How to Excel at Sales Savagery with Cole Gordon

All right, guys, welcome to the episode of Coffee is for Closers. Today we have an esteemed guest, Mr. Cole Gordon Cole. Thanks very much for coming to the show, brother.

Appreciate you. Welcome. Happy to be here.

Awesome. Awesome. So I wanted to get you on the podcast, man, because obviously we've been going back and forth and, you know, we've sort of rolling in the same circles and I've heard it's one of the few people I've heard nothing but good things about and so always wanted to get on and actually have a conversation with you and figure might as well use it for some of kind content. Exactly.

So, man.

So I just kind of wanted to get like a brief introduction who you are, where you came from, and how you got into the sales game.

So super brief. You know, I can tell the long story and you know, my marketing story, the nightmare story. There you go. My super brief story is like, I was in college, I was going to be a doctor because I thought that was how you got rich. Doctor or lawyer. And then I realized that wasn't true because I read a book called how to Get Rich by Felix Dennis. And so I dropped out of that, tried to start an online business, just, you know, got all over the place with that, no idea what I was doing, and eventually fell into the flock of agency owners trying to, you know, grow a business. Because that's what I thought, you know, you should do. I was like 22.

If you listen to this podcast, you will make your first million within three years. I'm going to repeat that. You will make a million dollars within three years of the first episode you list. We don't want pikers. We're not here to save the manatees. We're here to make podcasts. You really want this? You listen and review. Put that coffee down.

And so I actually, after like years of trying to do that, got it to a point where I was doing $30,000 a month. This was like when I was. This was several years ago before it was as big as it is now. And dude, I just realized that that young of an age, I just hated fulfillment and I hated client management. And it also wasn't good at Facebook ads. Like, I was just good at selling. And I happened to be in this high ticket coaching program at the time. Her name was Kat Howell. And like, everybody would tell me, oh, dude, you're great at sales. You're great at sales. And like, I would have to outsource the work to the people in the program because, like, I couldn't fulfill on It, So it was just a huge headache. I was just too young and immature and I'd seen these high ticket salespeople out there and I was like, well, they're making six figures a year. You know, I thought there was a lot at that time. So I was like, yeah, they're making six figures a year and they're not having to do any fulfillment. And I was like, focus on one thing. It's like one thing. Not like nine things trying to build a business, but like one thing. So I was like, you know what? I gave my clients to one of our contractors and then I just hopped in, started selling this LinkedIn coaching offer to real estate agents. It was a really, really tough market. Real estate agents are very like, you know, if you sold them before, you know, they're, they're savvy and sophisticated. Then we brought into like mortgage and financial advisors and I've sold truckers and that offer we sold to like a ton of different people. And that's kind of really where I got my stripes. I was like the worst person on the team. And eventually when I left, I was the best person on the team. And then I left, sold for a few other companies and then went to a lot of people, no traffic and funnels with Chris Evans and Taylor Welch and then got a lot of great mentorship there. I was able to make a lot in commissions and do really, really well. And then kind of the next point in scale for me was starting my own company doing sales training. And really the main thing is sales recruitment for entrepreneurs, agencies, coaches, consultants who want to get off the phone and be able to build and scale their sales team. So that's kind of how it ended up. And it's gone well. I'm grateful for, grateful for finding sales because I found I was just doing a podcast right before this. I was telling somebody like, you know, because I've had my diversions and done a shiny object here and there, right?

Sure.

Yeah. I've gotten burned every single time, like not, not by like a coach or something. I've just been like, you know, it's just not been worth my time. And every single time I just double down on sales. It just works like it's always been like, the more I just focus on this one thing, the better everything else is from there. Yeah.

It's sort of funny. The reason why I got laugh when you said like the fulfillment side. I used to own gyms, right. I used to own a fair few of them and I hated the fulfillment. I hated it.

And like that's harder than the online is running, the whole. All of that stuff, you know?

Exactly, yeah. And then like when I. When I got out of the gyms and I sold back to business partners and stuff like that, we started doing sales for gyms. That's where our agency started, right? So we were doing sales for gyms. So originally it was me just doing like five or like it was like two or three gyms and I was charging them like a thousand bucks a week retainer plus comms, right. And I was just on the phones in the house all day. Then we started getting like, I started getting inundated with gyms running us because no one does that and like we don't do that anymore. And there's a reason.

It's a lot of work.

And then I got James to come help me out. Then we were both selling for gyms. And then I was like, well, I'll just do all the selling, you do all the admin. And then we started growing it that way. And then we kind of fell into high ticket. Just like through that, right. I kind of fell in love with the fact that my favorite part about owning a gym was it was so easy. Well, not easy, but it was. You could really get cash from people up front quite like without too much skill. But the fulfillment was a nightmare. So I can sell a 16 week package for two grand over the phone. That's no problem. But then you have to fulfill that and it's a whole different kettle of fish. And it's just a nightmare. And there's too many brick and mortar stuff like that. And that's where I really kind of got my sales chops was the fact that I used to open the gyms and we'd have to sell 200 people in three weeks. And so through that, it's basically like the equivalent of door knocking. So we would just dial for eight hours a day. And then we did thousands and thousands and thousands of sales calls. And then from there, the transition to doing the high ticket stuff was actually kind of easy because there's an ROI attached to it.

Easy? Well, for B2B, right? It depends on the offer, right? Cause we got guys with dating offers and fitness and still you can sell those really easily over the phone. 3,000, 4,000 bucks. But B2B with the ROI, especially to.

A market that has money, yeah, it's fantastic. So like we were sort of talking like just before the podcast about I guess how hard it is to find like what I would consider or like what you would Consider really quality, like, sales training. And, like, I haven't obviously heard your sales calls or anything that. So I don't really know, like, what style you have. Like, I guess, what would you say in terms of a style or, like, the Cole Gordon kind of method? Like, what is it about what you do that you think kind of works for you and the guys that you coach?

