How To Go From Crickets To Clients Fast!

Well, hello everyone, and welcome to From Crickets to Clients. I am so pleased to have you here. And for those who are listening to the recording, I'm pleased that you're listening to the recording. The most important thing today— yes, listening's good, but taking action is better. So I hope that you can take some key points that you're going to try in the week ahead of you. So welcome. Um, why I love doing this work is because so many people say to me, I don't know how to get clients. I don't know how to get them to say yes. They've tried lots of different things, um, but they just haven't had the success or the, you know, even the nibbles that they, that they want on the steps to success. So, um, I've been now— oops— I've been now doing this for 30 years, and, um, for the last 15 years I've been helping other people do it. And, um, so welcome today, and, um, please feel free to ask me questions. So you are absolutely in the right place if you love your business and what you're doing, or what you're about to be doing, and you're struggling just to find the first clients or consistent clients. You'll know that your business idea has beautiful potential. But you're struggling inconsistently asking people to buy from you. So here's my promise to you. You will get some awesome ideas over the next 60 minutes with me. Everything here has been tested through my own sales work over 30 years, and in the last 15 years of helping people just like you learn how to sell. And to ask people to buy from them with ease and grace. And the point of all of that is that you get clients on board. That's the number one thing that I want for you from this hour that we're going to spend together. So who am I to talk about this stuff? So I make sales and selling accessible to people. I make it doable because it's one thing to understand what to do. It's another thing to go out and do it. And the purpose of doing that, the result of doing that is to get on board clients that you love to work with. But it's not just taking the activities. It's the way that you phrase things. It's the stories that you tell that I'm going to share with you that connect those actions and create the motivation for people to buy from you. And it's their buying process which becomes your sales system. Okay, so hearing crickets is something that happens to all of us in business, and it's really annoying. But there's 3 major reasons that this happens, and I'll be able to share those with you, the reasons. But more than the reasons, I really want to share with you Um, the good ideas and actions that are gonna change that for the better.

Yeah.

And my hope is that over this time together, I will help you ignite your inner sales champion. Okay. So before we get stuck into how to fix it, I wanna talk to you about why, because there's some really common reasons that I see. And elements that are the root cause of this. So the first one I call crocodile selling. So in my book, More Sales, Less Marketing, I talk about crocodile selling a lot because to me, crocodiles exist in the age of the dinosaurs. That's where they're from.

Yeah.

And We think about the crocodile, what I call crocodile selling, as that snappy, pushy, icky, the thing that we don't wanna be, the used car salesman, the person who is annoying and pestering. They're all the things we don't wanna be, but we're so involved in not being a crocodile that we miss the rest of the sales process. And so I just want to say to you, have you experienced, and I'm sure you have experienced, crocodile salespeople in your life? And do they still exist on Earth? Yes. But does that mean we're in the age of the dinosaur?

No.

