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S2 Ep2 The mysterious mind of the seller
159 Plays2 years ago
Nobody likes salespeople. Let's just admit it. There's a fundamental feeling that whenever you talk to someone in sales, they'll have all sorts of answers and out clever you, so let's keep a wide birth, eh? Not so much. Keeping salespeople engaged is the mark of a great company - and keeping them motivated - even more so. We talk to one of the original kings of outbound, Denis Champagne, about the mind of a seller and how to keep them selling.
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Dial It In Podcast is where we gathered our favorite people together to share their advice on how to drive revenue, through storytelling and without the boring sales jargon. Our primary focus is marketing and sales for manufacturing and B2B service businesses, but we’ll cover topics across the entire spectrum of business. This isn’t a deep, naval-gazing show… we like to have lively chats that are fun, and full of useful insights. Brought to you by BizzyWeb.
Links:
Website: dialitinpodcast.com
BizzyWeb site: bizzyweb.com
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Transcript
Introduction to the Podcast
00:00:05
Speaker
Welcome to Dial It In, a podcast where we talk with interesting people about the process improvements and tricks they use to grow their businesses. I'm Dave Meyer, president of BusyWeb, and every week, Trigby Olsen and I are bringing you interviews on how the best in their fields are dialing it in for their organizations.
00:00:24
Speaker
You know, one of the things, Dave, that I've experienced as I get older is a sense of modesty and expertise that if you really want to find somebody who's really, really good at something and really, really an expert in something, find somebody who will absolutely refuse to admit that they're an expert in it and say that, oh, no, I don't know anything. Or I'm just, I'm just one chapter ahead of the class. Do you have that experience?
00:00:48
Speaker
Absolutely. All the time. And that's one of the things that I like to say about like social media gurus and all of those folks, anybody who claims they're a guru and that they're an expert is often just trying to oversell because they're a little low on content.
Guest Introduction: Denis Champagne
00:01:02
Speaker
And I think our guest today is the opposite of that. He's absolutely brilliant. We've had him on the show and done a pre-record and I'm so excited to revisit our chat today with Denis Champagne. Bonjour, Denis.
00:01:17
Speaker
No, I'm using the French because you actually live in Montreal, correct? So hopefully I'm not being culturally condescending. No, it's not. It's actually edifying. So I take it as such. Perfect. Perfect.
Experience in Sales and Coaching
00:01:31
Speaker
I think you've been in sales and sales coaching for going on 30, 35 years now and you're still going strong. Yeah. I'm actually starting to really learn actually after all that I'm starting to get at a little bit and it's a lot of fun.
00:01:46
Speaker
Exactly. I was just talking to Dave about that in your introduction. So one of the things that I think is certainly the case in development of a salesperson is any good salesperson likes to have their patented nine-step process. And if you just follow their patented nine-step process and buy their book on Amazon, then all of a sudden, mana will fall from the sky, your pipeline will be bulging, and everything will be all right.
00:02:15
Speaker
but i don't really subscribe to that notion and i don't think you do either you're absolutely right bang on i've developed a little methodology or framework to at least give structure to some of the work you have to do but you know you gotta get out there and learn just like coaching i used to be a squash professional and coaching athletes they have to find their own style with the racket the same thing in life you gotta find that
00:02:43
Speaker
that icky guy, that part of you, that your essence, you know, that makes you shine and unique.
Journey from Sports to Sales
00:02:49
Speaker
And you mentioned that the last time we talked that you were, uh, cause you're a former two sport pro athlete, right? I was a master's racer in cycling. Yeah. Cycling was my, my, my, uh, my passion in the late mid forties to early to late fifties. And now it's powerlifting. So I'm on my third journey now.
00:03:09
Speaker
Wow. And I want to learn more about that because I don't know anything about professional squash. So can you talk a little bit about what exactly does the squash circuit look like? Well, the circuit or the sport or the game?
00:03:25
Speaker
Well, I know the sport. So the sport is play it's, it's played on a smaller court than racquetball. I think half the size of a racquetball that it's played with a, um, not as lively of a ball. I think it's called the dead deaden ball. Is that right? Well, uh, first of all, it's not half the size. So just to be clear, the international squash court, because there are two dimensions, the one that's played with a softer ball that's played all over the world is 32 feet long by 21 feet wide.
00:03:54
Speaker
the North American version of that, which played mostly in the U.S. And it was just because the court could not be what the width of the walls were not sufficient to allow the royal family to play. So they constructed the court with 18 and a half feet wide. So it's a North American squash is narrower than walls.
