THE 10 THINGS YOU MUST DO TO SELL IN B2B ENTERPRISE

There are certain things that if you're working with other people that you should know and do and be. And these things seem obvious and, you know, if it's not you, they are obvious. But when we make the mistake, oh, we bring up the circumstances and how it's someone else's fault. And this is not a beat-you-up episode. This is a let's-think-about-this episode. What I mean by that is take these things that we talk about in the interview today and discussion and ask yourself, am I 100% on all of these? I'm not.

I'm pretty good, you know, but we all make mistakes.

We're all Uh, in process. But these are the things that everyone else expects when they're dealing with somebody else. And the worst thing you can do, and everybody does it, most people do it, almost everybody, is they come up with an excuse, or even worse, a lie. You know the lies. Oh, I got into a car accident. Oh, the traffic was awful. Oh, there was a breakdown. Oh, I had to help Nana with something, and the other person knows you're lying. And I deal with people all day, and 99% of them are fantastic. But when somebody drops the ball, they forget to add something to their calendar, they change their mind, instead of being honest and just saying that, or—

Saying it.

You know, being honest and telling me why. They lie. And it's so obvious. Maybe because I've been in sales my whole life that you hear it over and over again and you're like, yeah, yeah, yeah, right. And then you feel bad not being empathetic with that. Oh, what if they're not lying? Okay, what if they're not? Let's get into this and ask yourself through this whole discussion, How good are you at this?

Are you at 100?

Are you at 90? If you're not at least to 90% on all of these, and some are much easier than others, you might want to write them down because it's a good starting. It's a good way to hold yourself accountable. I know you love that word. But if you're not doing these, you're breaking trust, you're disappointing people, and you're starting off on the wrong foot. So, let's get into it. Hey, if you haven't checked out the Sales Question Show, make sure you're checking that out as well, where daily I answer your sales questions in a very short format. Very much, here's the question, here's the answer, have a good day. So, if time is of the essence, subscribe to the Sales Question Show.

It gives you a little bit of sales juice every day.

Here we go.

So you've probably seen that meme I posted. Some other people posted the 10 things that require zero talent. Does that ring any bells?

It does ring a bell. It does ring a bell. It looks like it gets a lot of good interaction too. So I'm, I'm looking forward to having this conversation because there's, there's a lot of good, good takeaways from that. So it'll be interesting to see what you think as well.

Well, I post it because it's like simple little things that any employee, never mind a salesperson, if they did, would take their game up to a, a better level. And it's pretty much the things that every manager and every client expect. And I'm just shocked that some of the people think it's— they do require talent, or they require some birthright or some degree or some education or training to do these things. And I just want to let salespeople know that if you have trouble with any of these things, you better get good at them or okay at them at least.

No, it's a great point. I mean, if you're going off of where you went to school or what big company you worked at before or whatever training you did, you know, that's only gonna get you so far. So there's a few that really stood out to me that, that I know I've focused on a lot, like being coachable, preparation, being passionate, but really all 10 of them are just table stakes, right? If you're not doing that, it's gonna be hard to be really successful in anything, especially sales.

You know, and number one, you're being on time. Maybe this is just a pet peeve of mine, but anybody in a customer-facing role that can't show up on time, I, it's like the most basic of human agreements that we have. We have an appointment, show up on time. And, you know, most salespeople I know are pretty good at this, but yet having, you know, I interview a ton of people, most show up on time. Some people after several reminders can't add the appointment to their calendar. They're reminded twice before the interview. To, you know, make sure everything's in place. I get no reply, then they don't show up. So what do you think happened there? So you, and these are people that are recommended as the best salespeople in their company.

That's crazy. It's mind-boggling. I mean, that's, that's something I remember learning like right outta college, right? I was kind of getting Getting right pretty hard with some people that were training me or whatever. But I mean, if I wasn't there 15 minutes early, I was late, right? So they would give me crap about that. So I mean, and that gets a little more confusing now because you have the in-person versus virtual. I feel like no one gets there 15 minutes early on a Teams or Zoom call. But back before all that, like if you weren't there for 10 or 15 minutes early, like I would get people would give me a hard time about it. So that kind of just like instilled it, especially in front of a customer, right? I think that that always makes a good impression. You know, I. If you're going in some lobby, you can email them 15 minutes before, like, hey, I just want to let you know I got here a little bit early. It's just a good impression, right? And they'll be like, all right, you know what? I mean, that's, that's where you want to be, right? You don't want to be the person who's like, hey, hey, I'm running 15 minutes late. I mean, you only get one chance with a lot of these people. So if you're not showing up on time and doing stuff like that, I mean, the chances of getting any follow-up are going to be very, very slim.

