ARE YOU DOING WHAT THE BEST SALESPEOPLE ARE DOING?

You often hear the term will and skill when we talk about salespeople. Sales managers use it a lot. It's kind of an oversimplification of what they're looking for in salespeople. And today, we're going to be talking about more on the will side, but both sides of will. Because when you hear will, you think of Grit, determination, resilience. We're going to be talking about that. But then there's the other side of it, the willingness to change, the willingness to self-reflect, the willingness to hold yourself responsible. And talking about things like creativity, I've brought that up in several episodes. And a lot of people ask me, can you give me an example of creativity? And I always respond, well, that's me being creative, not you. A lot of people have a hard time with this because certainly today we're taught to be robots. Managers and companies think that they can just copy what the unicorns are doing and get the same results. It doesn't work. There are unicorn Mostly because they had the timing right. They had the product that was a little early and they hit a wave and they executed very well. I don't want to take anything away from them, but most of us are not working for a unicorn. Most of us are working for just a regular company. It's got a good product. There's a market for it. And it's hard to get in front of these people. People are being bombarded by spam all day long, robocalls, you know, you know the game. Today's example, I think, is you really need to study because it has the part of will, the grit, the determination, uh, having done— he's gonna— his stories about from going from door-to-door sales all the way up to Selling technology. And what you hear is a bunch of great examples of applying both sides of will, the grit and determination and the ownership of changing himself. And most of us don't want to even look at that. Why? Because we're mammals. And mammals react Instinctually, meaning that we tend to view the world like we understand it best. We understand it completely, which could not be more distant from the truth. We're all kind of delusional that way. We protect ourselves. It's called homeostasis. We naturally want to feel comfortable. Safe. That's our highest priority, is that safety, that security, that survival. And we tend to rationalize away anybody who makes us think differently. So it becomes almost a catch-22. We can't see the things that we need to change in ourselves because we're protecting ourselves. Blind spots. We all have them. We all have a lot of them. And they are really the main obstacle because most people get the gritty side of will, the determination, the consistency, the hard work. That's frankly the easy part. The hard part is looking at yourself and asking yourself, how much empathy do I really have? Do I have the right amount of confidence at the right time? Am I able to change and adapt to the situation? Those are hard things. And I bet right now you're saying to yourself, well, I'm pretty good at that. Well, are you? Do you have the income that you want? Ask yourself that. Well, I need a better job, a better manager, better territory. Okay. How many times can you do that before you realize it's you? It's us. We have to really take a look and build us as human beings to go to market in the way that the market wants us to arrive. It's all about them. It's not about us. Let's get into the interview. Before I do though, if you haven't checked out Start the Conversation, Get the Meeting, and you want to get away from spam and rejection all day and learn how people want to be approached— everybody wants to talk, everybody wants a connection, but nobody wants to be pitched. Nobody wants to enter a sales process unless They decide to. Today we're trying to entice people or scare people into a sales process, and since everyone's doing it, it has become almost ineffective. As one person said in the course yesterday, 0.0 results until he took the course. And it's not a better way to pitch. It's a smarter way of connecting and engaging with people. Some people call it old school. I call it effective. Today, old school is what works and new school is what keeps you busy. Do you want to be busy or do you want to be rich? It's an easy question. Sales is a skill. It's not just a brain-dead cadence. Check out Start the Conversation, Get the Meeting. Also, I sat down with Brevity this week, brevitypitch.com, and I've been positioning mostly as a call practice role-play product, but it is so much more than that. Imagine having a buddy that you could test each other, practice every day, not just about a sales call, but maybe Q&A about Uh, business acumen. Let's say you got into security for the first time and you don't know what all those acronyms mean. Wouldn't it be nice to ask and answer, dig into it, have somebody prompt you with certain questions and certain different angles, and you would be able to do that on your own with no judgment? No judgment? My life is about judgment. I'll be doing some more videos on LinkedIn about the product. But if you really want to have a great sales buddy to make you better, because the better you are, the more you sell, the more you sell, the more you make. Check out brevitypitch.com.

Here we go.

Hey Vance, thanks for joining us today. As a way of getting started, give us a little background on yourself.

Yeah. So, I mean, where would you like me to start, Brian? I mean—

Sales relevant stuff. Like how'd you get into sales or why?