00:04:14
Speaker
and it's the same length and distance, but you're playing with a faster ball, a really fast ball, a harder ball in North American game, more racket than actual running. But the most important game around the world is the softer ball. And when you hit that ball enough,
00:04:34
Speaker
It squashes and creates friction and heat and the ball gets to be really bouncy, very bouncy in squash. If it's in an air condition, highly, highly air conditioned, if you're not hitting the ball enough, you won't create as much heat, won't bounce as much.
00:04:53
Speaker
But we use different spotted with blue dot, black dot on the ball, which we use for beginners. When they start, we had to bounce your ball to at least let them experience hitting the ball, right? Otherwise the ball would always drop dead, right? So that squat racquetball is 40 feet long by 20 feet wide. I was also a squat racquetball. I was a squat and racquetball pro. So that's why I know of both sports.
00:05:23
Speaker
My, uh, my gift and my racquetball play was just that I'm left-handed and not in, uh, nobody, nobody was used to playing with the left. Yeah. That happened to me as well in the tournament. I only realized at the end of the tournament, uh, the match that, Hey, this guy's lefty. That's why I lost.
00:05:39
Speaker
Ah, yeah, exactly. Which I think sort of, we'll get back to the topic, but one of the things that I remembered, one of my most important lessons that I learned early on in my life was my dad was a college professor. And I used to, in the 80s, when somebody on the tennis team was getting too big for their britches, they'd bring my dad out to play him.
00:06:01
Speaker
And my dad would, you know, he'd really ham it up and he'd put, you know, real socks up to his knees and he'd have the Bjorn Borg headband and everything and the little shorty shorts. And he would just absolutely annihilate the college kid. And so that was one of the important things I learned in life is you never play a racquet sport with an old man because they will crush you for fun.
00:06:23
Speaker
Some of them, yes, absolutely. Yeah.
Personalized Coaching Style
00:06:26
Speaker
So, Denny, your job is primarily a sales coach and helping develop salespeople into successful closers, right? Would that be fair to say? It's somewhat fair, but I will make it more fair. I coach people who want to become better or great at the profession of the career selling for the purpose of helping the team become
00:06:52
Speaker
prosperous i coach also executives like members of the sales leadership team they also need and i'm finding three of my clients they need to talk to someone they can turn to their ceo so they bounce off ideas with me they don't know everything they can turn to their vp of operations they'll talk to someone who knows so because i've worked with owners all my life as a consultant or as a
00:07:18
Speaker
vice president in marketing sales on a by-project basis. I've worked with the ownership and I know the inherent problems and I own businesses myself. So, you know, I bring that to the table. So I work with executives as well as sales teams and the individuals because I believe people need in, you know, private coaching, these raw, raw two-day seminars.
00:07:46
Speaker
It's like inflating a balloon and it will just deflate by itself after a few days. So it's the continuous reinforcement, encouragement, practice, awareness-building, constant 10-week behavior-changing approach. That's what helps people to transform poisons into medicine, if you'll accept the term. So that's how I tend to work.
00:08:17
Speaker
I charge less because it's private lessons. Well, it is. I charge more, but I could do a seminar and make it all up in one day. But I won't feel that I'm rendering service to the company. I'm not doing its service. Some people say, I don't care if they pay me the fee for the day. I'll do it. But people leave with kind of mitigated kind of feelings and knowledge about that. I would prefer them to recommend them to read
00:08:47
Speaker
And in my coaching, I expect them to read. And then let's talk about what you read because I read the book. So over a 10-week period, they read, they practice, they become aware, and they follow a little bit of a structure that I created. So that's how you change people. You change people one person at a time, one hour a week at a time, through constant 10-week, 12-week periods.
Challenges in Sales: Fear and Engagement
00:09:12
Speaker
I think that every salesperson says they want to get better, but they don't actually want to get better. So where do you start and how, what are some of the differentiators that you see when you really know somebody really wants it? Well, when they're willing to be coached and they actually start acting and showing me that they've done what they, we agreed mutually that he will do for the following week.
00:09:39
Speaker
I have a particular young lady with whom I'm working with a struggle. And she did more thus this week. We were on the session yesterday. She did more than the week before. And then she's a bit of a very sensitive and self-esteem. This is self-esteem issue. People are fearful of people, but they're also fearful of success and prosperity.
00:10:06
Speaker
Say more about that, because I think you're right, but I'd like to hear your take on it. Yeah, sales has been, it's true. Then I posted something the other day about, did you fall into sales or did you jump into sales? And all of us have this notion of prosperity versus the scarcity syndrome versus the prosperity or abundance syndrome.
