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How Long Does It Take To Master Sales?
193 Plays2 days ago
Just like a black belt, mastering sales is an art that takes not only skill, but real exposure to the process. In this episode, we go through what it takes to master sales and the habits that you need to instill to maximize your overall potential.
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Transcript
Introduction to the Solarpreneur Podcast
00:00:03
Speaker
Welcome to the Solarpreneur Podcast, where we teach you to take your solar business to the next level. My name is Taylor Armstrong. went from $50 in my bank account and struggling for groceries to closing 150 deals in the year and cracking the code on why sales reps fail.
00:00:19
Speaker
I teach you avoid the mistakes I made and bring in the top solar dogs of the industry to let you in on the secrets of generating more leads, falling up like a pro, and closing more deals.
00:00:31
Speaker
What is a solopreneur, you might ask? solopreneur is a new breed of solopro that is willing to do whatever it takes to achieve mastery, and you are about to become one. How long does it take to actually master sales?
00:00:43
Speaker
We're going be jamming on this topic today and a whole lot more. Welcome to the podcast. My name is Taylor Armstrong. We're here to help you get better at sales, get a whole lot more at leads and referrals, and have a much better time in the solar industry.
00:00:57
Speaker
Hope you are getting a ton of sales right now. And this topic, it's something that's very interesting. Got me thinking about it. um Some of you know I'm a jujitsu guy. Been training about three and a half years now.
Derek Moneyberg's Jujitsu Journey: Talent or Controversy?
00:01:10
Speaker
And something that happened, if you are in jujitsu, you probably know about this, if you train jujitsu. But there's a guy, his name's Derek Moneyberg. ah he is He got his black belt in three and a half years.
00:01:24
Speaker
And um I'm like, man, I wonder how long it takes to get your black belt in sales, so to speak. hey But the reason it caused such an outrage in jujitsu is because this guy he's ah he's like a financial guru type guy.
00:01:40
Speaker
And so um he had he basically developed this all-star ah team that just trained him. um He had some legends such as Jake Shields, Frank Mir, Lyoto Machida,
00:01:52
Speaker
Glover, Tex Sierra, I think I'm saying that right. Bunch of like UFC guys, just legends in the sport. We're training him. But he didn't start training until he was like 42 years old. He's already an older guy.
00:02:04
Speaker
He doesn't look that athletic or in shape. So just drew drew a lot of criticism because there's like, there's no way even the best of the best. There's guys like BJ Penn that got his black belt about the same amount of time. But Derek Moneybergs, he's just this guy that paid a bunch of these UFC fighters to go train him.
00:02:24
Speaker
And there's a whole lot of other things. Like he didn't have any footage of him. They call it rolling, right? it's when you're like sparring with other people. He doesn't have really any footage of all of him.
00:02:35
Speaker
rolling with other guys. And he's done basically all private training. It's not class structure. And, ah you know, like one of the best ways to learn jujitsu is you go you train with other people, you have it in a class structure, because that's how you know, that's how you test the stuff if if it actually works.
00:02:53
Speaker
And went for him, he's paying these people thousands and thousands of dollars to train him, getting the highest level instruction. But he's not really testing the skills on other people. Drew some raised some eyebrows.
00:03:05
Speaker
I don't know if this guy's a legit black belt. Who knows? I don't think we'll ever know until we see him actually tested. But he can't argue he did have some of the best of the best instruction in the world.
The Power of Continuous Learning in Sales
00:03:15
Speaker
this guy, he does like financial mastermind type things. So guy's got money.
00:03:20
Speaker
But ah so that's the backstory. And that's what got me thinking about how long does it take to actually master sales. So I want to go through ah few things that I believe will help you actually master sales.
00:03:34
Speaker
And first of all, just to preface it, I don't think there's ever a ending point, just like with anything you master. The best the best in any skill, they're always learning. And that's no different in cells.
