The Million Dollar Rebuttal | The Authors Unite Show - David Walter

All right, everyone, welcome back to another episode of the Authors Unite show. Today we got David Walter with us. Welcome to the show, man.

All right, man, I've been looking forward to this podcast.

Yes, dude, me too. If you can start us off just with a little introduction, who you are and what you do.

Oh yeah, my name is David Walter and I'm author of The Million Dollar Rebuttal. It's a number one bestseller and also founder of the Cold Calling Academy.

Gotcha.

Yeah, I've got, you know, many, many years, over 20-something, many more than that years in cold calling experience. So my goal now is to share with the world. People ask me often, you probably have it in your list there, why did I write the book?

Uh, yeah, yeah, that's gonna be one of my questions. I wanted to talk about cold calling specifically because it's, I feel like It's a thing that a lot of people, they like dread to do, but I feel like you've figured out a way that like it works and it's like not that bad. Like, it's maybe enjoyable in some sense.

Yeah. Well, it's— if you— the COVID of my book, it's got this thing that says cold calling is not a numbers game.

Yeah.

And I just told— I just shared with you pre-show that that phrase got me number— as a number one bestseller on Amazon.

Yeah.

That phrase cracked the code. 'Cause for some reason, Tyler, everybody, I don't, when I would try to ask people to give me reviews, I get Starbucks, hey, I got a book, I'd love to get, if you give me a review, that'd be awesome. They'd be like, what's the book about? Cold calling? Ooh, you know?

Yeah.

We all know that cold calling is a numbers game. It's hard and tedious and painful. Even people who've never cold called in their life.

Yeah.

I don't know how they've, you know, they watch, all watch Boiler Room or I don't know what, but.

So what, I mean, what was your experience with it? Or like, how did you get into it?

I got into it, actually, I was in college in a bank, you know, like they set up a little forum and invited, and I was like, hmm, cold calling a bank. Banks make all the money in the world. Yeah, I guess I'll try it. And so they did a lot of training. And that was B2C, my first experience cold calling. And basically we took credit cards. So we call people and try to get them to fill out credit card applications and super hard at the beginning. Then I kind of cracked the code because I had sales experience in the past, but it was all about speeding up the process when I worked there and getting them and making them laugh, laugh, you know, and laughter. I just did a post about that. Laughter is the best way to sell. I mean, it takes people's minds off anything they're worried about when you make them laugh.

True.

I would read the credit card, you know, the— when you take a credit card out, there's like 2 pages of legalese speech. I would read that so fast, like an auctioneer.

That is funny.

Okay, people would just be laughing at it, you know, and it's a variable rate, 2.5% based on— annual fee, annual fee. And people would just laugh, you know, and you know, what's your social security number and make jokes about it. People laugh, it lowers their guard. So that was my big secret there. But there I started setting 40, taking 40 credit cards a night.

Yeah.

Which made me like the number one person in 3 call centers in the United States.

Wow.

I was killing it every night. I came home with a different prize, like free movies to go to the Arlington ball, you know, watch the baseball game and like, top front row seats.

Yeah.

Go to the football game and see the Cowboys because I got all the prizes.

Got it. Interesting. So like, how many calls? So 40 a day. How many calls do you think you were doing to achieve that?

I've really never thought about that. I have the stats, you know, for my book.

Yeah.

Once I did B2B, which is what I really focus on, I have all the stats for that, but I don't really remember how many calls I would make.

And then obviously for that, for that job, you were getting the, like, the leads, I guess, provided to you, right?

Yeah, yeah, there were, there were warm leads, um, provided. There's still cold calls, um, totally.

Yeah, yeah.

But then I moved into the environment where they did the cards, like the Texas A&M card, and you're calling people that had went to Texas A&M and wanted to participate. Money went back to the, the affinity cards is what they call it. Okay, that was a little easier. I said more that way, uh, but that's, you know, anytime you get a warm weigh-in, that's always better. Oh yeah, and that was cold. And if you're cold laughing, laugh all the way to the bank.

Yeah. So what did you, um, did you start out with SEO? Like, what's MSP SEO Factory? Is that before?

Oh, that's the one of the companies I control, and I, I, that's the last thing I've been doing.

