Mastering Sales Foundations With Tom Hopkins (1 of 2)

When you're looking to learn something, how often do you look at the book or the course and say, I wonder what this person did in order to deserve the right to be able to have a conversation on this topic? Today we get to listen to Tom Hopkins, and there is no shadow of a doubt this man knows sales because he's done it. Now, I would love to give you an introduction to Tom Hopkins. However, Dan Kennedy is about to do it inside of the episode. Just note, Even though it is an hour-long episode, this is a two-part episode. So if you're ready to learn from someone who knows sales extremely well and you're ready to learn at a deep level, these next episodes are just for you. Let's jump in and listen as Dan Kennedy introduces Tom Hopkins.

I don't think there's anybody that has had a bigger impact in the field of direct response than Dan Kennedy. The legend of Dan Kennedy should be ignored at your own peril. They're not really less Lessons, they're kind of laws that you live by. Dan opened my eyes to what small business marketing looks like. Dan teaches strategic direct response that is timeless. His ripple effect touches people who don't even know his name.

The world as we know it was changed because Dan Kennedy became obsessed with marketing.

Welcome to the Magnetic Marketing Podcast with your host, Dan Kennedy.

You have a full evening with another longtime friend and colleague. We were just trying to figure out when we first got to know each other, and Tommy remembers 1980. He does not remember 1978 when I was just starting in speaking and met him at the National Speakers Association, and he cheerfully stayed in his circle of friends and ignored me because I was nobody. But so he remembers 1980, and I don't hold a grudge, so here we are. Tom and I spent a lot of time on the road together doing the Success events, and there's several things I want to tell you about Tom and about tonight. And to cut to the chase, the first thing that I will tell you is, is that, um, what he provides is critically important to you, to us, um, in every aspect of your business. Um, so it falls under the heading of sales, but for example, all direct response copywriting is selling in print or selling by media, often a principle that copywriters keep forgetting. And so if you aspire to write great copy, you really want your nose in the sales book even more than you want your nose in the copybook. And I've said on a number of occasions, in December of last year, if you were at our LA event, where Zig spoke, on my top shelf where I write copy, amongst the reference books that are there, there's a dictionary, there's a thesaurus, there's a frequently misspelled words dictionary, because I still don't know how to use spell check, and even if I did know how to use it, I wouldn't like it, and there's a words that sell thesaurus, But there's Zig's book, Secrets of Closing the Sale, and there's Tom Hopkins' number one book, which by the way is a sales book. Think about this, a book on selling, not Madonna's sex book, not Rachael Ray's cookbook, but a book on selling has sold 1.6 million copies at last count. And that's pretty much attributed to word of mouth. That's one salesperson telling another salesperson, telling sales manager, telling sales manager, but it's also copywriters telling copywriters. And so those are two reference books that those of us who are pretty smart about copy, we rely on. When you go to build marketing strategies, you're really implementing sales strategies. So don't be thinking, "Oh, this is a great evening and I'll have a good time, but it doesn't apply to me because I don't sell face-to-face or I don't sell on the phone." Some aspect of your business is dependent on your mastery of sales fundamentals. I have a client who, for who, gee, I've had for almost as long as Tom and I have known each other. And during the time that we've had a relationship, they've gone from a relatively small company to last year about $1.7 billion, and I no longer choose to travel across country to go to meetings, but for many, many years, they paid me to come to meetings, and mostly because I was the guy who would remind them, and this is, they enunciated this, I didn't, I was the guy who would remind them of essential direct response fundamentals and keep them from getting too far astray, even getting too cute, too clever, too creative, and getting too far astray from direct response fundamentals. And so they viewed me, their description was, we're paying him to be our direct response conscious, conscience, you know, the little guy that sits on the shoulder and whispers into the ear. I would say similarly, you need one of those to remind you of the proven and time-tested and always successful fundamentals of selling, and there could be no one better on the planet to have do that for you than Tom. So how did Tommy get so smart about selling? Well, you may know Tommy is a salesperson, began in the real estate business. He's a college dropout, by the way. Began in the real estate business and was knocking them dead. I think, well, I wrote it down to make sure I didn't screw it up. After his first 6 months in real estate, he was averaging a monthly income of $42. At that time, he was not getting any invitations to come show us how you're doing. What it is that you're doing. But only a very short period of time later, his last year full-time in the real estate business, 365 days, he sold a property every single day. 365 properties in 365 days. Now if you don't have a frame of reference for that, let me tell you, that's huge. I mean, that says enormous things about sales skills, about discipline, about consistency, about something we talked about at Renegade Millionaire Day, about having a system for selling, not doing random acts of selling and so forth. And so he's, he earned the right in his own career in selling to go ahead and become what he has become, America's number one sales trainer. More people pay attention to what Tom Hopkins has to say about selling than anybody else. There have been 3 million salespeople through his training programs and seminars, and you are in for a fantastic evening with a true authority and expert. Oh, and I must tell you one little piece of trivia. I just found out that Tommy and I have one other thing in common. We both work— well, I work to feed my racehorses. It turns out he works to feed his wife's racehorses. And so we're both laboring here this weekend for oats and hay. So keep that in mind when it comes time to give him money if you happen to be an animal lover. You should know that it's passing right through his hands. To his 75— to his wife's 75 horses in Ocala. So you're in for a great evening with, with a great friend of mine and America's number one sales expert, Tom Hopkins.