So, you know, I teach something called, you know, I was always doing this, and then I finally, you know, we were talking about Jeremy Miner. I heard him say this, and I was like, oh, okay. That's what I'm doing is a Socratic dialogue thing. Right. So that's what I teach. And the way I teach, it's very unique because I literally just like, you know, after you take thousands of sales calls, you kind of just like, start making some stuff up. I believe seven beliefs that your prospect has to have to buy. Okay. So the entire everything before the. What's called the transition phase of the call is mainly about eliciting these seven beliefs before you transition into your pitch. Okay. And when we can do that, we can create an objectionless close, or instead of having to, like, hard close the prospects or, you know, jujitsu, all these objections, the prospect closes themselves because they view you as a leader who can give them insight and not a salesperson.

Absolutely.

It's using Socratic dialogue to lead somebody through the illogical, emotional conclusion of those beliefs, if that makes sense.

Yeah, sure.

I didn't read that from book. I literally just, you know, one day I was just. Just overthinking and taking all these calls. You just kind of create your own. You innovate, you know, because every single time. So that's how I think about it. And my clients tend to like that a lot as well.

And so, like, that. It's obviously. It sounds very similar to how can I do things? I've done a lot of Jeremy stuff, and then I have my own method because I've done thousands and thousands of sales calls and sort of like, you know, molded that into what kind of works for me. But it's very, very similar to that. Right. It's trying to create the objection that's close. Because how I was taught to sell was going hard, pitch early Objection, handle for 25 minutes. Right. Like, that's how I was taught to sell originally by, like, sort of all the, you know, the fitness guys and all those kind of hardcore closer type dudes. Right. Which is. It gets you really good at objection handling. However, if you're really good at sales, you don't need to do that much objection handling. Right. But also, we had Jeremy on the podcast, and he said a quote, and I'm going to butcher it, but it was basically like a man who is. What's the quote, James? I don't want to get it wrong. It was like a man whose mind has changed. I can't remember it. Have you got it?

Even Kirby, a man convinced against his will, is of the same opinion still.

Yeah, right.

Yeah.

And that summed it up perfectly for me, because you can Jedi mind trick and jujitsu people into doing whatever, but essentially you just won a temporary mental boxing match. You haven't really changed their mind. Because a bad idea has to unravel in someone's hands, and. And a good idea has to tighten somebody's hands. And so the element of persuasion is essentially getting someone to come to the conclusion themselves. Because everything that I say is garbage. Everything the prospect says is gospel.

Yeah, yeah, exactly. Well, it's funny, too, is. And, you know, I kind of like handling objections and not in a real sense of like. Like, if I had to pick, obviously, I would pick no objections and get the money.

Yeah, right.

But, you know, it is kind of fun, like. Like playing around with that and having fun and then, you know, doing some different, like, language patterns at the end of the call. And what's funny is, you said, like, in Fitness and B2C, I do see a lot more objection handling then, like, as you go more sophisticated and B2B, a lot of that stuff just doesn't. You know, it's like, a lot of times they either, you know, by the end of the call, they're going to move forward, or it's just they're going to tell you no, you know, gonna give you a smokescreen. Right. So you're like, a lot of the objection, jiu jitsu, ninja stuff, as you go, more B2B, more sophisticated, kind of falls by the wayside. But I do see it like, you know, a lot of the fitness, B2C, a lot of that is out there. Doesn't mean it's the right thing to do. It's just that you see that a lot in those types of markets and reviewing calls for those types of clients and stuff.

Yeah, you said something there that, like, some of the guys might understand. You said a smokescreen. Do you want to kind of, like, define, like, what you mean by that?

You know, you might have a guy say, can I speak with one of your clients? Right. And that could be a real thing, or it could be like, let me just like kind of pacify this guy so I can get off the phone. Right?

Yeah.

Latter would be a smokescreen. Now that could be a real thing and there's a way you can handle that, which you can actually see if it's real or not. And if you want to connect with one of your clients, you can do that and then get them back on the call and have one for. Right. Well, I, you know, a lot of times that can be a smokescreen. I need to think about it. A lot of times is a smokescreen. You know, it's very vague like that opposed to, can I let you know tomorrow morning? You know, sometimes with certain personalities, letting them.

Do they have to do that? Yeah.

You know, it's just a lot. Instead of me having this come to Jesus conversation about why that's the wrong way to make decisions and why that way you're gonna be broke for the rest of your life. Like, sometimes they do really want to do it, but a very feminine, flowy, spiritual woman is, you know, you're better off letting her like do that. And that's not a smokescreen. Right. So it's just people tell you to be able to try to get off the phone.

Yeah. There's that logistical, you know, objection. And I think that's the one that really, the logistical objection is the one the guys who really push hard, that's the reason why they get a lot less sales. And from the guys that I've encountered who have that sort of, you know, as Jeremy would put it, like a first or second era of sales where it's like those 80s 90s, early 2000s models where it's real hard. You're pushing mindset all the time, you know, like you have a bad mind and those guys never close. Anybody who has a legitimate logistical objection, like, hey, I have to speak to a partner, I have to do this, I have to figure out finances. There is something that they have to do, do. And you push and push and push and the person just says, okay, I'm out. Like, this is too much. Or they just ghost. Right. Ghosting is a symptom of too much pressure and like not being, I guess, like coming to the core with the sole intent of making a sale.

Right. It's a lack of trust. Right. So like what I teach my guys is basically like. Cause what I was really good at when I actually sold full time was like long term follow up and closing deals. Like, you know, usually I could close the deal after a call or two. Right. But like, I Also could like maintain relationships with people. And for certain companies closing three, four months down the road, you know, so I would still close 40 to 50% on the first call, but then also bring in a lot of people, have long term follow up. And the key of that is just like main, like if you're a true advisor to the client and you're providing them with insight and you can maintain the relationship and they feel like they can get on a call with you without it being like a come to the call with a decision type of thing, that does a lot. So like when you're sending follow ups, what I teach my clients to do is to remove the risk of it being like a come to the call with a decision type of thing because that's why they're good at ghost. But if they feel like they can show up and be honest with you now, we can create a dialogue and a discussion and that can lead to a sale or maybe it's. But you still have the relationship, you know what I mean?