Oh, okay. This is the most recent.

Yeah. Yeah. It's a side thing. I had a call center. Basically what my story is, is that I left that. I went to work for my dad.

Okay.

I helped him make a million dollars. Then we hit the '90s recession and he went bankrupt. And so I had to go get a job. And so I had some background in cold calling. And so I found this job called CSI out of Mesquite and it was a, a PEO company, a large company in Mesquite, Texas. They had a room, you know, sizable call center there. And the guy hired me off the, you know, just like, boom, just like that. Because he used to, he interviewed, tried to get a job at NBA America Bank, which is the bank where I had been a superstar. He heard about me and he's like, David, I want you. Yeah. And they had this huge bonus structure. And I thought I could see all the dollar signs, you know, cha-ching. After working there for a little bit, I wasn't making the money that I wanted. And I was like, because everybody there had low goals.

Yeah.

They said 2 a day. Literally one guy had a bell and he'd bring a bell when he had 2 appointments. I'm like, dude, you're not gonna make any money with 2 appointments. You know?

Yeah.

But those are clock riders. You know, those are average people that are, they're happy with meager, meager money and, you know, just wanna put in the least amount of effort. But I, I just had this whole thing where I started meditating. I was like, I gotta crack that. 'cause I need to help my dad find a place to live. I want to buy land in the country and build a house. And so I picked up, they had this sales library there and I picked up Zig Ziglar's book, See You at the Top.

Nice.

I read it, but I had read a lot of books about the subconscious mind. That one was the tipping point. I tell people, that's why you have to keep reading books. You don't read one, you got to read and read and read because one will speak to you.

100%.

One of them will finally tip, you know, like just tip the whole process and make you take action. And, you know, unless you— until you take action from reading, it's a waste of time. But I actually, in that book, that's where he tells people to look in the mirror and claim your goals, like I was talking about before, the vision board and all that. Yeah, I looked in the mirror every morning and said, I'm gonna make 15 appointments today. I'm gonna, man, I'd say it several times with passion and belief, you know, visualize it. And I did that for 6 months and 6 months later I set 15 appointments.

Nice.

Everybody was setting 2. I was setting 15 and I did it every day. Hmm. That's the miracle. That's the cold calling hot streak. I call it the uncanny cold calling hot streak. 15 every single day. For 6 months straight, just every day, 15 appointments. And I, you know, on my website I have the guy that worked there, um, that was the vice president of the company, testifying that, that he got my book, he read it, and everything I said happened, happened. So nice. That's what I tell people. Imagine, most companies would freak out if they got 15 appointments tomorrow.

Yeah, they might not even be ready for it.

Yeah. My God. And then if they got another 15 and another 15, they'd be buried, man.

So you said it took you like 5 years to write this?

Oh yeah, well, I wrote it in about a year and a half, but a 5-year process of getting it out in the world because I got screwed over by one editor. You know, you know how you help authors?

Yeah.

And you're legit. For every one company like you, there's 100 of them that want to take advantage of authors and take their money and do nothing or do very little tiny bit. Yeah. So just any authors out there, just now, he didn't ask me to plug them, but I would say don't waste your time trying to figure it out yourself because it's going to take 5 years. You want to shortcut it, get connected to Authors Unite because these guys are legit. And you could see from the testimonials and everything, they actually help people with the things they need, not a bunch of junk that you don't need.

Totally. Yeah. And an editor is one of the most important things for a book. So I can definitely see how that would, uh, delay things or mess things up a little bit. I always tell people that, like, when I wrote my first book, I was 20 years old, and honestly, I don't think it was that good at first. And then I had an editor come in and just— she took it from like a 2 out of 10 to like a 9 out of 10. Like, it was that dramatic. And, um, I don't know, just an editor makes a very large difference.

Yeah, I was paranoid, man. I had my book edited like 10 times.

I think, you know what's funny, 10 times edited. I, I think that's actually more common than not. Like, for me at this point, I'm jaded because like, I've— I don't even know, I think we're over 2,000 authors now that we've worked with. So like, I've, I've been through the process so many times that I'm almost like a support channel. I'm just like, yo, it's gonna be okay, don't— but I do remember my first book and how freaking like scared I was of there being like any spelling errors, any missed period, like anything. I was like freaking out for months after it launched.