Thank you. Thank you.

Thank you, sir.

Thank you, my friend.

Have fun.

Thank you, Dad. Thank you. Let me ask you a question. What would you say to me if I said, "How's business?" What would you say to me?

Good.

That's what I want to hear. That's a test question. I want to teach you a great word. You can't say great when you've had the worst day of your life, but whenever you're asked how business is, get excited. You've always got to be excited in business. No one can ever see you down. So when they ask you how business is, get excited and go, "Unbelievable!" Because that covers it either way, doesn't it? Let's hear it. How's business? Unbelievable. How's your in-laws? Unbelievable. See, covers it either way. Now, because of you being entrepreneurs, owning your own companies, some of you own huge mortgage companies and real estate companies and all kinds of companies. I decided tonight I'd like you to look at this as a train-the-trainer program to where in essence what I want to teach you is designed for you to take back and through a series of meetings with your folks you teach what I teach you because they need this and they're not here. And so that's the way I'd like to approach tonight. It's kind of a train-the-trainer program. Now, how many of you agree that training is critical? You know what's the one thing that most companies don't do? They'll spend money on so many other things, but when it comes to getting a new person up and trained to where they can go out in the field and do their job eloquently and know exactly what to say, they don't spend the time and money on that. And I have watched so many companies that have a great, great company, but the people aren't trained. So I'm prejudiced because that's my job and I love training. So I'm going to do my best tonight to not only train you, but maybe I'd love to maybe have an ongoing opportunity to work with your team, your company, if you like what we do tonight. Alright? So Dan told you my beginning. I, uh, in fact, let me ask you this. How many of you didn't go to college? A few of you? Okay. Well, I quit college after 90 days. I broke my dad's heart. He came home, he said, "Son, I'll always love you, even though you'll never amount to anything." Now, that was my first motivational talk. And you know, I had something to prove because my dad said I'd never make it. I didn't know what I was good at. I'm 17, scared to death. My uncle helped me get a job as an iron worker. Now, do I have any men in the room that ever carried steel as an iron worker? Couple of you. Hardest physical labor on the planet. You see, this building made of concrete has no tensile strength. Without reinforcing bars. And the main bar in a big building is a number 11 bar, 1 3/8 inch in diameter. They are 208 pounds. The only way you get them out to the deck is men like animals carry them. So for a year, I carried bars on a bridge deck. One day I said, "I gotta do something else with my life." I mean, I was 6'2" when I started, and I said, "God, what am I gonna do with my life?" My dad said, "Son, you got a nice way with people. Why don't you get a real estate license?" I said, "Oh, Dad, you know I couldn't probably pass the exam." How many of you had to pass an exam to do what you do today? How many of you failed it the first time? Come on. Anyone the second time? Third time? How many times did you fail, sir? 3 times. Anybody beat 3? Stand up, won't you, sir? Give this man a hand because he never quit. You never quit. That is the key to success. You've never failed until you quit. I'm betting you got that little card that said you failed a 3rd time. You never dreamed 900 folks would applaud you for being such a failure. But you never quit, and I'm proud of you. That was what's happened to me. I passed the 4th time, and in 6 months, holding the record for the number of homes ever sold today still, I only made 1 sale. I didn't make that sale. Let's tell the truth. I didn't make it. I was the only one in the office. And a couple comes in and they said, we saw your sign on a home and they wanted to buy it. And luckily the husband knew how to fill out my forms. So what happened to change my life? I wrote a check for $150, now at age 18, to a man named J. Douglas Edwards, then called the father of American selling. He wrote the book on Closing the Sale. His records, that's all we had back then, most prominent selling records on selling in the world. And I went to see him for 3 days. It was $150. Now keep in mind, it's over 30 years ago, and that $150 meant a lot to me. But I learned all the questions of how you lead people to the decision, which is going to be a major part of our evening this evening. So as we get started, the 4th year in sales When I set some records, I knew, I knew I was gonna someday teach. So what I did was, after every sale, with a pencil and paper, I wrote down everything I said that worked, everything that didn't work, and started teaching phraseology to people. Now the first key to success in any business is attitude. Now how many agree with me on that? That's the key. So I want you to start with me every morning, and please take out your shower card. I have hundreds of thousands of people that join me in the shower every morning. Stand up if you would please with your shower card. And I'd love you to start your day reading your shower card in the shower. Now it's plastic, it'll hold up for a