Their day is done. The new model of selling and sharing that I will run you through today is the exact opposite of crocodile selling. And the key reason that the crocodiles exist and what they do is they're focusing on the wrong thing. They're just focusing on what they want. They're focusing on the client and getting that client on board with them Irrespective of what the client is saying to them. So I want to encourage you that this change, or these changes I should say, will absolutely work for you. And the reason that I know that, and I can be so confident in saying that, is because For the last 15 years, I've been helping people just like you overcome these issues. And one of the keys that I repeat often is that instead of focusing like a crocodile on that last thing, the sale, the thing, and having those dollar signs in your eyes, I want you to think about all of the steps in the process. So when you go and take some of this and you go and talk to someone and they understand what you do and they ask you for more information, that's a result. When you ask them to read a book, or can I send you an email or whatever, and they say yes, that's a result. When they have a conversation with you, that's a result. Each step in the process is a result. And in my book, More Sales, Less Marketing, I use the analogy of The Wizard of Oz. And so when you think about the results, the sale is Emerald City. We wanna get to Emerald City because we wanna get home, because we wanna get the sale. But the process is the Yellow Brick Road. So each step on that Yellow Brick Road, each character that you meet along the way, they're the results that I want you to focus on. And when we focus on Taking that journey, doing those things, then the results look after themselves or the sales, I should say. Okay. So I wanna cover off with you 3 key reasons that we hear crickets and obviously how to fix it. So the first reason that people don't listen to you is because you're not speaking to them. I know that sounds a little obvious, and I'll go into a little bit more detail in a minute on each of these topics. Because you're not listening, or because you're not speaking to them, you're not really addressing their pain, the thing that is causing them Heartache. And when you don't address that pain, they're not motivated to buy from you. And lastly, we don't exactly forget to ask for the sale, but we think if we've laid out everything for them and we've told them how fabulous we are and how we might be able to help them, that they should just buy from us. And I'm gonna show you why that doesn't work. Okay. So first of all, I want you to think about how you speak to your clients. And often when I think about crocodile selling and what people think selling is, they think that selling starts with talking. And it doesn't. Great selling, which is the opposite of crocodile selling, great selling starts with listening. So when you are listening to someone and when they can tell that you are listening to them, they're looking at you, they're more engaged. There's all of these things going on in their face, in their body, in their voice that show you When you listen to them and understand them and seek to understand first, that's when they get to tell their story. And that's what they're aching to do. They're in this predicament, whether it's about their finances, their personal life, their health, whatever it's about. They're in this predicament for a reason, and only they know the story that has brought them here. So you need to give them the courage and the opportunity to share that story. When you're listening to them and you hear where they're from, where they're coming from, and you hear what's going on for them, then you're able to apply what you know to them and their individual story. And that's so much more powerful than blanket statements. About who I help or what I've done in the past. Because at the end of the day, what are people listening for? Here's what they wanna know. Do you listen to me? Do you know who I am? Do you understand my problem? And can you help me fix it? And when you can really speak to that person by person, Then you will make sales and you will get clients. And the other thing that I want to encourage you to do is allow them to see themselves in your stories and solutions. So instead of talking about what you do in an ABC type of way, I want you to tell the story of your clients or your life experiences. So for those people that are here who are just starting out in business, it doesn't mean that your life experience and your business experience started when you started your business. You've been in business and you've been around people and you've done these things for a really long time. And that's inspired you now to start your own business. So all of the stories that have been part of your journey to date, are really relevant to your clients and potential clients. But here's the rub. To make them relevant, to make them— that person who's sitting in front of you listen, you have to make the story relevant to them. So what you're listening for is their pain and what's going on for them, the problem that they want to fix. And it doesn't always have to be a pain. Sometimes it's about an aspiration.

Mm-hmm.

