Sales Mindset Series #2 - "We Don't Need No Education"

Foreign. Hello and welcome everybody to this edition of the Contractor Radio podcast. I am your host today, John Townsend, going to continue our discussion, our series where we dive into the sales mindset. The purpose of this discussion, in this series of discussions is to help you, the owner, and to help you, the sales leader, and to help you, the salesperson, really understand some things that can get in the way of you becoming the best you possibly can be as an owner. That includes thinking, recognizing the differences, mentally, you know that and emotionally that you know you have versus your salespeople. Right. The way you think about money. We discussed this last week to two main competencies that show up. I think that can help an owner best understand what separates them from somebody they might bring on to sell. We discussed the need for approval and we discussed the supportive buy cycle. The need for approval is essentially saying, hey, they must like me in order to buy from me. A prospect must like me in order to buy from me. And the supportive buy cycles and the understanding that how I typically buy thing, how I buy things, in particular what I believe to be expensive purchases can affect. It's usually the way that I allow, typically the way I allow people to buy from me, okay, it can be overcome, but it takes work and it takes intentionality and I would say vigilance when practicing it. As an owner, we need to be able to understand when these things are coming into play, when we practice and role play and we are developing the skills of our salespeople. Right, because there is a difference. And then salespeople out there hopefully give you a couple of tools and tricks, maybe enlighten you to help you understand the way that you think. Right. And how it can be used for and against you in a sales environment. But before we get into that, I want to give a shout out to our sponsor, Contractor Coach Pro, for hosting putting on the the Contractor Radio podcast. And I also want to invite you, if you have not already, to join the thousands of other folks who have joined our Contractor Community page on Facebook. Yes, get in there. There's all kinds of free content on the page. You know, you will be challenged with questions from our coaching, our head coaches, and our champion coaches when it comes to running your business. Our goal at CCP is to help you take control of your business so you can grow it at the pace that you want to and then ultimately find the freedom that you likely set out to find when you started your business. And that extends into our contractor Community pages for vendor, vendor partners, for other thought leaders in the industry and for you the contractor. It's a safe place just to get challenged and learn a thing or two. So please join that if you have not already. And like and follow us and subscribe, follow us on LinkedIn. We want to give you as much valuable content as we possibly can. All right, so let's talk about today in continuation of this sales mindset series. 1 Self Limiting Belief that I think is often very misunderstood. It usually leads to a fun conversation. It's one of those. If you joined us the last time, I made a few comments that whenever I talk to owners and sales leaders and I talk to you guys every day, right? And whenever these conversations come up, I usually get a weird look or two. I usually get a quizzical. And if you don't have video capability right now or if you're driving, you know, don't look at the. Don't look at it. But I usually get that look like what? You know, that requires some follow up. Like John, what do you mean by that? So today is no exception, the self limiting belief. And what I mean by self limiting belief is that it is a. This is something that exists in our head and in our heart that could potentially sabotage our sale, our ability to sell value. Okay, so it's not a great thing, but nevertheless, here it is. So as a salesperson, I can come into a sales conversation and the belief that I have that could be self limiting could potentially be hazardous. And self limiting is that I feel the need to educate my prospects. I feel the need to educate my prospects. And so you are probably sitting there saying, well, isn't that a good thing? Isn't that a good thing to educate your prospect? Don't we want our prospects to be educated? What do you mean by that, John? Well, I'm glad you asked. So the answer is yes, we want to educate our prospects. It's not necessarily the need to. The feeling that we have that we need to educate our prospects is not bad, it's not wrong, and it comes from a good place. However, the question is, the questions are, when are we educating our prospects and are we educating them the way that they want to be educated? Okay, let me tell you a quick story. So in a former role, I had a colleague and I had a meeting, a zoom meeting with a credit card processing company. We were thinking of changing, changing to a different company. And it was a 30 minute Zoom meeting. It was myself and a colleague and then two people from that company on the other side. One of which was a younger female, she was in sales. And so she said she set up the meeting and walked through the initial value proposition, right? And explanation of who they are and what they do. And then there was her. Obviously her superior was brought in to help close the deal. And so this was a 30 minute Zoom call. And we explained, exchanged pleasantries, you know, yeah, I'm John, this is what I do. And then for the next 25 minutes, I'll never forget it. For the next 25 minutes, the man who was on the call, who was evidently superior in the company, he was an executive. For the next 25 minutes, he just went on telling us about everything about their company and how their history, where they started, who all they've helped, all the big companies in the past they've worked with and what they did for them. For 25 minutes he went on and on and on and on. And then finally at the 27 minute mark, he says, okay, so what do you guys want to know? And I said, dude, all I just want to know that it integrates with our current software and then it might save us a little bit of money. And there was a pause on the other side and the young girl says, the, the