Ultimate List On How To Sell Authentically In Your Podcast And Make Better Connections With Nikki Rausch Of Sales Maven Podcast

Wish you were one of those influencers with raving fans who binge on your every word, consume all your content, buy everything you have to sell, and demand even more. Then stay tuned while Authority magazine columnist and buzzfeed contributor Tracy Hazard shares strategies, tips and tactics from top videocasters, podcasters, authors, and social influencers on creating that bingeable factor. Now let's join Tracy as she explores how to rise above all the digital noise with the Binge Factor.

Hey, everyone. Welcome back to the Binge Factor. I'm Tracy Hazzard and I'm so excited to bring you the Sales Maven today. She's the host of the Sales Maven podcast. She is the Sales Maven. She has a community around it. You know, here's the thing. The other part I love is that she's so super connected into the community. I can't believe I haven't met her sooner. So she was introduced to me by a great publicist who really does an amazing job of sending me some great people that I absolutely have loved having on the show. She does such a good job. She just has a direct link to send them to me, and that's rare. But also, when I mentioned recently on a coaching call that I had just interviewed her and she dropped some amazing nuggets right on our show here, which you're going to hear shortly. Shortly, someone else in the group said, oh, I love her group. I'm a part of it. So I'm finding all these threads of connection that we had already, and I love that when that happens. And I posted an episode and people are messaging me back and saying, hey, I'm so glad you had her on. How could you not know her already? And that's the amazing part about it. So now I know her and I'm so glad I do. And I'm having Nikki Rauch, the CEO of Sales Maven, on our show today. She has the unique ability to transform the misunderstood process of selling. With 25 years plus of selling experience, entrepreneurs and small business owners now hire Nikki to show them how to sell successfully and authentically. Nikki has written three books, all available on Amazon, and she has a podcast called Sales Maven, which you can find on your favorite podcast platform, which you're listening to. I hope right now her community is called the Sales Maven Society, which I just love that idea. It kind of elevates what it is. And she's going to talk about that time between her show, her group, her paid group, and how she uses the Sales Maven podcast to promote all of her own selling within the community. Plus she's going to give us some great selling tips. So let's listen to Nikki Rauch, sales maven. Nikki, thanks so much for joining me today. Sales maven. You are definitely a sales maven. I mean, there are a hundred episodes in your feed here that are chock full of some of the best sales advice I've ever heard. It is nitty gritty. That's what I love. I love it when we get really deep and nitty gritty into it. And, you know, when I flip through some of your topics, that's exactly what I'm saying here. I'm seeing, like, you know, things like how not to lose customers by doing this, how to try this, how this is going to get you more, like, I love those kinds of topics. You must spend a lot of time figuring out what your topic plan is going to be.

Well, in my own way, I'm going to say so my process a lot of times is I choose my topics based on things that I'm doing a lot of coaching around. So clients are bringing these issues up or. And I kind of have a rule of thumb that if I talk about something, say something, teach something, you know, give advice around something five times, I want to turn it into some kind of content.

So.

So now it becomes usually a podcast episode.

I like it. Now. That's the five times rule. Nikki's five times rule. I love it. So that's when it starts to feel like you've. You've repeated yourself too many times. I love it.

Well, I feel like if I share it with five different people, then there's probably more people who will benefit in some way from it. So it usually becomes a podcast episode. But it probably has been already some part of a training or some. Again, something I've coached some clients, multiple clients around.

That's really great advice right there for building your own topic list. So why just start the podcast? You're 100 episodes in. Congratulations, by the way. But why just start it?

Well, like, truthfully, the reason that I started the podcast was because in 2017 and early 2018, I started getting asked randomly to guest on people's podcasts. And over the course of like, and then in 2019, people started telling me that they binge me on a podcast. And I was like, how can you binge me? Like, I don't even have a podcast, right? And so 2019, I did a lot of guesting, and when people started saying like, oh, I binge you on podcasts, and I was like, I don't even know how you can do that. You go search my name and you just listen to all these different podcasts I've been on, which is what people are doing. And I thought, well, if somebody wants to binge me, they might want to listen to my own podcast. And then I can really control the content and I can control all the pieces of what I'm sharing.

And you're not repeating yourself because you never know when that's going to happen on a show. Right, right, right.

Yeah. So that's really why I started the podcast. And I was really specific about what I wanted the podcast to do. So, you know, it wasn't just, oh, I'm going to put a podcast out. I knew that the thing I wanted to drive the podcast to specifically was to attract people who wanted to be a part of my monthly coaching program, which is called the Sales Maintenance Society. And so kind of everything leads down that path. And that was my ultimate outcome for the podcast. So people wanted to binge me. Great. Now I'm going to give them content, but I want to drive them to something which is the salesman and society.

So how did you find it when you were starting out? Did you find it really difficult to get listeners in the beginning? Did you. You know, let's. Let's do our three things here right away, because I think, you know, it ties right in. So how did you find it in terms of, you know, increasing listeners?