good year. By then you won't even need the card because you'll memorize it. I'd love you to start with me every morning. Let's read together, ready? I will win. Why? I'll tell you why. Because I have faith, courage, and enthusiasm. You need those 3 things today. You have to have faith in our country, faith in what's happening, faith in your business. Then of course courage, you got to do what you're afraid to do every day, which successful people do. And then of course enthusiasm. The word enthusiasm comes from a Greek word, "entheos," and "entheos" means the God within, the spirit you have about life. You got to have it in here before you can overwhelm people with your enthusiasm. Got to always be excited in business. Let's read the next one. "Today I'll meet the right people at the right place at the right time for the betterment of all." See, make your whole life a win-win. Everyone that meets you, be it a minute or an hour, is better for the time that you spent with them. Make your life a win-win. Next, I see opportunity in every challenge. See, we're all gonna have challenges. Crisis is part of life. It's an opportunity. Some of you aren't good at names, and because you say, I'm not good at names, I want to redo that. Your subconscious will start retaining names if you just tell it it's good at names. So ready? I am terrific at remembering names and faces. Watch how much better you get. Then the bottom: When I fail, I only look at what I did right. See, don't look at what you did wrong. You did something right. Then you turn over, get your back wet. I never take advice from anyone more messed up than I am. That's an important one. We all have people in our lives that are messed up, but they want to tell you what to do. Plan on getting lucky. Next: Today I will meet the right people in the right place at the right time for the betterment of all. Oh, I'm sorry. And then— see, just handle failure. It's OK. Right? Next, I turn negative thoughts into positive ones whenever they occur. Next, I'm a winner, a contributor, an achiever, and I believe in me. Try my little chant. Now let's see if you have some guts. Start with your left hand. Goes like this: I'm alive, I'm awake, and I feel great! Let's see if you got some guts. Ready? I'm alive, I'm awake, and I feel great! Now you start doing that, you watch how the adrenaline gets pumping. See, all athletes go through a mental psych-up period before they hit the competitive field. They don't just blase walk out there. They talk to themselves, they pound each other's pads, Some of the great golfers I know, they have certain rituals they go through. Then of course the last one, I love this one. I feel good, I feel fine, I feel this way all the time. Ready? Left hand first. I feel good, I feel fine, I feel this way all the time. Give it to me again. I feel good, I feel fine, I feel this way all the time. You do this for 21 mornings Tell your spouse what you're doing so they don't come get you with a net. Alright, have a seat. Let's go to work. Alright, now let me start off. The workbook is designed to follow my presentation, and I want to start on page number 1. Most people don't know the 5 steps to learn something. Many of your folks that work with you Maybe you've never heard of the 5 steps in the learning process, so I'm going to cover them quickly. But if you said to me, Tom, I want to be a better golfer, these are the 5 steps. You first have to hire a pro that gives you the impact. Now there's 4 impacts to learn something. And as you'll see in the blanks, hearing is the first impact. You hear something you want to learn. The second is writing. You must write what you want to learn. You'll see the fill-ins are on the screens on the side. And then, of course, you must read what you've written or you'll forget it. Then you must say what you want to learn through repetition of how you handle people, what you say to people. Now, the real key to learning is number 2, which is repetition. You must hear, read, or write and say something 6 times for 62% retention. I don't know how many of you are golfers. Of course, it's a passion of mine. And I play in California in the summer. It's too hot in Arizona. At a place called Sherwood Country Club, which is where Tiger Woods has his big annual tournament. And when he comes and plays, everybody's very respectful. But most of us that can't break 90 very often will hit 20 balls and head out to play. Tiger stands there, the number one golfer in the world, for 2 to 3 hours hitting balls because he realizes you can't stay number one if you still don't out-practice everyone. And that's the challenge with most people in business, or especially the groups I usually teach who are outside in the sales force. They don't learn what to say. They just keep saying what doesn't work and master it. That's why they have low incomes. Now, number 3 is you must use the material that you want to learn. Utilization is consciously making myself use the techniques. It's kind of like later on this evening, I'm going to tell you what to tell your people to say when a buyer says they want to think it over, because everyone in business is going to hear it. It's a procrastination stall that people have learned to say yes to anything. Well, they have to learn the words by first of all hearing, reading, writing the words. Then of course they have to go out and rehearse and repeat them. Then they