Yeah, it's a really important point because I think like, like we recently sort of. So we work a little bit different to you. Like we still do some sales training, but predominantly what we do is like a done for you sale. So I have a team, we have like 15 guys and we sell all different offers. Right. And we kind of take over the sales process of somebody who just doesn't want to manage salespeople. Right, right. You know, so salespeople can be really hard to manage. Some people just don't want to have to deal with that. So they just go, all right, you do it right. And so we just kind of absorbed somebody else's sales team. And they've been taught by a very, very hardcore, very hardcore sales. And they've had like hundreds of thousands of leads and they've never sold a single person or follow up in like five years. And because they push people so hard and they do the whole, well, if you're not willing to make a decision today, then you're not a good prospect.

And you're not buy or die attitude. Yeah, forever to me or what do I call it in my marketing? Buy now or you're forever dead to me. Fast action discount now granted. I first sold, I was forced to use one of those and you know I did well. Right. But like I would have sold way more if I didn't do that. You know, when I sold eventually for, you know, tailoring creation, traffic funnels and stuff, they didn't believe in that. And man, it helped so much having flexibility to do what's right for the other person at the end of the call and be able to deal with logistics. Supposed to. It's like, well, you know, like, I guess you can sleep on it because you know it's gonna go up to 15k tomorrow, but it's 9k today.

I hate that, man.

I hate that too, because it's such.

A load of shit.

I don't even hate it because of the. It's not like I think it's like, I get how people think. It's like false scarcity and scammy and all of that may be true. I don't really hate it because of that. I hate it because it's less effective. Like, I'm more effective without that. Because you can. You can create dialogue and a discussion and you can. You can one or two call clubs. Like, you can do the right thing for the prospect. You can still negotiate some stuff and you can negotiate turns. So you just lose sales when you do that shit.

Absolutely. And there's a. You can use those, but they have to be framed so early on. Yeah, very early on in the process. The person knows that there is this available if you try and use it as a closed tactic at the end. I mean, I'd love to see some stats on like, the amount of people that that has convinced to do the program would be microscopic. Like, I could not like, it's not even worth putting in there. But people who like, I guess it's just a really old tactic. Well, if we give them a discount now, they'll buy. It's like, well, no, people don't buy on money. People buy on the emotion, the need, the desire and the want.

Right. Well, that's. That's external pressure. And people buy based on internal pressure. Right. And when you have dialogue with somebody and you lead them to logical, emotional conclusion that what you have is the best next step for them, that's what creates the internal pressure. Because they want to do it for their own reasons, not yours, you know?

Exactly. Exactly. Yeah. We had Peyton on the podcast and he was sort of talking about all that stuff, and he had some really good insight. What is it that you think are some sort of key things that someone who's kind of young in the sales game, who's kind of up and coming, like, what are some of the, I guess, the traps to avoid? I know, like, I've spoken to a lot of young sales guys. They come to me, they want to sell for me, or they come to someone like you and they want to get training. Like, what are some things that you're like, okay, like there's a logical series of steps here for you to actually be successful in the sales game. And like, where would someone who's like, you know, they're sick of their nine to five, they want to get into something where they have a bit more freedom and they do like have an affinity for sales, like, where would you tell someone to start?

So I mean, man, that's such a big question, right? Like, are we looking for the most common pitfalls or the best places to start?

Yeah, I would say pitfalls first. I think that's probably the, you know, the mistakes that you can avoid making. Like for me, the mistakes that I would avoid making is like thinking that you can just hop into closing straight away without kind of going through like a natural progression with where you get comfortable on the phone and then sort of get comfortable with actually communicating with people in a specific way without going straight to like going into a high ticket offer, you know what I mean? Because a high ticket offer, it can cost 500, 600, 1,000, $2,000 to get somebody onto the sales call, right? And so the amount of pressure it puts on you to perform very early in the piece, I think is unproductive. And it's one of the reasons why the attrition rate for salespeople is so high because it puts an extraordinary amount of pressure and then this and then the business owners are not willing or able to be able to put the time in effectively to make sure that someone can be successful long term, right? So there's like a natural progression there to go through different offer steps and stuff like that.

Well, dude, I totally agree with that. So I mean, I think that's one. I think the, you know, I'll give you the obvious one, right, that I get all the time is people just want to know like, like if you have a Q and A call in your sales program, which you'll notice very quickly is that people just come on the call and they're like, alright, well you know, can I show you this text of somebody after the call and like, can you tell me what to say to like get them back on the call so that they buy? And I'm like, dude, I mean, sure, I'll give you my best shot, but there's like nothing I can tell you. It's gonna like remove all the damage you did to get it to this point, right? So in a nutshell, I would tell somebody. The first thing is it's not Knowing exactly what to say. It's having the right. And I got this. I'll give Taylor Welch credit for this, because this is where I got it from. But it's having the right philosophy is the one thing, and then the second thing is having the right energy, being able to manage yourself. Because when you can lead yourself effectively very well, you can lead other people. And that's really important as well, is like, once I can get somebody really good on the fundamentals, like just the very basics, if I can raise their standards as a human being, they're gonna sell a lot better. Right. Especially in high ticket, where you're holding somebody accountable to their highest selves. It's like, how can you hold somebody else accountable to their highest self if you're not even holding yourself accountable to that at the same time? Right. So the more we can raise our standards of who we are and who we want to be, the more we can influence. So after they learn, that doesn't mean, like, you hype them up, get them all Tony Robbins ready to go. Yeah, yeah. Teach them sales. Like, I'm very about the mechanics and like, actually, you know, having like, you know, good training, but that is a huge needle mover. When you get the fundamentals down is the energy aspect as well.

