In the latest episode of Mastering Modern Selling, our hosts sat down with the renowned sales expert Mark Hunter, offering a deep dive into the world of sales and its evolving dynamics.
Here are some key takeaways from this episode:
1. The Power of Association:
Mark emphasized the significance of who you associate with in the sales domain. Your circle greatly influences your professional demeanor and prospects, underscoring the old adage, "You're the average of the five people you spend the most time with."
2. Consistency is Key
Mark highlighted the importance of consistency in establishing trust and credibility in sales. Whether it's how you present yourself online or your follow-through on commitments, consistency helps build a solid reputation, ensuring your potential clients know what to expect from you.
3. Understanding the Buyer's Journey
The conversation delved into the necessity of aligning with the buyer's journey rather than enforcing a seller-centric approach. Understanding and supporting the buyer's needs and process fosters a more meaningful and effective sales interaction.
4. Credibility Through Value
Mark stressed the need for sales professionals to focus on delivering value, not just pitching products. By truly understanding and addressing the customer's needs, a salesperson transitions from being a mere vendor to a trusted advisor.
5. Reflection and Learning
The episode was a reflective journey, with Mark sharing his own experiences and transformations in the sales world. His initial challenges and subsequent learnings serve as a testament to the dynamic nature of sales and the continuous need for personal and professional growth.
The episode with Mark Hunter was a treasure trove of insights, emphasizing the essence of relationships, consistency, and genuine value in the sales process.
It's a call to action for sales professionals to introspect, adapt, and continually evolve to meet the changing landscapes of modern selling.
Don't miss out—your next big idea could be just one episode away!
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Speaker 1: Welcome to Mastering Modern Selling relationships
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social and AI in the buyer-centric age.
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Join host Brandon Lee, founder of Fistbump, alongside
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Microsoft's number one social seller, carson V Heddy and Tom
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Burton, author of the Revenue Zone and co-founder of LeadSmart
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, as we explore the strategies and stories behind successful
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executives and sales professionals.
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Dive into business growth, personal development and the
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pursuit of excellence with industry leaders.
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Whether you're a seasoned executive or an aspiring leader,
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this podcast is your backstage pass to today's business
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landscape.
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This is Mastering Modern Selling, brought to you by
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Fistbump.
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Speaker 2: Gentlemen, welcome to episode number 80.
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I can't believe that Modern selling, I know.
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Speaker 3: I don't think I realized it.
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Speaker 2: We were just at 50, just 30 episodes ago.
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Speaker 3: It's just kind of like my age.
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I was just at 35 and now I'm not.
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Speaker 4: It happens, fast it does.
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Speaker 2: So it's good to have everybody back together.
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I think this is the.
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We haven't had all three of us here in like I don't know how
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many weeks.
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Speaker 3: So, brandon Carson, great to have you back, and we
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have a really, really awesome guest today, mark hunter.
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Mark mark brought it out of all of us.
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Speaker 2: Mark was here, so we all got here.
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That's right.
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That's right.
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We all made it happen carson's got the swag I.
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Speaker 3: I drove home from dollywood breaking all the speed
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limits so I could get in on time we're glad to have you.
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Speaker 5: You mean you gave up Dollywood just for me?
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Speaker 3: I was all day Dollywood yesterday, over eight
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miles on my feet.
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I had it on my watch.
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I told Zoe, anything she wanted to do, we'd do it.
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We went on those soaking wet water rides like six times.
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Speaker 2: Well, good job on getting back.
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Speaker 3: It was a good day.
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Yeah, let's get to this.
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This is going to be fun.
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I don't want to take away from Mark.
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Speaker 2: Yeah, so, and if you're online, hey, dave,
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welcome from Indy.
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If you're online, let us know you're here.
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Say hello to Mark, let us know you have his book.
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But, Mark, let's talk a little bit about your background and
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then we're going to get into sales, sales, credibility, which
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I don't know why credibility should be an issue in sales.
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But we'll sort that out today.
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Speaker 3: Can we start this out this way, carson?
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We have a sales legend in the house with us.
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We've got to at least acknowledge that right.
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Speaker 4: I mean it's amazing how I've probably followed Mark
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for well over a decade and you know what most about Mark is
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like.
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He still puts out so much to the community, you know, with
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regular content and just thought provoking statements, and he's
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so at the pulse of the sales community, so I couldn't agree
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more.
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Speaker 5: I got to put food on the table, man.
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That's why I keep putting out content, you know.
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Speaker 3: You know what Mark did too.
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He took a really big risk and had me as a guest on his show a
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couple months ago yeah, pretty generous with him that's okay.
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Speaker 5: I've had carson on my show too, see I, but I had to
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say I expect that that was a bigger risk.
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Speaker 4: Bill mccormick.
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Speaker 5: Hey buddy, hey in the house we Bill, we love Bill.
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Yeah, great guy Love it.
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Upstate New York.
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Speaker 3: That's it All.
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Sales are social Bill.
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Speaker 5: That's right.
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Speaker 2: Mark, for those that don't know, you tell us a little
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bit about your background and kind of how that ties into what
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we're going to talk about today, about credibility and sales.
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Speaker 5: Yeah, well, you know what I am known as the sales
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hunter, and people always ask me what was your name before you
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changed it?
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No, I owe this to my dad.
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I mean, what a cool name.
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I tell you what, whenever we go out to dinner and they want to
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know your name, I always just say Hunter, because it's always
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Hunter, hunter, party of two.
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It's really cool.
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Anyway, okay, I got into sales purely by accident.
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If you read my book A Mind for Sales, which Carson's got a copy
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of it there I detail the story in the first couple of chapters
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because I did not want to go into sales sales, I was going to
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go into marketing.
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Actually, I wanted to be a disc jockey in college.
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You know I was a disc jockey in college, but that's a separate.
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That's a separate story.
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And the only reason I got into sales was because I got three
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speeding tickets the last two months of college and I could
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not afford car insurance.
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I had bought a brand new car.
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That was the reason for my speeding tickets.
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See, I can blame the car, it wasn't me.
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I had apartment rent and I now had car insurance I couldn't
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afford, so I literally had to get a job that supplied me with
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a car.
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That is how I wound up in sales .
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Now to say I was an overnight success.
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I got fired from that first sales job.
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That means I gave up the Buick.
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I got a second sales job, second Buick.
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You know what?
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I got fired from that sale.
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It wasn't until my third sales job that I finally began to
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realize what sales was, because I treating sales as if as if you
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, you are my customer, you are a bowling pin.
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My job was just to knock you down and take your money.
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And it wasn't till my third boss sat me down and really
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instilled me.
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You don't really know what's going on with your customers,
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you haven't taken the time to figure out what your customers
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want.
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And it wasn't like it was an overnight.
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You know, you know, boom, suddenly I'm brilliant.
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No, but I began to realize that sales was really about serving
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the customer.
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And when you serve, when you listen to the customer and serve
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the customer, it's amazing at what happens.
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So I was in, I was in corporate roles for about 17 years and,
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um, then, uh, 25 years ago, I bailed, I went out on my own.
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I've been doing this for 25 years ago, I bailed, I went out
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on my own.
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I've been doing this for 25 years.
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Really scary, so please send me a big check, would you?
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I got people to feed.
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I love it.
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Speaker 4: I love the journey, mark.
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You know it's funny because when you think about great
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prolific sales, content creators , authors, legends like yourself
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, you don't see those missteps per se.
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And it's funny because I often reference the same things, like
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I made it very far on hard work and adrenaline, but I started in
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that pound the phone, one call, close environment.
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You know, brandon, we've talked about that before and I thought
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that was what sales was and it's not.
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And I didn't really even realize more until, honestly,
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like my 30s and 40s, than I've ever realized in my 20s about
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sales.
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And it's ironic how we have those experiences and that you
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can have what is perceived to be a lack of success only to have
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that be part of your success journey.
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What have been the biggest things that have changed but
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also stayed the same, that you've learned over the years in
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sales?
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Speaker 5: Well, some of the biggest things and this was a
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lesson.
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I move again.
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I did everything wrong initially.
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I didn't realize you really needed to have a peer group.