have to use them. And then of course the day that I live for is when people I train get to step number 4, which is internalization. And that's when the techniques and strategies become a natural part of me. Meaning they become you, and the words are yours. Then of course here's the challenge a lot of us have in life and business. We get away from the things we did when we were new and we get into bad habits. So you've got to always have a time, number 5, of reinforcement, which means you go back to basics once a year. Every single year you say, "I'm going to retrain myself." Very, very important. Now I decided on the bottom of the page to just real quick give you an overview of the fundamentals, the fundamentals of the entire process of selling any product or service. And you must tell the people that work for you that if they don't have all three sides, they won't be a high-income person. Now the first part of it is A, product knowledge. That was my biggest problem when I started in real estate. I didn't ever purchase a home. I didn't understand financing. So, but the product knowledge is where your strength comes from. Then of course they must perceive you as a competent— that's important— competent expert, the way you come across with them. Then of course, B are the people skills, and there are 7 basic people skills. Now, if right now we had a professional golf instructor come out on the stage and say, "I'm going to give you a quick lesson," he'd say, "We're going to have 4 things we're going to cover: grip, alignment, stance, and posture. If you don't have those down, you will not have a decent, good swing." Well, there are 7 fundamentals in the people business. The first is prospecting. Finding a way to meet more people. Of course, that's one of the wonderful things with Dan and Bill and what they give you in these programs is ways to prospect. In essence, gently to meet, get your marketing program out. Number 2 is original contact. People judge you in 10 seconds, and that's why the way you come across visually and verbally in the very beginning has an impact on them, positive or negative. Then of course, number 3 is the qualification. The qualification is asking the right questions to find out if they are not only the decision maker, But if they are the ones that are interested in saying yes to your opportunity. And then of course presentation demonstration. How you show the product. How you present it at the table or desk or on the telephone and inside marketing. How you present with the words. And then of course number 5 is handling objections. People can't say yes to spend money until they first say no. So handling the nos when you present are very, very important. I'm going to try to spend the major portion of our short time together on number 6, which is closing the sale. The most misunderstood fundamental of all. Because the closing of the sale is getting the agreement and getting their approval, a check or their endorsement, and that's what most people don't do. And then of course you're not done when you close a transaction. You must learn the art of getting referrals. We call them quality introductions. Tell your people to drop the word referral because many people don't give referrals because they did and it was a bad experience, but they will give a quality introduction. So the key words are the quality introductions. And then of course I think the triangle or the pyramid, if you will, would fall over if you didn't have it built on a foundation of the right attitude, enthusiasm, disciplines, and goals. Which make up the foundation. The enthusiasm, the goals, that's your foundation, and that's kind of the overview of a sales and marketing program. Now let's go to page number 2. You might notice on the front of the book I call it the art, and my first book was How to Master the Art of Selling. I think selling is an art form just like any business is. How many of you like art? How many of you like realistic art? What it is is what you see. The landscaping, the seascape. How many like realistic? How many like surrealistic which you're not sure what Picasso or Salvador Dalí or what these guys were smoking when they painted? How many of you like that? I like them both and I collect them both because I have a passion, a love for art. And I really believe that the artist uses a blank canvas— watch this now— and with the canvas paints a picture hoping to be pleasing to the person watching it and thus paying for it. You that are in the communication business, forget selling. You that are employers with employees, you that are running a company, your job is to use your words to get things done. Because I think we're in the word business. Now there are words you can't let your people say. I had one of the fellows in the furniture business, and I was just thinking, I bet that when people walk in to see the furniture, that a lot of people on the floor say these words, and these words create the biggest enemy we have, which is on the top of page 2, and that's fear. Fear is what keeps people from making investment. So I'm going to ask you to try your best to get these words out of your company. Now the first word you don't want to say is the cost or price of the product or service. Because when it goes into the person's ear, "Our price is," immediately it triggers, "We should get some other opinions." So we always ask for the total investment or total