Yeah. So, I mean, I got into sales really early. I feel like when I was probably about 10 or 12, one of my aunts actually told me, she's like, this kid needs to be a salesperson. I don't think anyone would like, anyone would not like this kid. So I remember from a very, very early age that that was kind of something that I might be good at. So, but how I started my career, I basically started with door-to-door sales. I thought that was the best way to really earn your keep and have a good sales base, you know, with really just figuring out how to gain someone's attention when you're, when you're, they're completely on the defense opening up their door. So I started with door-to-door sales. Got into commercial real estate and did commercial real estate brokerage as well. And now I'm in the multifamily property management, prop tech sales industry. So that's kind of my journey along the sales path.

So nothing but easy jobs, right?

Yeah, nothing but super, super easy, mellow jobs.

Taking orders and—

Exactly. No, I mean, I probably, in my door-to-door days, I was doing about I want to say like 200 to 300 doors a day. And then when I was on the commercial real estate side, about 250 to 300 calls a day. So very high volume sales environments that really got me my base to kind of, you know, got me to where the success I've seen today.

So what was the door-to-door in the commercial real estate commission only?

Yes, both commission only. Yeah. Wow.

Yeah, I think that's hard, but it's good, right?

Yeah, it's definitely difficult. But like I said, I think it like, it gives you a really, really good couple of pillars to stand on when you are in that environment because you either sink or swim. Yeah.

And how did you manage the rejection? Because as a, you were probably a young guy, right?

Yeah. Yeah, no, for sure. The rejection is tough. I personally am a— I went on a church mission for 2 years. So getting rejection from, you know, selling the Lord is really, really difficult. So doing that, especially speaking a different language, I was down in Argentina at the time. So I was like, if I can do this, I can do anything.

Well, you're not the first person I've interviewed that had that experience. Yep. And let's face it, you were probably what, right out of school?

Yeah, I was. I think I had a year of college experience when I went.

So 19?

Yeah, about 19. Yeah.

Foreign country.

Foreign country, Argentina, and foreign language. And then also, you know, you're trying to tell people the way that they lived for the past however many years they've lived has been wrong.

And you have the answer.

Exactly. So it's, One of the most difficult sales possible, I think.

Yeah. Well, it's gotta be great training.

Yeah. No, it's, I mean, it's like military training in some ways.

Boot camp.

Yeah.

Yeah.

And it's, you know, very arduous and you have a very strict schedule and, you know, besides the trumpet, it's pretty much military.

And it's not like They pair you up with somebody more experienced so you just don't goof off all day and—

Right, right. I think, I mean, it has a really good structure to it. I mean, with any type of environment like that where you're learning a ton, you need somebody to lean on. And I think mentorship is so important. That's like one of the first things I tell all new salespeople or all people in general getting into a career that they're trying to seek is, hey, go find somebody that's successful and go try and emulate what they did.

Yeah, because when I started with drop-bys, it was really, you know, go to industrial park, visit every company in the industrial park.

Yep.

And, you know, I first tried it by myself, but then they paired me up with a guy who had more experience.

Mhm.

And then we just kind of battled who could be the most creative, because there was no fun just dropping your stuff off. It, it was only fun if you got a meeting.

Right.

So if you chatted up the receptionist, you know, worst case, she'd give you the name and when to come back.

Right, right.

A little creative.

Yep. There's always a different little angle or different, you know, it's always funny because there's no matter who you are from a sales perspective, everyone has a little bit of a different sauce that they like to use. It's so fun to learn from that, you know. I, in every single position I've been in, I've been like, oh wow, I've never thought about it that way. That's such an interesting way to go about it. So you probably learned a lot from your mentor doing the same thing. You're like, oh, I never, I never would've thought of doing it that way, you know?

Well, well, that's it. Because if you only get paid on results, you know, all that pain is just nothing. It's nothing, right?

Yeah, exactly.

Which is different than a mission. But when you get into commercial real estate, You only eat what you kill, right?

100%. No, I mean, digging kind of right into what we were talking about with commercial real estate was really interesting because you're in a boiler room, you're in a bullpen, and you just have calls left and right and you're hearing everybody's conversation. And when you're doing 250 calls, you have a pretty good idea of who's successful, who's pretty average, and who's below average. And when I was Right out of college, starting as a commercial real estate broker, I thought, you know, this person's really good, this person's pretty average, this person's below average. How can I differentiate myself from those average and below average people? And it was really interesting because I personally would hear these calls and the, you know, the people that were on the below average or average side were doing this very scripted call. You know, they were doing the, Hey, I'm so-and-so from Marcus and Millichap. Hey, I'm, you know, and they're doing that scripted call and they're, yeah, I mean, if you do enough calls, someone's gonna give you a positive response, but you wanna have that high—

A lot of calls.