younger girl says, leans into her microphone and says, yes, we can do that and it's probably going to be about the same price. And I was actually texting my colleague during the call saying like, I'm falling asleep. I mean, it was, it was, oh, it was brutal. And bless this guy's heart, like all that effort that he put into sharing everything about his company, I mean, he did all of that just to find out at the end of it of his giant pre rehearsed spiel that it didn't really matter to me. All I wanted to know was, hey, can it integrate with our current software? And is it like, can it save me a little, Save us a little bit of money? That's it. Okay, so there, that's an ex. That's an example, a pretty good example of over educating when they're. When. And that's. That's another risk. All right, so yes, we feel the need to educate, and that need to educate is good, right? But the danger we face is that we can very likely over educate our prospects. But let's ask ourselves a question to begin with. Where does the need, the feeling that I need to educate these folks, where does it come from? I said earlier it comes from. Comes from a good place, but where does it come from? I think there's a couple different components there. Number one is we want to bring value to this conversation. We want to Bring value to this conversation. And a lot of, a lot of sales folks, particularly in our industry. Right. Particularly in the, in the construction industry, home services industry, home improvement. We recognize that. They called us. They called us. They want our help. This is what we do. Whether whatever trade you're in, it's roofing or if it's landscape painting, kitchen, bath, remodeling, it doesn't matter. This is like, this is what we do. This is what we focus on. And I can't, Part of me, part of me just, I can't wait to tell them about it. Oh, you've got this problem. Well, guess what? I got the solution. Here goes, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. And 15 minutes go by and we take a breath. We all know that salespeople have a tendency to talk too much. All right? So that's. One component is like, how do I bring value to this conversation? The other one is that we just, we, we want to be viewed as the expert. We want to be viewed as the trusted authority that's going to help guide this decision and do it the right way. So that's why, I mean, it comes. The desire to educate somebody. It comes from a safe place. It comes from a good place. Comes from a good place of I'm here to help and I can't wait to tell you about it. Right? And we get giddy and we get really excited, and as a result, we skip steps in our process. We'll talk about that in another discussion. But yeah, so I think that it's. So it's very common, and you can see why it's very common. But the two questions that, the challenges that I posed earlier was, okay, am I. It's not about whether or not I'm going to educate them, it's about when I'm going to educate them and then how well am I educating them. In the example I gave you, I did not get the questions answered as to whether or not the two questions I had, I did not get them answered until after the presentation was done. So we run that risk of wasting time with this big, great presentation proposal. And then at the end of it, they, we finally find out what they really, really wanted to know. Here's a good example. Well, let me, let me give you the, Let me give you the tip first. All right, this is the, this is what we need to always be have in the back of our mind when we think about, I need to educate my prospects. Well, instead of thinking that, let's rewire that thinking on the front end of our Conversation in order for me to best understand the problem so that I can solve it the best way, right? I need to be educated by my prospects. I don't need to. When we first get there, we first get to the appointment, until we understand the best way to solve this problem, because we understand the problem better than anybody else. I don't need to educate my prospects. I need my prospects to educate me. That's the spirit that we need to go into a conversation. I need them to educate me. Think about your doctor. Okay? Talked a lot about. If there's a common theme here. I'm talking about doctors every single. Every single appointment. But when I. Or every single discussion. But when I go to my doctor, he doesn't spend the first 30 minutes of our appointment talking about him. Where he's educated, where he lived and where he grew up, how long he's been doing this and how often he's. All the unique things that he's seen, right? All the illnesses that he's helped, all the people he's helped and how many people like me he's helped. He's not spending that first 30 minutes talking about him. I mean, shoot. He actually has somebody else other than him come in and do take my vitals and ask some preliminary questions. And then when he comes in, he tells me. He asked me. He asked me more questions. Like, for instance, I actually, I went to the doctor. I jacked up my. My right big toe. It's an old baseball injury. Okay, tell me about it. How did you hurt it? What does it feel like? What does it feel like when I do this? What can or can't you do? What does it feel like when you run, when you jog? When does it hurt? When does it not hurt? Okay, tell me about. You mentioned you heard it before. I mean, he is. He's asking, what kind of lifestyle do I have, right? I'm athletic. Well, I used to be. And I like to exercise. I like. I have four kids. I love to run around. I don't like to run, but I'll do it. I mean. Oh, I hate running. Nevertheless. Excuse me. So bottom line is that he's asking me all these things, and then he says, okay, well, you know what? Let's examine this. Let me do my inspection, so to speak, right? So he's gonna. Let's go get an X ray, okay? There's nothing broken, so let's get another. Let's get another picture of it, right? Let's get. Let's get something. Let's get. Let's inspect it a little bit more. All right. Because I want to figure out what this problem is before I tell you what we're going to do about it. I need to make sure I'm right. So he's just asked questions and now it's time for the examination, for the evaluation, for the inspection. Okay. It's an mri. Yeah. It looks like there's some ligament damage. And