Well, I did have a little bit of a listenership kind of built in, I will say, because I did have people that were podcast. Still, to this day, podcast guesting is the number one source of leads into my business. So I know that people who listen to podcasts, for whatever reason, tend to resonate with my message. They like to hear it, so they come and they want to, you know, hear from me. So I had my email list, right. So when I launched the podcast, I had quite a few people on my email list that were willing to kind of take that chance and listen. And it's just slowly grown. I mean, in no way has it grown as fast as I want it to grow, but I'm super honored that people listen to the podcast and that it is growing month over month and has consistently done that since I started it in 2020.

Do you find that this, the members of your Sales maven society are all subscribers, too?

Yes. So it's interesting because, like, even just this week, the podcast episode that aired this week, multiple people have gone into our private group and commented about listening to the podcast, which I find super flattering because in that program they get a lot of me and they're still wanting to still listen to the podcast, even though they get me live. And, you know, there's a lot that they get from me. So I feel really honored that even my members still listen well.

And it probably also has to do with your recent guests being a maven member too. So, you know, there's probably a little cross pollination there too.

Well, and that's strategic too. So I knew that one of the things that I wanted to do with the podcast is I wanted to demonstrate what it like to coach with me. So I started the podcast doing on air coaching calls with my Maven society members. So it's a way for them to get essentially a free coaching call that's private, you know, yes, it's a podcast episode, but for them it's very specific and it gives people the opportunity to kind of be the fly on the wall of like, what's it like to coach with Nikki? And so. And then once those started, sorry, what are you gonna say?

No. Which is such a great strategy for you because, you know, you don't know, how is this coach gonna work out for me, coaching, I think, is one of those mystery things. And when they can see you in action, they start to understand, hey, this could make a difference for me. This is what I was looking for.

Yeah. And I always want people like, if you hear me on the podcast and you show up on a coaching call with me, I want it to be the same experience, like, you know what you're going to get. Which I think is always like, super flattering and also really funny to me. When I get on a live coaching call with somebody who is a podcast listener and they're like, it's so weird to see you live because you are the exact same as you are on the podcast. So that was one thing was wanting to be really strategic about giving people the opportunity to be the fly on the wall. And then I also like to highlight my members in the Sales Management Society. So I also do sales success stories and let them come on and talk about something they've implemented into their business and they've gotten really great results. One that's a good demonstration of the work that I do. But also it's an opportunity for them to highlight and showcase their business. And my members get business out of coming on my podcast, which is super exciting.

Well, you have guests on your show, and sometimes they're on air coaching and sometimes they're outside Guests. And how do you decide who's going to be worthwhile, who's going to be like the best subject here?

Well, I just actually started in this last year bringing outside like guests that weren't like coaching clients of mine onto the Sales Maven Society or onto the Sales Maven podcast. And I kind of went back into my background. So I have a pretty extensive background in neuro linguistic programming and in this NLP for short. And if that's a new term to anybody listening, it's essentially the study of communication. And, and when you go into a master certified program or at least the program that I went through, you had to do this master level project and the idea behind it was to understand the structure of excellence. So you would ask people that are getting exceptional results in their business or in their life on a particular topic, a pretty structured set of questions. So when I decided to bring guests on, it was this idea of doing a Mastering Excellence session series where I ask the same set of questions. And I find that my guests that come on and do the Mastering Excellence series, a lot of times they leave going like, I didn't even know that about myself. Like, I feel like you just pulled out kind of the secret sauce for how I do what I do. And that's really what the, the objective of the on air guest call is, is so that the listener starts to understand what's the structure, what does this person do to really, you know, achieve these exceptional results. It's been really fun to have these amazing people now, most of them I know really, really well. So I have great rapport with them and they're people that I really admire and that I know that they have achieved some level of success in their business or their life. So that's who I've been bringing on for guests.

Yeah, I think it's always a tricky thing and you do that well, is that there needs to be this alignment with your, the way that you are authentic and integrity with what your advice and that you're bringing to that is that anyone that you bring in front of your sales maven society, community in general has to have that same love of integrity or it's just not going to be a good fit. And it's always a toss up when you have someone as a guest on your show, right? Yeah.

Especially a show as educational as yours.

Yeah, I mean I have had a couple of those go off the rails. I will say where, but I've still aired the episodes. Not because, because I still think there's good quality content in there for people to get. But the topic that, you know, I thought we were going to talk about, the guest kind of goes in their own direction. They're like, I don't want to talk about that. But then you're kind of going, oh, well, yeah. So so far, I've still aired all of the episodes because I still think there is something that the audience member can take away and implement into their own life. And that is always a priority for me.

Yeah, no, that's so good. I'm glad you did. Now, monetization, that's the third thing that we usually ask everyone who comes on the show. And in your particular case, you're running ads for your sales maven society, for courses, for boot camps and programs and things that you have going on. How is it doing? What have you seen? Have you seen growth in the sales maven society? Have you seen, I'm going to say, less attrition? What are the measurements that you're looking for in that CPU side of selling your own stuff?