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I didn't realize you really needed to surround yourself with
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successful people, with other people who you can learn from.
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I thought I could be this maverick, this kid, because I
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was in my 20s and you know.
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I just thought I knew it all and so I had to learn.
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I had to learn that you've got to surround yourself with people
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.
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The other thing is this is that you know it's amazing you can't
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fake your way to success.
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You know, you just can't.
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You've got to live it.
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You have got to live it.
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And it comes.
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It comes through.
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Customers pick up on it, and I think that was my problem early
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on.
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I didn't want to be in sales.
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I was.
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This was the last thing I I, so I was going through the motions
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just doing the least possible work to try to get the most
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amount of money and go on and survive for the next day and
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until I really began to take a step back and realize this is a
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people business, this is people.
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That is why I say sales is not a job, sales is not a profession
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.
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Sales is a lifestyle, and it's a lifestyle of just helping
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people.
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I mean initially people would ask me which I would not say I
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was in sales.
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I was embarrassed to use the term sales and it took me a
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number of years to overcome that , but now I'm proud of it.
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Speaker 3: Do you mind me asking sorry to interrupt, why?
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Because I think there's like.
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I know I got one daughter who is studying sales as part of her
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business degree and then she also will tell me but I don't
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want to go into sales, and I know it's, it's because the
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perception for you when you didn't want to go into sales.
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Why was that?
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Speaker 5: Well, why was that?
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Because my view was used car salespeople, the slimy stuff,
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all that type of stuff and I felt I was just trying to rip
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people off Because, again, I didn't understand what sales was
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.
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Yesterday I happened to be with a class of seniors, university
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of Texas, dallas, and I was talking to them and one of them
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shared with me.
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He said you know how do I go about this whole deal?
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When I'm trying to close a deal , I feel like I'm just begging
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them for money and I go take a step back and look at it this
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way If you believe that you can help someone, you owe it to them
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to reach out to them.
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That's why we prospect.
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That's why I firmly believe that we prospect.
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Two, if you believe in your solution, that your solution can
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help them, you're not asking them to buy, you're asking them
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to come alongside you so you can help them, and it's an
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investment and collectively, we're going to help you achieve
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this outcome, because my definition of sales is to help
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you see and achieve what you did not think was possible.
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Now, stop and think about that for a moment.
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That's the definition of a good salesperson and that's the
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definition of a great leader, because really, a great leader
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is a great salesperson.
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The great salesperson is a great leader.
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Now, I'm not talking about the one-time wonders.
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I'm talking about the people who are on the top of the hill,
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year in, year out, consistently.
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They absolutely believe in the outcome.
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They're going to help them and they would never ask their
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customer to buy something if they did not firmly believe that
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it was going to help them, if it was not going to help them
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achieve the outcome that they wanted.
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That's why I say I don't ask people to buy, I ask people to
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invest.
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You know, you just hit a.
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Speaker 2: you hit a really, I think, important point about
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prospecting is you know you're saying prospecting right, is
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you're?
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Basically if you have the viewpoint or the mindset that,
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hey, I'm here to help you right, or I'm to me if somebody and
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Mark, I'd be interested to see how you help people kind of
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switch to that mindset, but if they really believe that
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prospecting actually becomes, I would think, fairly easy.
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To the degree that you don't believe it, I think prospecting
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gets harder and harder and harder and more and more
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difficult.
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Speaker 5: You are so spot on there because if all you're
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focused on is the product, you are going to get sick of it very
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quickly.
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This is going to turn your stomach.
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But again, if you're focused on how you can help people, I tell
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people there's two exercises I want you to go through.
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I want you to take a piece of paper, draw a line down the
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middle, on one side, write down names of 10 customers and on the
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other column, write down the outcomes that you helped them
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achieve, not what you sold them the outcomes.
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And then you give yourself a big hug and you go I love myself
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.
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And then you give yourself a big hug, I love myself.
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And then you ask yourself who are those people?
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And you want to be called the same type of people.
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And here's the way I look at it .
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If I have a problem, trust me, my kids would tell you I have
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plenty of problems and you could help me.
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I would want you to reach out to me.
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I would be upset if I found out later that you could have
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helped me and you didn't See.
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That's the level of.
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That's what prospecting is all about.
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Prospecting is about helping people.
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Now here's the deal.
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Tom will say you're the one calling me and you can help me.
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I don't know, you know.
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I will say I don't know who Tom is.
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So you're right, I'm going to blow you off.
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Initially, no-transcript, I don't want to.
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Yeah.
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Speaker 2: So what?
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I think I hear you're saying is that's credibility yeah.
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Speaker 4: I have that mindset as well, you know.
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I think so much of this is to your point, mark.
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It's about what value can you bring to the prospect, and it's
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not always about your products and solutions.
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Sometimes it's about what you as the person can do.
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Often the biggest value that I can bring a prospect is that I
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can demystify the giant behemoth that I work for and the value,
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the relationships, the resources , the investments all that stuff
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I get paid to get that on behalf of my client and that's
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the value that I can bring.
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And sometimes I'll even steer them toward the competition if
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that's the right thing to do.
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But it's all in this ever-loving pursuit of going out
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and becoming the trusted advisor, earning the right to be
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the trusted advisor and heads up sales leaders, you set the
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tone, you set the culture.
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You've got to make sure that you establish a culture that has
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a prospecting mindset and that is about value, not trying to go
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toe to toe with your competition based on their
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strengths, because you're not going to win that way.
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You've got to go out, be outcome driven, but understand
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your clients.
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Speaker 5: I love what you're saying there, because you focus
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on the outcome and we don't know what the outcome is that the
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customer is looking for till we just stop and listen, listen.
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But we want to get into this, this pitch mode, so quickly.
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And how many sales leaders?
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Well, you're not moving.
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You're not moving them along fast enough.
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You're not moving them.
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Hold it, hold it.
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I always contend that we will close the deal faster by going
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slower initially.
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Speaker 3: I love it.
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Speaker 5: Go slow to move fast, right, you go slow.
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During that discovery, there's this race to the demo, right,
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race to the demo.
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And then what happens is the demo becomes this vomit show
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where you're showing the customer all kinds of stuff that
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they're not interested in, and then they go.
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You know what?
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I don't think this is the right solution.
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Or I think we need to go.
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Look, I think we need to go, and boom, the thing falls apart.
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But because sales leaders are challenging their salespeople,
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get to the demo, get to the demo .
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You know, for some reason, that's this mark.
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Boom, get to the demo and big mistake.
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Speaker 3: It's part of the sales journey.
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It's a checkbox.
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You got to get there.
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Speaker 5: Yeah.
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Speaker 2: So, mark, let me ask you a question.
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And, Brandon, I'm definitely interested, brandon, and all of
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us, we talk a lot about now the importance of following the
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buyer journey and supporting the buyer journey rather than
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forcing the seller journey right .
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The demo you're talking about is forcing the seller journey on
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the customer.
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Come on, come on, we got to get the demo because that's what I
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need in my seller journey.
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That's there.
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Do you, as far as you know, do you spend time?
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And it sounds like it?
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Right, because there's really no way you could provide that
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level of help, support, credibility, expertise unless
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you truly understand a little bit about that buyer journey and
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are working to influence it rather than to change it and to
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move it into your seller journey .
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Are we looking at that right?
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Speaker 5: Yeah, here's a couple of things.
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You know it's interesting.
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The customer's never going to share with us enough information
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until they have a little level of trust with us.
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You know, when they finally trust us there's that level of
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confidence, that credibility we've established.
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Then the customer begins opening up.
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But again, what happens is too many times when we're on the
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seller's journey we race, we race past that first step and we
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don't establish that.
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And then we wonder why we're not getting the real information
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from the customer.
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Slow it down, establish the relationship, let them get to
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know you and you get to know them.
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And then there's a level of credibility that begins to
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percolate up.
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And the more it comes up, guess what?
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The more open the customer is going to be.
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The other day I was on the phone with a VP of sales of a company
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and I was amazed at the information, the confidential
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information, that was being shared with them.
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And I've done very little work with this company.