So because there are people that are Nazis out there that will climb mountains and hills and traverse through the rain to knock on your door, you have a misspelling here, I've circled it for you.

I know, you're right.

I just can visualize those people knocking on my door. It's— you read your book and you have misspellings.

You're under arrest.

The Spanish police. The grammar police.

My first book was only like 70, 80 pages. So it was like pretty skinny. And one of the reviews I got, mostly it has good reviews, but I got a couple of bad ones. And it was saying, the worst thing about your book is that you can't even use it as a doorstop because it's not big enough. And I was like, Yeah, man, that's pretty evil, man.

But have you seen one of Grant's new books?

Uh, oh, The Millionaire Booklet.

Yeah, it's a booklet.

That thing's pretty small. I, I, I have, uh, I've actually, I've read that and it's, yeah, it's, well, it's a booklet exactly like you said.

I guess you get away with that when you're Grant Cardone, right?

Yeah. Yeah. It is pretty small.

This is, uh, that's not to promote other authors, but this is, uh, Brandon Bournaché's book I just got, but Oh yeah, yeah, that's what I was, I was checking out actually when we were talking.

That, that book, um, in one of the categories you're in, that book is number one in one of them.

Yeah, and Whatever It Takes is his new book.

Oh wow, there you go.

That was number one for a period of time, but that was a while back. But the good thing about totally being a number one bestseller is you've got to crack it one time and then you're good. Oh, it's like being president and then you're president for the rest of your life.

Exactly. Well, you're gonna be removed from Twitter, but other than that Um, so about the book, just because a lot of our listeners, they are authors or aspiring authors, like, what are some of the things you learned? Like, walk us through the process. Like, what— I get it's a big question, but it's like, why did you decide to write the book in the beginning? And then like, what did you learn along the whole entire process to now that you have it out?

Well, the, the reason I decided to write the book is I had a lot of lack of confidence. I think that's what keeps people from really going after their dreams is the fear, fear of failure.

Yeah.

Just, you know, the author, the whole grammar thing is just a part of that fear of failure. What if people don't like it? You know, like, let's see, Back to the Future. Yeah. The dad that he went back in the future, I forget the name, but he was writing those science fiction novels. And he's like, I can't let anybody see it. What if they don't like it? Yeah. That's, we're all like that almost. Right. You know, what if, you know, what if you say something bad about it? So your failure holds us back. So, but I was on a, I was on a plane with a guy that going to Florida, this is like 5 years ago. And he was just taking a job as a glorified cold caller in Austin, Texas. Just got hired. And so I was like, well, I'll tell you some secrets. And so I started— he started writing stuff down, man. He started writing it down. He's like, so what if this happens? You know, and he's like getting all my knowledge. I was like giving him all my knowledge on a 3-hour flight. And by the end of it, he wasn't bored at all. He loved it. In fact, he walked me out, we talked, and he was getting married. He had his fiancée, she entered introduced me to her. And I walked away, you know, on cloud nine thinking, man, somebody actually values my knowledge. And so that's why I felt the confidence. I was like, you know what, I am going to write that book. I've been thinking about it for a long time and I was like, I'm going to write that book. And, but that's the con, it gave me the confidence. And why did I write the book? It's because the greatest for me, I love to teach people things. When I teach somebody something and I see they get it and then they go on and can do even better than me, uh, man, that brings me joy beyond anything material could. So I was just in— I was in Fort Lauderdale. I was telling you I just came back from Miami.

Yeah.

And we were— people were starting to get bored on the beach, and so I went and bought a volleyball my nephew, nieces and nephews. We had like 15 people out there. I started teaching them how to play volleyball and they started learning it and they were okay. And then we did it the next day and then they were like pros. They were like slamming the ball and everything. And they were like, David taught us how to play volleyball. Just that joy, you know? And I've trained people to get to do cold calling and seeing them do amazing. And it feels good. Just like you, you train people on how to write books and become bestsellers and you see them, you know, on the wall.

Oh yeah, it's amazing, right?

You know, like I help somebody else.