Sure. So. So I guess, like, making sure that your day to day, that you're consistent, you're doing the things. Like, it was. It was really interesting. Like, one of the guys, he was having a talk to another guy that was on team because they do role plays and stuff like that. And the guy was just struggling in a few areas. He was getting a lot of, like, money objections, which is unusual. And so in the role play that that like. Like that they were doing, one of our sales guys basically got him to admit that he, like, wasn't investing in himself at all. And so he was. Because of COVID he was hoarding his cash. He wasn't doing anything. So he was like, you need to invest in something. And so he actually sold him into something. Like he took credit during the role play, sold him into a training program, took credit card details, took payment, the whole box and dice. And then from there, that sort of freed up that sort of headspace with him. And then he hasn't gotten those objections since. Right. And nothing's changed in his process. Nothing's. You know what I mean? Nothing's changed in the leads. You know, it's just the fact that, like, he's now kind of. He's walking the line. Do you know what I Mean, he's.

Practicing what he's preaching internal philosophy and standards essentially, as well. Just mentioned. That's what you get. Yeah, well, indeed. One thing that's very interesting as well, I've noticed this being. And this is not like a shameless plug of my offer, but it's like, away, plug, away.

So good.

I had a guy last week, and he bought my offer, and he was in a huge rut. He was, like, freaking out, doing a huge rut, and I sold him one call, close. And then, like, he had a hit, a full day of sales calls after that. And after he paid in full, he literally was like, dude. He's like, I just closed three out of five, man. I was like, yeah, dude. That's just what happens when not only you invest in yourself, but it also helps to get on the phone with somebody and, like, be sold to by somebody who's sold well. Yeah, it's a lot of confidence. And it's like, a lot of times, like, in your brain, you're like. Especially for people who were experienced, but now they're in a rut. It kind of like, okay, like, I know how to do this. I'm overthinking it. This is simple. It's about helping people, creating a gap and solving that. And, like, I just need to get on the phone, connect with the person, and, like, you know, exude that same type of confidence and make it happen. So I've had that happen so many times where people will, like, I literally had another guy this week that happened to where he upgraded into our backend program, and he was in a huge riot. And then he just, like, hit us up today, and he was like, dude, he's like, closing, like, 30% now. It's like, just. It's weird how that works, but there's a. There's something to that for sure.

Awesome, man. So that kind of brings us a good segue. What do you do, bro? What do you do? Like, you know, it's sort of similar to me. You probably see me post shit up. I see you post shit up, and everyone's like, my family's always like, what the fuck do you do? I'm like, like, don't worry about it. I'm fine.

My friends from back home still think I do something in fitness for some reason. I don't know what. Jacked Jack. I never anything in fitness, but for some reason, I think I sell fitness stuff online. I don't know how that happened, but, you know, they just don't. They just don't get It. So basically we have two offers. We have a sales training where they work one on one with me and my coaches. So we have a head coach who he was one of the top sales people for clients in Demand. So with Russ Rafino and Marc Von Muser and all those guys, very good sales organization, too. So we have a sales program where we work one on one with sales teams and just general people just trying to get better at sales. So we take them through training. I'm really big on call reviews.

Yeah. Massive. Yeah.

That's a whole other topic if you want me to talk about that. I go on a huge rant.

Yeah, I do. I do a. We do like every single month or every single week, we do a call review with the team and we do that as a group that I lead. And then every single month, we do an individual core review. And it's the most powerful. Once you're at a level where you're good and your fundamentals are down, it's pretty much the one thing that I think will get you to that next level.

Yeah, it's exactly. And that's because of what's called the rule of specificity. So it's like when you're training for a sporting event. On all the training books, they'll tell you whether that's powerlifting, weightlifting, track, anything. They'll tell you you want your training to be very specific to what you're actually doing. Right. Like if you watch a powerlifter who's training for bench press, what does this training look like? It's like a bunch of bench press with sales. Going through a course is great. Right. Talking about sales is great. Go into a Q and A call and asking some questions that are all usually surface level. Look, that's helpful. But the best thing is the most specific, which is going to be somebody who's better than you sitting down, listening to one of your calls and breaking down what you should be doing, what you shouldn't be doing. Keep doing this, don't do this. And basically opening up blind spots that you weren't even aware to. That's the number one thing I think people can be doing. The second most is getting maybe a call of mine or a call of yours or somebody else who you look up to, who you know is better than you.

Right.

That's important because, like, you don't want just a random person. The old guys call you false patterns, but somebody who you know is better than you get one of their calls and even better, have them break down what they're doing, why they're doing it. So I've shifted a lot of our training and sales to basically call reviews and also having my. Like, I'll put my calls in there, and I'll be like, all right, like, this is what I'm doing while I'm doing it. And that's.

That's actually so funny you say that. That's literally exactly what we do. It's just funny that you can come from. We've never spoken, and then we've had very different experiences, but we've decided that, like, the way to coach your team is, like, this is how you do it, you know?

Yeah, well, I mean, dude, 100%. And it literally just comes from, like, I got so tired of, like, you know, you hop on the call, it's a Q and A, and then they're like, you know, okay, well, what do I do when they don't have the money? You know what? It's all. It's like, we got all these band aids, and look, that can be valuable. It's like, that can be fine. The typical Q and A.

That's the reason why I did that course for 50 bucks a week, because I was like, this is a course with that stuff. But, like, it can get you to a decent. Like, it's.

It's.

It's just enough. But I don't see the value in someone's paying $10,000 for that gentleman. But if you want the specificity, you can come to us and then we'll do that. We'll do your core, you know, all that kind of stuff. So there's. You know what I mean? But, like, you know, some people, if you're terrible, do a course, get to here if you want to be good, do coaching, get to hear, well, think.