00:10:32
Speaker
So if you want to really become good in sales you have to understand that although you may know product you may know clients problems maybe the way you speak maybe the way you engage maybe the way you write in white.
00:10:47
Speaker
When you approach people, they don't feel the passion that you want to help them. They don't feel the confidence in your voice. All of those things speak more loudly than anything. Thomas Edison say, who you are speaks so loud that when you open your mouth, I can't hear you. So it's in the making, it's in the continuance. If you really believe that you can help a company sincerely, you will continue. And eventually, as my Buddhist mentor says,
00:11:16
Speaker
They will come to understand your sincerity to serve. And that's a very deep statement to understand your sincerity. And a lot of salespeople lack that drive to say, I don't care if you've not called me or responded to me seven times. I'm going to call you an eighth time.
00:11:37
Speaker
and I'm going to add something of value there, and I'm going to continue until you give me the time. Often, if you do that, they'll say, oh my goodness, this guy really wants to help me. I remember I was calling someone on the 22nd of December, my birthday. It was the last day in the office. Finally, I reached someone, a VP of sales, he says, oh my goodness, finally we speak. He says, you know what? He said, you've been at it for nine months with me.
00:12:08
Speaker
And at some point he says, you are starting to really annoy me. But it came to a point where he says, I started respecting you. And I brought my national sales manager to listen to the voice messages you left. And I said, this is the way you continue the journey with someone until they acquiesce.
00:12:38
Speaker
Absolutely, but it seems to me that one of the hallmarks and when we were right before we started recording you talked about your follow-up and I think that's one of the true masterstrokes of great salespeople. They follow up without annoying and
00:12:55
Speaker
It's what I like to call it is lazy linking or lazy networking where you just say, hey, just following up or just checking back. That's not the kind of follow up that you're talking about, right? So you provide value with every touch and every interaction or that's how you coach. Yeah, I try. I try and I encourage people to, that's why one of the things that recently I read from a very respected professional in sales training,
00:13:20
Speaker
in the u.s who i love and i admire his name is anthony and arena. He said that we're lacking reading and we're lacking research and i spend a lot of time now coach and really adding to their opponent. Research properly your people before you engage have some value to talk about to the point that you're starting to fall in love with the problems they have.
00:13:49
Speaker
Someone said that in linked fall in love with your prospects problem so that to the point that people really understand you want to help them and you have something to talk about your ass and he says you're one up on them. You have something they don't have yet knowledge and they'll say you know what i'm gonna give you fifteen twenty minutes it's worth my time.
00:14:13
Speaker
So there's got to be value almost on every single touch outbound sequence point that they feel how jesus guys giving me value so to the point where they say you know what you're going to help me buy. A great salesman today is i'm going to help you buy.
00:14:33
Speaker
One of my sales goals for 2023 was that during my selling hours, which is usually nine to noon and then one to four, is to not use the word just.
00:14:48
Speaker
So in email or conversation, never saying, hey, I'm just following up because then that immediately demeans me and the prospect dies because, oh, I'm sorry to bother you, but here I am. So there's a difference in confidence of saying, I'm calling to follow up as opposed to, oh, just following up, like, oops, sorry.
00:15:12
Speaker
And I'm better at, it's still there and it's still something I'm trying to stamp out, but it's definitely something that I've focused on. And I think the other thing that I'd be interested to get your take on, Denise, is the rise of AI when it comes to prospecting, because I think everybody gets that same email
00:15:33
Speaker
or LinkedIn requests, as Dave said, lazy linking of their first name. Hi, my name is Trigby and here are three things that my company does and here's my calendar link. And then they wonder why nobody clicks on it. Right.
00:15:51
Speaker
And it's just, it's the new, it's 21st century cold calling where you're just casting a wide net in and using a script in an inappropriate way and then hoping that you might catch something in it.
Key Traits for Sales Success
00:16:06
Speaker
I don't know. What do you think? Yeah, it's eloquence is rare. Okay. Relevance is rare. Uh, success is rare. Common sense is uncommon. So.
00:16:17
Speaker
The real bright people who know that people either want to be in for tain edu tain you know kind of. It's a little bit but with relevance and seriousness but they realize this guy's real or this lady is really a professional day they crafted their art. Because living is an art selling is an art as well and it's a science so it's a combination of all those features and.
00:16:45
Speaker
When you catch someone who, and you get a call from someone who's really a professional, it's so natural and comfortable and relevant and they know, when I listen to them, they pitch me or they call me, I feel like they know some things about me. They're already prepared. Proper preparation prevents poor performance in the five P's, right?