And I think a lot of people, and you got to ask yourself, How many appointments in the last year, last 12 months, were you late for? Were you late for any?

I have been. I will admit, not for customer-facing or business stuff, but for personal, maybe doctor's appointments or something like that. But that's, I guess, where you prioritize it. But yeah, You know, I'll admit some of those, but for customer ones, I don't know. I need to do a postmortem. That's a good, that's a good exercise to do.

Well, and, and the, all the time I've been doing the, the podcast interviews, you know, over 13, 14 years, one time I, I woke up late. I forget what, what happened. I partied the night before or something. I overslept, but I, I was at the desk ready to go in, in less than 5 minutes, to the point where the person— I apologized for being late and it was— they didn't really notice. But if you are, you gotta first get rid of the excuses— the traffic, the weather, you're busy. The client doesn't care. The message that, that you're sending to the client is my time's more important than yours. And some people say, well, you know, I've got ADD or this thing or that thing. I'm this thing. Okay. No one cares.

Sorry. Yeah. Nobody cares. And, and that's a good point too. Like when I used to travel a lot and go to trade shows, entertain customers, I mean, it was basically like kind of, hey, I don't care what you do. If you want to stay out late, you want to do all this stuff, as long as you're ready to go and you show up the next day, it's all good. But when you start missing stuff and then having excuses, that's a whole nother animal. And people will give you, I'm sure, one or two slip-ups, but if it's like a recurring theme, it's, it's not going to be a good thing.

And, and this is probably the one that's the most tangible where there's an asset test. You're either on time or you're not. You know, if you're a minute late, you're not on time. And I think today with the Zoom thing or Teams or whatever, people are fine because, well, everybody shows up a minute late. Well, a client can't because they're the client. You break the trust because you're saying a time and you're not there.

What does that say?

You can't manage your time, right?

Yeah. Why would they give you an opportunity to manage their business or this project if you can't even show up to a meeting?

You broke the first agreement. Show up. You know, when people say, you know, success is 80% just showing up, good, but you have to do it. And they don't mean just show up. They mean show up on time. Because if you're not there, all the other stuff doesn't matter because no one sees it. You're not there. And all the excuses and the rationalizations, stop it.

Yeah, it's a great point. I think the Zoom Teams thing has made it a little more cloudy. I feel like it's more acceptable, at least internally, to show up a little bit late because you have back to back to back. But that goes back to like, you shouldn't have that many meetings to begin with. But yeah, it's in front of a customer. I mean, it's, there's no doubt you cannot be late, especially the first few times that you're meeting with them. I mean, that's, it's just not gonna end well.

And then you go to like number 9, be prepared. If you're showing up late, what's the likelihood you're gonna be prepared? You didn't have time to get there. Did you have time to do any preparation?

Most likely not.

No. And I, I did a video on, you know, in sales it's hard to practice, but the next best thing to practice is preparation. Because during the preparation, you're pretty much practicing. You're thinking through what to say, what they're going to ask, what they want, what the objections are going to be, what the competition is, what the problem is. But if you don't do that, you're showing up late and you don't have anything to talk about. How well is it gonna go?

Probably not very well. But a lot of people think like, oh, I've been doing this for 10, 15 years. I can just wing it. I can just show up and you, you get kind of overconfident and I'm sure there's times you can get away with that. But I'd say that's one of the ones that sticks out the most for me of why I think I've been successful is like I'm, I'm usually overprepared now, maybe sometimes too much, but the client can typically tell if you did your homework, you have a nice presentation put together regardless if they look at it, you have it put together and you know, you know, little tidbits about their background and history. I mean, people can tell that stuff. So I think I, one thing that's made me stand out and just be successful is just trying to overprepare. And at least, you know, if you mess up or if you don't get the deal or the meeting goes bad, at least you know that you put your best foot forward and you prepared versus just showing up and winging it and hoping. So I, I've always been big on overpreparing, probably too much sometimes, but I feel like it's better to be on that side than the other side.