About it this way, dude. And this will be. This will make it seem real dumb. It's like, if you look at, like, sports, how do they get better? Well, they break down game tape. Not just the tape of the game on Sunday. You know what they also do? Because I play college football, they break down all the practice tape, the other team's tape. The teams who are doing the best out there, they break down their tape. It's like the amount of film they watch is like 5x to the amount of actually practice that they do. It's great. How stupid would it be if Bill Belichick. We'll just. For a second, we'll just imagine that Bill Belichick and Tom Brady still play together for a second. But, like, let's say you Know the Pats play on Sunday. Bill Belichick wasn't even at the game. Wasn't even there. Hasn't even seen the game tape, hasn't watched the film. But then Brady goes up to him on a Wednesday, like, three or four days later, and he's like, yeah, dude, we were on the 20, our own 20, and it was fourth and 18, and, you know, we went for it. We called this pass play. They lined up in this defense, and, like, one of the receivers, like, he went the wrong way, so I didn't throw it to him. I threw it to the other one. Like, what would you have done in that situation? And Bill Belichick's like, well, dude, first of all, I haven't even seen the game. It wasn't even there. Haven't seen the film. And why are you going for it on your own 20 at a fourth and 18?

You know, there's no context. There's none.

Yeah, right. It's like, you have to, like. It's so much easier for me to be, like, in most of the times, any of that symptom level stuff at the end of the call. You know this as well. It's like, you can literally find this. It's like I can listen to five minutes of a call and be like, all right, dude. Like, here's how the call's gonna go.

Like, here's the.

You need to remove. Here's how you need to position the offer. You need to probably spend a little bit more time talking about something that you tried in the past so you can differentiate yourself. It's like, we can just maneuver all of that stuff. But, you know, when you're. When you're caught in those surface level conversations and people are looking for the perfect thing to say, it's just. It can be. It's very frustrating on my part. So to kind of close the whole loop, literally, the reason we started doing call reviews on my own calls is just to. I found it was the best way to create progress in clients, you know?

Absolutely. I mean, like, when you can listen to something that's like, if you have a really good call, like, so whenever I have a really good call, I send that to all the guys, and then we do, like, a little breakdown of it as a group. Be like, this is why everything is being said. Like, we did a team training on yesterday, and I was like, okay, what we need to do is everyone needs to understand their script as well as I'm about to break down. And so I went through every single part of the script, like all the phases, you know, from the, that sort of like connection phase, the situation phase, like problem awareness, solution awareness, like, you know, consequence questions, committing phase transitions, pitches, that kind of stuff. And I was like, this is the questions that I use to transition into each phase. This is the principle and the concept that I'm trying to bring to each phase. And this is how I'm going to use it later. I don't want to say anything that is not productive because the longer my call goes for, the more tangents, the more unproductive lines of conversations I have, the less emotional power I can carry throughout it. And then the more chance I'm going to have of getting to think about it because that person has either forgotten or that what they said 30 minutes ago has lost power. So like we need to understand each phase and that's how we condense our sales calls. So we're not doing 90 minute sales calls. Which like makes my head explode. Having to listen to a 90 minute sales call. Because I can tell them at the end, they go 90 minutes. I go, let me guess. Think about an objection. Yeah. How'd you know go was fucking 90 minutes long, bro. A big.

Let me just, I'll just vent on. I reviewed a call not too long ago. Yeah, I hate is the, I call it anvil drop pitches right to where it's like a lot of times the call will go pretty well and then it's like they go into what I call the transition phase where you're transitioning into your pitch while like, like basically making it kind of permission based. And not a lot of people transition into their pitch. And then the way they do it creates all this sales resistance and reminds them is a sale. It's like totally backwards. So there's a method to that. But once they get into their pitch, instead of pitching in a way that creates dialogue, they pitch and it's like, okay, how fast can I say these words to just get through it? Yeah, get through it. No tie downs, no dialogue, no. What are your thoughts on that? Do you feel like based on what we talked about earlier, that may be a good fit for you or whatever may work for you to get you to X, Y and Z? No dialogue. And it's like all of this stuff, it's just like all this information and then prospects like about to throw up, you know, like I hate those anvil drops, man. And that creates a lot of think about it as well.

Absolutely. It's really incredible. You can have a 40 minute call that goes amazing and you could screw that three or five minute pitch up, all the need dissipates because they like come to realize that they're in a sales process, then their walls go up and then you have to start to redo all the work. And you can. Even if you pitch too much, like my sales guys calls it like overcooking a pitch. If you like, if you spread, if you try and insert too many problems and too many solutions into that pitch, the person's like, holy shit. And if you ever get like. I think I was talking the other day, I was like, if you ever get someone tell you, how much time is this going to take me? Like, you've sort of, you've expanded it too much to now the point where they're just like, oh, shit, like, what do I have to do? Because you've just uncovered too much shit. You know what I mean? So. And then for them to move forward, it's like you walk into a really dirty house and you just go, oh, fuck this time out. Like, you know, so. Whereas you kind of want to take them into the dirtiest room and go, let's fix this room. We can work on the rest of the house later. Well, let's just get this room clean. Let's talk about what we need to do with this room. This room is important to you. Let's just tie this all up and then move forward later. So overcooking that pitch, man, it's an incredible point, man.

I'm gonna steal that from you. That's good. I like that.

Yeah, go for it, go for it.

The anvil drop pitch, but overcooking it.

Yeah. There's also like solution dropping throughout, I think is a really, is a thing that a lot is a bad habit a lot of salespeople have. So when someone says, oh, you know, I just really need accountability, and you go, oh, that's great. Because we provide that in our program. And then they move on. Like, that does my head in. That's a really old school style of selling. And it just like whenever I role play, I role play as me. So I answer everything honestly. And I don't ever, like, be a Persona because it allows me to actually, like, be in the core, be emotionally attached to it, and go through the kind of emotional ebbs and flows that somebody would go through. And one of my guys had this great call and then he just put one little thing in there. He's selling like a high ticket online fitness offer. And he was like, yep, okay. Based off what you said, I Think online PT would be the best option for you? And then he just moved on really quickly, like he was just trying to seed it. And I was like, bro, that took me 10 minutes to recover from. I was like, you let me know at that point. And everything you said after that, he, like, recovered from it. But had he not said that sentence, I never would have been taken out and he wouldn't needed to recover. And it was a really interesting. Because I've never had that happen where I was really in the core because I am losing weight at the moment. I've lost 30 pounds or something like that, and I've got about another 12 to go before I'm back to pre kid weight. So I was being me. He's selling a fitness offer. It was all real, it was all genuine. Every answer I gave. It was a very interesting concept for me because I was just like, wow, that one thing could have cost him the sale.