Or something that they want to achieve. So once we've listened and we're speaking to them and we're, we're getting to the nub of what's going on, then we can actually address their pain. We can go deeper with that. And here's the thing that's really important. When we're selling, or more importantly, when they're buying, they wanna solve a problem. They're actually talking to you for a reason. So our first and most important job is to understand the world from their perspective. And they wanna solve it. And chances are they've probably tried to solve it already in some way or another. Even if that's by ignoring it. So how do we understand what this person has tried, what has worked, what hasn't worked, what this means to them? We ask awesome questions. And questions are part of listening because we want to get to the nub of what's going on for this person. So we want to take them back in time and say, Okay, so how long have you been aware of this problem? How long has that been an issue for you? Can you talk me through some of the steps that you've tried to fix it? Can you tell me, out of those things that you've tried, what do you think worked? What have you learned from that? What didn't work? Why didn't that work? So you really want to unpack these things because at the end of the day, If we're going to convince this person who's sitting in front of us, who's had this problem, who's tried some things and hasn't had the success that they're looking for, but they want to try something different, we need to be able to say to them, hey, I hear you. I can see what you've tried. I can understand why that hasn't worked for you. Here's some things that I would like to try with you. And you can see how what we're doing is we're crafting in our minds that story, not about us and who we are and what we do, but the story is about the person that we're talking to. It's their story. It's their buying journey. They're our Dorothy. And our invitation is for them to walk down the yellow brick road. And to solve this problem with your help. But it's still their journey, their decision. The most important thing about when someone's in pain is they want to be heard. They want to not just be heard, they want to know that you are listening. And they want to know that you have an option that might be able to help them if that's the truth. Sometimes at the end of one of these conversations, the truth is, I think you're better to work with this person over here. I think they have a better solution for you right now than me. That's still a great sales outcome because at the end of the day, a great sales outcome is about having a great buying outcome for the person who is sitting in front of you. So I want you to think about what are the questions and things that you can ask of your potential clients so that you really understand them better. Equally, I want you to think about what are the stories And the messages that you can tell them and show them that show that you've been down this road before, that you are a good guide for this journey. There's evidence there, and sometimes we need to weave that together for the client. And some of that is going to be the same or similar for, for clients, and some of it is going to be unique. For the client who's sitting in front of you, because some of it is core to what you do, but some of it is relational to this particular problem and this particular client. One of the things that I'm really passionate about with selling is that we lead in sales. So let me tell you a story. So imagine that you've walked up to someone and you've asked them to dance, and it's a waltz, and the music is playing, and you start dancing with them, and you're having a lovely time, and you're chatting away and dancing and chatting away and dancing, and the music is still going on. It's still the same waltz, and suddenly you stop, drop, turn away, and walk the other direction. What, what do you think that person thinks at that point? Oh, I wonder why they did that. Maybe I smell. Maybe I stepped on their toes. Something's happened that they're— maybe, maybe they don't want to work with me. Maybe I'm not the right client for them. So here's what we do, and this is how your clients feel when you're, you're talking to them about your solution, but you don't ask them to buy. Because while you're talking about it and while you're going through this process with them, the music is still going. So please don't leave your clients stranded on the dance floor. You've gotta finish all the way to the end of the music. And rather than the client or the, your potential client feeling like, oh, I don't wanna hear this offer, they actually do. They do wanna hear the offer from you. And it's not that you're pushing them or pulling them. You're actually just giving them a choice. And without the offer, they don't get that choice. So in sales, you've got to lead. You've got to lead the dance. And here's the thing. If you go and see a doctor and your arm is hanging in some weird, weird way, The doctor's going to go, I'm pretty sure that's broken. And then they're going to do some tests, and then they're going to tell you what to do after they've done those tests. Because they're not going to say, I'm pretty sure it's broken, we're not going to do any tests, so you could do a Band-Aid, or we could put a cast on it without x-raying. What do you think? That's not what they do. You are an expert. And so you also get to prescribe just like a doctor. And again, when you don't, when you don't use your expertise to explain what's going on to this client who's sitting in front of us, if you don't order the tests, if you don't tell them to put a cast on that break, then they get confused. So you're not serving them by not offering your expertise. So I talk about sales with ease and grace. And one of the beautiful things to do, and we actually covered this last month in the Accelerate Sales Hub, my membership, is what's your roadmap? What are the 5 or 6 or 7 or 3 steps that people work with you on. So I get to meet you, we have a sales call, uh, you, in preparation for that sales call, you might do an assessment for me, you might fill in a questionnaire, then we talk through that, and then I ask you to buy from me. So it's clear and simple. It's a one-page, simple, 4 or 5 steps process. that you can show people exactly how they might be able to work with you. So you show them the roadmap, the yellow brick road, and then you step them through that. So knowing those steps and sharing those steps with your clients takes some of the ick or the friction out of what you're saying, because you know exactly when you're going to say things and when you're going to offer something to them, and so do they. And the whole point of having a great, easy, beautiful sales system is to make it easy and open. It's an offer. You're an adult. They're an adult. You're making an offer. They get to choose. But if you don't make the offer, they can't choose. So as I'm going through a little bit of a summary, I want you to be thinking about on each of these points, what's one thing you're going to do differently? I want you to write it down and I want you to give it a go, because the only way we change our behaviour is by doing. So problem number 1, you're not speaking to them. You're often talking about yourself. The answer, you listen. You open up the opportunity for them to talk about what's going on for them. Easy, simple. Think about how you can do that. Think about having a list of questions that you might ask around that. Some examples of stories. One of the things that we've covered in this month, we've actually spent a whole month on listening in the Accelerate Sales Hub. And I love the topic of listening because it's not just words. It's the things underneath those words that really matter. And particularly if you're— if someone's got a problem or an issue, they don't necessarily tell you the truth on the, you know, from the first time they meet you. Sometimes they don't tell you the truth, not because they're trying to lie, but because they might not have uncovered it. And in your process of asking questions, which is the next point, You help them uncover their truth, and that's a gift. And so I just want to encourage you to try some new things. Asking great questions. So I want you to think about not just asking, why do you want to do this? What's going— you know, I want you to delve into their history. I want, well, what have you tried to do in the past? Why do you think that didn't work? So it might be if you're selling to a company and let's say you're talking to the CEO, what have you tried in the past? Oh, well, we tried to get a trainer in to help the people. Well, why didn't you think that worked? Well, the team thought they were a bit of an idiot. I said, oh, why do you think that is? Oh, the person didn't do their homework.

Ah.

So now, as I'm listening to that, I'm thinking, okay, well, how might I approach that differently and not just say that I'm different, but show that I am different, not just to the CEO, but to the team? Because if they're going to think, oh, here we go again, another person to talk at us, they're not going to listen. They're not going to take in and they're not going to adopt the things that you're asking them to do. And the last mistake is leaving it up to them. And honestly, this is probably one of the biggest things that I see with people because they just feel uncomfortable about asking. Sometimes it's about the price. Sometimes they're worried about what other people— how other people will perceive them. But the truth is that it's your job, and the client who's sitting in front of you knows that it's your, your job. And when you don't, they feel awkward, and that's not what we want in a client relationship. We don't want people to feel awkward. So instead, what I want you to do is lead the sale. Again, I want you to think about what tools and things you can have around you, like the sales roadmap that I talked about?