00:03:46
Speaker
I've been in this since 20, really 2012, I guess, is when I started my first summer of door-to-door cells in pest control. And since then, um it's been constantly learning, continuous learning.
00:03:59
Speaker
So if you think there's going to be an ending point, hate to burst your bubble, but there's not really an ending point. If you really want to master cells, then you got to be willing to study the craft till the day you die. Right.
00:04:12
Speaker
That's what the best the best do. There's no you got to be obsessed with it. Right. Grant Cardone says be obsessed or be average. And that's really what it takes to master anything. Hey, and so um that's, I would say the first point, just be willing to always continuously learn the the art of sales.
00:04:34
Speaker
There's no stopping point. There's things like one of the first books I read in cells is Psychology of Cells by Brian Tracy. And he talks about this whole concept of making your car a library on wheels.
00:04:48
Speaker
ah There's some people out there actually saw a post from ah buddy of mine that's in cells. And is I think he posted like a reel on Instagram. And he talked about like, oh, this is one of the best things that people should do. you should listen to all the music. He posts a reel of all the music he listens to when he's driving.
00:05:08
Speaker
And the first thing I thought of, and it's not not that it's a bad thing to listen to music from time to time, but first thing I thought of is if you are in sales, you should be listening to audiobooks.
00:05:20
Speaker
to YouTube University, ah to podcasts, this podcast, right? Hopefully it's the first on your list. But you should be listening to these things way more than you should be listening to ah Taylor Swift on Spotify, okay? Because Taylor Swift, she ain't going to make you money.
00:05:37
Speaker
But this podcast is... and audio books, stuff on YouTube. yeah These things, they can literally change your life, but you gotta be willing to make the sacrifice.
00:05:48
Speaker
ah Cut out the distractions, cut out the noise, develop that habit of making your car a library on wheels.
Learning on the Go: A Cautionary Tale
00:05:56
Speaker
Okay, just be careful. Actually, the day I recorded this podcast, rear-ended someone today. And partly it was because was trying to find some ah content on YouTube, was trying to find some um sell stuff on YouTube to listen to.
00:06:10
Speaker
And this guy, I'd say it was like half his fault because we're turning onto a main road. We're at a light. He starts going. And then he's behind a truck. It's the lights turning yellow. He's going for it. But then all of a sudden, mid intersection, he decided, you know, what I'm not going to go for it anymore.
00:06:27
Speaker
He stops. I run rear end him. And that was that. Luckily, could have been a lot worse. Tiny dents, little scratch on his back bumper. And he's like, yeah, it's it's fine.
00:06:38
Speaker
So shout out. I think his name was Mr. Young. Young he, Asian guy. So shout out to Young. You're the OG. Thank you for not calling the cops on me. And I promise I'll pay better attention on the road. I'll stop checking my YouTube.
00:06:52
Speaker
Hey, um but side note. So that is the first point.
Sales Training vs. Jujitsu: Drilling for Success
00:06:55
Speaker
yeah Devote yourself to continuous learning. Always learn while you're in the car. And make that a priority, continuously learning, going to events, hiring coaches, all these things that are super important in your sales journey. Okay, number two is specific training. Okay, going back to jujitsu, one of the ways that the top jujitsu guys progress is they do something called situational drilling. Okay.
00:07:24
Speaker
And that is you're not just like going out there and freestyling, whatever. You're starting in a specific manner. And you just see you have positions like mounts, you have positions like turtle, ah you have positions where you're starting on your feet wrestling.
00:07:42
Speaker
And so there's all these different positions that you need to master. And the best guys, they're starting in these positions and they're mastering them. Because if you just do ah continuous rolling, if you just start freestyle, do that all the time.
00:07:58
Speaker
then going be hard to master the specific things. So just on likeji just like in jujitsu, we need to have the situational drilling for sales.
00:08:09
Speaker
Okay, what do I mean by that? First of all, figure out what you need to improve, right? Is it closing? Is it setting? Is it getting appointments to sit? Is it getting your deals to stick? Getting your deals to install?