Yeah. So we run dynamic ads on the podcast. So I pick and choose. I have a set list of ads that run that are specific to downloads, that are like free downloads, and that's really just to turn my listeners into subscribers and those we run when I don't have, like a masterclass going on or where I'm not doing some kind of a promotion for the sales name and society or, you know, something like that. And so that does convert, you know, I get new subscribers to my list every single week from the podcast, which feels really good. And then when I do actually sell something, when I'm actually selling the masterclass or the, you know, strategy session packages or whatever it is, those do convert and not huge. But I will say that I almost always get one or two buyers that weren't on my list that just straight come from the podcast. So those always more than pay for the ads, which, like, whatever I'm selling, it more than pays for the ads. And then for me, it's always about how do I increase lifetime value of a client. So I know in my business that if somebody will come in and pay me a little bit of money, they're going to get such a great experience that their repeat rate or their opportunity to come back and do something else with me is really high. So we. We pay attention to that. So.

And I imagine you probably have a really high referral rate.

I have a pretty good referral rate, I would imagine.

I could tell.

And it's this idea of, you know, can you Offer them something that they get a lot of value in and then they're ready for the next thing. And what is the right next thing. So again, that's something we're constantly playing with and studying and looking at. You know, I'm really serious about, you know, who buys and how many buyers on which email that I send. And you know, when somebody comes in and they buy that first thing, can I sell them the next thing and do they take that and what does that, you know, look like from a lifetime value of the client? And yeah, so I get pretty, I'm not a total like numbers person, but I do kind of nerd out on those types of things. Anything that has to do with revenue, I'm so excited about.

Well, you wouldn't be a sales maven without that, right? You gotta be a little, a little in the dollars, right?

Yeah. And I want my clients, clients to be thinking about that stuff too. So I talk about it a lot with my clients of like, what are you looking at? Like, what's your lifetime value? How are people coming into your business and what does it take to, you know, convert them to the next thing and the next thing and the next thing.

You know, it's so interesting that you said that. So I, I find that when we do on air coaching or we do, you know, any of our outreach through our guests, I'm going to call it, you know, you would think of it like a guest funnel, but not in that, like cheesy marketing way. Like in a good way. Right. You know, I've planned this in and how I'm going to talk with you and where you're going to go next and, and how that path is going to go. But when we do that, I find that we have a higher lifetime value through that touch point of it. Do you find that your on air coaching clients actually become a higher lifetime value client overall?

I don't know that I have specific data about that, but I'm going to say my gut is saying absolutely. So it's common, I'm noticing now that I've been in business for eight years. It's common for people to come study with me for, you know, however long and you know, start to really hone their sales skills, go off, do whatever they're doing and as they start to scale their business, they find they run into kind of some new levels, new challenges, new communication issues that they want some feedback on and then they come back into the fold for usually, you know, a couple months or a year and, and then they Go off and do their thing and then they come back again. It's always really interesting. It's that you probably heard this saying, it's like, new level, new devil. And I find in sales, as people are scaling their business, it's kind of that same thing where they get really comfortable and confident and they're just rocking their business, feeling really good about their sales strategy and all the stuff that goes into building rapport and relationships, and then they decide they're going to put some new offer out or. And they start to go, oh, oh, my gosh, now I need Nikki's, you know, eyes on this. Or I want her feedback on how to, you know, how to structure the call or what questions I should be asking that lead people down that path to hiring me. And so that's been really great. And most of those people have absolutely already been done, like, on air coaching calls with me, for sure, on the podcast.

Yeah, I can imagine that that works because I'm seeing a lot of similarities in the way that you run your business to the way that we run ours as well. And sort of, you know, by providing this structure of support that allows a lot of on air, a lot of Q and a, you know, you, like, they get a lot of touch points with you. They get a lot of touch points with me as well. And as we're doing those things, what we find is those people that take advantage of those touch points and. Or come in and out, as you were pointing that out, they do tend to stick with us for a lot longer. And if they don't, for some reason, they feel bad about it. Like, you're like, I just decided I couldn't. Podcasting wasn't right for my business anymore. But I love what you do. I love you guys. And they refer a lot of people even though they left us, which is always really nice.

So, yeah, I have that too. Where, yeah, somebody will say, like, oh, I've decided, you know, to go back into corporate and, you know, I'm closing my business or whatever. But they're still great referrals for me. So I love that you guys are doing that in your business too. That makes my heart happy.

Yeah. Yeah, it really is. And for us, we decided that we would make it so easy. So, like, they don't have to have a membership to something that they're paying for. They're already paying to keep their feet alive for podcasting. And if you're keeping your feet alive, you actually have the ability to take on air coaching and do group and have lessons each week and consume that content in a live format. So we just made it so easy to do that that they would never unsubscribe, because why would you unsubscribe your feed if you've put that much time and effort into your podcast? Right. 100 episodes is a lot of episodes. You're not going to let it go anywhere anytime soon?