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I spoke at a sales meeting for them that was the extent of what
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I've done for them and this VP of sales was just opening up and
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it's like, wow, I must have very quickly between getting
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ready for the SKO for them and doing it and post after that
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established a real level of credibility to be able to have
00:17:29
this person share with me that level of information.
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But what does that do?
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That puts me in a better position to help them, because
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now I can begin to say here's some things that you might want
00:17:41
to look at, here's some solutions, here's some ideas.
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What does that do?
00:17:45
Creates value for the customer.
00:18:01
Speaker 4: What are some simple steps Mark today that sellers
00:18:03
should be leveraging, should be putting story.
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You know you built a body of work that didn't start out as
00:18:12
you wanted it to or as you envisioned it to, and I think
00:18:16
that's true of a lot of sellers.
00:18:17
You know, if you start out in your career, if you look back on
00:18:20
a career at like our ages, it didn't go the way I envisioned,
00:18:24
but it went very well, based on a lot of sequential steps.
00:18:28
What should sellers be prioritizing today to build the
00:18:31
credibility that they seek?
00:18:32
Speaker 5: Well, there's two things.
00:18:33
One is who are you associating with?
00:18:36
This is so key.
00:18:37
You've got to be associating with the right people for two
00:18:40
reasons.
00:18:40
One you become the sum of the five people you spend the most
00:18:44
time with I believe Jim Rohn said that line initially and
00:18:51
what happens is you begin to pick up their nuances, you begin
00:18:52
to pick up their language, but as those people in their circle
00:18:54
see them, they will in turn see you.
00:18:55
Second is this you have to establish a level of consistency
00:19:00
.
00:19:01
Carson, you made the comment that I've been out there,
00:19:03
consistently, out there on social media for years, years
00:19:06
and years.
00:19:06
Yeah, you're right.
00:19:13
Now, consistency doesn't necessarily mean it has to be
00:19:14
daily or hourly.
00:19:14
It can be weekly, it can be, it can be whatever.
00:19:15
But you got to demonstrate consistency because in this era
00:19:20
of fakeness that we have in our world, people are looking for
00:19:26
authenticity, and authenticity takes on different forms.
00:19:30
Totally get that, but one of them is this level of
00:19:33
consistency, because nobody wants to do business with a
00:19:36
salesperson they can't count on.
00:19:38
Nobody wants to do business with a salesperson that they
00:19:40
don't know if they're going to show up for this meeting and
00:19:42
they're going to be there for that.
00:19:43
It's going to happen.
00:19:44
So you actually I always say your reputation arrives before
00:19:49
you do One of the big things.
00:19:51
This has never happened before.
00:19:56
I was at a networking event last night.
00:19:57
Sat down at a dinner, gentleman next to me, oh, you're Mark
00:20:01
Hunter.
00:20:01
I just read the first two chapters of your book.
00:20:04
Okay, now that is literally the first time that has ever
00:20:08
happened, but it was amazing.
00:20:12
We had a great conversation.
00:20:13
I said, hey, would you hurry up and read chapter 3 through 18
00:20:16
or whatever it is, and then tell me what you think of the book?
00:20:18
But it was very interesting because you know, this was a
00:20:23
networking dinner Again, nobody really knew anybody and it could
00:20:29
have been an awkward conversation.
00:20:31
But this guy made me.
00:20:31
See you're mark hunter, I, I recognize your picture from the
00:20:35
book.
00:20:35
I've just read a couple chapters your book.
00:20:38
So what does that do?
00:20:39
That means my reputation arrived before I did.
00:20:41
Now, it wasn't about me in the book.
00:20:44
I wanted to find out hey, tell me, tell me about what you're
00:20:47
doing, what brings you here, what data, data, data it's.
00:20:52
We have to flip the script as rapidly as possible to be able
00:20:58
to have 100 percent of conversation about the customer.
00:21:02
It's not about us.
00:21:04
We may use our reputation to bring them in, but then
00:21:07
immediately flip it and ask questions about them.
00:21:12
Speaker 3: Mark.
00:21:12
So I had timing wise.
00:21:14
Today I had, and I'll say, the company's open text.
00:21:20
They're in their SKO and one of their sales leaders has become
00:21:25
a friend of mine over the last several months and I guess they
00:21:28
were having a conversation around personal brand, around
00:21:33
LinkedIn, and I had like six or seven people send me connection
00:21:36
requests this morning.
00:21:37
I said what are you guys doing?
00:21:39
What's going on?
00:21:39
They're like, oh, we're talking about reputation.
00:21:42
And I said, oh well, perfect, mark Hunter is going to be on
00:21:44
our show.
00:21:45
You need to come listen to it.
00:21:46
And I said, oh well, perfect, mark Hunter is going to be on
00:22:08
our show.
00:22:08
You need to come listen to it.
00:22:09
For them, them all listening I love what you're saying there is
00:22:10
.
00:22:10
You've got to turn it around and be about them.
00:22:11
What are some of the suggestions you have for sales
00:22:13
producers to be able to use the activities they can actually
00:22:14
control to even make it about their customers from the very
00:22:19
beginning?
00:22:20
Speaker 5: Ask questions, ask questions, ask for people's
00:22:23
opinions.
00:22:24
I do this oftentimes and I don't do it enough.
00:22:29
This is shame on me.
00:22:30
I'll make a comment and say you know what are your thoughts on
00:22:33
this, or you know what do you think of that?
00:22:36
You know, I want to engage people in a conversation as
00:22:41
rapidly as possible, and one of the ways we do this is I say
00:22:46
I'll take an online connection and turn it into an offline
00:22:50
conversation.
00:22:50
Okay, it used to be a landline, okay Now.
00:22:53
Now we just call that a student call or a team's team's call
00:22:56
for Carson, okay, okay, we'll keep, we'll keep this in the
00:22:59
family, yeah, but but again, it's it's.
00:23:03
How do I, how do I create more of of a conversation, more
00:23:09
relationship, in fact?
00:23:09
It's.
00:23:09
How do I create more of a conversation, more of a
00:23:10
relationship?
00:23:10
In fact, it's funny.
00:23:10
This morning I was out on LinkedIn and I was looking at
00:23:13
who's looked at my profile over the last several weeks and, man,
00:23:20
wow, you know I probably should be doing this more often, but
00:23:23
are there common threads or are there things that are seen?
00:23:25
Are there people?
00:23:26
Hey, you know what they've looked at.
00:23:28
I need to reach out to them, not to sell them.
00:23:30
I don't.
00:23:31
I don't want to sell them, I just want to get to know them.
00:23:34
You know, what's interesting is , we can all look at at at
00:23:39
journeys in our sales career, where there's been strings of
00:23:44
business that have come together because of a person we met
00:23:48
years ago.
00:23:49
Right, there's somebody that we met.
00:23:52
I mean I was sharing this with my wife the other day.
00:23:54
I said, man, I'll never forget, there was a dinner I sat down
00:23:59
to probably 10 years ago, met an individual and that has just
00:24:04
one connection to it and I didn't.
00:24:06
I didn't know that individual and that has just one connection
00:24:09
to it and I didn't.
00:24:09
I didn't know that.
00:24:16
But again, it's nurturing everything you come in contact
00:24:17
with, being a person that people want to be able or feel
00:24:19
comfortable associating with.
00:24:20
You know, I always say my goal is not to be the better part of
00:24:25
each person's day.
00:24:25
I want to save that for your spouse, your significant other,
00:24:29
your kids, whatever.
00:24:31
I just want to be one of the better parts of your day.
00:24:34
If I can be one of the better parts of your day, then you know
00:24:38
what You're probably going to remember me.
00:24:39
I don't mean that egotistically , but I mean that you know that
00:24:44
hopefully then I've earned the right, the honor and the respect
00:24:47
to be able to come back and meet with you again.
00:24:49
Wow, that's how.
00:24:52
That's how we keep things going .
00:24:53
I mean, carson, I have a feeling in the business you're
00:24:56
in, a lot of your deals, a lot of situations are these are
00:25:00
connections that you've made over the years, right?
00:25:03
Speaker 4: Without a doubt, and the biggest value that you find
00:25:06
that you bring.