00:17:10
Speaker
There's a marketing piece, but there's a sale. Even in athletics, you've not prepared the starting line on the bike. Forget about it. If they attack, you're gone, right? So it's the same thing in sales. So relevance. What is relevance? It's really talking in the depths of that person's motivations. What are the motivations of a buyer? We have to ask.
00:17:38
Speaker
I learned the other day and back home to me, they are caring about their success in the position they hold. They're thinking about their children's success because they make more money, or they achieve more bonuses, or they land a good project for the company's outcomes. It's a combination, but deeply, very deeply in their own psyche,
00:18:08
Speaker
The dialogue, the monologue they have is, how can I get something out of this for me? They work for a company, but they're thinking about themselves as well. There are two things. The company's outcomes, their own personal outcome. We had a fraud here, a dark web theft of 5,000 personal IDs and social insurance numbers with one of the banks.
00:18:35
Speaker
Yeah, that was about six, seven years ago. In 24 hours, the CEO lost his job. So what do you think he thinks about when he gets called by people about cybersecurity now? And in a new position? It's about his own kind of success and security. And that of the board of directors.
00:19:04
Speaker
So we all have our own and justifiably so. But it's got to be the balance of that. And people will understand that. And you're calm. You learn to practice. You learn to craft your style, your narratives. You got to practice. It's like just lifting a school, just squatting the barbell on my back. I'm constantly checked by my coach every week in video to make sure that the little kinks in my lifting
00:19:32
Speaker
will allow me to get another 10 to 15 pounds, you know, on my next top personal record that I want to break. So technique, little tweaks, little things. I think what's interesting is as you describe the buyer's intent, which I wholeheartedly agree with everything that you said, is the one the one thing that you didn't mention is money. Yeah, but I didn't. How much something is
00:20:01
Speaker
I found it doesn't matter as much as the risk of buying in today's world. Yeah. Especially in a lot of B2B, right? Because you're dealing with money against some future goal or some future thing. So if you're really tapping into the empathy of what success looks like in the role for that person,
00:20:25
Speaker
it matters less about what that line item is and especially in B2B sales because the money is just the part that says that you're going to do something. And so where do you go from there is you need to get the person excited about, oh, this is going to make me look awesome to my boss.
Understanding Buyer Motivations
00:20:42
Speaker
Or this is going to be, it's going to remove all of the risk and I'm not going to have to worry if my job is going to be gone tomorrow because of some hacker, right? So, and I, I know to me that you,
00:20:53
Speaker
coached your own call center in a previous career and ran that, and then building that art of conversation into something that can be rapid fire on calls is a true talent. I know that you have your own model, you have the team's model. Can you tell us more about that and how to get too empathy right away with your customers? Well, in order for that to happen,
00:21:23
Speaker
other things previously should have been done and prepared, trained, fortified. So spectacular 10-second sprints has been preceded by 10 years of preparation. So, you know, some people are good at just naturally because they have integrity. I think integrity is heard and felt by people. I was never the higher volume in a call center that I had and the other call center in the 80s that I managed in Toronto.
00:21:53
Speaker
I was also the best paid to sales ratio. My, my, my deals paid. They didn't have the bigger volume, but I had good quality deals. So that's very important that people understand that if you want to really get good paying clients, you need to make sure that people again, understand your sincerity, your integrity, you're prepared.
00:22:20
Speaker
There's no, there's no secret to success. It's preparation is desire is, you know, coach ability is humility is that learning mentality, uh, ongoing continuing education. And my call center, it was a different game. It was transactional. It was fundraising for charity.
Salespeople's Motivations and Integrity
00:22:42
Speaker
But again, you appeal to no more motives of people when you fundraise. So you have to call upon their own intrinsic desires to appeal to, you know, that part of their lives that make them feel worthy and helpful and humane, right? But it depends on what you're selling. So my team's methodology after all of this has been done over the years, I realized the number one
00:23:11
Speaker
kind of glitch that exists within selling is poor targeting. That's why the tea is there. So really be crystal clear on your targets and break it down. What does that mean? That means first of all, how much time do we spend with our salespeople to onboard them to care for them?
00:23:38
Speaker
to give them that environment that they you're going to be fine. We'll do everything we can to make you the absolute best. Believe me, the messy is being paid $15 million a year right now to play for a team right in the U.S. You know, messy, Lionel Messi and soccer. Same thing. Absolutely. Why are we on board our people correctly? I'm astounded as today.