Not planning to. I actually really enjoy the podcast experience, and I will say my. I don't know about you and your business, but for me, my best clients are podcast listeners. Like, by far, they're the biggest subscribers to my list as far as new leads come in. But the people who come in from my podcast specifically are so such great clients. They're just great clients. They. I think they already feel really comfortable with me. They, you know, they at least feel like they know me in some way and know what to expect. And then when you deliver on those expectations and they feel that, like, personalized touch, it's like they're. They're in.

I love that. Are you a podcast listener?

Yes. I love podcasts.

I can tell the difference.

Podcast for so long.

I can tell the difference when I'm listening to a host. I mean, that's how many shows I've listened to over the years here. But I can tell the difference between someone who listens to podcasts. I can tell that you listen to podcasts by the way you approach your show. And it just has to do with some more of the flow, more of the way that you like to consume content. You're presenting your own content in that similar way. And I think that that tends to work. You can tell people who have that skill set. What I think is really interesting is that your show doesn't have a specific time slot. Like, sometimes you're 30 minutes, sometimes you're 20, sometimes you're 40. And I love that that has that fluidity, because sometimes the subject or the guest demands it.

Thank you for noticing that. I sometimes worry about that of like, oh, my gosh. But I'll tell you, I just did an episode with somebody, and we went over an hour, which I don't normally.

I saw that.

That actually that podcast has gotten so many downloads now. The guest on it is a rockstar, amazing guest, and she's sharing kind of, you know, this, like, peek behind the curtain of what she does in her business and how she's making decisions. So it's a great episode. And especially she has a huge fan base, too, so that helps. But I was like, oh, my gosh, Are people gonna freak out? Like, Nikki, I can't listen to an hour long podcast. But they are listening and they're continuing to listen. And every single day we're getting downloads to that.

I think that probably has to do with. And I'm just going to say is because you don't do it as often, where if you did it all the time, it's formulaic, but because you don't do it often, I think it's working for you. Because everyone's saying if. If Nikki's, you know, did this for an hour, it must really be worth it. And so it actually makes them want to check it out. Like, it's a special length episode, so you might want to do that strategically. Drop it again.

Okay.

Yeah.

Thank you. Thank you. I feel like you just gave me, like, such a great gold nugget there and I appreciate it.

Well, that's what I want to talk about. You just touched on the thing that's going to tip over to your binge factor here. So, Nikki, your binge factor and the binge factor of the sales Maven podcast is the fact that there are golden nuggets in every single episode. And you can tell because you have some, like, fabulous titles to your episode that are just giving you hints at what's going to be a part of that golden nugget. I mean, you start out your very first episode with pivot your business without losing clients. Like that to me is like, I mean, why wouldn't you want to listen to that? Okay, everybody's in a shift and a pivot at some point in their business. But did it ever occur to me that, oh, my gosh, I could lose clients, so I must listen to this episode? Those types of naming of things and topics of things and the nitty gritty golden nuggets that you're dropping into every single episode is why people are binging on you. There's no question in my mind. I could tell from the titling I even picked, and it was hard for me to like, because you've got a hundred amazing episodes for me to just even pick three to check out in prep for our interview today.

You just totally made my day. I love that. Thank you so much. Because that is my ultimate goal in life, is that if you're going to spend time listening to me, that you walk away going, I got something that I can immediately implement and I feel really good about it. That's the goal.

I just wrote an inspirational quote for something that came from Jeff Bezos, and it says, like, your Brand is what people say about you when you're not in the room. And I think the highest compliment to a podcaster is that, I guarantee you, Nikki, somewhere out there someone's quoting you to someone else and you don't know it, but that's what's happening. And I think that's probably the highest compliment to a podcaster is they're repeating your advice now. Hopefully they're giving you credit for it, at least your podcast credit for it. Right? I bet you they are. Because your show is growing. The listeners are growing, but they're quoting you. And so every so often it happened to me like three times in the last year where someone quoted me back to me and like, you know that, that saying and When Harry Met Sally, if you've ever seen that, that old movie. But anyway, it was like I got quoted me back to me and I was like, I don't know where I heard this, but you know, and I was like, I think that might have been on my show. So. So anyway, I bet you that's going to happen to you at some point, Nikki, and I can't wait for it. You're going to write me back and you're going to say, you were right, Tracy.

Like, I just, I'm going to be like, Tracy, you totally this. You called it big time. I will be super thrilled. I will say my clients often say I hear your voice in my head all the time. Which sometimes I feel like, should I be apologizing for that? Like, they hear my voice constantly. But I feel really flattered by it too, that they feel like I'm just taking Nikki with me. And I know what, she would give me some advice here of what to say or what to do and that that brings that confidence to them. So.