Exactly. So I thought, you know, how can I make this more conversational? So what I started doing, and luck, I mean, I was the Rookie of the Year this year, I think largely for this reason, is I just decided to make it a conversation. completely outside of not real estate, you know, not talking about their properties. So when I picked up the— they picked up the phone, I would be like, hey John, how are you doing? How's everything? You know, that was my intro. It wasn't, hey John, I'm so-and-so from whatever. It was very subtle difference, but that made such a world of difference in my view.

This is it because I was listening to this other podcast where somebody was calling that old school selling and I'm like, So what doesn't work is new school selling. What works is old school selling. But people have been selling off the script since selling started, right?

Yep. Yep.

But what drove you to be a little creative, get out of your shell, just warm up to people?

Yeah, I think like once again, I just wanted to kind of see what was working, what wasn't, you know, like, and at the end of the day, like, Did I want to be average? No, I wanted to be way above average. So I'm thinking, okay, I got to spruce something up or I've got to just change little wording because at the end of the day, these people are getting calls. You know, I know that they're getting calls. So how can I make my call just a little bit different, you know, and from there just start a conversation.

Right. And no one's waiting for a rep to call about commercial real estate.

Exactly. But if you say, hey, hey Brian, how are you? How have things been? Now you're thinking, you're going, who's this guy? Exactly.

Where do I know this guy?

Exactly. And now you're asking me questions instead of me asking you questions.

Trying to figure out how do I know you?

Exactly. And I'm going, oh yeah, you know, I sent you an email from blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. And then that opens the conversation.

And so sounds like, is it competitiveness? Is it lack of, or the, just the hatred of being mediocre?

Yeah, I think, I mean, I've been a sports person, you know, I'm a big surfer and a big basket— I love basketball. And I mean, you could probably see in the background here, I got a couple of Kobe posters. I'm a big Laker fan. And from my end, you know, Kobe was such an inspiration to me. He, You know, his competitive drive, his needing to win. I think like for me, I mean, I'm not, I'm no Kobe, but I definitely feel like I've taken a little bit of that, you know, Mamba mentality from him where I just, I see competition and I want to and need to be at the top. And I think something that I learned a lot from Kobe as well was you learn a lot more about your failures than you do from your successes. And when you fall, learning that lesson so you don't fall again. So like the, I think that's part of the reason that I've been so successful.

And because what I'm finding that people have, you've heard the saying will and skill, right? And I think too many people misinterpret the will as only the willingness to do the hard work. I think what they've been missing, it's really the willingness to change your personality to what will work. Right.

No, 100%. That's, I mean, and think about it, Brian, like that's the hardest part. It's not, you know, the hardest part is changing who you are naturally, right? Like how you naturally think about things and having to tweak that. I mean, think about anything. I mean, you, you in a relationship that you're in, like I always think about my wife. The hardest thing is, you know, I know I don't wanna do the dishes or I don't wanna do laundry and me trying to change that habit. You know, it's, it's, that's the difficult part. That's like the natural part of me is saying I don't want to do this and now having to go try and do that.

Right. Because sales, who wants to talk to strangers all day and get hung up on? Nobody.

Nobody.

Right. Who wants to handle objections? Who wants to, you know, give it another try? Be creative. It's all counterintuitive. It goes against our grain. Who wants to knock on a stranger's door?

Trust me, after doing that for 3 years, I was, I was just about done knocking.

And so how did you get out of commercial real estate? Because you're much more on the technology side now, right?

Yeah. So, I mean, just kind of give you a framework. I was waking up at 3 a.m. and commuting into L.A., so I would start my days— I'd go work out in the morning and start my days around 6:00 AM. And then from 6:00 to about anywhere from 7:00 to 8:00, be working, um, you know, obviously making dials, then, you know, doing a lot of the analytical work from like a commercial real estate property standpoint, um, you know, 1031 exchange analysis, all that stuff. Um, and that started to wear on me. I started to feel that You know, this isn't sustainable for me and my personality. I definitely, I had a new wife at the time that wasn't sitting real well with her. And I was seeing her for about 30 minutes a day. It wasn't cutting it. So I started to think, you know, I need to figure out something where one, just to have a better work-life balance. I was really just working too much and it wasn't healthy for my overall being. So I just decided to kind of look. I had a couple of friends who were in the multifamily crop tech space and I just reached out and said, hey, what's available and moved down to San Diego once I found the right company.