00:08:22
Speaker
Is it getting referrals? Okay, And the way you know what you need to improve is you track, you measure and adjust. Okay, talk about recording yourself all the time. That's a good way. But how about ah going through your stats and looking? Hey, maybe I'm getting a ton of cells, but wow, my ah install ratio is not great.
00:08:42
Speaker
And personally, that's what I'm working on right now. I'm getting a lot of sales, but my install my installs aren't where I want them to be. So figure out for you, what is it? okay Start tracking your stacks stats if you're not already, but track how many appointments you're getting, how many hours you're knocking, ah how many sales you're getting.
00:09:01
Speaker
How many appointments are sitting? Once you start doing this, you can see, okay, I need to improve on these parts. And that's when you can start a situational drilling. ah Our team, we have correlations every Tuesdays and Fridays.
00:09:14
Speaker
We have a setter and a closer, ah separate training. We separate them out. But it's funny, sometimes I look around the room, um i go to the closers training most of the time.
00:09:25
Speaker
I'll go to setters sometimes. But I look around sometimes at the closers training and I'm like, man, some of these people, yeah they're not even sitting in appointments. So really, i don't think they should be here. They should be in the setting training because they're not signing appointments.
00:09:40
Speaker
Why are you practicing closing if you're not getting enough enough appointments? yeah Granted, it could be work ethic. Maybe they're just not working enough. But ah figure out what you need to improve on, make the adjustments, drill it, do your situation situational training just like you would in jujitsu.
00:09:57
Speaker
And that's going to be a key way for you to get better in sales.
Building Confidence: Key to Sales Success
00:10:01
Speaker
Okay, and then last but not least is just have the belief. We just finished up a blitz up in NorCal.
00:10:09
Speaker
um Pretty decent blitz. I think a few things we could have done better, but ended the week with five sales. Most of our team that was up there got at least a deal. Can't complain.
00:10:20
Speaker
um But there was one guy that did the blitz with us. who we could tell he was just getting down on himself. He's a newer setter. And if he's listening to this, shout out to him.
00:10:31
Speaker
But um he he was getting down on on himself during the week. And as the week went on, we could just see his belief go down. there Yeah, I don't think and don't think I'm going to get a sell this week.
00:10:43
Speaker
yeah It was just in his body language. You could see it. You didn't have to say it, but just in his body language, ah you could just tell he was down. He didn't have any belief. And then it came around to the last day. And I remember we had like five hours before our flights. So we're all getting out there for the last hour or two just to hit it, see if we can rip any same days.
00:11:04
Speaker
And I'm trying to hype up our guys a little bit. I'm like, hey, who's going to get out there? who's getting Who's getting the first appointment? Who's going to get the same day? And ah you know this individual, he's he's a little down. yeah He's still down, you could tell.
00:11:19
Speaker
And so I started asking him, hey, let's go. You're going to get out there, get a same day? And his response was just like, no, probably not. And I'm like, dude, if you think you're not going to get it, that's not going to happen.
00:11:33
Speaker
and So sometimes that that's what we need in sales. Hey, before we master sales, we need to believe that we are great, right? I think it's ah Brian Tracy says every master was once a disaster. Maybe it's Zig Ziglar.
00:11:49
Speaker
But even if you're not the greatest, you need to believe you're great. You need to believe believe you can go out and get sales. I was telling this guy, hey, do you think Kobe went out on the court are thinking ah we're down too much?
00:12:03
Speaker
We're down five. There's no way we can come back. There's no way it can hit the game winning shot. No, he had insane belief. hey And he was one of the best in the world. But ah the people that I've seen do great in sales,
00:12:17
Speaker
They believe they're great before maybe they are, right? I'm not saying you have to be all like and cocky and just talk down on other people because there's those type of people too, right? That they think they're the best and they're kind of, you know, a dick to other people.