amount. The total investment or the total amount. Number 2, don't let them know what the down payment is. Always call it the initial investment or the initial amount. The initial investment or the initial amount. Number 3, everybody almost in our country is up to here in debt. And that's why when you say monthly payment, they immediately see themselves trying to make their money stretch. So when you're going to give an amount, especially if your company finances something, always call it the monthly investment or monthly amount. The monthly investment or the monthly amount. Then of course number 4, this is a very scary word. When suddenly you pull out a form that's got printing on it and you call it a contract. Right away they go, "We're not getting near a contract." So any printed form should be called the paperwork, the agreement, or the form. Let's go over the paperwork and see how it looks. Number 5 is a scary word because almost everyone over 40 years of age bought something that was a good deal and ended up being a what? Bad deal. So don't call it a deal. Call it an opportunity or a transaction. This is an excellent opportunity for your company. This transaction will make your company very successful. Then of course, mom and dad are the ones that said don't sign anything. So instead of asking people to sign things, we ask them to either okay the paperwork, approve the agreement, authorize the document, or just endorse it as you would a check. And it's amazing how they'll okay it, approve it, authorize it, endorse it, they just won't sign it. Which is amazing. Don't call it a pitch when you're talking to your buyer. Call it a presentation. A presentation. On the top of the next page, number 3. When you say the word objections to someone, they think of ones they haven't forgotten. So I'm going to suggest you call it the areas of concern or concerns instead of objections. Areas of concern or concerns instead of objections. I know many of you, you're buyers of your product. You call customers. I personally have never liked calling people customers. Like if I had a mortgage company, my people that let me do the loans with them aren't customers. Because it's almost like a customer goes to a market, fills up the basket, and pays. I always love to call people that do business with me either the families or the companies or the people that we serve. People like to feel they're being served, not a customer. And then of course, I want you to try this next one. I test all these things with the people that have come to my training, and I'd love to have you try not asking for an appointment, because the word appointment for most people in business is an hour, and most of them are so darn busy they keep stalling you. Why don't you, for the heck of it, see if you can just pop by and visit with them? Sure would love to just pop by and visit with you. See, the pop by and visit has a connotation. I'm popping in and popping out. With a check, of course. That's why I'm here. Now, what do we call the thing that we keep when a baseball player keeps track of every hit, every out, every strike? What is that? That is their what? Batting average. Okay. A batting average for a professional baseball player, if it drops under.300, could be worth $500,000 or $1 million of their marketability in the professional game of baseball. Well, what I want to do with people in the field of communication is teach them to say better words to get people to say yes more often and thus increase their income by getting people to agree. And that's really what this process of saying the right words is. And again, I don't know how many of you or how many salespeople you have, but as part of a meeting, you may want to let them know that we're gonna try to eliminate these 10 words when we talk to our prospective buyers, because people judge you the moment they hear you. And 96% of the American population do not like salespeople and the thought of being sold because they come across too pushy, most of them. That's why in saying the right words, you soften the emotions, as we're gonna learn in some of these beautiful questions we're gonna talk about tonight. So that is some 10 words for you. Now the next heading on page 3, it says Prospecting Your Way to Riches. STP, see the people, which is really the key. We can't have people sitting around waiting. They gotta find ways to get out and talk, to meet more people, make more calls. And that's why in the top of page, or the bottom of page 3, It says selling is finding the people to sell and then selling the people that you find. That's the essence of it. STP, see the people. Also on the bottom, as you'll notice, it says understanding that prospecting is a numbers game. And that's why one thing we have to teach people is to— they must change their attitude towards the one word that most people hate. Now as you'll notice, and I'm gonna be on the Elmo again, one closed sale, as you see in the bottom, equals $100. Let's just use that as our formula. Then of course, if you make 5 contacts and you get one closed sale, in essence you're getting one yes and 4 nos. Now if we divide the 4 nos into the 100 that we earn, thus on the bottom each no equals $25. So now you've put a dollar value on being rejected. So when someone says no, you smile and say, "Thanks for the $25." And you know, some people will give you $200 or $300 if you just keep following up