And what was the adjustment like?

The adjustment was interesting. Like it seems so much easier. I, you know, obviously learning product and learning tech and how to navigate corporate world and like the internal versus external aspect of sales orgs and just cross-departmental functions was a little bit different. But I did think it was a pretty natural, from the sales point of view, pretty natural and easy fit because from the commercial real estate side, you really, like, it's very, very cutthroat. The clientele that you're working with is very difficult and very specific. And then in the multifamily proptech side, you know, the people are a lot more open to having conversations and Yeah, I mean, I wasn't having to do 250 calls anymore, so I had a lot more time to dig into the product and figure out, you know, the multifamily landscape and how the industry worked. And so it was, it was a, I would say, very, very easy transition actually.

And were you replacing in-house systems or paper systems or?

Yeah, so we were selling what was called, it's called payment processing, utility billing. So, you know, when a resident goes and pays their rent, They have to have a portal and a couple of different options like credit card, ACH, you know, when you're renting an apartment. So we were the facilitators of those payments. And then we also had like a utility billing product. So when you get billed back for the utilities at an apartment, we actually facilitated that tech. So there was a couple of different products that we would sell, but those were, it was all kind of facilitated and surrounding the resident lifecycle.

And I gotta believe change was the real competition, you know, they've already got something in place or—

Yeah, I think there's 2 things. One, like change is always difficult. You're having to try to preach a concept and tell people that what they were doing is not right. So that's one, I think that's a constant in sales, right? But 2, I think another thing is, hey, you know, urgency when you're talking about These type of operators have so many different initiatives and so many priorities. You know, they're, maybe they have a building that's on fire, maybe they have a resident that got shot. You know, you don't, there's so many different priorities. I've heard crazy, crazy stories. You have like, Oh. I have a list, but there's so many competing priorities. So for you to say, hey, like, let's go switch out your payment processor, They're like, okay, that's great. I think it might be a good idea. We might have to talk about this in 6 months, you know. So it's just kind of, it's competing priorities and also just, you know, committing people to saying what they're doing today is wrong.

What was the hardest part of selling? Because you went from kind of a more direct one-to-one sale, is that true? To more one-to-many people in the account.

Right. No, 100%. I think when you're talking about an ownership group or an owner of properties, several properties, you're talking to just one person, right? And it's just single-threaded. And it's very multi-threaded now in the multifamily space. And that was actually pretty difficult for me because you're not talking to one, you're talking to many, and you're having to prove the concept to not just one person or win over just one person, but you're having to compete with a bunch of different personalities as well, right? So knowing like the buyer map and saying, okay, these are the different types of personas, this is what's important to them, this is what's important, you know, to marketing, to finance, this is what's important to the C-suite. You really kind of have to break those down, which I think was probably the most difficult for me was trying to navigate that.

Yeah, you just gotta think like many different people.

Right. I mean, what may be important to finance, which is, you know, the bottom line and how is this gonna pencil? And what does the contract look like versus marketing, which is how is this gonna affect my brand? How is this going to affect the way our company is perceived in the marketplace? You know, those are 2 very, very different things. So trying to figure out, okay, my product is this singular product, but how does it fit into both buckets for 2 different parties?

So the strategy is much more important And kind of probably even more important than the prospecting.

Exactly. The prep that goes into the calls that I, that I am hosting now is a lot more than it was in commercial real estate.

And what do you do different or better than most in this space?

I think the average salesperson I think I'm good at being creative. I think like at the end of the day, like that's, that to me is what sets me apart from the rest, in my opinion. In my opinion. Sorry about that. I think that's what, you know, a lot of salespeople get lazy and they decide, okay, this is what so-and-so is doing. Let me just, you know, copy and paste.

Yeah.

You know? And I typically like to think, okay, this is what everyone's doing. It's kind of like what I said in commercial real estate. You know, I saw the script that everyone was saying and I'm like, okay, that doesn't— that's not going to work for me. How can I make this creative? So I try and look at different angles. You know, like, here's a good example. I showed up to a client's office and they said, oh, hey, I had to take a last-minute flight. I actually won't be in the office today. And I was going to do an in-person visit. I said, all right, well, I'm here. I'm either gonna drive home and, you know, make this a wasted effort, or I can go bang down on that door and say, hey, I was supposed to meet with so-and-so and I'm here. He went on a last-minute flight. Let's chat, you know, and that's exactly what I did. And that has ended up being a huge opportunity for me because I think most salespeople would say, count that as, you know, okay, like it's not gonna work out. I'll figure this out later. Whereas like, you know what? No, I'm not gonna waste my time. I'm gonna go make this effort worth it. Yeah.