00:25:06
Like when you were talking about that Mark, that resonated
00:25:09
deeply with me because I started thinking about years ago these
00:25:13
symbiotic, mutually beneficial relationships that I would
00:25:17
create with these other vendors and other partners, and
00:25:19
sometimes even with my competition, to basically say,
00:25:22
hey, I can't help this customer, but I know you can and I know
00:25:26
you don't do this, but I do.
00:25:27
Let's establish a relationship and these paid so many dividends
00:25:32
.
00:25:32
You don't always realize it at the time, but going out and
00:25:35
thinking about these ways where I can help you and I'm willing
00:25:38
to make those investments, like sometimes you'll make a lot of
00:25:41
deposits and maybe that vendor, that person doesn't ever
00:25:44
reciprocate, but often they do, and sometimes in mysterious and
00:25:49
unexpected ways.
00:25:50
It's amazing what happens if you show up to serve.
00:25:54
Speaker 5: You know what's something about showing up and
00:25:56
serving you feel good.
00:25:57
You know when I could make a recommendation for somebody hey,
00:26:00
go talk to this person, go see that person or connect to people
00:26:03
.
00:26:03
You know there's nothing in it for me, but you know what I feel
00:26:06
good and when I feel good it's amazing.
00:26:11
I'll share with you a very quick story and anybody can
00:26:15
Google this.
00:26:16
Bob Eckert is the retired CEO of Mattel Toys.
00:26:20
Years ago I was doing some consulting work for Mattel Toys
00:26:23
shortly after Bob had been there and Bob was replacing a CEO by
00:26:30
the name of Jill Berard and again, you can go ahead and
00:26:33
Google that.
00:26:33
She was a very difficult lady and these two are total polar
00:26:38
opposites and Bob's staff was very taken back by Bob's style.
00:26:44
And I asked Bob at a meeting.
00:26:46
I said Bob, for a CEO, you're incredibly gracious, you're
00:26:50
incredibly nice, you really show an interest in people.
00:26:52
He made the comment to me First of all.
00:26:54
He said ah, shucks, don't worry .
00:26:56
I said no, bob, get up.
00:26:58
He said here's the deal I do show an interest in people.
00:27:03
I want people to succeed.
00:27:04
Because I had seen it the night before and we had been out to
00:27:11
dinner and the waitstaff.
00:27:12
He was incredibly courteous to the waitstaff you know, it's the
00:27:14
guy's CEO Mattel Corporation, incredibly gracious, and then,
00:27:18
and then he goes on to say he says you know, he says when I'm
00:27:23
nice to other people, I make better decisions.
00:27:27
Drop the mic on that one.
00:27:31
And if you followed Bob's career through Mattel and he was
00:27:35
also on the board of directors of McDonald's Corporation and
00:27:38
several other corporations he went through some very difficult
00:27:40
times, very difficult times, but he always weathered the
00:27:46
storm and somehow made the right decision.
00:27:48
This is when I'm nice and gracious and take interest in
00:27:55
people, I make better decisions.
00:27:56
That's huge.
00:27:59
Speaker 3: That's huge, you know .
00:28:01
It reminds me we've used the quote from Maya Angelou a few
00:28:05
times that people don't remember what you say, but they remember
00:28:10
how you made them feel.
00:28:11
And in so many circles in sales that's like the antithesis,
00:28:15
like it's totally illogical, and yet I believe it's the most
00:28:19
logical.
00:28:20
The most valuable thing we can do in sales is remember that how
00:28:25
we, how we help make people feel, and then what you're
00:28:29
tagging onto that is, and then we feel better and we actually
00:28:32
make better decisions overall.
00:28:33
And we we got touchy feely in sales today.
00:28:36
I love it.
00:28:37
Speaker 5: Whoa, this is going down a wonky weird road.
00:28:49
Speaker 2: So I have a question or a comment, mark, and then I
00:28:52
want to get Hugh's question here as well, and I know you touched
00:28:56
on this earlier, but maybe it's just you know I'm a little slow
00:28:58
to the game.
00:28:59
I'm getting over COVID.
00:29:01
So, as Brandon says, I'm not thinking as quickly as I usually
00:29:03
do, thinking as quickly as I usually do.
00:29:05
If you're talking to somebody new graduating from college,
00:29:08
coming into business, it seems like if you can start and work
00:29:15
in sales and build that, I guess , that mindset and the way that
00:29:20
you handle yourself and the way that you do things, you're
00:29:29
really creating a huge foundation for you to move up
00:29:31
executive level and really move up in an organization over time.
00:29:32
I just can't.
00:29:33
I can see a no-lose situation by building that right mindset
00:29:37
right from the beginning and then using it in a sales,
00:29:40
because what better way to really hone your craft, if you
00:29:42
will, than out there dealing with you know selling?
00:29:45
Speaker 5: Yeah, and I'm going to add to that.
00:29:47
You know it's funny, but we're also selling as much internal as
00:29:50
we are external.
00:29:51
I mean I, I look at it, I mean any salesperson for a company.
00:29:55
Uh, when I was leading a sales team, I always used to crack up.
00:29:59
I used to say, every quarter, every salesperson has to fight
00:30:03
50 battles and they got to win at least 30 of them.
00:30:06
And some of them choose to fight them with customers.
00:30:08
Others choose to fight them internally to get their quota
00:30:11
changed.
00:30:11
But it's like you know, would you please focus externally?
00:30:14
But?
00:30:15
But I mean it is, but it we're.
00:30:17
We're always dealing, we're always selling at every level.
00:30:21
And I'll tell you what the greatest salespeople today are
00:30:26
the ones that create a team of people who want to help them.
00:30:30
I talk about a person in my book, a Mind for Sales, who was
00:30:36
my greatest leader, john Canavan , and he was just.
00:30:40
I mean I'll tell you what everybody wanted to walk through
00:30:43
a wall for the guy, because as a salesperson he was amazing in
00:30:47
front of customers, but he lifted everybody else.
00:30:50
He lifted everybody up around him, the customer and himself.
00:30:53
So you know, he walked into a room and he put energy into the
00:30:57
room.
00:30:58
He did not take it out and it was not self-centered.
00:31:00
It was literally creating this aura that anything is possible,
00:31:11
and it was just amazing as I got to work with him for a couple
00:31:14
of years the results we were able to achieve against some
00:31:19
incredible odds.
00:31:24
Speaker 2: Let's hit Hugh's comment here or question uh,
00:31:28
mark, you know he's asking.
00:31:29
When you failed originally the first three times, was it
00:31:32
because of your leader and uh who inspired you the fourth have
00:31:37
?
00:31:37
Speaker 5: I only failed three times.
00:31:38
I think I failed about 3 times.
00:31:41
You know I yeah, I think the first couple of times it wasn't
00:31:44
the leader, it was my lack of willingness to learn from my
00:31:50
leader.
00:31:50
And actually I failed twice initially.
00:31:54
Third time I almost failed, but he was able to catch me the
00:31:57
first two times.
00:31:57
I look at those leaders and one was not a good leader, I admit
00:32:01
that, but I still could have learned.
00:32:02
I still could have learned.
00:32:04
The second one was a great leader.
00:32:06
I just chose not to learn.
00:32:09
I thought I was so arrogant, so cocky.
00:32:12
I thought I knew what I needed to do and remember I didn't want
00:32:15
to be in sales.
00:32:16
See, so you're not going to tell me these sales things
00:32:19
because I don't want to do them anyway, I'm going to do it my
00:32:21
own way.
00:32:21
And it wasn't until my third one that I think I now became
00:32:27
paranoid that I could be without a car you know I may not have a
00:32:32
car to drive that I finally began to realize what sales is
00:32:38
all about.
00:32:38
You know, sometimes in order for us to change, you got to go
00:32:42
to the edge of the cliff.
00:32:43
You know, you really have to be at that point where you sit
00:32:48
there and say, because otherwise you just keep trudging along,
00:32:51
trudging along, and I think if I had not gone through those
00:32:56
experiences early on, I would have just been trudging along.
00:33:01
So I mean, this is where don't nobody and I told this to the
00:33:05
students I was with yesterday getting fired.