Yeah, because people can tell it and it gives you the opportunity to develop your skills and it doesn't take talent, it takes work. It takes a little bit of dedication, and you may not feel like doing it because it's either not appreciated or applicable, but that's okay. Most of what we do isn't appreciated or applicable. It's all a lot of hard, hard work and the hope and the likelihood of something working out. But if you don't do it, what do you— what's gonna happen? Anything good, you're probably gonna think about it after the meeting's over and then it's too late. You're gonna call them up, hey, I forgot this great idea. But that was the point of the meeting. The point of the meeting was to share your great idea.

Yeah. And you only get so many chances, so you gotta, it doesn't have to be anything crazy. It depends what type of meeting, but I mean, at least 15, 20 minutes, have like your framework of what do you want them to do as like a, you know, prep before a call, or if it's a bigger meeting, I practice presenting depending on what it is. I might practice like walking through, especially if there's multiple people on the call that you're working with. Definitely want to do that. Otherwise it can get, it can get really dicey. So.

Yeah. And, you know, like number 2, make an effort. People can tell when you're putting effort into it or if you're just going through the motions, you know, because I, I've been on the customer end of it and when somebody shows up and they've got their deck and they just start reading their deck, I'm like, I could watch this on YouTube. I don't need this live. I want somebody who's gonna hear me out. This is what I'm trying to accomplish. Walk me through how I would do it with your product. But that requires them doing a little bit of effort, getting out of their little robotic process. And I think today people hate getting out of their little robotic process because it's Requires calories and thinking. It's not button-oriented.

Yeah, you're right. I mean, those meetings are brutal where you know that they're just like, have that same presentation they've been doing over and over again. They have no idea your background and do any research and they're just going through the motions, right? So yeah, I mean, just flip it and be like, hey, put, put that company's mission statement as the first slide and be like, hey, you know what? I took some time to go through y'all's mission statement, your values. Here's what really stood out to me. Blah, blah, blah, you know, like that type of stuff can make a big difference or putting their logos on the presentation, you know, small things like that just takes a little bit of effort, but it can, it can make a difference.

Yeah. And number 5, being passionate. I think that's— there's a lot to that. I think there's caring, being emotionally connected to the opportunity, demonstrating that you want to help. That you're a human being and you are passionate about both your product, your company, but helping them most of all. And that comes through.

That's a big one. That's a big one. And it, and, you know, it's tough if you're going to different companies, you can't always get that perfectly right and be like over the top passionate about it. But you can tell the difference for sure. Like when you, when you believe in the products, you believe in the brand, you believe in what it can do to help that customer. And, and you can tell Like with the tone and how people present that, that they feel that. And, you know, with what I'm doing now, it's like I have kind of a journey that got me to where I'm at now. And, you know, I can share that story with people and they resonate with it. So it's like, it really does make a difference. It's hard to like pick that out, you know, when you're going company to company. But I look back at like certain brands that I worked for and some stand out more than others of like being really passionate about it because, you know, you can kind of always believe in that product or, you know, the values behind it and the effort put into it. So passionate's a big one for sure.

Yeah. And I think too many people don't wanna get passionate about what they're doing because then they get disappointed and it's like, well, this is sales. You better be passionate if you want your client to be passionate about your product and you're not, how's that gonna work? Good luck finding that client.

Yeah. And I think some, some are easier than others. I mean, medical device stands out because medical device, you're, you're helping patients, you're helping doctors, you're helping nurses. So that is a big one. It's a little cliché, but like you, you really do think a lot about like how it's impacting patients in that hospital, whatever. And that's a big one that, that stood out to me is like, because it's, because it's serious stuff, right? It's like these people are using these products in surgeries, whatever it may be. And it's like, If you don't have that passion and you're talking to a doctor or something, I mean, they're not going to give you the time of day or they're just going to go back to whatever they were doing before. So it's— it does make a difference.

Yeah, because they're thinking, if you're not excited about it, why should I be excited about it? Clearly, if you're not excited, maybe I shouldn't be excited over it. And when I get pitched by a salesperson, If I genuinely feel that they're passionate, that what they're selling can help me in my business, I give them a chance. If I, you know, if I really think they looked at my website, my LinkedIn profile, they mentioned something that I know they know something about it other than just scraping the internet and tagging it in an email. I'll give them a chance. But if it's that usual cadence by the, you know, the spam bots, I'm like, this has nothing to do— I've been surprising people because last year I was in market for YouTube thumbnails. It'd be nice to have somebody do a professional thumbnail. I don't have time to do it. It's not worth my time. If I could find somebody who would, well, they hit me up on an email. I was in market. I replied back, yeah, I'm interested. They didn't know what to do with me because so few people replied back that they were interested. They didn't have a process for it.