with them. Which makes rejection good. That's called the handle rejection game. Put a dollar value on it and have fun with it, okay? Now, let's look at the top of page 4. Top of page 4, it says making a powerful, positive, original contact. Now these are critical. This is not anything to do with selling. You meet another human being, the moment you meet them you want to do these things. Now you really must teach your people this first one because if I were to stop the average American in the street and I said, "What are some of the things you don't like about people in sales?" They would say they try to get too familiar too soon or they keep forgetting our names. So I'm going to ask these 6 things of you. I think you'll really enjoy your people doing this. The first one, number 1, use their names as they give it. Now, how many of you ever forgot a person's name after they give it to you? Can I see your hands? Gang, I messed up so bad one day. I had a couple with me for 2 solid days, and at the end of the last, second day, I found the right home. We got back to the office And I put— I went through the financing, and I looked at him and I said, should we put it down as Ron or Ronald? He says, Tom, I think Jim makes an awful lot of sense. I had called him the wrong name all day long, but he was secure. He didn't correct me, but he thought, man, if it's going to be in the document, let's get the right name. Here's another thing we always want to do when we meet somebody, regardless of the situation. Establish common ground with them. Try to find things in common as soon as you can because people like to do business with someone they feel they have something in common with. I had one woman that I— she called on an ad in the paper and I didn't know this, but her husband had given her strict orders that they weren't going to use a real estate agent. Well, I had questions and the phraseology down on how to handle an ad call, which is kind of a specialty, and sure enough, I ended up— they ended up coming in and you could just hear how mad he was, and of course when he drove in the driveway, I saw he had this membership of a golf course, one of the ones in the area, and I said, "Hey, I noticed you belong to such and such." We talked golf for maybe 5 minutes, And you could feel all that dislike just go down because we were talking commonality. Now, as trite as some of this stuff sounds, it is important. Find out what they have in common with you and they'll want a longer relationship. Then of course, number 3, always smile when you meet someone. Gang, if you look like you've been weaned on a pickle when they first see you, they, they won't warm up to you. So work on a nice smile when you meet folks. Folks, okay? I also think number 4, you must always let people know that you're here for them. Now, can you raise your hands if you are in retail at all? You got some retail folks? Okay, I'm gonna give you one quick suggestion. The average person walks into a retail business, let's say I met one of the fellows in furniture, And they usually walk in and the first thing that happens is a person walks up to them, says, "May I help you?" Now they've been asked that every single time they've walked in a store. So because they've been asked that, as a reflex there is, "We're just looking, we'll look around." Now you can't really talk with them without becoming pushy. So I'd love you that are in retail to have your folks when someone walks in, walk not towards them, that's threatening. Try to always walk kind of across their path when they come in as if you were going over here. Then turn and smile and say, "Thanks for coming in. I work here. What brought you in to see us today?" Now when you say, "What brought you in to see us today?" you haven't said, "May I help you?" You have qualified for the reason they burnt their gas, drove into your building, and walked in your office to invest time in your building. Hi, thanks for coming in. I work here. What brought you in to see us today? And you watch how the better beginning when people come to your retail. Okay, number 5, adjust your rate of speaking. This is another speech habit that when you're talking to someone, try to speak about the same pace they speak. In the beginning. Now you will meet what we call the empathetic person who's kind of a slow talker. Now what's the two things we think of when we think of a salesman? They're what? Fast talkers. You don't want to be a fast talker. See, if you sit down with someone and they are the real slow talker— Mr. Hopkins, uh, What is this all about? Well, I think when you see, you're going to be thrilled that we came in to visit with you today, and I'm awfully happy to work with you. I think you'll love what we do. We help to level up companies like yours. Right away, fast talker. So I'd slow down with him just for a while to have a rapport built. But the opposite is true of the A-type who's very impatient. I mean, if he's a fast talker, Mr. Hopkins, impressed with your follow-up, Bob sent you over here to see me, and I'm— "Kind of busy, but tell me what it's all about. I'd like to kind of know what you do." "We're very excited about—" See, you do that and the fast talker is sitting there going, "Come on, baby. Come on, talk to me now. Let me hear it." So you always want to speak about the same speed that they speak, at least in the beginning, okay? Then I think we have to relax