Yeah, the end result is always— it's incredible. I love it. That's what never gets old for me. Um, and really with the pod— like podcasting, I agree, it's, it's interesting. Like one of the main reasons I do the podcast is I just, I love to learn and this is my favorite way of learning, you know. It's the most non-boring way of learning, in my opinion, because it's interactive. And, you know, it's almost like I can, uh, it's like I can ask you anything I want. I mean, you can decide not to answer. That's up to you.

You're right to steal ideas.

Yes, but ultimately, it's like, I don't know, I just think a podcast is one of the best things you could ever do.

I've had some podcasts, they actually go too far, you know, like they want all your secrets. I'm like, well, I got to make some money, man. Well, I mean, every secret you've got.

That's where we're headed. So, get ready. So, but I'll share a lot.

Go ahead.

Tell me, well, you let me know, but we were talking before this and I just, I find it interesting. So, and this is a video as well. So, like, one of your new books or not one of the new books, but your new book coming out, you're gonna share it in there of what you were showing me with LinkedIn. Are you waiting to share that publicly or would you?

Oh yeah, no, I'm not sure.

Okay. Yeah, no, well, I find it so fascinating. So either way, we'll just make it more— that's more spicy then.

So you'll have to go back and do that.

Okay.

Yeah, probably. I'm like, I'm 2 months away from having the book done.

Okay, cool, cool. You let us know.

Back on. And John Jan is the same way. Duct tape marketing. He wants to talk about how I got— how I got— how I booked him on the podcast. Yeah, he wants to talk about that. Yeah, I was like, I'll come back, I promise.

Okay.

Yeah, people are excited about that. That's what I— and you, you know, hopefully you can help me, but I think, yeah, that's what I teach people in this book is the basics. But, um, I had, uh, I think it's Steven Shipman— no, Claude Whitaker, who has a book on telemarketing, uh, and he's always in the first page of telemarketing Amazon. He went on and he reviewed my book and he said that there were things that I teach in my book that are not taught in any sales class or not revealed in any book. And he actually even mentioned the page names of page numbers that they're on. That gave me a lot of confidence. But that's what basically I have secrets that are basic secrets, right? How to get past gatekeepers that he said he had never even heard of before. Secrets on the big— and I'll share you what the big secret is in the book.

Yeah, yeah, please do.

You need this secret before you get to my next book. The big secret is, it's think about everybody in that call center was setting 2 appointments and I was setting 15. Why was I able to set so many more appointments than them? That's the big question. And it goes to the heart of the matter. The heart of the matter is that in sales, you probably heard this, a good prospect has to have a need. Yeah, that's like sales 101. You got to have a need, man. Start by qualifying the need. And that is a— that is, that is wrong. It's a myth. And it's the myth that is like a wet blanket over all telemarketing efforts.

Interesting. Okay.

And the reason is simple. And I want to ask people this, they kind of realize it, they didn't know they— it's like Socrates, I'm going to teach you something you already know. Yeah. I already know if you've ever picked up the phone and called, um, for any kind of product or service, you're offering a product into a market like, uh, dentists, lawyers, accountants, right? And you're calling lots of accountants and you want to get, you know, a partner on the phone and offer them something or try to get an appointment to meet with them. What you're going to hear, I'd say 90% of the time is we're happy with what we have. Or we're all good. There's a few different phrases people say, but what they mean is they have something now and they're happy with it. Very small, very rarely do people say I'm not interested. Like flat out, I'm not interested. Most people that you talk to say they're happy with what they have. Now, what people call, 9 times out of 10, their objective is to call somebody and talk to them who says that they have a need. Yeah, that's a tiny— that's, I call it looking for a needle in a haystack.

Yeah.

Uh, most comp— most marketing agencies say that there's about 3% of any market that has a top-of-mind need for something.

Interesting. Wow. Okay.

And the reason why, the reason why that is, is the best way I could describe it, this is one of my secrets, um, is I read a book called The Power of Habit.

Yeah, I've read that too.

Yeah, great book. Terrifying though. True.

Yeah.

Not only do we have a subconscious mind, and it's proven with the basal ganglia, but corporations are trying to hack our own subconscious mind.