00:12:35
Speaker
They be ah have humility and be confident, right? I think there's a difference between confidence and being, you know, stuck up, cocky, all that. think be humble and have confidence.
00:12:47
Speaker
And if you do that, you're going to progress at a level and you're going to notice that sometimes even if you don't have the skills, you can go out and get deals. So these things, they're three crucial things you need in order to master sales in 2025 and beyond.
00:13:05
Speaker
And last thing I'll say, so answer the question, how long does it take to master sales? So my opinion is this. I think...
Mastering Sales: How Long Does It Take?
00:13:13
Speaker
I think if you study, if you apply yourself, if you ah have apply the continuous learning, I think you really can become a master in sales in five years if you apply these things, right? If you're continuously learning.
00:13:27
Speaker
ah Just my opinion. But ah another thing is, i think in order to get to a level where you're proficient, I think it's three months. Okay, so some people that are newer, listen to this podcast, maybe you're in your first month in sales, maybe you're getting down on yourself, maybe you're about to quit.
00:13:45
Speaker
Give it a full three months of just all out hustle, all out learning, application. If you do that, I think it's but almost impossible that you're not going to have success. You're not going to get a deal in those first three months. I think you can get a deal rather.
00:14:01
Speaker
yeah um But even if you don't give it, I always tell our our new guys, give it three months. Treat those three months as just like training. Any deals you get, that's a bonus.
00:14:13
Speaker
And everyone should get a deal in three months. ah But ah just really treat the three months as your learning period. So don't get down on yourself. You're having a terrible week. Don't beat yourself up. um Don't quit.
00:14:25
Speaker
Give it three months. And I think that's how long it takes to get at least to a proficient level. where if you apply yourself after three months, you should be able to, just you know, confidence that you can at least get consistent deals.
00:14:38
Speaker
Okay, so I hope this helps someone out there. Five years to master sales. And I still think getting in there, I don't know if I've mastered sales. I've been doing this, what, 13 Okay, so sometimes I feel brand new.
00:14:50
Speaker
That's just how it goes. So even five years, still keep learning, right? Okay, send this to someone that maybe needs a little confidence boost, maybe someone that needs to master sales that wants to just figure out how to achieve their potential.
00:15:04
Speaker
Hope that helps you. Please send me your guest suggestions. Send me your topic suggestions. We still are needing more guests to come on the show. So we'd love to hear anyone that's producing at a high level or doing something different or interesting in the solar world.
00:15:19
Speaker
Hey, so hit me up. Love to hear from you. um Either social media or taylor at solarpreneur.com. Love to hear from you and we'll see you guys on the next one.
00:15:30
Speaker
So some of you already know that I run my own door to door sales team here in San Diego. And as we are gearing up for the summer, I realized if we do the same thing we always did, we're going to get the same results.
00:15:41
Speaker
But if I want to increase my deal flow, I need to do something different to get an advantage. Then we discovered an app called Solar Scout.
Innovations in Solar Sales: SolarScout and Solcite
00:15:49
Speaker
But it's not a door knocking app. It's a data platform that shows us who is likely to go solar in our market.
00:15:55
Speaker
It shows us who has previously applied for solar, but later canceled the deal. who has moved in recently, and even how much electricity the homes are using in a given neighborhood. It's been working for a lot of teams across the country, and now I'm on board too.
00:16:09
Speaker
I'm going to be one of the first to use SolarScout in San Diego, so I decided to partner up. But I told them, hey, if I'm going to talk about SolarScout on my show, you need give my listeners a great deal. and they did.
00:16:19
Speaker
So go to solarscout.app forward slash Taylor and book a demo with them and you'll get 10% off your first month when you sign up That's solarscout.app forward slash Taylor.
00:16:32
Speaker
Okay, back to the show. Hey, solar pruners, quick question. What if you could surround yourself with the industry's top performing sales pros, marketers, and CEOs and learn from their experience and wisdom in less than 20 minutes a day.
00:16:46
Speaker
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