Yeah. So the way I think about it, right, is there's the product and there's the problem. Okay. So there's the product and the problem. So it's like the salesperson and the prospect, obviously they want to talk about. They want to focus on the product. And like a good salesperson, they're going to shift all that attention over to the problem. And it's always about the problem. Even when you pitch, if you pitch correctly, 90% of my pitch is just talking about the problem. It's just talking about it at a higher level of thinking than they were currently thinking about it before. Right. Because it's like tying it down to.

The labeling, the emotion, all that kind of stuff. Yeah.

It's like no problem can be fixed at the same level of thought that in which it was created. Right. So if we can think about our problems at a much, much higher level, the solution becomes naturally obvious as, like, a byproduct of that. So a lot of selling is like, problem. Like, a lot of pitching that I do is problem education. Because when you can educate someone in the problem, the reason why that's a problem, the consequences of that, then, like, what you need to do in the solution becomes really easy to explain. It, like, tees it up, you know, it's like teeing up a golf ball before you hit it, if that makes sense.

Yeah, absolutely, I suppose. Like, where, like, where are you headed, man? Like, what's the grand plan for Colegard? Like, you taking over the sales industry, booting out all those Dan Locke dudes, and gonna be like the sales trainer to the stars or gonna Start wearing a red suit and talking to your phones like this. Closing deals or what?

That's some funny stuff. You know, I don't know right now I've been really blessed. So to close the loop on, you're asking like what do I actually do? Right. So we have that sales training offer we also had recruitment and training offer for. Entrepreneurs are trying to get off sales team, especially in like the high ticket space. Right. That one is like the referrals I get for it and just the. Just the organic traffic we get from that and how interested people are in that is like exploding. Right. So right now, you know, it's not really a sexy thing to say, but just really focused on getting our customers results and making sure that they're able to successfully build their sales team and keep our reputation good. Obviously, you know, cash flows good as a byproduct of that. So that's fine. But you know, I don't know, you know, I'm kind of in a phase where we're doing good financially and so helping the people that we have and then gonna plan out the next steps from there. Ideally I would like to like, you know, scaling and make the biggest impact I can because probably like you, I feel like what I have is really good and it can help people. Especially compared to like what most sales training out there is really poor, you know, so.

And the bigger the name, the worse it gets. It's.

Yeah. You know, I was gonna say we were talking about it before we hopped on. It's like it's so weird with Mark. You know, you have these like really good books like Breakthrough Advertising. Anything by Michael Masterson is really good. You have Scientific Advertising by Claude Hopkins and Victor Schwab's books. It's like you can go on and on about these classics when it comes to sales, you know, sure, there's like classics, but they're really not the honest would mislead you today and probably instill bad habits. And there's just not a lot of good sales books. There's not a lot of good sales.

There's not a lot of. Yeah, there's not a lot of really good. Like, like I suppose the high ticket sales industry is so new. You know what I mean? Yeah.

But no, it is new. And I would say, you know, there's a lot of garbage sales in high ticket. But high ticket industry is fairly new. Yeah, I continue to ramble and say that, you know, I think a lot of what's going on in the industry is, you know, there's definitely Some garbage sales and some stuff that's like not good at all. But man, when you compare it to like I was sold insurance not too long ago and it's like I was like man, where was the sale? I was like kind of pissed. I was like where's the fricking sales process? Like you literally just like ask you one question and just pitch ya. It was like what's up with that?

You know, so it's just the assumptive. I got fish, you want some fish? You know what I mean?

But yeah, so. But it's interesting. I do think High Ticket is, you know, the good people in High ticket are much further along than the majority of the industry. Which again is not really like saying much when like most people in those professional services like the traditional sales based businesses like real estate, financial advisors, insurance agents are just totally like they think they're good at sales but they're just getting really hot referrals and they're just pitching people. It's like man, like I think and that's maybe long term vision for me is like I think those guys really need help because like if you just taught them like the bare fundamentals, they.

Probably just had to communicate effectively with people.

Yeah, they'd absolutely destroy it.

It's funny, like I think I'm a, like, I don't know, like sales snobbery is probably the right word. But you know, you see people like selling this kind of products and they're like salesmen. I'm like, you know, just sort of being the, being the person who's in between a product and a person. I don't know if that makes you a salesperson, do you know what I mean? Like being able to really understand a prospect to take them through a journey that has them buy something that's in their best interest, even if they don't know it's in their best interest, but it genuinely is. That's what sales is, you know what I mean? Just sort of connecting someone with a product or a service. I don't know if that's really sales, that's more of just kind of, you know, to connect people with products or services. But when you can take someone through a deliberate process and you're in control, but the person, the prospect feels like they're in control but you're guiding them, leading them and having them come to the ideas themselves. That's sort of when you can call yourself a true salesperson. I think I put it on Facebook that I was chatting to you before. Dan Henderson said that you sold him into client kit and it was a thing of beauty. So well done.

I wonder if. Australian guy.

Yeah, yeah, yeah. He's a fitness business coach.

Oh my God. I don't even know if I should reveal details on that one on this call, but that was a. There may have not been some pressure on that call.

Yeah, just a little bit.

It was the best thing for him. So, you know, it's weird. I don't know if you're the same way I've sold, you know, I don't know. I mean hundreds if not thousands of people now, but I can still like remember everybody pretty well for whatever reason. My recall is very good. So I don't know if that's like a. If you have the same thing, but.

I do, I do. For the high ticket stuff, I've probably done 10,000 fitness sales. So that's a, That's a tough one.

You're probably like.

And I'd prefer to forget those. The way like I listen to old cold recordings of when I used to do fitness sales and I've got some of it in that group that you're in because like there's like very teachable versions of sales and there's ones that need to be coached. Right. So like to get someone to a good like, and that's kind of. There's a. There's a funny line between it. Right. Like to get somebody really good requires core recordings. Coaching. There's also. You can teach different styles within a coaching than what you can teach in a course environment.