00:24:04
Speaker
They give them a half an hour, two hours, five hours, 10 hours, and then run because there's a perturbed sense of what a salesperson is. It's not an easy job. There's going to be a lot of time and again and again follow-ups. So targeting for me is first, let's look at the personal salespersons intrinsic, private,
00:24:31
Speaker
motivations for being in this job. So the first session I spent is, why are you here? Why are you selling for this company? What are your dreams? What are your motivations? And let's be frank, tell me, and let's write that down so that it's clear. Now when they have to do the extra, will they question
00:24:56
Speaker
No, probably not because they know about their why, you know, this classic why that everybody thinks like, you know, Simon Sinek invented, you know, you know, Heraclitus properties and Plato and, you know, created and talked about that and Spinoza. So we don't have the right. So anyways, but then this extrinsic motivation, what motivates you
00:25:21
Speaker
in this company? Why are you selling what you sell? Do you believe in this? Do you trust and believe in the management and the cause and the value that you bring to the table? Are you proud of that? Are you burning with desire to reach out and make a new contact and say, geez, I can't wait to see if I can help that person, that I can't wait to see kind of thinking in your heart, in your mind.
00:25:49
Speaker
So that's the target. The first is the target is the salesperson's full motivation. Then is what are the serious problems that you actually really solve and try to figure that out, like put it into a sentence or two, articulate, and then you may have to regurgitate and reiterate that to a point. It's all still in the T targeting.
00:26:15
Speaker
There's many components of marketing. Then once you have that, then you can say, okay, what are the companies out there that are likely to experience this serious strategic problem that you can solve? Then who are the roles in that company that are going to be instrumental or influential in, say, in this that are also going to be somewhat impacted by it?
00:26:44
Speaker
So then forget about single threads prospecting, do multi-thread, talk to the CEO, talk to the VP of operations, talk to the manager on the floor, talk to a number of people and say, I heard that you work here. I heard that you're the manager. I'm trying to get a sense of things. I heard that you have so much knowledge and I really value your opinion. Man, people love to give their opinions.
00:27:15
Speaker
So you seek their opinion and you document all of the various people that are likely to be impacted by the decision, right? And then you have value. So you have multi-thread, you're talking to a number of people to navigate the consensus in the organization. So it's not, it's a lot of work. It's not easy, but you know,
00:27:40
Speaker
Deadlifting 500 pounds is not easy as well. It took time for me to do it, right? So same thing. So you build an athlete. Salespeople are the athletes of a company. So once you have that, then you talk to what roles am I going to talk? And what conversation pieces I'm going to hold, what kind of conversation I'm going to have with these different kinds of roles and then craft those narrative.
Effective Sales Execution Tools
00:28:06
Speaker
Then you go to E. E is nothing beats execution.
00:28:12
Speaker
Now, there's a list of how you're going to execute. There's the web, there's LinkedIn, there's email, there's a phone, there's video, even video direct message on LinkedIn. I did that to a CEO. CEO responded to me in five minutes, my friend. He called me. Now, why did he call me? Why did he call me?
00:28:39
Speaker
because I left my phone number on my LinkedIn contact section. So with the rep, also make sure your LinkedIn profile is bang on. It's rich. It's complete. It's full. It portrays who you really are as a full human being. Put everything that you do. People want to get to know you.
00:29:03
Speaker
Because if you don't appear to be somewhat prepared, they may say, I sounds cheesy. They're going to check you before you respond. So all of this just takes a lot of preparation. That's what I'm saying. That's E for execution. That's brilliant. A
00:29:24
Speaker
is something that 90% of people don't do. I'm going to ask you to think about that. What do you think people mostly don't do in a sales organization? It's mostly follow up. I'd say follow up enough. I don't know how that gets to A though. Maybe ask for the sale, but that might be too early. Yeah, no, it's not. It's a simple account activity.
00:29:52
Speaker
Put the information in CRM account for activity. Absolutely. Make sure you put that information where it deserves to be seen by you and the ownership. I talked to I work with owners. I said
00:30:14
Speaker
if you were to sell your business tomorrow what kind of picture would you be able to present to the buyers about forecasting about account to cash my cfo says the from the first point of contact with someone from contact to cash how long is that cycle is in the account the liquidity the cfo is the recipient of that money that system of record is supposed to be
00:30:44
Speaker
perfect representation of all activities as it relates to revenue generation and service rendered. And the CRM can be, you know, tickets to server customers. You know, depending on the pool you buy, the brand you buy, because we know that there are all kinds of CRMs of all kinds of levels are less or more organized. But fundamentally,
00:31:12
Speaker
Put that information, preserve that, preciously, in the moment that you do the activity. Not 10 hours later or an hour later, you will have forgotten. Zig Ziglar says, once it's fresh in your mind, that's the time to save it on your CRM as a filters and activity.