So tell me a little bit more. Tell all of us a little bit more about the sales maven society and like, and really what level of client base are in there and what they're focusing on.

Well, it does really run the gamut. So we have people that are, I usually say, close to a year into their business. I find that for me, most people need to be about a year into their business because they're starting to realize you can't just put up a website and people are just going to flock to it and buy from you. Like, you actually have to do some selling. So, you know, people who are kind of that year into the business and have figured that they need some selling skills. And then I have, you know, people that are rocking their business, seven figure businesses in there too. But realistically, I think where the people get the most value is it's in that place where you're ready to scale to whatever your next level is. And like you're doing some things right because obviously you have a business but you're still not feeling really comfortable or confident around, you know, how do you have those really strategic conversations with clients that have scope creep with you and you know, are kind of taking, maybe.

Taking advantage of that. I saw that title, that was the one, I was like, that's my next listen.

Yeah, like not paying for things that, you know, all of a sudden you're like, oh my gosh, you know, I'm going to go out of business if I keep doing this. So there's a lot of that. There's also a lot of people who are, you know, ready to scale that are doing a lot of business development and they know they, they've gotta be, you know, having strategic conversations and generating, you know, leads and what's the messaging around that? Because you don't wanna sound like everybody else where you're sending out these messages like, hey, you need me and if you don't hire me, your business is gonna fail. Like, we're all getting so sick of all these messages. So I spend a lot of time on language with clients is like, so a lot. One of the things they do in the sales maven society is they'll post, here's what I'm about to send out. Will you take a look at it? And I look at it and then I tweak it for them and I make it so it's very reader friendly and increases their chances of people actually responding. So I don't think I answered your question very specifically.

No, you did.

It's that scale level. Like wherever you are in your business, you're ready to move to some next level. You probably would benefit in some way from having somebody kind of peel away and show you some of your blind spots and help you kind of get to that next level, guide you in a way that you feel really comfortable and confident to initiate conversations that might feel a little difficult.

Do you hear a kind of common thread across the different stages of business though, challenges that people face? Is there some kind of commonality, like it's always language or it's always confidence or it's something. Do you see that occur across the different levels?

Yeah, yeah. It's interesting because people will sometimes be like, well you should, you know, people that are paying, you know, that have seven figure businesses should be paying you at a much higher level. And but the thing is, is they're asking me a lot of times the same questions that people are just getting to that six figure level. A lot of it is language. It's like, I'm not sure how to have this particular conversation with this particular client or, you know, my discovery calls are taking too long and they're not converting or, you know, I don't know how to tell people that want to get on calls with me that they're not a good fit. Right. So all of these, which sometimes feel like kind of awkward conversations, but I can give language that feels really easy and keeps the rapport intact, doesn't make anybody leave feeling pinched or offended by anything you say or do. And yeah, and then really it's about that confidence and then, you know, earning more money, frankly, because a lot of it is like, how do I increase my prices? How do I communicate the price increase?

I just did a whole lesson this week because we're running a certified strategist program for those who'd like to take podcasting and turn it into a complete business for themselves. Not your podcast as a business, but like the business of podcasting, helping other people set up their shows or do all of that. And I just gave them a whole, an actual whole module just on how to make price increases palatable, acceptable. Just a really hard conversation to have. And, you know, I so agree with you. That's a topic I could hear again and again.

Yeah, it is one of those things, like, people are like, well, I got to tell everybody. And I'm oftentimes I'm like, I don't know that you need to tell everybody. Let's really dig into who really needs this information and how can we communicate in a way that doesn't sound like you're one defending your price because that's not a good place to be. That puts you on the back foot. Or how can you do it in a way that you don't come off sounding defensive about making a price increase? And are you increasing enough to where it really makes sense for your business? Or are you shying away from like, oh, I don't want to tell this person that the price went up, you know, a couple hundred dollars or a couple thousand dollars, depending on what you're doing? And yet how do you then bless and release clients that are no longer a good fit? Because as you scale your business, there will always be those people who were with you in the beginning but really are not a fit as your business grows? Because one either they can't really afford you, or they just haven't grown with you in that same level. And it's okay to bless and release clients, but do it in a way that feels really good because at some point, they may come back to you because they are ready for wherever you are.

I love that we'll have to have some more. I could just see two of us swapping stories for hours on end. So I so look forward to the fact that this is the start of a great relationship between you and I as well. So that's one of my favorite things about podcasting. But you mentioned before that you really like podcasting. What is it that you love the most?

For me, it's a way to connect or put my message out into the world where people can consume it at their own pace. So that's, for me, as far as, like, the way that I podcast, as far as a listener goes, I learned so much from podcasts. I learn about things that I would have never, ever been able to find on my own. I learned about people, people's story. I love people's stories. I love people, frankly. So any story about someone, how they've reached whatever level of success they've reached or whatever trial or tribulation they've been through. So, yeah, I just love the people aspect of it. Touching and making an impact makes to me feels like you're making a difference in the world.