Right.

So like what I tried to do with that group is like the way that I can teach someone to actually get better quite quickly without requiring to speak to anybody. Like a step by step. This is how you get rid of most of your objections. This is an easy way to objection handle. Here's how you can loop some things in, like a logic trap. I don't use it these days, but it's a very effective form of objection handling if you know how to do it properly, you know what I mean? And so it's very teachable through just examples. Right. And if someone can learn the concept, then you don't really need to be coached through it. You just practice. Right?

Yeah.

How I would coach someone one on one is a totally different form of sale because it's so much more nuanced and so much more subtle that teaching on a course environment. For me, I haven't figured out how to do that yet. I've got a couple of different styles of sales that I'll teach people, depending on how they come to me and also depending on where they start and also depending on what volume they can do. Someone in fitness, they have hundreds and hundreds of leads a month. So they need to learn the fastest way to close somebody because like they have to do it that way. Right. They can't be spending, they need to close people in 20 minutes essentially. Right. So because they're doing like 100 or $400 offer, they're just trying to liquidate their marketing. Right. So like that style of sales is going to be like the efficacy for the business owner is different than someone who's selling a higher ticket model. Somebody's selling a higher ticket model, they have the time and it's worthwhile them spending longer on the phone and really because it's online. Right. Then they have to sell them the right way the first time. Whereas if it's an in person thing, you can then create the necessary relationship later. Right. So the style of selling the fulfillment for me plays a little bit of a role in how I'll teach somebody and how fast they need to get up and how and like what they're trying to get out of it. So when I'm selling like in gym fitness stuff, it's different than how I would sell online fitness. And then same for high ticket or low ticket. There's a couple of different methods that I would use and that's the most. The best method is the one that I would coach. However, I mean coaching people one on one, there's a tremendous amount of time, there's fulfillment and there's also a lot of money that has to be exchanged in order to make that effective for both sides. So some of that stuff that you've seen, it's not how I would do it now. It's more like a hybrid of how I used to do it. It's nowhere near as aggressive as how I used to sell because I used to just have mental boxing matches for people, which was effective, but I wouldn't recommend doing it long term. But yeah, I don't know where I started with that, but that was a.

That was a tangent which dude, like when it comes from, you know, and I know like in certain environments with like pressure and I don't even like to say pressure. Aggression is actually a better word I think, you know, in certain environments it's hard to use. Right. The more I think sophisticated B2B closer, like corporate that you're going to get, not really going to happen. Very language of trust, neutral based language. Definitely where you want to be now on the B2C side. Like, I'm just. This is my experience is if it comes from the right energy to where it's not about you trying to pressure close somebody, but it's about you. And this is quoting Taylor Welch, but leading somebody to the best decision for them because it's the best thing for them, then it's like a totally different energy. And you're their advocate, not like a salesperson trying to close them. Right. I want to get to the truth of, like, who their highest self is. And then I don't. Like, I'm very indifferent. Doesn't mean I don't care. But I want to make sure that they're held accountable to their highest desired self. Right. Who we want to elicit that person, that identity earlier on in the call. So they want to live congruent to that. Right. Because identity is the highest driver behavior. So if they say they want to be somebody at the beginning of the call, they're going to want to stay consistent congruent with who they said they wanted to be. And sometimes I remind them, like, dude, you said you wanted to be this person at the, you know, five minutes ago. Now you're saying this. What's really going on? Just be honest with me also. Sure. Cole, you've got to get to other appointments because we're right on time for you now. So probably have to finish it there. Otherwise we could talk for another two hours. Go on many tangents.

Sales guys can talk. Yeah.

I got another five minutes if you guys got any.

All right, cool. Well, I'll ask a couple of the questions. What do you think? This could be a huge question. But what do you think? Think are the few. What's the biggest myth that you think is around sales that you think is just total bullshit?

Well, I mean, the biggest thing is that, you know, I already kind of said this one. That there's the perfect words to say, right? Tell Me what to say. That book on Amazon. It's actually a good book, by the way, but it's called exactly what to Say. It almost, like, pissed me off. I was like, oh, man. But it's actually pretty good. It's just like a cool book to nerd out on. So I think, like, the exact things to say. I think also people don't realize how little, like, it's not about logically. Like, you know, there's somebody out there who teaches a lot of sales. I literally heard him say one time, you know, you just want to sell them with logic.

I Was like, the science says otherwise.

But yeah, yeah, I was like, you know, look like you want some logic to be there, right? But, you know, there's. There's a whole. You got to move them emotionally first. Right. If you've ever studied the cap, which is child, adult, parent, it's like the child responds to overt benefit, moving away from pain towards pleasure. And then the adult is the wants to know, like the how to the kitchen table logic. And then the parent is the judge, which is always gonna say, you know, yeah, okay, but what about this, right? That's the one that you get the objections, right? So you need to appeal to all of those things. And I think that's from Sandler, by the way. But you need to appeal to all of those things to really create a good, objectionable, close to so misconceptions for you.

All right, cool. And last question that I'll say is, any advice for somebody wanting to rapidly improve sales, actions you can take or some study that you can do that you think has the best bang for buck? Obviously, you can give Cole money, but.

Yeah, it wants to get better sales.

Just, like, really, like, I guess, like, what do you think is the lowest hanging fruit for someone who's been doing sales for a little while but wants to kind of get to the next level? Like, what's the. I guess the path of least resistance to getting there?