And did you have this confidence before kind of the mission and before you did the door-to-door?

And my mom would probably tell you yes.

With her? Yeah.

I personally, I think yes, like I definitely think I had a little bit of that, but I think as my sales career grew, Um, especially like post-mission. Um, I had the most confidence that I, that I'd ever had. And I think part of that was due to me being thrown out in the street and said, hey, figure out the language, figure out how to, you know, preach the gospel. And that, that kind of really allowed me to gain the confidence I have today.

And was it just gradual, like just exposure therapy, or was it something that you kind of told yourself or someone told you how to do it?

That's a good, that's a good question. I think, I think it's exposure therapy. Uh, 'cause like at the end of the day, like you can be told things and you can be trained things, but at the end of the day, if you don't go do it, it's like anything, like you can't really fully figure it out. Yeah. Um, so I, I'd say just for those that are having confidence issues, like just get outta your comfort zone. You have to just try.

Every day.

Yeah. You know, I don't know. What do you think, Brian?

Well, you know, I had to do the same, not, you know, mission or anything, but I certainly wasn't a born salesperson. And I just, I talked to myself and I said, if I don't do this, I'm not gonna make the money. If I don't make the money, I'm wasting my time.

Right.

So it was baby steps, right?

Yep.

And, you know, same thing with cold calling. I went from being an engineer, not having to talk to anyone all day, to having to talk to people all day.

Pretty, pretty, pretty solid difference there.

And, you know, I've told people before, the first hangup I got, I had to go out and run 5 miles to get over it. It was not a, a blip, it was a bang.

Yeah. Thanks.

But if you don't do it, then you kind of fit into this cocoon and you protect yourself and, but you're not really getting anything.

Yep. No, 100%. Yeah, I hear you.

And what do you see most salespeople doing wrong?

I think most salespeople get complacent. And, you know, once again, like the average to below average salespeople, I feel like they're not harping in on their skills and figuring out how they can do better. A lot of good salespeople, they listen to their own calls and they pick it apart and they figure out little tweaks within those calls, even if it's a fantastic call. Every single one of those calls could, could have something to pick apart. And I think like from my end, like what I would do is I'd pull up my call and I would figure out, okay, what was my talk time? You know, so if I'm talking 80% of the time and the client's talking 20% of the time, that's completely backwards.

Yeah.

You know, that, and I had real struggles with that coming into this industry. I was talking way too much. And not asking enough questions. So like that, for example, yeah, I may have been closing deals, but at the end of the day, like I wasn't, I wasn't doing as much as I probably could because I wasn't getting my clients talking. That's when the real sales, you know, motion happens is when they're selling themselves instead of you having to do the selling. Yeah.

And that's counterintuitive. It's like, It's very intuitive to talk. It feels good. You're releasing stress. You think you're doing something.

Yeah, totally.

You're moving it forward.

Yep. You actually are spinning your wheels, you know, which is crazy.

You're annoying somebody. Exactly.

The person on the other end is like, when is this guy gonna shut up?

Yeah. Because, you know, I always found the investment in designing your questions got you 100 times more than, you Your statements.

100%. That is so true.

You know, the right question at the right time with a big pause after it, forcing the other person to almost answer, have to answer.

Totally. The pause is so powerful.

And hard to do.

Very hard to do. It's so awkward. You want to, you want to, you know, you're sitting there in that gap of space and you're like, how can I fill this?

And what drives you? Is it the competition? Is it the money? Is it the—

It's a combination of things. I mean, I just had my first kid and I think my motivations always change. I think initially when I got into my sales career, I was like, okay, I wanna prove people wrong, you know, I wanna try and, you know, it's funny because like I have an older brother and I'm the second of 4 and My older brother has, you know, always been the best at everything he does. And he, you know, he's just, you know, such a great person that I'm like, okay, I'm this kind of second, you know, wheel that's not necessarily pulling the amount of weight that the first is. And I was always trying to, you know, I had kind of that chip on my shoulder, uh, wanting to make sure that I was proving people wrong. But I think now it's a little bit different. It's, you know, I've kind of in my tenure said, okay, now I have a kid and a wife and I'm trying to, you know, provide a better future for them. So it's a little bit more about legacy at this point. Yeah.

So you're looking more long-term.