people, and that's why I've developed this little introductory statement that I'd love you to take and see if it fits you. Notice, let me begin. I've already spent some time with you, we have a little rapport going. I look for some common ground with you. Let me begin by thanking you for the time that we're going to share. I hope we can consider this meeting And I love the word somewhat exploratory. I hope we can consider this meeting somewhat exploratory, meaning my job is to analyze your needs and show you how we at— name of our company— can assist you at this time. Now the reason I like that introductory statement is it kind of says to them, I'm not here to sell you anything, and they need to feel that. And I love the word somewhat exploratory. I hope you'll— I had you fill them in— I hope you'll make that part of it. I also feel that we should all become note-takers like a counselor. Meaning I always carried with me, I had it out of my briefcase, I had a legal pad binder. This is not threatening like opening a briefcase. And I had all my people carry these. Of course they have all the documents they need to close a transaction in here, but it's not as threatening as opening a briefcase. Briefcase scares people. Also, I think you need to get permission to make notes with people. I wrote this little sentence on the bottom, "You know, Mary, over the years I found it very beneficial to make notes during conversations so I could do a better job of helping people. So I hope you won't be offended if while we chat"— I love the word chat— "I just make a few notes." Now what I've said is, "Can I have permission to make notes so you get used to the fact that I write?" because they don't want to forget anything that's important to you. See, many people, again, if they are in sales, they don't take their pen out till the end, and that scares people. I want to get them used to everything in the beginning. I used to love it. I'd get to the first house that I was showing, and see, one of the things I want you to realize is I can't explain a lot of what I have created as far as my teaching. But this one thing I'll kind of show you here. This is what happens when you've closed over 1,500 homes in my career. I'm going to put these up here and let's hope they come up. Yay! Now all of you pick a number and don't tell anybody which number you've picked. You all got it? Okay, good. There should be 8% of you that picked number 1. So would you all raise your hands that picked number 1 for me? Now if you looked around the room and I counted them, I bet you I'm within 5 people of 8% of this audience. There will be 70% of you that picked number 3. Would you raise your hands, number 3? How do I know that almost 70% will always pick 3? I don't know. They just always do. And it was amazing when I developed this how I would then, showing my product, put the one in the middle that I felt was best, and it's easier for them to take it. So I began putting the finest property, if you will, here, these two preparing them, then one with a backup. And I again increased my closing ratio by 15% just by that one strategy. So all of these little things I hope you'll take and say, okay, I'm gonna start seeing how my folks can use these. Okay, now let's go to the top of page 5. This is the most overlooked, and I will also say underrated, step in selling, and that's qualification. Now let me explain this to you this way. The average person has a tendency to want to get people to do things and they have a tendency to make statements of fact to get them done. Now my whole premise in my teaching is to get yourself out of the way and think of not what you want, but you really want to uncover their needs. Now I took the acronym NEEDS, N-E-E-D-S, N-D-S. And this acronym will trigger the type of things you need to ask before you decide what you'd like them to say yes to. And as you can see, I have the acronym there in your book. The N stands for what do they have now? You want to spend more time on their past experience. Now here's the basic truth that I know Dan and I have learned over the years: average people don't make big changes in their habits of purchasing. You tell me what you have now, and I'll get a good feel for what you have, or what you'll say yes to next time. So what do you have now? Then I want to know, what do you enjoy about what you have now? Then I want to know what you want to alter. I'm going to just put them up here and then we'll put them, then decision maker, and then I'm going to put them up on the screen and then the word solution. Okay, now enjoy alter decision maker solution. So, tell me your past and I'll give you a little pretty good idea. That's how I knew that So many of you would pick number 3 because the past always happens. What are you going to enjoy about what you have now? Then what would you like to alter about what you have now? And then of course D, who is the decision maker? That's an important one. Many people are talking to the wrong person because they don't ask this question. See how nice that is? John, Mary, if we're fortunate to find a whatever to satisfy your needs, who other than yourself would be involved in the final decision? Great question. Very important question. And I really believe almost all of us are in the solution business. We find out the need, and then we satisfy it with our solution. With our solution. Okay, now look at the next