00:33:09
There's nothing wrong with that .
00:33:10
Now, as long as you're not fired for an ethical reason you
00:33:12
know an ethical or a moral reason there's nothing wrong
00:33:15
with being fired because you learn from it and it's okay.
00:33:19
You're going to come back from it.
00:33:21
You're going to be better than ever.
00:33:22
It's no different than in sales .
00:33:24
I mean, we lose deals, we don't win all.
00:33:26
Well, okay, I hate the term win , I never want to win a deal.
00:33:34
I earn a deal, I earn a deal, but there's a lot that I don't
00:33:36
get, it's okay.
00:33:38
What can I learn from it?
00:33:39
I establish relationships.
00:33:59
Speaker 4: I'm going to keep nurturing this long.
00:34:02
It's going to keep coming.
00:34:03
It's going to keep coming.
00:34:04
It's going to keep coming.
00:34:05
I think it's very critical to find the people that are better,
00:34:09
that are doing something that maybe you're not performing in,
00:34:12
who's performing well in this solution or this bucket.
00:34:15
Go ahead and find these people, learn from them, share ideas,
00:34:18
brainstorm with them, assimilate what they do into your arsenal.
00:34:21
It doesn't take food off the table for you to do what they're
00:34:24
doing, or vice versa.
00:34:25
In fact, it makes everybody better.
00:34:27
It elevates the game.
00:34:29
The other thing, that epiphany that I think a lot of great
00:34:31
sellers have, going from arrogance to selflessness.
00:34:34
Hopefully we've all gone through that right Like I was
00:34:39
like that in my twenties.
00:34:40
I had a lot of success.
00:34:41
I thought I was, I didn't need anybody to help me be better,
00:34:45
and boy was I wrong.
00:34:46
And I think when we finally have that epiphany, that's what
00:34:50
is honestly the gateway to improvement going from lone wolf
00:34:53
to being the consummate team player.
00:34:56
Mark, you're the author also of high profit selling and high
00:34:59
profit prospecting, and when I think about high profit, I think
00:35:03
about what we're missing out on in the total addressable market
00:35:06
.
00:35:06
Sometimes I think we are very short-sighted.
00:35:09
As salespeople, we look at hey, I need to go out and sell this,
00:35:12
I need to go out and sell that, or I'm going to talk to the
00:35:16
people that are easy to get meetings with, or I'm going to
00:35:19
just talk to the people that I inherit relationships with or
00:35:22
get introduced to.
00:35:23
Prospecting's hard.
00:35:24
You've got to figure out what is your message.
00:35:27
You got to figure out what is going to resonate with the
00:35:29
people that you're reaching out to.
00:35:30
But I always think about from sellers today there's two big
00:35:33
areas you hit on one.
00:35:34
It's being outcome driven.
00:35:36
The other is being bold and going out and really
00:35:39
understanding the total addressable market, the TAM, and
00:35:42
what it's going to take to go out and actually achieve it.
00:35:45
It's relationships with your customers at a high level, with
00:35:49
the right influencers, which isn't always easy to get,
00:35:52
development of a C-level acumen, et cetera.
00:35:54
But also how to sell internally , how to know who I need inside
00:35:59
that I'm going to go to to really unlock the coffers so
00:36:02
that I can bring to bear the most resources for my customer.
00:36:05
How do you believe that sellers today should be approaching
00:36:10
that total addressable market in a different way that will make
00:36:13
them more successful?
00:36:15
Speaker 5: Well, first of all, we have to get outside of our
00:36:17
own bubble.
00:36:18
We all live, everybody lives in a bubble and I challenge you
00:36:23
know, somebody always asks me what's the best sales book to
00:36:26
read, and I go it's Atomic Habits by James Clare.
00:36:29
That's not a sales book.
00:36:31
That is not a sales book.
00:36:32
But boy, I'll tell you what it's a great.
00:36:34
We have to be able to be willing to expand our horizons.
00:36:39
Why?
00:36:39
Because it allows us to see things differently, one of the
00:36:42
things that I always say.
00:36:44
Top performers, top performers will go into any meeting, any
00:36:47
conversation, any activity and say there's something to be
00:36:50
learned here, there is something I'm going to learn here.
00:36:53
Average people will go into something and say there's
00:36:55
nothing to learn, there's not, this is this, is this is this is
00:36:57
a waste of time.
00:36:58
That right, there is a mindset difference.
00:37:01
If I go into things saying thinking I'm going to learn
00:37:06
something, we're going to end this show and I'm going to
00:37:12
challenge myself what did I learn from the three of you?
00:37:14
What did I learn?
00:37:16
Because again, every day, we have to ask yourself and what
00:37:20
this does is this?
00:37:21
Then helps us begin looking at this total, addressable market
00:37:24
in a different way, because otherwise what happens is we get
00:37:27
blinders on.
00:37:27
Now there's something to be said for blinders, because
00:37:30
success in sales is staying focused no ifs, ands or buts
00:37:34
about it.
00:37:34
But at the same time, we got to be aware of what else is going
00:37:38
on out there, because if we can be aware of what else is going
00:37:41
on, guess what?
00:37:42
We're in a better position to help our customers help their
00:37:46
customers.
00:37:46
You what?
00:37:47
We're in a better position to help our customers help their
00:37:49
customers.
00:37:50
You know one of the things that salespeople and I'll ask this of
00:37:53
companies I'm working with and salespeople I say tell me about
00:37:54
your customers.
00:37:55
Okay, tell me about your customers' customers.
00:37:57
And they don't have a clue.
00:37:59
They don't have a clue.
00:38:00
You got to go downstream, we got to go upstream, we got to
00:38:05
understand the entire supply chain, and that's not the right
00:38:12
term.
00:38:13
But what I'm saying is this whole thing from raw materials,
00:38:17
whatever it might be, all the way through to customer outcomes
00:38:22
, and I don't care what it is that you sell, and I don't care
00:38:25
what it is that you sell, it's going to somebody else.
00:38:28
Because I want to be in a position where I know more about
00:38:34
my customers' customers than my customers know about them,
00:38:41
because if I can bring insights to my customers about their
00:38:44
customers, they're going to look at me differently.
00:38:46
They're going to go oh wow, that's to me.
00:38:51
That's operating at a completely different level.
00:38:56
And you know what?
00:38:58
Now I'm really starting to understand the buyer's journey.
00:39:00
Hmm, interesting.
00:39:06
Speaker 2: You know, mark, my head's spinning, so, um, maybe a
00:39:14
little of both, I don't know.
00:39:15
But yeah, the conversation is definitely building there.
00:39:19
You know what I heard you say here about knowing your
00:39:22
customer's customer to me.
00:39:24
You know we talk a lot about building your online presence
00:39:27
and your LinkedIn presence and whatever.
00:39:29
What I hear you saying is that now opens up the door to a whole
00:39:33
bunch of other connections.
00:39:35
If I'm thinking about my customers and then my customers'
00:39:38
customers and building connections and healthy
00:39:41
connections and relationships with them, oh my God, what value
00:39:45
am I going to then provide?
00:39:46
It's like I've just hockey stick my value on the others.
00:39:49
Speaker 5: You have hockey sticked it, because it also
00:39:51
makes it that much easier for your customers to now give you
00:39:54
referrals.
00:39:54
Think about it Exactly Because you know that you know it makes
00:39:58
it so much easier for them to refer you and it makes it easier
00:40:01
for you to refer others them, Because I mean the whole thing
00:40:06
about referrals.
00:40:07
I just got to clarify this for a second.
00:40:09
It's not a game about getting referrals, it's a game about
00:40:13
giving referrals, and if you're focused on giving referrals,
00:40:17
stuff will come back to you.
00:40:18
Focus on giving, Don't worry about the getting.
00:40:24
Speaker 3: Bob, you're going to be proud of us, right?
00:40:26
Speaker 4: powerful there, Mark, is when you think about the
00:40:29
customer's customer.
00:40:30
A lot of us work in an organization where our
00:40:35
organization whether it's us or somebody else, most likely
00:40:37
somebody else supports that customer's customer right?