Yeah.

What are the 3 or 4 steps? What's a way that you can have that, um, in a nice graphic or, um, in, in an email that you send to people or in a questionnaire that you give them that keeps repeating this idea of the 3 or 4 steps, the things that you do, the outcomes that you get? With people. And here's the thing, at the end of the day, and I'm pretty sure I've said this before, people's biggest fear around sales is that I'm bugging you, I'm pushing you to do something, or I'm pulling you into a situation you don't wanna be in. And it's not that. Let's go back to The Wizard of Oz and Dorothy. Here she is at the beginning of the movie. She's gone from black and white into color. She's 16 years old. She's nearly lost her best friend, her dog. She's certainly not in Kansas anymore.

She's terrified.

So Glinda, who knows so much about Oz and so much about the potential, doesn't say to her, there's flying monkeys who want to take you to a witch who wants to kill you for killing her sister, and the wizard's a fraud. Glinda knows all of those things, but instead What she does is she encourages Dorothy just to get off the porch, put on those ruby slippers, to make some steps forward, to sing a song about going to see the Wizard. She introduces her to just to the idea, the concept of the Yellow Brick Road, but then she allows Dorothy her journey. She allows Dorothy to journey on that yellow brick road and find that indeed she had the strength all along. And that's often what we do for clients. That nub, that sales champion is in there waiting to come out. Oh. He or she is there. It just takes that encouragement that the tools, the tricks, the words, the ways of thinking about things, and most importantly, that reminder to take that activity. That's what you need. You need that in order to nurture your Dorothy and turn her into a witch killer. I might rethink that story. So I'd love for you to join me, and I'm just gonna cover off a few ways that I work with people. One is through the Accelerate Sales Hub, uh, which is a membership, and I'll be talking a little bit more about that. Um, as I mentioned, this month we've been focusing on listening and really how to listen beautifully. to our clients and what are we listening for and what stops us listening. In November, we're doing a deep dive on questions. How do you actually create, ask, dig into those questions so that you can formulate a fantastic solution for the client who's standing in or sitting in front of you? I also have an Accelerate Sales signature course that I created, wrote, recorded. I have a coaching program that I do in small groups and also one-on-one. And I work in what I call fractional sales. So companies can have me in their business from, uh, one day a week, and I can recreate their— or renovate perhaps their sales system, um, and train their people to use that sales system that's built around their most loved clients. So if you're tired of the crickets and not having enough clients and Then join me in the Accelerate Sales Hub. I want you to be done with second-guessing your price and value, lacking the confidence in what to say and how to engage, not, not really doing it or cringing or not sure of the words to follow up someone nicely or how to ask for the sale. And struggling to explain what you do in a way that people really get and they understand. My book, More Sales, Less Marketing, what I tell people is marketing is wonderful, but right now you don't need any more marketing. You need a simple sales system That works with you and helps you talk to your most loved clients and, and gets those clients answering your question about whether to buy from you and to work with you. And sometimes the answer to that question will be no, and sometimes it will be yes, and sometimes it will be, oh, not right now. All of those outcomes are fantastic outcomes. But a great sales process takes our person from the beginning of the yellow brick road all the way to the end, and we get an answer. Now, inside the hub, it's all about clarity. I do weekly coaching calls, which for Australia is in on a Monday. at 1 o'clock. That's Australian Eastern Time. I also do a US version, which is at 7 AM Australian Time on a Tuesday. So that's also open to Australians if 7 AM on a Tuesday morning is more your style. And what I do in the hub is I focus on giving you information in a masterclass, About, so for example, asking questions, and then we do Q&A, and then I give you things to go and do, and then we do some more digging into what worked and what didn't work, and and how did this happen? You know, and what what else would I suggest that you try? And then the last week is all about embedding because there's no point me teaching you all of these beautiful things about listening or asking questions or roadmaps if you. don't have something that you can then codify that into, because I want this to be easy and graceful and repeatable for you. And the thing I love the most about the hub is they're all different people. I've got artists, I've got, um, I've got people who run Businesses with 5 or 6 people. I've got finance people, I've got recruiters. It doesn't matter who you are. It's all about engaging with your best-loved client. And that's the thing that I think really works in here is that the sales system that I teach isn't a one-size-fits-all. I'm not asking you all to do the same thing, but I am asking you all to understand who your client is, understand what motivates them, think about how you talk about that, and think about how you ask them to buy. And that process is different. The yellow brick road is different for each of you, and that's okay. So currently it is $97 a month. Or if you want to sign up for 12 months, it's $970 for the year. And I'm just doing a push into the US. So in line with Thanksgiving, I'm increasing prices. So I'm finishing the special price or increasing the prices after Thanksgiving. So I'm just telling people that's the 1st of December. So, and I only— I have a 100% money-back guarantee. So if you don't like it, just tell me and I'll refund your money. So I just wanna tell you a few stories about people who've done this work with me before. And I know Lynn, who's on the call today, has a story from the beautiful Philippa. But Sarah really cringed at selling, and that's because she didn't know how to do it. She didn't know How to make those steps so it was easy for her to do, and that's what that's what I helped Sarah with. Alex was really cringe, like she just she says, "I never thought I'd say that I love selling, but I do." So ten years ago. Was it 10 years? 8. Anyway, a long time ago, I helped Alex and Tony, and now they're running a big business and doing really well in their agile consulting. And the thing I really enjoyed about working with Ray is just thinking about what made it clear for her. And the clarity for her was around metrics and doing the things and the numbers that she needed to do and the, the consistency that she needed to have in order to generate her best sales in years.