Yeah, a little bit more long-term. I think initially I'm like, ah, I gotta be the best, you know, I gotta, you know, this, that, and the other. And now it's changed a little bit.

And plus the middle child thing, there's a lot to it. Yeah. You know, because you're kind of overlooked, you kind of got to do something to get attention.

Yep. And I had no shortage of that. No shortage of me trying to get my own attention. I'll tell you that much. Are you— do you have siblings, Brian?

Yeah, I'm the second of 4 as well.

Okay. So you get it.

Well, yeah, I know exactly what you're going through because, you know, and my younger brother was very close. So it was like, you're, you're the baby for like an hour and a half and then someone else comes along and now you're in the way.

100%. It's funny, my brother, my older brother's about 2 and 2 and a little bit more, uh, 2 years and a little bit more. And then my younger brother and I are like a year and a half apart. So it's like same thing. Same exact thing. You kind of feel like the third wheel in some cases. But yeah, I mean, it just, it's the nature of the beast.

And when younger reps come to you, what do you see them not getting? Because the chip on the shoulder is kind of the driver to make those counterintuitive changes, the willingness to not just brush off the creativity. Or the go-getter.

Yes. So your question is what are they asking me or?

Well, you know, everybody wants like the silver bullet. They want like, okay, like how'd you get that deal? What was the subject line? They think it's something simple and repeatable copy. Let me just, can I have your template?

Yeah, exactly. It's funny, like you can tell on a new rep side if they are intuitive enough to understand the greater picture or not. And, you know, that it's funny because I, my first advice for any new rep when they come to me and say, hey, how'd you get X and Y deal done? I say, okay, hey, look, you have to figure out how to get in front of these people in ways that they've never been gotten in front of before. So this person, you know, is trying to avoid all of the nonsense that's in their inbox.

Yeah.

So how do you do something different? I'm huge, huge, huge on text. I have gotten more deals over text than I have ever over email. And I think the reason for that is email is inundated. It's so—

It's overdone.

It's overdone. And like, that's something that a lot of reps really have issues with is they try and hang themselves on the email side of things because Because I think that's where business is done, but it's not. At the end of the day, people are focused on, you know, things that are different, things that are grabbing their attention. And a text is much, much likely, more likely to get a response than an email, no matter what your subject is.

Is it a cold text where they have no clue who you are or is it, yeah, do something first, then text?

I mean, it depends. I've used it in a couple of different ways, but yeah, in some cases I've been a cold text where it's like, hey, it's Vance from, you know, wherever. wherever I'm at at the time. And it's, that has gotten me results. And yeah, there's a couple that are uncomfortable and don't like text and, you know, it is what it is.

Right. And it's that uncomfortableness. How about like empathy? They're trying to think like the client, not just feel what they're going, but really like, how do I think like they're thinking?

Yeah. And I mean, it's funny, we're talking about text and talking about this at the same time. I think like, I, there's so many times where I said, hey, I know your inbox has gotta be incredibly just full. This is why I'm shooting you a quick text. I had sent you an email, but, you know, I, and I've done that and that immediately will get a positive response because they're like, oh, they actually understand what I'm going through. So yeah, I think empathy's a big one where if you show that, upfront to a client or a prospect, they'll definitely give you a very heartwarming, a more heartwarming response in my opinion.

Yeah. And also you kind of did the personas within the account, the stakeholders and what they're thinking about and what they care about.

Yep. Yep.

Where new reps don't think like that. They think logically the product does this, it's worth this. Why aren't you buying it?

Exactly. This is a no-brainer. Yeah.

You know, why aren't you ready to go?

Yeah, exactly. You know how many times I've heard no-brainer in our industry? It's like, you guys, they've heard this literally at every company that's reached out. Like, how can you say, okay, this director of marketing is very, you know, very heavy on brand image. How can you tailor your message to that? So when you're sending a text, say, hey, I was thinking about you. I say that all the time. Hey, I was thinking about you the other day. I saw this pop up, you know, you know how easily that's being responded to, you know, they're picking up their phone and think, oh, someone's thinking about me. You know, that, that's huge.

It's a give. It is though. It's not a big give. It's a little gift, right?

It's a little give. Exactly.

That's, I like that.

Yeah.

What would you wish you had learned 5 years ago that you've got down now?