00:40:41
You know, like I work in an organization where we have a lot
00:40:44
of managed accounts and in fact I've worked in different
00:40:48
verticals where customers that I supported in the past became
00:40:52
the customer's customer of somebody that I support today.
00:40:55
When you start to think outside the box and this is why I loved
00:41:00
your answer, one of many reasons why I loved your answer
00:41:02
about total addressable market Sometimes we fail to think
00:41:06
bigger picture.
00:41:07
And beyond that bubble, beyond that box, If I'm able to take a
00:41:11
relationship that I made three to five years ago in an
00:41:14
organization that I supported, where I was a trusted advisor
00:41:18
because I understood their business model so well and I was
00:41:20
so entrenched, and I'm able to take a relationship from here
00:41:24
and bring it to present day and put these folks together and
00:41:27
then get heck out of the way and let them make magic happen,
00:41:30
guess what happens there?
00:41:31
Your credibility goes up a notch and all you really did was you
00:41:35
were the orchestrator of a beautiful relationship, and I
00:41:38
think that's why, when you think about the referrals that you
00:41:41
can give and you even think outside the box on ways that you
00:41:45
can prospect.
00:41:46
That is when I prospect today, outside the box, on ways that
00:41:51
you can prospect.
00:41:52
That is when I prospect today, which I send, sometimes
00:41:53
thousands of prospecting messages, and when I do that, it
00:41:55
is never about a product, it's never about a solution.
00:41:59
It is always about ideas that I have for ways that my company
00:42:05
and I can uniquely enhance the relationship with this
00:42:08
organization because of the people that they serve that we
00:42:11
often also serve.
00:42:13
Think about that.
00:42:15
Speaker 5: It's giving the customer value.
00:42:17
And you know what?
00:42:19
Don't worry about the business.
00:42:20
I love to do the same thing.
00:42:22
I have an expression I say 10 lists.
00:42:26
I create 10 lists.
00:42:27
In fact, every week I create a 10 list and it's 10 things that
00:42:31
companies can use to help them do their business better, 10
00:42:34
things that a sales leader can do to help them do their
00:42:36
business better.
00:42:36
And I've got probably hundreds of these now and I'll put one
00:42:40
together and then I email it out and it's a huge prospecting
00:42:46
tool for me.
00:42:46
And it's also a reinforcement tool with customers who I'm
00:42:49
already doing business with and they just love it.
00:42:51
They just love this stuff.
00:42:52
And it's amazing.
00:42:54
And I'm not selling, I'm not standing up saying, hey, bring
00:42:59
me in for your sales kickoff meeting, bring me in for this.
00:43:01
No, I'm just sharing with them and it creates conversations and
00:43:08
it creates credibility, it creates reputation, it creates a
00:43:13
tremendous amount of opportunities that you just keep
00:43:20
building on and building on and building on and building on.
00:43:27
Speaker 3: I really appreciate our conversation.
00:43:29
It's so often sales conversations are about what we
00:43:34
do like what we do for the customer and how do we get their
00:43:39
attention and how do you move them to the next stage and what
00:43:42
do you do when they have objections, and I think there's
00:43:46
a place for some of that.
00:43:47
I think we got somebody here we got to kind of remove from chat
00:43:55
and I like it.
00:43:59
What we're talking about is it's the things that we can
00:44:02
control, but doing it from a place of giving and trusting and
00:44:07
believing and knowing that when we do that, it works out and we
00:44:13
actually gain in response to it .
00:44:18
Speaker 5: You know, let's talk about that for a bit here,
00:44:20
because the whole thing about is I want to go into this habit of
00:44:24
just giving, giving, giving, and you know one of the of the
00:44:29
things.
00:44:29
In fact, this is an interesting prospecting situation and I'm
00:44:32
sure all of you have seen this.
00:44:33
You're prospecting with somebody, you think you've got
00:44:37
this prospect, you're gonna, they're gonna turn into a
00:44:40
customer and then they go radio silence.
00:44:42
They go radio silent right.
00:44:44
Or you've had this great conversation and they go side
00:44:47
and I would say the sales made the follow up and there's
00:44:50
multiple ways we can follow up, but I just keep coming in,
00:44:54
coming in, coming in with more and more ideas that can help
00:44:59
them.
00:45:00
More and more ways.
00:45:01
Just stay in the touch.
00:45:02
I mean I've got multiple.
00:45:05
There was a client that I finally landed and it took me
00:45:08
over three years, three years of just touching, touching,
00:45:12
touching.
00:45:13
Now some people might say, mark, you're a lousy salesperson
00:45:15
because it took you three years.
00:45:16
It just it, just.
00:45:17
You know.
00:45:18
But when you get things systematized and you can do
00:45:21
things, it's amazing at what you can do.
00:45:23
But you've got to be willing to stay in the game and the, the
00:45:28
ways that you stay in the game is again is you surround
00:45:31
yourself with key people Because you know what.
00:45:33
Everybody's gone through this situation.
00:45:35
I'm sure all of us here have had major screw-ups in sales,
00:45:40
major.
00:45:41
Speaker 4: More than I can count .
00:45:42
Speaker 5: Yeah, yeah.
00:45:43
And yet you know what.
00:45:44
You keep coming back.
00:45:45
And yet it would have been easy for us to stay down for the
00:45:48
count.
00:45:48
No, but again you begin to realize that others are going
00:45:52
through the same problem, etc.
00:45:53
Etc.
00:45:53
And life works out.
00:45:56
But it all starts with your own headset.
00:45:58
If, if your head is not screwed on right, nothing's going to
00:46:03
happen.
00:46:04
Speaker 2: Yeah, yeah so I I made a of notes here and I'm
00:46:11
still back on the prospecting thing and the TAM conversation
00:46:14
we were just having here.
00:46:16
You know, and Brandon, we get people all the time right oh, my
00:46:19
TAM or my prospects are too small, or there's not enough
00:46:23
people in my world that are on LinkedIn or that are on social
00:46:26
or whatever.
00:46:27
If you just sat down and you kind of took your customer and
00:46:30
then basically from there kind of built the ecosystem right
00:46:36
which surrounds that customer, their customer, their partners,
00:46:40
whatever the case may be, all of a sudden your TAM quote unquote
00:46:44
TAM gets way way more massive.
00:46:47
Your relationship or your ecosystem gets way more massive.
00:46:51
And you know, brandon, I think that eliminates a lot of this
00:46:55
where we hear people well, my customer is not on linkedin or
00:46:59
they're not on social, but yeah, their partners may be, their
00:47:02
customers may be, and you may be able to connect them and and
00:47:05
then end up having them on linkedin or on social or
00:47:07
whatever, yeah, and I think I think a lot of times when it's
00:47:10
oh, my people aren't on LinkedIn .
00:47:12
Speaker 3: What they're really saying is the small percent of
00:47:16
my TAM who are currently in market aren't responding to my
00:47:21
outreach messages where I'm asking them for a demo.
00:47:23
I mean, that's really what they're saying, right?
00:47:26
But it comes to well, my people aren't on LinkedIn because it's
00:47:30
easier to blame the tool or blame the prospects than to
00:47:35
actually take responsibility for our behavior, which is stop
00:47:38
spamming people messages, asking them for a demo, when you don't
00:47:44
know anything about them.
00:47:45
You don't know if they're even in market, you haven't earned
00:47:48
any sort of credibility, you haven't asked the questions, you
00:47:51
haven't shown up giving information, You've done
00:47:54
everything else wrong.
00:47:55
But you just get to that stage and say it doesn't work because
00:48:00
they're not responding.
00:48:01
Because when I show up and I tell everybody, hey, I can give
00:48:05
you a demo, everybody should start running and show up and be
00:48:09
ready for my demo, right?
00:48:11
I mean, is that kind of what you were talking about too, Tom?
00:48:28
Speaker 2: scarcity of opportunity.
00:48:29
And when you really start to look at the ecosystem and you
00:48:31
look at how you can leverage that ecosystem with the value,
00:48:32
the scarcity aspect kind of just goes away and it just gives you
00:48:36
a lot more freedom.
00:48:37
Is what I see.
00:48:38
Speaker 5: You know what?