Yeah, I can see that as being the underpinning of why you probably won't quit podcasting anytime soon. Because, you know, a hundred episodes and more, it is that point of a pivot. Right. Is am I happy with the show? Do I want to make some changes, keep it exciting for me. But if the excitement is in the doing and is in the connecting, is in the, you know, in the human aspect, the human touch side of it, then that's not going to change. You're still going to keep that no matter how the format slightly shifts for you.

Yeah, I agree. And I just think the other thing that I love about podcasts is, you know, some nugget that I gave, you know, two years ago, somebody can find today and apply it to their business and it will mean something to them. And, you know, that's the same about guesting on podcasts, too, is that, like, I still have subscribers that are coming to my list from a podcast that I was on four years ago. That feels so awesome, like there's no other marketing medium that I can think of that that happens with.

I love that. Well, you know, the one thing I want to do. Because you're an expert in selling. So let's talk about this. There are lots of podcast models in which we are selling to our guests on the show. I think that's probably one of the more dominant ways at which my clients can make money off their podcast is that they sell during the relationship building of the or the connection of the podcast guests to them. What are great ways to have that post interview sales entry conversation? So how do we approach that? What's some advice there that you could give?

Well, one thing is I think it's always really important to ask permission before you launch into any type of a pitch. So one of the ways I might frame that is, I would say, you know, based on some of the things you, you shared in the podcast, I wonder if there might be an opportunity for us to work together. Would you be interested in talking a little bit more about that? Just that little, like prepping and asking that permission? Well, frankly, if you say to me like, hey, something you shared in the podcast made me think about a way we might work together, of course my answer is going to be yes, right? So the guest is going to be like, yeah, tell me more about that. So once you have their permission, now they're in mode of like, they're prepared for what's going to come, right? So that's super important. And then I would, you know, be really careful about not doing a bunch of like, coaching and giving advice, but doing like, hey, you know, one of the things you had mentioned was this, and it made me think of this program that I, that one of the things that we focus on is this, this, and this is, you know, I'm wondering if that's something you find value in. So that's like a trial close. Like, is that something you find value in? And then, you know, again, they're probably going to say yes to that or if they say no, I don't think so. Leave the door open, right? If they're like, hey, I don't think that's for me, then, you know, you leave the door open like, hey, I would absolutely love to earn your business at some point when something changes in the future, please think of me and how can we stay connected and really mean it? Like, stay connected. Because people have what's known as a convincer strategy. So it's a certain number of times they have to say no to something before they say yes. And you don't know the person that you're in conversation with because it's context specific. You don't know what their particular convince or strategy is. So you might present something to them today as a way to work with you. They may say no to it because that's their first, like it's the first tick on the convince or strategy. They're like, I have to say no. But let's make sure that we keep the relationship intact and keep in touch with them. And especially if you know they're an ideal client for you because chances are you're going to have an opportunity to put another offer in front of them. And that may be their convince or strategy. That may be the thing that tips them that says yes or they say, yeah, still not feeling like a right time for me or whatever. Great. You know, if, if, when something changes in the future, I'd love for us to continue, you know, our conversation, continue to work together. Just keep putting it in front of them until they give you like the straight up. Like, hey, I'm never going to buy from you the hard no. Like take no as it really is a full sentence when it's a like, that's absolutely not something I would ever do. Fine. But if they're like, ah, it's not really the right time for me, that's still leaving the door open.

I love that. Such great advice there, Nikki. I'm sure you have so many nuggets of advice, but I want to touch on repurposing. So, you know, you mentioned when we were sort of prepping up and I mentioned how great your titles were, that you are working on a keyword strategy and I can tell that you have good topics and you're working on a keyword strategy. Are you using them as blogs? Are you using them on social? How are you repurposing your podcast and what do you find that's really working for you?

I try to repurpose, recycle and reuse everything that I do in whatever way. So right now we know that every podcast episode gets turned into a version of a newsletter that goes out to the list. There are multiple email, multiple touches that happen each week about the podcast on social media. So a way to repurpose, we take little snippets of the podcast and then we also take the full podcast and repurpose it onto YouTube. And I'm always surprised every month when it's like, this is how many minutes people spend on YouTube on your content because I do have some videos on there, but mostly it's podcast content. We also repurpose really great episodes for like the on air coaching Calls and the client success stories, and we put them in the training center for my sales maven society members. So if they're looking for something in particular, the podcast episode will pop up for them to listen to as well. So that's another way that we repurpose the content. Wow. And then I do a lot of.

Use out of them.

Yeah. And then I sometimes will look like. Because, again, we're doing some keyword things. I have written over 200 blogs, I think, so the person who. Her job is SEO and, you know, always going in and making some updates to the blog from the SEO standpoint, a lot of times she'll reach out to me and say, this particular blog is doing really well. We need a podcast that's a complimentary podcast to it. So that will be another way that we repurpose.