Well, I mean, look, like, you don't have to do it with me, right? It's like, find somebody who's better than you and just pay them to review your calls. I just wish. And I did that, like, I paid thousands and thousands of dollars for call reviews. And you know what? Looking back, I wish I would have just done even more, you know, like, it was what drove the needle for me the most is having people review my calls on a weekly basis. I'm super thankful for the mentors I had that helped me through that, and that is truly the fastest way you can get better. Now, let's just say you couldn't do that for some reason, because that. Whatever. Let's say you're just like, yeah, you know, you're broke, you're closing, but you're also paying the bills. And you're kind of like. You're kind of at a phase where you're a little bit stuck, so you're saving up. You know, if you could just get a hold of some call or review your own calls. And if you're on a team and there's people better than you, like, you better be reviewing Their calls, too. Like, I was like a fanatic with, like, if anybody was closing better than me, especially in the early days, I was like, I would listen to every close. Like, I didn't matter. I was like, I'm listening to them all. And then try to, like, you know, there's guys where I'm like, dude, I'll probably ask you this too, but, like, I'm like, give me a call recording, man. I want to hear your close. Like, there was a guy who he had sold way back in the day with Jordan Belfort in the. In his stock days, where it was unregulated and stuff, and now he's selling to big B2B startup corporations. Really, really great guy, amazing salesperson. And, you know, he's selling, like, 100k contracts to call close. I was like, bro, give me a call recording.

Like, send me that shit.

I'm just trying to learn. I was like, he. I was like, man, he's probably doing something. There's probably one thing I can learn from him that I'm not doing. And so, you know, he gave me some call recordings, and now we're buddies. But the call recordings are your gold, man. Call reviews, Call recordings from people better than you buying those. I think that's the fastest route to get better than I've ever.

Totally agree. Well, I'll send you one. You send me one. Trade calls. Yeah, man, for sure. All right, dude. So last question. What's the objection that's stuck in your crawl the most or something that you find is absurd or just one that you just like, ah, fuck.

I've been thinking about it the entire time, man. Dude, I can't think of, like, a really. Like, I know I have to have these funny stories, and I can't think of anyone. But, dude, I've had, like. I've had closes where I was talking to three women and they all started crying. And then I started crying. That was an intense one, man. And then, you know, I've had. I've had that happen before, you know, Dude, I've had husband and wives. Especially when I saw the real estate agents, man, I would have, like, the husband want to do it.

That's the worst.

Wife come in the room. I did. I've even had it to the point where the husband comes or the husband's, like, ruffling around his credit card, and the wife, you can hear walking the room saying, what are you doing? You can tell. It's like he's almost like, oh, shit. Well, then you hear this, like, mumbling and you're like, you know, we're not on a Zoom call. This is like an audio, right? So I was like sitting there like. Like, especially. This was like early days, right? Like, I was like, no, I wasn't balling at this point. So, yeah, I'm like, oh, fuck. Oh, fuck. Like, what are we gonna do? And, you know, I have literally had, you know, put your wallet away right now. And he's like, getting wifed.

It's the worst.

Oh, honey. And then I'm like, I'm like, yo, let me talk to your wife. Let me. Because, like, honestly, like, I'm probably better at negotiating that situation than way better. Yeah. I'll never forget there was one time I had this really good sales trainer and he used to listen to my calls and slack me, like, stuff to say as I was doing the call. Now, personally, I found that was really annoying and it actually fucked up my sales.

Sure.

Worst thing, it puts you, like, instead of listening to the person you're looking at, slack. But that was like the sop of that company. And he did that to everybody. So he's a great closer, great guy, great trainer. I don't even know if that was his idea. It might have been like upper management. That was. I thought that was a good idea for him to do that. So I think it did more harm than good. But in this perfect case, that was a scenario that was going on, this wife was going crazy, and I got on the phone with her during this whole fiasco and he gave me these words. I literally did use his language because this is New Days. I was stumped. And I was able to get on her side and get her on his side and be able to close it. But I remember it took three and a half hours. This was a long.

Whoa.

My last call of the day, I took it like, was it a half million dollar deal, 10K. So, you know, I got my 1K commission. This was. This was probably my first three months.

Of still 300 an hour, still doing well.

Hey, you know, for me, it was like, you know, back then, it was. I was excited. But pause where, like, you just. You just hang up the phone and you just stand up and just base plan bed. Like, I'm done. You know, it's funny, man.

Like, the size of the deal doesn't matter. Like, we did 100k deal like 2 weeks ago, and I was like, yay. But then. But then, like, my wife's got a fitness program and it's like 50 bucks a week and I close two people over messenger. Right. So a non Roi offer to like, it's mum. So they're traditionally very hard market and I close them over messenger, like. Cause it's like a messenger thing. And I was like. Cause I was trying to figure out if it could be done. Sending the payment links. They paid all good to go. And I was like, man, I was cheering. I was like high fiving people. I was like, yes, 50 bucks.

Yeah.

Because like, that's a really hard thing to do. You know what I mean? Like a non Roi offer. Selling to a new mom over messenger, you know, into an online fitness account.

We can have a whole channel about that idea now. Let's just learn how to sell 100k deals over messenger. I did a quarter million in a month, only on messenger. No calls. But, like. Because it was giving away my control of my circle of competence. It was like the worst month of my life.

I was like, just terrified.

Freaking out. Yeah. Because I was like, you know, somebody wouldn't buy. Who? Like, I had the volume to make the numbers. But then, like, there were certain people that weren't buying and I was like, that person should. That person should freaking buy. I would get really mad about that. It was like, really stressful. I would never do that again. But I'll share with you what worked and what didn't work if you're doing messenger sales stuff.

Yeah, man. Yeah, for sure. We'll have to book it another time to chat, brother. But I know you got stuff to do. I'm actually speaking to Mitchell Miles next. I'm having a chat with him. All right, man. I really appreciate you coming on. Some great insight. Where can people find you? How can they give you money? All those things hit me up.

We'll hop on a call if you need sales training or sales recruitment, sales team stuff. And then best places like Our Face. My Facebook wall is good. And I also got a pretty good Facebook group. Seven figures selling secrets. It's pretty cool. I like to think that the group is pretty valuable. There's a whole free course in the units tab.

Awesome people.

Like, I get messages all the time of people going through that and like closing deals and stuff, so.

That's awesome, dude. Wicked. All right, guys, go check them out. Cole, I really appreciate your time, man. And thanks for being on, brother.

Thank you, Matt. See you guys. Bye.

Put that coffee down. Coffee's for closers only.