00:48:38
And that's another difference between the average performer
00:48:41
and the top performer, because the average performer looks at
00:48:44
things from a scarcity mindset and the top performer there's,
00:48:48
there's abundance, there's abundance, there are, there are
00:48:51
more opportunities out there today than ever, and they're
00:48:56
actually easier reach.
00:48:57
Oh, nobody answers the phone, nobody responds.
00:48:59
Hold it.
00:49:00
Do you think it was ever easy?
00:49:02
No, it wasn't okay.
00:49:04
Excuse me, you know so.
00:49:05
I mean again, it's, we have more ways to reach people, but
00:49:10
it comes down to are you going to blame your tool, or is it.
00:49:15
Speaker 4: You.
00:49:15
Your outcome is going to come down to how you understand the
00:49:20
total addressable market, what you're willing to do to go out
00:49:24
there and create relationships.
00:49:26
And, mark, you said something really important again earlier
00:49:28
about it's not it's not winning a deal.
00:49:30
You know, I believe that relationships great
00:49:34
relationships beget deals.
00:49:35
I also I don't believe I'm a great salesperson.
00:49:39
I'm very resourceful and I'm willing to do whatever it takes
00:49:44
to take big swings and go out and make bold asks and do
00:49:49
everything I can to understand how to create relationships that
00:49:52
I don't have.
00:49:53
What relationships am I going to need in order to get done what
00:49:56
I want to get done?
00:49:57
Where are these folks?
00:49:58
How do I go out and get a meeting with them?
00:49:59
What do I need to say to get that meeting?
00:50:01
We're always thinking five steps ahead or we're trying to
00:50:04
categorize it into I need this demo.
00:50:06
That's not true.
00:50:07
You just need a conversation and I wouldn't want to
00:50:09
pigeonhole my first conversation into hey, I want to talk about
00:50:13
this one product, I don't.
00:50:16
Maybe that's what I want to sell , but you're not going to get a
00:50:19
conversation by trying to talk about the one product that you
00:50:21
want to sell.
00:50:21
You're going to get a conversation by showing up,
00:50:23
talking about or trying to talk about what matters to your
00:50:26
customer.
00:50:26
And sometimes, if you think about it, it's going to be how
00:50:30
can I, or how can my company, create a better relationship
00:50:34
with this company that I want to talk to and the companies that
00:50:37
they want to talk to?
00:50:38
And if I can go out and make that relationship better, that's
00:50:41
what's going to earn you that seat in the room.
00:50:43
And then, once you get in there , it comes down to the good old
00:50:46
fundamentals of relationship building and sales.
00:50:48
But the tools and the landscape looks different now than ever
00:50:52
before.
00:50:52
We're in a position of power and I think one of the things,
00:50:55
mark, too, that I respect so much about you, like you've
00:50:57
worked with so many high caliber , you know name brand
00:51:02
organizations.
00:51:03
You've created this credibility and brand that anybody would
00:51:07
kill for.
00:51:08
It didn't necessarily like start out like that.
00:51:12
You've built this body of work, but I think the key thing is is
00:51:15
we're all sellers sitting here today.
00:51:17
What have been the biggest learnings that you've had along
00:51:20
the way that we should be having our eyes on?
00:51:25
Speaker 5: Yeah, here's one.
00:51:26
It's consistency and stay in the game.
00:51:29
You and I have had this conversation, carson, that top
00:51:33
performers lead a very boring life because, again, it's such a
00:51:36
routine, such a routine.
00:51:39
I love routine.
00:51:40
Right, and I'll tell you what I mean.
00:51:43
I start my day the exact same way every day.
00:51:47
I mean I go through certain steps of things and I do not
00:51:54
deviate from that and I know that it's consistency.
00:51:57
It's day in and day out, and I realize that I'm playing a long
00:52:03
game.
00:52:03
It's when I begin thinking it's a short game.
00:52:06
This is again.
00:52:07
This is the difference between average performers and top
00:52:10
performers.
00:52:10
Average performers are focused on just this quarter, this
00:52:14
quarter, this quarter, this quarter, long long.
00:52:16
You know, top performers are focused at least six months out,
00:52:20
six, nine, 12 months out.
00:52:21
They're looking down the road, they're saying and they manage
00:52:26
their pipeline accordingly, and this is so key.
00:52:30
And they also realize that you know what, if this doesn't
00:52:35
happen right now, at this moment , it's okay, it's okay, it's
00:52:40
going to come, there's another swing at the ball and you keep
00:52:47
staying in the game and you also have to realize that much of
00:52:52
what you do is going to fail.
00:52:54
That's okay.
00:52:55
I mean, look at it.
00:52:56
Hey, in Major League Baseball, if you're batting 300, you're
00:53:00
commanded a pretty fat paycheck.
00:53:02
You just have to stay in the game.
00:53:07
Uh it, it, you just have to stay in the game.
00:53:15
But here's, here's the piece.
00:53:16
You've got to be willing to work at it.
00:53:18
You know, I'm I'm going to use Tom Brie.
00:53:19
Tom Brie, I think, without a doubt, greatest NFL quarterback
00:53:27
has ever played the game.
00:53:27
He doesn't just show up for games.
00:53:28
The level oh, we got a Joe Montana in the house.
00:53:31
I know that's right, you're a 49er man, okay, okay.
00:53:34
Anyway, brady's great, don't get me wrong.
00:53:37
Brady's great, I don't care, we can put Joe Montana in there
00:53:40
too, but both of them.
00:53:44
You think about the number of hours that they spend on the
00:53:46
practice field.
00:53:47
You spend about the number of hours they spend in the film
00:53:49
room.
00:53:49
They are constant, and this again is the difference between
00:53:52
average people and great people.
00:53:53
Great people are continuously working at their craft.
00:53:58
They never accept anything but not perfection, the next level.
00:54:05
You know it's interesting.
00:54:07
We've gotten in the habit of saying best practices.
00:54:09
We should throw that out.
00:54:13
It's these are our best right now.
00:54:15
We're going to come up with even better practices.
00:54:18
We're going to come up with better ones.
00:54:20
I mean, I had a call the other day where I just caught myself
00:54:23
and I used a line and I go, wow, that was great, that was man.
00:54:29
I mean I'm using that line again and all it was was this
00:54:34
subtle piece that I was in a conversation with a senior level
00:54:38
person talking about an upcoming sales meeting, talking
00:54:40
about some other stuff that they want me to do for them, and
00:54:43
they lay this out and I just said you know, what do you think
00:54:47
we should do to address this issue?
00:54:52
What should we do?
00:54:53
I could have sent over a proposal, but I want to hear
00:54:57
from them what do you think we should do?
00:54:59
And the person said you know, yeah, I'm really eager to see
00:55:03
what you could provide us.
00:55:05
So what did that do?
00:55:07
That?
00:55:07
That suddenly gave me the entree.
00:55:10
But now it wasn't me telling them I'm going to send you over
00:55:13
a proposal, it was them saying, hey, send me a proposal, send me
00:55:17
a plan.
00:55:17
It's powerful.
00:55:19
And it's just a shift of one word.
00:55:21
Speaker 4: Yeah, be a student.
00:55:22
Yeah, I always like to say monotony is better than misery.
00:55:25
Embrace discipline and then you know being consistent and being
00:55:30
resilient.
00:55:31
Like again, I'm not a great salesperson but I'm like rocky
00:55:35
and rocky one.
00:55:36
I may be fighting the heavyweight champion of the
00:55:39
world, but I will keep getting up in the 14th round, even when
00:55:42
my trainer tells me to stay on the mat like you can't.
00:55:45
You know will not keep me in a box and if you have that
00:55:48
mentality, you can achieve whatever.
00:55:49
You know will not keep me in a box and if you have that
00:55:50
mentality, you can achieve whatever you want to achieve in
00:55:51
sales.
00:55:52
But you know what?
00:55:53
Speaker 5: That takes that inner strength.
00:55:54
You know it takes a.
00:55:56
You're surrounding yourself, you have a belief, you have a
00:55:59
personal faith, you understand, you're solid in who you are and
00:56:04
that is absolutely key, right?