00:31:35
Speaker
That's one of the things that we work with a tool called HubSpot for all of our clients and that was a big difference for us when we started to really focus on getting everything into a system that you can track and that you can share and that you can show.
00:31:50
Speaker
This is one of the places that I think AI is going to have a massive impact because we probably six months ago instated a note taker for all of our meetings. And darn it if that note taker isn't just brilliant. So not only does it transcribe the text, but it says the pain points identified, the next steps that we talked through,
00:32:15
Speaker
the content that the customer was most concerned about. And it wraps all that up automatically where it gives that sales rep much more detail when you're building and taking the next step. So it's so cool to have a tool like that. It still doesn't replace the need for good old fashioned hard work and being on the ball. But oh my goodness, it's making my life as a salesperson much easier.
00:32:41
Speaker
Very well put. And there's ancillary benefits, too. Yeah, because we just had a client with a fairly large bill say, I've never been told about this. I'm not paying it. And because we had all those transcripts, we said, OK, well, on April 12th, you were told. And May 13th, you were told. And June 14th, you're, oh, OK. And then he finally acquiesced. He admitted, oh, yeah, I never opened that email. And we were like, yes, we know.
00:33:11
Speaker
Because we can see that you never opened the email. I have a question that I think is controversial and also how you answer is completely dependent on age.
The Importance of Phone Calls
00:33:23
Speaker
We can talk about this as a group, but I'd love to get Denise's feeling. Is the phone dead in 2023 or is it still a useful prospecting tool? As long as people want to hear another person's voice, it will always be alive. Once we start talking telepathically,
00:33:40
Speaker
But in the meantime, even AI tools now are able to predict a divorce between a couple the way the voice sounds between each other. So the voice and I've done a lot of podcasting on this way back when I first started because I would
00:34:03
Speaker
When I was started selling on the phone, I would put my watch. We had no computer in those days, eighties. So I would just put my watch and I would make sure that I was able to grab a person's attention within 10 seconds. And I would look at the seconds meeting and I would work on really making sure I have an impact. They remember my name or they, they respond. They, okay. Yeah. Yeah. Right. Because people are like, their minds are everywhere.
00:34:32
Speaker
And it was all about modulating my voice to make sure that people sense my integrity my naturalness my authenticity and just being a downright good person. That can all be summarized in your way you express yourself in those first ten to fifteen seconds and it can make it or break it.
00:34:53
Speaker
And people love to hear voices. Look how many people pay to buy albums to go listen to great singers and performers on stage, the power of the voice. You know, I have a dream. Remember that statement, you know, the way he spoke and the voice would tremble of Dr. King. I still remember that, you know. I was alive when I was young. I was a young boy when I remember that I have a dream event.
00:35:22
Speaker
So or Walter Cronkite, right? When Walter Cronkite, I don't know if maybe you guys don't know him. Sure. Oh, no. And that's the way it is. Hey, what do you think? Do you think the phone's dead? Me? No, I think it just just like Denis was saying, it's harder and harder, I think, for people to
00:35:48
Speaker
muscle up to pick up the phone and to dial because we're in a world where it's becoming increasingly seen as rude to call people instead of just texting them. And so we're we're we need to work that and figure out better ways to I mean, there's no easy way to game the system. Like you're not going to just cold call and dial like Wolf of Wall Street. You're going to be
00:36:17
Speaker
engaging and connecting. And like Denis was saying right there, if you can build some sort of a hook or a connection with that person in the first 10 seconds, and then you have a conversation where you're asking things that imply and share that you actually care about that person. It's like, oh, well, I see that you're in Montreal.
00:36:39
Speaker
And I know that the local sports team just had a big win, or I see from your recent LinkedIn post that you are really concerned about this thing. And do you have a couple of moments to talk about that? You know, that's the kind of thing that builds real connection and relationship. And if you can do something in real time in voice to build connection, I mean, there's no easier way
00:37:07
Speaker
than a great conversation. So I believe very much that the phone is still relevant. It's just getting tougher. And I wonder where we're going to be in 20 years with all the kids that have only been texting. And that's now their full job to be in the corporate world.
00:37:25
Speaker
Yeah, I think one of the things that I do is I teach prospecting for HubSpot Academy. And one of the things I see is that anybody under the age of about 35 is just scared to death of the phone and has active backlash to any suggestion that they need to use the phone.
00:37:41
Speaker
to talk to people and people who are over 35 kind of get it and they realize that it's it's scary, but it's it's necessary and So I think what you guys said is that is absolutely true that it's never been harder in this day and age to be good at it and
00:38:01
Speaker
but the only way that you get good at it is by doing it.