I think something that I wish I knew before and learned is how important internal relationships are. They're either, in my opinion, in some cases more important than the external relationships. We focus so much in sales on whether you're in B2B or B2C or B2B2C, you focus so much on who you're selling and you tend to neglect the people that are closest to home, right? And I think that's completely backwards in my opinion. I think, you know, you think about even just real life, right? If you're in your personal life, that happens as well. You know, the people that are outside of your home, you treat better than the people that are inside your home and that that to me, I think is backwards. And I, I've had to learn that a hard way a couple of times cross-departmentally. I probably didn't communicate very well in my early career. And over the years I've decided, hey, like these internal relationships are so important and you need to hold them very near and dear to your heart.

Cool. Hey, I really appreciate your time today. Where can people go to connect and follow you?

LinkedIn. Yeah, you can find me on LinkedIn. I, Vance Ekstrom. And yeah, I mean, I, I'm happy to, happy to connect. Feel free to reach out.

Did you notice that he wasn't talking about grinding, talking about working more than other people? And the grinders never make the most in a company. I've always Been a student of the game, and I wanted to make the most. Why else would you be in sales? Go work in customer success or marketing if you want a nice comfortable lifestyle and not have to work hard. In sales, it's about figuring out the game, becoming great at the game. And there's a lot of the game that's exposed, that's outside of us, but the game internally. Is the real game. That willingness to change, to take feedback, to analyze the performance and separate it from the performer, and be able to manage those feelings that you get when you get feedback. Do you seek to understand it, or do you fight it and push it back on the person giving it? Well, you don't do it either, or you're not that good at it. I'm pretty good at it. That's defensiveness. What you want to do is, help me understand that. Can you show me where in the call I lost it, or I wasn't as good as I should have been, or I was focusing on the wrong thing? If this is making you feel uncomfortable, that's natural. That's your instinct. That's innate. We're born that way. It's to keep us alive. That's why it's there. Human beings, like mammals, are pack creatures, tribal creatures. So when we meet somebody outside our tribe, we assume it's a threat, so we become defensive. When we hear feedback, we feel like we're being ostracized outside of the tribe. Which is the equivalent of death. This is tens of thousands of years of evolution that is still with us. We haven't caught up. The world has changed so fast that we have not adapted to it. And we also haven't been socialized to it. We're socialized to be told— do what we're told. To stay in line, to follow the leader, not to think independently, not to analyze it, not to question it. It's not that it's wrong or it might be wrong, but to really evaluate it to see what is right for us. This internal willingness to change is where you'll find greatness. Because even if you learn how sales works and you become pretty good at executing it, this internal work, if it's not done— and it's hard, it's not easy, and you probably can't even see it. You have to go and ask for it or compare yourself to others. Find people who are good at it and say, well, what are they doing better than me? That was kind of my approach. I would observe other sales reps that I worked with and my managers, and I loved going on calls with other salespeople where I could watch and listen to them, or bring in executives to talk to other executives. And before I would plan, during, I would just study how it was going and how are people reacting to How did they have all this confidence? And it wasn't cockiness confidence, it was just that executive-to-executive confidence. I wanted that. I didn't want to just deal with the user buyers. I wanted to deal with the economic buyers, the people who had power, who could implement a decision, and how decisions were made. Instead of relying on my champion to get it done, which is a death nail in sales. It's this inner working. How do you become more creative? A lot of people want an example. That's not— that's copying. That's not creative. That's imitating. That's not creative. Creative is getting outside of that box and asking yourself, if I was them, What would work? Like in the case in the interview where he shows up and the person he wanted to meet wasn't there. He didn't go home. He got a little creative, started asking, say, hey, I was here to meet Joe.