Thank you.

So questions. I am absolutely here to answer questions for you. I can see that Leanne has already placed a question in the chat. So you are very welcome to put a question in the chat if you have a specific question that you would like me to answer about something that is sticky or tricky for you, or if you'd like to, if you'd like to talk rather than type, that's fine. If there's a tab on the bottom, and there's a button that's called React. And if you put up your hand— I wonder whether it's going to do it. No, it's not. Anyway, on the React button, you can put your hand up so you can raise your hand, and then I can unmute you, and we can— or you can just wave at me if that's easier. So I'll start with Leanne's question, but I just encourage you, if anybody else has Any questions, I would love, um, for you to share that with me so that I can help you with that. So Leanne says, in a group call, is there a good way to get people to tell their story? So Leanne, I'm assuming in a group call, so these are all clients or potential clients on a group call? I'm just guessing.

Potential clients.

Potential clients. Okay. So like a webinar.

I was thinking more for a course rather than one-to-one because I don't seem to have much problem converting on a one-to-one.

The one-to-one physios.

Yeah.

It's just to give service.

It's more for a course that I was— or a product.

Okay. Okay. So, so I suppose if, if If I was running something like that where I was trying to convert off a group call, then I would be asking— I'm assuming then that this isn't the first time that you've spoken with them. So— Oh no, it might.

It might. It's just, it's— this is experimental, you see. So that's why I'm asking the question, because I've not been in a situation where— oh no, there's one, but I knew everybody before that. But I think in the new venture I'm starting, there won't be Too many people who would have met me in person. Yeah.

Okay, okay. So then I would encourage people to tell you beforehand. So do some research about who's on the call.

So send it through an email sequence or something?

Something like that. Or even just Google stalk them. Oh, right. Okay. So you could spend You know, I'm not thinking about hours and hours, but if you spent a little bit of time understanding who's in the room, understanding what type of practices they have, what their problems may— like, what similar things you've seen in the past about practices that might be— maybe they're rural, or maybe they're, you know, this or that. Also, You can do a poll at the front. So let's say you make an assumption or you have an idea that it's this problem, this problem, or this problem, right? So you've done a bit of research, you know what the key problems are. So then what you could do is at the beginning you could say, what would really help me help you is understanding which of these key things is your number one, if you could rank them 1, 2, 3 for me.

Okay.

And then you get to lean into the part that is most relevant to them, and you get— then get to tell. So often when we're working in a group, it's telling the stories that you think relate to the group and then asking them to respond to that with questions or, or what have you. So often when you're working in a group People come to— and I'm just talking about myself now— people come to webinars and masterclasses and those sort of things so that they can learn. And often they'll do that with their camera off, and often they won't participate, or you won't know whether they're participating. So that's why I like to tell stories about other things that I've done People I've worked with, those sort of things. Because what I'm thinking about as I structure that masterclass is what are the stories that are gonna resonate with the people who are coming along? And also, I think one of the key things to show your expertise is having a question time at the end.

Okay.

Yeah. And Nat says that she uses Slido to ask the group questions. Hi, I run, like, I love running in-person training, but I often run online training and I