should I do this or that?
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And that s only two options.
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I would have you step back at this point in time and say,
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Is any of this my thing?
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Maybe they wanna go back to culinary school, or maybe they wanna go and start a not-for-profit that serves clean water to people.
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This is just a good time in your life when you re having these feelings to make sure you re stepping back and saying, is this what I m here to do?
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The quicker you can get to purpose-driven things, the more happy you will be, is my advice on that.
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Look at other options.
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SPEAKER_00
That s good.
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SPEAKER_00
Very good.
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SPEAKER_00
Thanks for the questions, Arvid and Josh.
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SPEAKER_00
And if you have a question you would like to turn into a voice memo, send it to us.
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Send it to listener at advancedsellingpodcast.com.
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SPEAKER_00
Don t forget to include your shipping address so we can send you our little gift to you for being a part of our podcast.
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Once again, if you re a listener, we want to thank you.
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We have grown this thing over the past few years, and thanks to you, it s really taken off.
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And we really appreciate all the LinkedIn group texts that we get, and messages, and all the emails, and of course, the voice memos.
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So keep them coming, and we ll keep trying to help you become a better salesperson in the future.
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SPEAKER_00
Love it.
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SPEAKER_00
See you next time.
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SPEAKER_00
Bye.
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SPEAKER_00
Bye.