Yeah.

And I'm like, okay, now I'm, now I'm not interested because you're not really, you don't know what to do with me. They kind of like sent me to their website to sign up and I reluctantly did it and they did okay work, but it wasn't, for the amount of money and time, it didn't really have that much impact on me. So they could have had a great customer if they kind of had organic passion about what they did.

A great point. And And I agree 100%. Like, I'm very empathetic to salespeople. So I get hit up quite a bit on LinkedIn or whatever it may be. But if it's just that normal spam, I just don't have time to really pay attention to it. If someone calls, I don't get as many calls probably anymore as I used to, but if someone has like a legitimate call and they're really trying and I can tell, like, I'll, I might give them a little bit more time. Right. So I think that goes to like this whole list, right? That, that customer, if they know you're doing this stuff, they'll probably give you the time of day and give you a chance versus if you're just going through the motions, they're not going to even talk to you probably.

Yeah. And like number 8, doing a little extra. Now, how hard is that? Talk about something that requires zero talent and only a little effort. And, you know, 9 times out of 10, people in the comments of my post are asking a question that I answered In the description of the post. I did one the other day about how sales research is all BS. And if they wanted to hear what the best salespeople— you're not gonna read it in a book. I interview the world's best salespeople. I put that up in the description and in the post. They go, so how do I find out where the best salespeople— how do I learn from them? And I replied back, read the post. You couldn't read the post, but you have time to comment on the post asking a stupid question. It's in the definition.

Yeah, that's mind-boggling. I mean, doing a little extra, I thought about— so I have slacked off a little bit lately, but I used to, anytime I'd have a meeting with a customer, I would send a follow-up email within 24 hours and it wouldn't be anything crazy. Just be like recapping like what the next steps were. And that stood out to people. They're like, dang, man, Dustin always follows up with an email and at least they can go back and look at it. I can go back and look at it. So I would do that. I mean, I think of like video emails. If you do that above and beyond with somebody you're really trying to close a deal with, or, you know, handwritten notes, especially when I was doing healthcare stuff, I would send that stuff to like you know, nursing leaders and whatnot, like for Christmas or what have you. And like that, I mean, that makes a difference. So just little things like that, that doesn't take any talent. It's just, it, it kind of sucks. It's not fun sometimes if you do that, but it's like if you want to stand out, which you have to these days, that's, that's a big thing you can do. Just being a little extra.

Yeah. Because most of the, the in-mails I get on LinkedIn are, you know, other than asking for job advice, You know, looking for jobs, managers, how do I deal with the managers? How do I deal with my comp plan? And I always notice that these are not the people that I see like commenting and sharing my content. So it's like they're unwilling to hit the little like button, but they'll go to the inbox and ask for a half hour of my time. And I'm like, what's the likelihood I'm going to get anything out of that half hour?

Very small.

Very small because they're unwilling. And I've had friends who will call me about a post and I go, hey, could you do me a favor and just give it a little thumbs up next time before you call? Why? Well, it kind of helps me a little and it's not really that much of a stretch. I mean, can you think of anything that takes less effort than hitting the like button? Doesn't cost you a penny, doesn't cost any time, but it, you have to take a little action. And people say, well, what do I get out of it? That's what they're thinking. I'm not going to do that because I don't get anything out of it.

No, that's a great point. I think of this like influencer I was trying to get in touch with on LinkedIn and like literally for, I think over a month, I just like liked and commented their stuff. And then I asked, you know, I think I sent a video email to like set up a time to talk and they right away replied because they knew who I was because I'd been liking, commenting, liking, commenting. So yeah, just put it, you're gonna give someone the time of day if they're going above and beyond doing stuff like that, writing a note, follow-up video email, liking, commenting, you're, you're gonna give 'em more of a chance, right?

Yeah. And number 10, you know, that having a strong work ethic now, Have you ever heard a salesperson say, I don't have that strong of a work ethic? Everyone thinks they have a strong work ethic. And everyone tells me, oh, I'll just outwork everybody. Well, early in my career, before I got into sales, I was a software developer and I shared an office with this guy from India and his extended family. Sent him to MIT. He got in with a full-boat scholarship, but he had to get here. His father was a cab driver.