Oh, that's so great. I love that you're doing that. You're getting so much value out of it. Yes, a lot of times we use our episodes as blogs, of course, transcript episode blogs. But we also then repurpose them as articles rather than publishing them in our own blog, because we have both. So I could see this future strategy of where you're seeding out articles in these great publications because your advice is so universal, like, it doesn't matter what industry you're in, your selling advice works. And so I could see that really being a great little future outreach for you, and it's going to get you more listeners in the long run. So. Yeah. So a little bit of ideas there. Well, yeah, you mentioned that you have a lot of downloads and free offers that you make. What do you find works best in terms of both what it is that works and how you present that on air to your podcast listeners to get people to download it.

So, one, I keep, like a section on my website that's, you know, it's password or you have to like, opt in. You can't just find it on your own. That's where all the resources are for the podcast listeners. Now, I never say, oh, I have this resource center for you that's got like four or five or whatever resources in it. You know, go grab them. I always do an ad that's for one specific thing, one specific resource. Now, it still drives them. They go to the page and they're going to get to see all the other resources there. But the objective is just to convert them to subscribers to the list. But I try to make sure that it's somewhat related to the podcast episode, but it's not specific to the podcast episode, because I have like this, you know, I have like a full length training which is something that I pulled out of the Sales Mailman Society. It's something people pay for that only my listeners can get. And only when they hear that ad can they go and get it. Or, you know, then I have something else that's like a PDF that's, you know, about buying signals. Because that's something I talk about all the time. I don't know if I'm answering your question very well, but that's really, that's kind of the strategy behind it.

No, no, you're totally answering that. And you know what I would love to do is, and I'll do this, is making sure that people can connect with you over the blog post for this episode and be able to go to that area. What PDF do you think would be the most useful to podcasters trying to sell over their show? What have your downloads, what in your resource library?

So I have an ebook called Closing the Sale, and it really talks about the three secrets of the close, because I find that people think that they're selling and they think they're closing, but oftentimes they're missing these three key things. And if you're not doing these three key things, you actually aren't closing. So even if you're reaching out, looking for sponsors or whatever, if you don't do these three things in your clothes, you haven't actually closed. And if you don't close, if you don't do a really good close with somebody, oftentimes they won't say yes or no. They just won't make a decision. So your job is always to make the decision super easy for them to make. And this is why I give this Closing the Sale ebook, because one, it's going to give you some confidence, but it's going to give you some real strategy that's needed in that close process. And I'm always so surprised how people think, like, well, I put an offer in front of them, but okay, but did you actually close? Like, did you attempt to close the sale? And they're like, I told them I'd follow up next week. I'm like, then you didn't close.

You didn't close it. I love it.

You missed something big there. And we got to make sure that you close. Because if you start learning how to close better, you absolutely will close more deals, you'll have better sponsors for your podcast, you'll have better, you know, clients, whatever that is for you. So, yeah, so important.

Well, that's great. So they'll get to go check out your resource area, see what one looks like. And they're going to get such a useful ebook in the end. So Three Keys to the close. I love it. Thank you for sharing that with Nikki. Now, before we go, I want to know, what's the future of the podcast? You hit 100 episodes, what's next for you? Are you going to change some things up? Are you just going to keep going? What's next?

Well, as far as the podcast goes, I'm going to keep going as I am and I'm probably going to do more of the Mastering Excellence series because I'm finding that people, people really love them and they're getting great takeaways. And it is a way for me to highlight some, you know, expert guests that aren't necessarily clients, which is kind of exciting. So I'm going to do a little bit more of that. And then the other thing in my business that I'm really excited about is I'm working on kind of taking all of my, I'm going to say my superpowers around language and putting a package together for people who are doing launches. Because I'm finding that even though you can hire out people to write your copy and you can, you know, work with somebody who's going to manage your launch, there's these key things that are happening in your communication, in the sale of whatever it is that you're pitching and launching that are some real big missteps for people. So I'm working on a launch package right now to do some sales consulting for people who are doing six figure launches.

I love that. I think there's so much value in that because I can say that from, you know, you buy these programs, you know, these launch programs, and, you know, we just did one because we're actually doing a crowdfund. So we're doing an equity crowdfund through Republic and we hired their marketing firm to come in and they give you the language of all of the emails and they're, they're terrible. Like, I'm reading them and thinking to myself, why would anybody want to invest reading that? They're like, no, but these work. And, you know, I know better than that. I'm a writer at the, at the heart of everything. So I'm like, you know what? I need to make it me. I still need to make it me at the end of the day. So I messed with them. But then they weren't working. We launched them and they weren't working. And I was convinced it was because the subject lines were all wrong. And so then I sent everybody back to the drawing boards and we redid the subject lines before we sent it out to the larger list. And I'm really glad we did that because I can so see that as being extremely valuable because I thought that as I was reading some of these subject lines that it's like, they're not clickable, they're not open. You know, why would I even. I mean, email open is so bad today. Why would I open them? And so if you're already like hurting your sale before you even like open an email, then what, what good is it? Right?