Reframing Sales Calls as Gifts
00:38:04
Speaker
And it's a learned muscle memory. You're not gonna pick up the phone and make a sale in your first call. It's hundreds and hundreds of calls before you start feeling confident and then hundreds and hundreds of more before you're conveying that confidence. Right, and part of it's just building up the wrong thing in your head. If you view in your head that, oh man, I've gotta go cold call a bunch of people and convince them to do something they don't wanna do, nobody wants to do that.
00:38:31
Speaker
If I know that I have a gift that I have the ability to share with someone, it's like I know that these four people today really need what I do. And all I have to do is form some sort of a connection and I can actually tangibly help them. You know, giving away a gift is an entirely different conversation than selling some poor sucker. Right. So having that empathy and being able to build that is huge. And that makes it a much easier conversation.
00:39:01
Speaker
Denny, I know we started and we were almost halfway through Teams on the conversation. So we said, yes, so I want to loop us back. What does the M stand for? Right. There's two M's, by the way. There's not only one, there's two of them.
00:39:17
Speaker
Teams, because I'm not using the word like Microsoft Teams, I'm double M. But just to bear down on the first three, the TEA, those are the foundational. The TEA is the most important, all three of them. The MMS are very simply measure, so decipher, analyze, decide where this fits into
00:39:44
Speaker
the level of degrees of information that you've been able to kind of extract and generate from the conversations, the exchanges, backlash, you measure also, well, I've been trying this person for 24 weeks now, and not one sign of life is a target. Maybe you haven't been relevant. Maybe it's bad timing. Maybe put it on pause and put later. Measure means
00:40:11
Speaker
to give it a degree of seriousness or gravitas or relevance in the terms of all of the other opportunities or pipeline. Because the idea is to generate opportunities, not leads. I'm looking to opportunity. I'm not looking for leads. Lead gen is a passé term. So M in that case is try to decipher, analyze, evaluate where you're at with that.
00:40:40
Speaker
The other M is how to manage that. How do you manage that? What do you do? Do you put it into the follow-up in six months? Do you put it into a campaign that goes onto the marketing side? Because, of course, alignment between sales and marketing is always a problem.
00:40:56
Speaker
I still to this day, but so it's learning to manage that and that means success success means did I achieve my objectives when it was it to have the first conversation to close the contract to accelerate. Go to market with this particular client for the implementation what are the what's the criteria is going to call this t a m s successful.
00:41:23
Speaker
And what you have to do then is you go right back at the beginning of the target. What are my sales targets? I forgot to add that in T also, there is your quota. Of course. Right. This young lady, she didn't pay attention. She has issues with her self-esteem. Her goals for the year is 80, 800,000. She's at 70,000 and we're in August. So there's a very strong chance that she may not be there anymore.
00:41:53
Speaker
And I'm working with the two owners and, you know, now they're asking me to come on board and sell for them, which I may take on because I love these guys. They have an amazing tool. Yeah. So the message. Sorry.
00:42:14
Speaker
I was just 750,000 and a quarter. That's heavy lifting for anybody. Yeah, no, it's not going to happen. And she wasn't paying attention and she, you know, kind, there's a lot of things. So as also I try to screen people like when I'm coaching them is, are they really fit for this? They may not be in this particular kind of sale. Maybe it's customer success. Maybe it's.
00:42:39
Speaker
Like they're working with agencies or directly to retailers so agencies will take on this digital signage digital signage business. Here in canada so now. You have to kind of decide do you really want to be in sales that's so but if you don't coach them and they don't make it. Whose fault is it it's a combination of both people the company as well most sales people are not well on board they're not coach.
00:43:07
Speaker
They're actually, I find it very disparaging, you know, and it's sad to see in the world of sales, how so very few are well onboarded correctly. And then they're expecting them to call on to a mature business people in their 50s, 60s that are executives and they have to have 25 years. They just finished a degree. They've been, you know, hustling on the SDRs and they're expected to get an appointment for me. Nah.
00:43:37
Speaker
That's, that's twisted. That's actually insane. I call it insanity. No wonder that so many people. Oh, it's, it's, it's very saddening. So, uh, I coached a lot because I spent time with my people in the sales call center. We did role playing every single Monday morning and I would put two people buyer seller in a role play. All of the others sit around and watch theater like a, like an acting car class. Right.
00:44:07
Speaker
But guess what? Those two people would win the competition, the contest at the end of the week. So when you're pushed, right? Playing tennis between two friends is one thing. Playing in a tournament with a referee in a crowd is another game. Your legs get all wound, right? So different levels. You got to put people to the tennis. It's a state.