Yeah.

So guys out there, we have a subconscious mind, read that book. But the story from that book that I took away was the story of Febreze. And when they launched their product, how they failed, if you remember that. And then they relaunched it, but they had to find out what was wrong. And they sent out MIT grad, MIT professors to go study the market and interview people and find out why it failed. And they walked into this one woman's house. It was like one of the last calls they had. When the door opened, the smell of cat smells wafted out and it made them gag. I mean, it was that, it was rancid. I mean, I don't know if you've ever, anybody in the audience have ever smelled something rancid. I had rent houses one time that I thought I had this one, it was perfect. Nothing was missing. The air conditioner was still there. You know, the stairs, I was like, man, this is the best. And then I went in and opened up the microwave and boom, rancid. I had to vomit. And they left a little surprise for me. They left a surprise. I know, I know, I'd been there for like months, but that's what wafted out. Yeah, they had to hold their nose. They walked in and asked the lady— it was the smell of cat smells— and they had to ask this lady a series of marketing questions. And number one is, did you buy it for priests? She said yes. Have you used Febreze? Yes. How many times? She said one time. Now, why did you use Febreze? And she said because of the cat smells. Idiot. Duh, the cat smells, right? And they're like, okay. And then they said, okay, okay, so do you smell the cat smells now? No, no, she didn't smell the cat smells. And the lesson from that, they have this big campaign called Nose Blind. Yeah, you know, where they show these massive socks that are like stinky socks laying around a room, you know, and you would blow your nose out if you walked in there. But they're kids, they're playing a game, and you know, there's a car that's a dog, literally it's a dog car. And the people don't realize it because people get used to their smells.

Oh yeah, true.

Right. And so they had to change their whole marketing plan. They had to sell to prevent smells. That was the key. But back to what I was talking about is simply everyone's happy with what they have because they can't smell their needs.

Ah, yes.

They're used to the problems and they think that's normal.

Totally.

Does that make sense?

It does. Makes a lot of sense. That's awesome.

Software that doesn't work right, but that's just the way that software works, man.

Yeah.

Printers that are a hassle, you know. Uh, what was that? What was that show where the guys kicked the printer, you know, and like beat it with a bat and all that?

Oh no, no, it's, uh, that's a movie, Office Space, right?

Or something. Yeah. Yeah, those guys knew they had a problem with that printer. Yeah, but everybody else, everybody else in the company didn't know they had a problem.

Yeah, everybody else is cool.

Then the guy would just say, yeah, just you got to push it and turn around and do a little dance and do the jiggy and it works.

That's a good movie. I like that movie.

That's one of my favorites. I'm just a— it was a mild, uh, I'm forgetting things now anyway, but that, that is the reason why So basically the largest part of the market doesn't know they have a need, a problem, but they're not, not interested. But we're skipping all that. We're trying to find somebody who has a need right now. Do you have a need right now? No, we're happy. Okay. Do you have a need right now? No, we're happy. No, you have a need right now? No. Oh, that's only 3% of the market. And you may never even get, find that 3%. Yeah, true.

There we go.

Everybody else is setting a couple of appointments, you know, a day. So I was setting 15 because when they told me, Tyler, I'm happy with what we have, I was like, fantastic. Let's talk, man.

Yeah. That's great.

Tell me about it. Yeah. That's what you like so much about it, you know? And I just, that's my whole approach. And I mean, if anything that the people could take away from this call is that opens a huge door. It's like playing golf and you got that tiny little hole you have to put that ball in and then taking it and making the hole this big to play golf. How easy would that be?

Dramatically.

Boom. You'd be holding a 1 every time. Get it on the green and somewhere it'll roll in.

Happy Gilmore.

When your target is so huge, when suddenly you're not trying to find people that have a need, when it's, hey, we just got to get people on the phone that are happy with what they have, and you could turn more of those people into calls. And of course, the better you get, then the more— and that's what I did, is I basically evolved that into the Zen state of mind. Yeah, right. From I could set more than everybody else to I could set way more than humanly people thought even possible on B2B calling. 15 a day is I'm willing to bet I broke some kind of a record if anybody keeps records of that.

Yeah.