Where's—

I know he's not here, but could I ask you a crazy question? Being able to engage people, that takes confidence. It takes a little bit of determination. A little bit of creativity. And where does it come from? And you can think of that the drive will get you there. Sometimes it does, but a lot of times it doesn't. You have to work on yourself. Maybe you're quiet and introverted and shy. I know what that's like. And being able to just push yourself out of that a little bit every day. Or maybe the opposite. You're an extrovert and you can't shut the hell up sometimes and listen. Maybe you have to practice that. You know, have something in your hand that says, okay, I'm gonna be quiet and count to 10. Any little gimmick you can get to make yourself more effective with other people. Start by asking someone that you trust, someone that you feel has your back, Ask them, what's my blind spot? What do I keep doing that's not helping me? And I'll give you some examples. Most of them are about listening, about thinking about the other person to the point where you can read their mind because they're not thinking clandestine thoughts. They're just natural thoughts that they would be thinking about how this purchase would impact them. Politically within the company? How are they going to be viewed within their tribe if they do this? This work is both hard and only you can do it. Nobody's going to make you do it. Nobody's going to assign you to do it. And most people aren't even going to tell you because they don't want to hurt your feelings. And most of us are very defensive about it. We get angry, we get upset, we feel threatened. It's all natural, but it's not helpful. So what I wanted to do with this episode was kind of encourage you to look at that side of will, because it's the most important. And I'll give you an example. I hired this Turned out to be a great rep, but when I met him, he was not a great rep. I met him on a day where it was just a terrible day. I canceled the interview and he called me back. He goes, no, I really want to meet with you. I go, man, I had just a terrible day. And he said, well, let's just meet for a beer. I never met the person before. And, and I liked that. I liked the casualness of it, the confidence to initiate the meeting instead of rescheduling it. And I go, okay, but let's just make it a meet and greet, not really an interview. So we sat down and had a beer, and he showed up and he was sweating. Like, he was nervous. Nervous sweat. And I don't know if you've ever had that, almost like a panic attack level sweat. And I told him, I go, look, I'm not judging you here. But he kept on wiping his forehead off. And— but he was a fun person. He was likable. He could tell a story. He could joke around. A lot like me. Jack Black. I don't know if you know the actor. He was that kind of frat boy type fun without being over the top. But the sweating kind of worried me. But we ended up hiring him and, you know, I showed him some ways of controlling that to calm himself down before meetings. And he took the advice. He wanted the job so much he was willing to change his personality.

That's hard.

Most can't even begin to do that. And he also said to me, and it's kind of funny, he goes, Brian, you can mold me like a piece of clay. And he did it in a very funny way. But I liked that part of his willingness because rarely have I met a salesperson even open to changing their internal system. But we all have to do it. Some are little tweaks, some are major changes, but it's possible, which is the first step. You have to believe it's possible. And he was able to do it and he's very successful today. And we're still in touch quite a bit longer, a long time ago. And that might be an extreme case, but most salespeople that I've hired or worked with already think they're fantastic. But it's not my judgment call. It's the market. The market tells you how good you are. Because the internal customers, they'll get you the job, they might keep the job, but they're not going to pay you commission on potential. They pay commission on actual, and that's the market. So my judgment of it is purely pedestrian. It's an observation, and who cares? It's— I, I intend it as positive feedback. of a gift. People don't take it that way. They take it as an insult, a put-down, a dunk, but it's not meant that way. And I'm very cautious about it because sometimes I was too blatant with it, or people would push me to the point I become blatant with it instead of trying to Gently hint at it, but the hints never really land because people are very protective over it. Think about that. Pick something small. Don't beat yourself up. But we all have it. I have a lot of them. I mean, if people met me when I started in sales, you'd be— you would not be impressed at all. And even when you see my walk and talk videos, most people that I know say, how do you have the guts to do that? And I don't even think about it anymore. And maybe 15, 20 years ago, I would have been way too nervous to do it. And thank God the technology didn't exist back then to do it. But now I don't even think about it. I don't worry about the judgment. I don't worry about the trolls and the haters. I do it for you. Great salespeople who want to become greater for you. And if you really want to become great at sales, go to b2brevenue.com. This is what you get. It's a phenomenal opportunity if you're willing to do the work. And the work can be passive, but you really engage, do the exercises, show your work. And this is something that I really encourage people— come ask questions, give case studies, because that's what it's based off of. Yes, show you how it works, the steps, plenty of examples. But if you don't show your work, you think you're doing it right, or you think you're doing it the best way or better. But if you show it to other people, they can give you feedback. It's not a put-down. It's not a judgment. It's intended as help. You may not feel that way, like you don't feel like it's help, but it is if you can take it. And this part of will is what's going to get you where you want to go, but very few people will ever do it. So in the courses, what you get is the core content, which is, you know, how to do it with plenty of examples. But then the gold is in— there's office hours, an hour meetup every other week, but they've all been recorded over the last 5 years. So there's like 125 of them, each about an hour long. Case studies, examples, deep dives, question and answer. If you listen to all of them, Your life would change. I mean, listen to understand, not listen to judge. Because this is what people do, and this is the part of will I'm talking about. People judge. That won't work for me. My world's different. Well, is that reality or how your instincts are telling you, I don't want to change, I don't want to try, I don't want to see if this would Work. Which one is it? Because that side of will is what's in the way. Anyone can work hard, but very, very few people can change. We'll see you next time. Thanks for listening.