heading. The presentation or demonstration is nothing more than preparation for the close, and during the presentation you keep control by asking the right questions. Let me, if I can, real quick show you something I think you'll have fun with. What is your name? Maureen. We've never met before, have we, Maureen? No, sir. To increase the learning experience and the enjoyment of the audience tonight, you wouldn't be offended helping me, would you? No, sir. Nice of you to volunteer. Thanks. Let's give Maureen a hand for volunteering. Come on up here, Maureen. Come on up here real quick. You're going to love this. You can have such fun with this. You can do this not only in business, you can do it You can do it at a party. I love jokes. I collect humor, and this is kind of fun. So what I'm going to ask you to do, I'd like you right on the end, if you'd just grab your book and your pen, and I need you to just come right over here. Now, Maureen, have a seat here and just relax. I'll be right back. Now, sir, would you just write down at the bottom of that page One of the 52 cards in a deck of cards, but don't let anybody know what it is, just you and me. Just anywhere, let me see it nice and big. Don't make it an ace so they'll think we're working together. See, most people start there. Do it another one. And give me the suit. And cover that up. Just stand right there for a second. Now Maureen, you've played cards once or twice, haven't you? Yes. If I'm not mistaken, there's 52 in the deck, isn't that right? Yes. And there's two colors, there's red or there's black. Would you name the red or black? Black. That's right. Now, on the black, we have two types. We have clubs or spades. Would you name the clubs or the spades? Clubs. That's right. Now, on the clubs, we have two types. We have face cards or number. Would you name the face or the number? Number. And that again would leave you with the face, wouldn't it? Okay. Now, on the face, we have got three choices you seem to enjoy. We have the jack, queen, or king. Would you name the jack, queen, or king of clubs? Queen. And that would leave you the Jack or King, wouldn't it? Yes. What would you name the Jack or King of Clubs? King. I think you found it. See, we don't believe in pushing people. We want them to make their own decisions. And what did you write down, sir? King of Clubs. Didn't Maureen do good? Give her a big hand. Now stay there for a second. I'm not teaching you a card trick, and you can have a seat, and thank you very much. I'm not teaching you a card trick. I'm teaching you a basic premise of leading people through the art of questioning. And that is really the key to getting everything you want in life, is not telling people, but designing the right questions. You see, we led her to one of these, and we did it through questioning. Now here's what 3 things that you really, I hope, will take from this. And if you'd make a note on the bottom of page 4 under the— what would you be offended if while we chat and make a few notes, would you make a note, it's my job to qualify. Now this is our job to qualify before we decide what's best for people. Make a decision. My job is to qualify, make a decision, and lead them to it. My job is to qualify, make a decision, and lead them to it. And that's really what we do in business. We qualify as the decision maker—now, enjoy, alter, solution—then we lead them to the decision. The second thing we learned from the card trick is they must know all the answers. Make sure you never let your people ask questions they can't answer. You threaten them. I've got some of you that are in a high technical selling situation in your business. Be careful if you meet someone who's not real talented technically that you don't threaten them with too much information. Because they can get afraid because they don't understand, but they won't tell you that. So they must know the answers. Well, you notice how smart Maureen was, is I gave her all the answers before I asked her the question so she couldn't make a mistake. Now here's the last thing about leading with questions. Every answer must confirm the fact they're going ahead. Every answer must confirm the fact they are going ahead. Now on the bottom of page 5, I want to give you a question that you can have such fun with. You can use this little question form, and I teach 42 different questions. This one is so fun, and as you notice in the bottom, you'll see A, it's called the tie-down. And that's question number 1 of 42, the tie-down. Notice the definition: a question at the end of a sentence that demands a yes. I've used a couple this evening, haven't I? In fact, that was one, wasn't it? I did it again, didn't I? You're catching on, aren't you? They're kind of fun, aren't they? See, it's taking "isn't it," "doesn't it," "wasn't it," "couldn't it," "wouldn't it," "shouldn't it," "couldn't you," "haven't you," "couldn't you," "wouldn't it," and you put them on the end of your sentences and you nod. You'll be amazed, they will nod with you. I've written 3 for you. A reputation for professionalism is important, isn't it? They can't say no to that. Oh no, we want the rottenest company we can find. Or look at the second one, investing in a quality product. Gosh, makes a lot of sense, doesn't it? Or this opportunity is exciting, don't you agree? So we'll take this quick break.

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