Yeah. If you can't get people to open? And as a matter of fact, I have somebody who just did one where she's in the sales movement society and she's like. So I did an A B test. I used one of Nikki's subject lines. I used my normal subject line. I got a 50% more open on Nikki's subject line. And it's like, because I always look at it from the reader's perspective and making sure there's a sales component to it, but that it feels really good. And there's a lot of language out there. I mean, I always say, like, it's super cringey when I get people's like, promotional stuff. I'm always like, oh, they probably paid somebody a lot of money for that. And it just reads like it makes me actually like cringe Sometimes I get the like, oh, feel nauseous when I read them. I'm like, oh my gosh.

Now you're inspiring me. Because I get so many people pitching themselves as guests on my show with the cringiest emails ever. Now I'm gonna. I've been meaning to, like, gather them together and like, do a read, like do a read through on air and a critique of them on air. I'm gonna do it now because you just inspired me because it is. They're so bad, some of them.

They're so bad. I actually do that in my group in the sales maven society. I always try to protect, like, I'm not trying to shame anybody, but I will. So I'll take out anything that is, you know, revealing about who it is, but I'll post it in the group and I'll go, like, how could they have made this better? Because I want them to be learning too, right? And then I'll share, like, here's how they could have rewritten this. And it's like, oh, feels so Nice when you get that versus, like, oh, my gosh, this person is like, here. This is. I'm such a big deal. And this is why you need me on your show. And it's like, I don't know who you are, first of all. And so telling me what I need is probably not in your best interest.

Well, Nikki, I am so glad somebody reached out to me and got you on my show because this has just been such a joy and so educational for me and listening to your show. You know, there aren't a lot of shows I say this. I listen to a ton of shows as I'm previewing here, but there's really only a handful gonna. That I go back and listen to again. Some I go back because they're just too much fun to like, not pass up and not check in with them and hear how they're doing, you know? And yours, there's some that I go back because I need some education and I need something, but I might need it just quick. A quick little hit of something is like, I gotta help someone with this. Is Nikki the right person? Oh, look, she's got a podcast for this. I can refer them. That's how I use it as a resource. And you're now one of my podcast resources. I can just tell it you're gonna make my top list for my next hundred anniversary.

Thank you so much. I appreciate that.

Well, keep going another hundred at least, if not more. Sales Maven podcast. Such a great listen. Nikki Rash, thank you so much for being on my show.

Thanks for having me.

I warned you it was going to be packed with some really great things and, you know, this is it. I love when I can come away with notes. And I have notes. I have notes right here. I wrote about the five times rule authenticity. I wrote about some of the episodes I want to go back to and check out. I mean, pivoting a business without losing clients, that sounds really great. I could refer that episode to a lot of my clients as well. So I love all the things that she's working on, but I so love that she was so willing to share with all of you and she's got a great ebook for you and that is going to be available right at the episode blog post@the Bingefactor.com so all you have to do is go to the bingefactor.com, navigate right to the most recent episode because you're probably listening to this in real time Nikki Rauch and finding all about Sales Maven, and you'll be able to go right down there and there's going to be a big call out. And also down at the bottom we'll put bullet points with the ebook link right there and you can connect right through. You can go check out all the messaging and the way that she does things because here's one of the things I learned when you could put together a swipe file. In addition to getting a great resource like the Sales Maven Society, you should take advantage of it. So I have people that I never unsubscribe from their email lists because I always want to see what they're putting out and doing. And while I may drop in and out of their community just like people do, just like Nikki mentioned that people do in the Sales Maven Society, staying connected through their newsletters, through their emails, through all of those sequences, give me an idea of what's going on. This is going to be one of those people that you want to stay connected to too. So go find Nikki Rauch. Go to the blog post for this Episode@the Bingefactor.com Go connect up with her and be sure to download and listen and subscribe and rate and review the Sales Maven podcast because it is fantastic and you are going to get a lot out of it. Personally, I know I have and I've got a whole bunch in my playlist ready to listen on this next upcoming weekend. So don't miss the Sales Maven podcast. Nikki Rauch. So glad she was here today and so grateful that everyone has connected us in the universe here and I'm going to bringing you more back. I am very sure we're going to do some more things together. So I'm sure she'll be back on with some more trainings and other things because who doesn't want to learn how to sell really authentically from your podcast? That's a great way to monetize your show. So I will be back next time with another podcaster, another great Binge Factor and I am also looking for your input. So make sure you tell me who you'd like me to feature next.

You've been listening to the Binge Factor Podcast. For more information on podcasting and videocasting success tips and tactics, please go to thebingefactor.com and be sure to listen to our other show for podcasters called Feed you'd Brand. If you'd like to be interviewed on this show as well as featured in Tracy's column, please go to thebingefactor.com guest and apply.

Sam.