00:44:39
Speaker
Yeah. Talk a little bit more about role-playing because I'm a firm believer
Role-Playing in Sales Training
00:44:44
Speaker
in it. And I think that's another one of those things that especially when you're coaching new salespeople, they feel is weird and it's awkward.
00:44:53
Speaker
Well, it's because, but I don't know how else you get good at it unless you do it in a lab. Yeah. And then, and then roll out what you've learned. Absolutely. So talk more about how that, how you have that in your process. Cause I believe in that too. Well, it depends. First of all, do you know what you're going to talk about? Have you done your research?
00:45:13
Speaker
Right away, it brings down the pressure if the person knows some stuff about the prospect, knows some stuff about the industry, knows some stuff about the problems and is able to articulate. So we talk a lot about that at the beginning. Forget about making a phone call for now. Just do you know your stuff, right?
00:45:34
Speaker
I had a I had a I coached many reps in South innate in Hong Kong, Korea, Taiwan and Australia. And I had five of them in South Africa, one of which was in Brazil and Sao Paulo. And I speak Portuguese and Spanish. So, you know, I was working with him. And we spent more time researching in the newswire and the PR platforms about issues that they had because they were into predictive analysis.
00:46:00
Speaker
and environmental intelligence for the mining industry and for the water and the water retention centers and water treatment and all that stuff. It's a very high level kind of thing. But he had to know more about, did they get problems with the government? Did they have issues where there are a lot of major events that triggers the need to get better predictive and all information? So once he called,
00:46:30
Speaker
He was so confident because he had information and he had knowledge. So right away his level of pressure comes down. So before we even start talking about how to call, what to say, how to do a video, how to write an email, know your SH, you know the rest. So start with that. Get information, get knowledgeable.
00:46:59
Speaker
Right away, you are so much closer to creating your own natural narrative. And then when we do, then we close the screen. We don't see each other on Zoom. And we practice. I'm a recipient of the call. Then you say, OK, what kind of role are you going to play? What role are you going to call? OK, I'm going to play the role of a CFO. Go ahead. And you know what? Everybody stumbles on the first 10 seconds. So go back to basics.
00:47:29
Speaker
get that comfort, that practice. But now he or she knows stuff that he's willing to be able to talk about. We just have to get that first, you know, off the blocks. You know, I was a cyclist, right? I raced in track and on road. And when I raced at the World Championships on track,
00:47:51
Speaker
when you do your your what they call your time trial race which for my age bracket was five hundred meters two laps around your bike is kind of grab the back wheel is held up by an apparatus and equipment piece that holds you so you can get on your bike you know and it's going to be be beep beep and then releases so you got to practice that right like it open up and you go those who are perfectly it opens a gone
00:48:22
Speaker
You're talking tenths of a second.
Impact of a Single Presentation
00:48:25
Speaker
The race is usually lost or won in the start. And I screwed up royally in 2011 Manchester because I got stuck for like half a second. The guy beat me because we're both are pretty good at going around and achieving hitting 50 kilometers an hour or what they call 29, 30 miles an hour.
00:48:49
Speaker
But by the time we hit the fine, he's already beat me by, you know, half a second, a second. No, nothing I can do with that races are lost by the length of the width of a tire. Some sales are a lot of that kind of thing. Right. I raced and I was like this much to the difference between the two tires. This much I want to gold medal and metal this much.
00:49:18
Speaker
So, right. So same thing with getting started. So know your stuff, do your research, do it caringly and professionally. Then let's practice those first 10, 15 seconds to calm yourself down. And once that person says, uh, when I asked them, how have you been, you know, cause I asked how I've been, have they been, there's a reason why I asked that. And if they say, I'm okay, how about you? The minute I get, how about you from that person?
00:49:49
Speaker
I know I'm psychologically in a safe place because they're willing to ask me. So that's just my my thing. It's always worked for me. I've developed the naturalness. Right. I'm happy to talk to them. I wait to talk to them. But you've got to control that. This is just so many aspects to the psychology of doing the right. But it's, you know, something done with excellence can make or break your life.
00:50:19
Speaker
one sales presentation can completely make you or break you in your life. It's the next one. The next one, it'll make or break
Connect with Denis Champagne
00:50:32
Speaker
you. Denis, thank you so much for joining us. If our listeners want to find you, how do they find you? Because I think they should. Well, on LinkedIn, really, the place of excellence is really
00:50:48
Speaker
is Denis Champagne, D-E-N-I-S, and then C-H-A-M-P-A-G-N-E on LinkedIn. I'm always there. I'm navigating. I'm all over the place, so yeah. Perfect. Thank you, my friend. It was a pleasure as always.