so, and so now his proposal as to what to do about it is going to be completely, completely based on what I'm telling him, what I'm feeling, what my experience, that me, the prospect, basically, all right, what I'm doing, what I want to be able to do, what I'm not currently able to do. All right. And then how this treatment is going to affect me, how this solution is going to affect me being able to do that. Oh, you'll be in a boot for the cast for this long, a boot for this long. And then you can resume, resume exercise activities or weight bearing activities, whatever it might be. And he's going to give me that timeframe, he's going to walk me through what that solution is going to mean to me. And then he's going to walk, he's going to tell me. And as a result of all this, here's what you're going to feel. You're going to be able to run. I know you don't like to run, but you're going to be able to run. You're going to be able, in six months time or whatever, months time, you're going to be able to play with your kids. You're going to be able to resume normal exercise activities like you do. Right. So he's tailoring the education to me. Right. The point is that he has all the time in the world to educate we salespeople and owner, as salespeople, we have all the time in the world to educate our prospects after they have educated us. The other thing, we run the risk of not only just wasting our breath and giving them a whole bunch of information and, and at the end of it, them saying, here's what I really want to know. All right? Not only the risk of wasting our breath, but we also run that risk of free consulting. And not just free consulting, but really good free consulting. Because at the end of our incredible inspection, at the end of our great appointment, we made a friend and all that junk and then we gave him this great presentation. At the end of all of it, we, we still didn't get their questions answered. Something. And you felt that you've Been there, you've been there, you've tried your hardest. And at the end when you, when you delivered your cost and the solution, the solution and the price, you've delivered it, you've handed it over and you just know in your gut something's missing. Something's missing. Didn't quite, didn't connect the way I was supposed to. Yeah, we've all been there. So we, our job is to, instead of thinking about how quickly, how quickly and how early on I'm going to educate them, think I need to be educated by them. So I can now educate them really well the way they want to be educated. And they're not only are they going to want to work with me, they're going to want to spend more, they'll be willing to spend more to work with me. It all fuels that supportive belief that I solve the problem better than anybody else. Why? Because I understand it better than anybody else. How do I understand it better than anybody else? Because I asked the questions to understand it. Not only the apparent, the obvious issue going on, but the real problems behind it. The emotion, the pain that it's creating, the emotions that it will create when it's solved the right way the first time. Here's a great question to ask. What do you value in a contractor? What do you want, what do you want from a great contractor? Right. Maybe they want to know about your trust, your company history. Maybe they want to see examples of homes like theirs that you've worked on in the past. Maybe they, maybe they want that, maybe they don't. And so we don't need to waste our breath or our time doing it because it's not going to impact them, it's not going to influence their buying decision. Okay, so we ask questions like that, like, hey, you know, have you ever dealt with this before? Have you ever dealt with a contractor before? What was that like? What was that like? Right. So we are educated. We're allowing them to educate us as to how they want to be educated. What do they, what do they want? What do they need to hear? What do they need to hear to be, to feel like they have, they've been educated the way they want to be. We are. You're in a very unique position to come from a place where you want to help them. I want to help them. And part of that includes being willing to allow them to educate you. All right, so that's where the need to educate can be identified as a self limiting belief. It can be hazardous. Again, just to reiterate, it's not about whether we, whether or not we will educate them. It is about when we will educate them and then how effectively will we educate them as to how great our solution and our price is for them. I hope that helps. Oh, and by the way, so as you're you should be scheduling practice, right? You should be scheduling practice with your sales team or just by yourself role playing in front of a mirror if you have to. But if you have a team of sales folks, you should be scheduling practice. And when I say practice, I mean role play, right? Whether it's just a standard, you know, a prompt, a make believe situation that you want to challenge your folks with. Say, hey, you know, this is, this is the setup. Ready, go. Take action, right? Take one action. That's a great way to role play. Or you can do a if you have a call coming up, an appointment coming up, you can say, okay, here's what we know about the situation. Let's role play it. Or you can do a post call debrief. So at the end of a sales call, maybe it went the way you wanted it to, maybe it did not, you debrief. You start at the end of the conversation. Okay, how did we end? And these are all great. These are just for those of you who are struggling to find what to practice. Those are great ways to practice. Maybe we'll do, you know, maybe a part of our series will be hey, what do we practice? But regardless, you should be practicing. And when you practice, sales leader, owner, keep an eye out, keep it. This will show up. If you're looking for it, it'll be obvious to you. Just keep an eye out for the for an a salesperson getting excited and over educating talking a little bit too long. We know we like to talk too much, but when, when do we feel it? And before you know it, they'll start recognizing it too. Ooh, I'm talking too much. I need to stop and ask a question. Great thing to look out for. Hope this was helpful. 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