Okay?

This guy had 2 shirts. He slept in the office without anyone knowing because he didn't have an apartment. He sent all his money home. This guy worked every waking hour. And when people tell me, They're going to outwork. I couldn't outwork that guy. He called me lazy and I was like, I worked easy 60, 70, 80 hours a week. He looked at all these people as, so if you think you're going to outwork like a first-generation American, good luck. We are so cushy. You know, here I am going home at night to my own apartment and he didn't have a car. No one knew he was living in his office. You know, he had this little blanket and he put it in the corner, but you could, you know, I'd be in early in the morning. He'd like hide, he'd leave, then come back at night after everyone left and he'd go to the gym to shower and stuff. And I, I think like when people say, oh, they got a strong work ethic, they don't know what hard work is.

Yeah, that's an impactful story. I mean, that's one you're never going to forget and that, that, that's a big deal. And, and I'm all about the strong work ethic to a certain extent, but I think over the years, over, over the years I've learned that that's not the only thing, right? I've, I've seen, you know, parents and family that have worked really, really hard and it's kind of like, you're on that hamster wheel just like trying to get somewhere, but you, you know, so I think it's a generational thing too, as far as, you know, who you're talking with. So I think to a certain extent it makes sense to work hard, but I, I'm more about like working smarter, having quality of life, like being able to scale my time, like, you know, be, that's why I do LinkedIn stuff, be in different places at different times. So I, I still have that work ethic, no doubt, but I'm trying to be much smarter about it the last few years versus the first, like, 10 years I was just like grinding, like doing what you're talking, not, not, not to the level of the, your story, but like just, you know, overworking myself, like saying yes to everything, going above and beyond and like that. It's just not sustainable. So like I had to kind of make a change at some point. I do believe in the work ethic side of it, but only to a certain extent, I guess.

Yeah. And my point is not to do that, you know? Yeah. Because even in my 20s, yeah, I contemplated it, but I was like, But the point is, are you putting in the work or are you trying to be a union worker in sales? And if you're the type of person that's trying to, you know, try and get extra days off and vacation, look, sales is like in a company. I by far the hardest job. You're unappreciated. You're between a rock and a hard place. Um, you're trying to get other people to do things on the company's timeline. You've got to put in that effort. And I don't think anybody in sales really thinks, I'm a slacker, but you really have to do the work. Yeah.

And you have to be self-motivated too. Yeah.

You can't be looking for somebody else. Well, you know, if I go to better territory or I'll work hard on a good deal, which means I'll take an order. If somebody calls in, they're ready to buy, they're looking at us and our main competitor, I'll give 'em a great discount. We'll get it done. Okay. But that's, you're not going to make your number on those deals. You're going to make your number on the marginal deals. The small deals you could make big, the deals that you have to beat a competitor at, the deals that would've slipped away if you didn't do the extra things. And I think too many people just kind of just say, oh, I'm a real hard worker. And when I, I just get sick of hearing that I'll outwork somebody when they're, you know, at, at some soccer game at 5 o'clock. It's like, okay, yeah. It's all relative, but yeah, it's not true.

It's not, it's not gonna make you stand out in an interview anymore. You hear that so much. It's like, I mean, you really have to have a compelling story to, to get away with using that now.

Congratulations if you made it this far. If you made it this far, at least you took these issues seriously because a lot of people hear it and they automatically react with, I know, That. Yes, I know you know that. We all know that we should be on time. But how many of us are on time? How many people show up for that little Zoom call a minute or two late because that's when everybody does? And that's okay when it's an internal meeting, but what if it's with a client? The client feels like it's not important. That's— these breaks in trust, you can say, oh, it's just being human. Well, they're paying money. They want a little bit more than human. They want superhuman. They want you ready. They want you sharp.

They want you at top of your game.

And guess what? It's your income. You should get there. Now, these things you have to create habits for. And Systems. And what I would do is if you have trouble with any of these things like being prepared maybe, or having a positive mental attitude or staying motivated or something, come up with a system for it because the excuses, also known as lies, deteriorate things even faster than being late or not being prepared. The lie says, oh, you're not trustworthy. And all the bullshit excuses, people assume you're lying, especially because you're in sales. And this is where we have to go above and beyond, not just the sheer minimum. I hope you enjoyed this. Make sure you check out the other shows, Sales Leadership, B2B Revenue, And the best of the Brutal Truth. We'll see you next time.