That's a lot of appointments a day. But, uh, that's where the book, what I try to do. And then I have the Cold Calling Academy where people can watch my videos. And the idea is to hone your skills, to be able to overcome all the objections. Because when I was setting 15, I had a response that it was practiced and rehearsed for almost every objection humanly possible. You know, oh, like, I'm glad you asked that. Boom. Let me, let me do this for you. Wow. That's very interesting. Let me, I'm glad you brought that up. Let me hit that. So it's until you become a Zen, you know, Zen. And that's what I want to teach people. I want these guys and gals in business and cold calling and business development to become Zen masters at setting appointments. But the cool thing is it's not only easier, but you can do it with less time.

Okay.

You don't need to sit around and call all day long. That's the other secret is that you call less often. You call less people, but you call them more often.

Gotcha.

That's not a numbers game. You don't call 150 people a day. It's a waste of time because you're going to miss— you're calling consecutively, you'll miss most people. I call You right now, and you're on a podcast. Well, now you may not be on a podcast, right? I only had one call for you and I missed it. Yeah. But if I'm gonna call you 3 times today, Tyler, my chances of catching you increased dramatically. And so that's what I was doing. So my answer to that, to set 15 appointments, I would get in contact with 40 people a day.

Gotcha. And like multiple times, kind of like follow up with them?

No, no, that was the one kind of contact is all I'm after, but that would be the result of multiple calls.

Got it. That makes sense.

Sometimes I get lucky and I get the, you know, the first time I call I get them, but sometimes the third call or the second call, but you'll dramatically increase your, your contacts. And that's the name of the game is that's why cold calling is not a numbers game. Right. It's not calling 150 people consecutively. It's calling 50 to 60 people a bunch of times over 2 or 3 days. And the result is I got way more appointments by doing that way. Of course, my market was bigger, right? Yeah. I could talk to more people because I was targeting people that were happy with what they had.

Got it.

All the things in my book, they layer on top of one another.

Perfect.

Each thing makes it easier, and then that thing you learn makes that easier, and then the whole thing together. You know, when you learn how to overcome objections— my secret to objections, which Claude thought was brilliant— there is no objection that I can't overcome because I don't see objections as objections. They're buying signs. It's a buying question.

That's a good point. I like that.

Just buying questions. And don't argue for How to Win Friends and Influence People. Never argue. The thing is, people, they argue with prospects all day long and they don't even realize it. It's true. Anytime they want you to send out information, you say, I would not, I don't want to do that. They want to get a proposal, you know, like some quotes, or they want a ballpark, or they want any number of things. And you say, I can't give them, I can't give you that. You've lost. You can never win. Yeah, you can never win an objection.

I like that though. It's a buying sign. That's true.

Yeah. So you basically get— you have to agree with everything they say. So literally imagine if I talk to you, and even if you say something negative, I see it as a positive and I agree with you in some way. And then we talk and then you say something, I agree with you, or we agree. We agree all the way to the appointment. It's that simple. Mm-hmm.

Got it. And, um, just for— so yeah, we'll definitely have to have you on again. Um, me and that— for our audience, uh, me and David got a little handle, uh, uh, what do you call it? We were talking for a while before we hit record, so you guys missed out on some stuff. But, um, let people know where they can find you and your book.

They subscribe to membership, they get the video to watch that beforehand, right? Yes.

Go ahead. Yeah. That's the deal.

You got to buy the full membership, but anyway, go ahead.

No, no. I was just going to say, make sure everybody knows like where to, to find, like, are you on Instagram too and stuff?

I'm on Instagram. I don't promote there. I'm mainly on LinkedIn.

Mainly LinkedIn. Okay, cool.

Connect with me on LinkedIn. But I also have my ClickFunnels account, getbookoffer.com.

Getbookoffer.com.

Okay, my free book, getbookoffer.com. That's a free book, and then you get a bunch of goodies. And then you can find out there, I have, uh, I have a cold calling seminar, a webinar that you can find out about my, uh, my training and my videos and stuff like that. Okay, you just have to go to getbookoffer.com.

Okay, perfect. And thanks for coming on the show. And then we'll, uh, when your new book comes out, then we'll schedule another time.

I'm excited.