00:56:08
I mean, we get kicked down all the time.
00:56:11
Speaker 3: I always crack up when Carson says I'm not a great
00:56:13
salesperson.
00:56:14
Then he lists off like the six things he does every day.
00:56:17
And you know, I just do this and I just do that and I just do
00:56:21
this, but I'm not very good.
00:56:22
Speaker 4: It's all about process and focus and other
00:56:25
people, and it's reality.
00:56:28
Speaker 3: It's strategies and systems right.
00:56:30
Like John Maxwell says, motivation gets you going, and I
00:56:33
think that's where a lot of salespeople start or stop right.
00:56:36
Motivation gets you going, but discipline keeps you going.
00:56:40
As John Maxwell says it and I think so often we talk to people
00:56:44
in sales they got that initial motivation I'm going to go make
00:56:47
money, I'm going to go do this and they don't have the systems
00:56:51
in place to keep them going and they get haphazard.
00:56:55
And then what do we do?
00:56:56
We blame the tool, we blame the platform, we blame the customer
00:57:01
, we blame something else.
00:57:03
Speaker 4: And what does Mike Tyson say?
00:57:04
It's all fun and games until you get punched in the mouth.
00:57:07
Speaker 1: What do you do after you get your face kicked in?
00:57:10
Speaker 4: that's going to determine your success, or lack
00:57:13
thereof, in sales or in life.
00:57:15
Speaker 5: That's why the book Atomic Habits by James Clare a
00:57:20
non-sales book is such a critical sales book.
00:57:24
Yeah.
00:57:24
Speaker 4: Yeah, yeah.
00:57:25
Speaker 3: That's like, you know Cups, michael Cups, who's been
00:57:27
on our show and he's part of our coaching group.
00:57:29
He's got a book called Time Bandits that we refer to a lot
00:57:34
and it's the same thing.
00:57:35
It's like, hey, what you got to identify, know what's stealing
00:57:38
your time and how are you owning it and protecting it, and I
00:57:41
think it's the same with Atomic Habits.
00:57:43
So, everybody, real quick, I got Tom before you, before you
00:57:48
go that everybody, cause most of our audience is on LinkedIn and
00:57:56
we we got there was a first time this ever happened on on X.
00:57:57
That was somebody kind of bombarded us and called us all a
00:58:00
few different names and things left Mark alone, which was
00:58:03
really nice.
00:58:03
So when we were a little bit, we were laughing and kind of all
00:58:07
over the place.
00:58:07
That's what was going on.
00:58:08
So, josh, thanks for your LinkedIn comment here.
00:58:12
We should throw that up there at least.
00:58:14
You know, get back to some sort of normalcy with our show.
00:58:20
Speaker 2: Yeah, I thought it was kind of fun.
00:58:22
You know it's good, it's signs of success right.
00:58:25
Speaker 4: We're getting all of that.
00:58:26
You know what that's right?
00:58:27
It means somebody of success, right.
00:58:28
Speaker 5: You know what that's right?
00:58:29
It means somebody's watching you know, yeah.
00:58:34
Speaker 2: Tomatoes are good.
00:58:35
That's right.
00:58:37
So well, I think that we have got.
00:58:39
We need to take this episode, put it through chat, gpt,
00:58:47
because I think we got a book that came out of this episode
00:58:49
alone on some of the really.
00:58:49
I mean, I have like three pages of notes here, amazing.
00:58:51
Speaker 4: Mark, thank you.
00:58:51
I'm going to read Tom GPT's version?
00:58:53
Speaker 5: I'd love to see it.
00:58:54
Shouldn't you put this through Copilot no?
00:58:57
Speaker 2: Yeah, oh, I'm sorry.
00:58:59
You're right, mark.
00:59:00
Speaker 4: I appreciate you.
00:59:01
Our stock goes up during this episode.
00:59:11
Speaker 3: I can't afford.
00:59:12
Speaker 5: Copilot, so I just don't use GPT it's fine, you
00:59:13
can't afford not to have co-pilot.
00:59:15
Speaker 4: There's Mark coming up with the sales lesson.
00:59:19
Speaker 2: I'm going to get you in a sales kickoff.
00:59:20
Mark Carson, can you send me a proposal for co-pilot?
00:59:23
He's convinced me, I got to do it.
00:59:27
Speaker 3: Carson's going to say Tom, how are we going to solve
00:59:29
this problem?
00:59:30
That's, that's what I learned from Mark.
00:59:31
Speaker 4: That's right.
00:59:32
I'd rather help you meet your customers better, Tom, than sell
00:59:36
you anything.
00:59:39
Speaker 2: So I think we're going to get a book out of this,
00:59:41
because there's some really good and the prospecting stuff
00:59:43
and whatever was just really really gold.
00:59:45
And I think Brandon ties into all of this stuff.
00:59:48
We keep talking about LinkedIn and the new modern selling
00:59:51
strategies and so forth.
00:59:53
So thank you, Mark Real quick too.
00:59:55
Speaker 3: What I loved about it is like this is more and more
00:59:58
top of mind, I think, with sellers, like I got a message
01:00:01
from someone today.
01:00:02
Again, there's a bunch of sellers with open techs that are
01:00:05
in their SKO events and one of them said he said look, I'm
01:00:11
naturally an introvert.
01:00:12
I've avoided this social selling thing, I've avoided LinkedIn as
01:00:16
long as I possibly could, but I'm in a place now where I have
01:00:19
to take my personal brand serious and that's why he
01:00:24
reached out.
01:00:25
And today's topic of building our credibility at all, I think,
01:00:30
looking at LinkedIn, if it, if it's coming down to credibility,
01:00:35
it comes down to how we serve our TAM, how we show up and,
01:00:39
mark, you said it earlier, our reputation comes before us, it
01:00:42
precedes us.
01:00:42
We have this really cool 24 seven, you know virtual
01:00:45
conference, if you will, this really cool 24-7 virtual
01:00:47
conference, if you will, that everybody's on it in some way,
01:00:51
shape or form and you can actually influence your own
01:00:56
reputation by what you produce, where you comment, how you show
01:01:05
up, how consistent you show up, and therefore influence that
01:01:06
reputation that you have in order to start opening up more
01:01:08
conversations with customers.
01:01:10
I just think it's so timely right now is that I think more
01:01:14
salespeople are coming to that awareness of I've got to do
01:01:16
something different.
01:01:17
I got to look at LinkedIn and take it a bit more serious.
01:01:21
Speaker 5: I think that is so spot on because, again, social
01:01:24
media is a great tool.
01:01:26
Linkedin is such a if you're in the B2B space such a powerful
01:01:30
tool, but you got to use it and you can't just post and ghost.
01:01:35
To quote our friend Bryn Tillman, don't do not post and
01:01:39
ghost, right.
01:01:41
Speaker 2: But I didn't come up with that.
01:01:43
Speaker 5: Another thing or at least that's who I heard it from
01:01:46
but you got to interact.
01:01:49
It's a conversational platform and it doesn't mean you have to
01:01:53
be out there hours every day.
01:01:54
You know I'm on LinkedIn maybe 10 minutes a day, that's it.
01:01:58
That's it.
01:01:58
But you use your time wisely, efficiently, and you know you go
01:02:03
.
01:02:03
But it's consistency.
01:02:05
It's not being out there once and then not showing up again
01:02:08
for six months.
01:02:08
You know you, but it's consistency.
01:02:11
It's not being out there once and then not showing up again
01:02:12
for six months.
01:02:12
You do have to be out there every week.
01:02:12
I mean, I think we're at the point that you've got to be out
01:02:14
there every week, at least 10 or 15 weeks, sorry.
01:02:17
Speaker 2: I think we can say consistency equals credibility.
01:02:20
Speaker 5: It's the show about credibility.
01:02:21
I like that.
01:02:22
That's a tweetable moment, a little portable.
01:02:25
There it is, I love it.
01:02:27
Speaker 3: There we go.
01:02:27
We're going to stay off Twitter though.
01:02:29
Yeah, we'll stay off Twitter.
01:02:32
Speaker 4: We need to get on.
01:02:33
Speaker 5: Reddit, then we can really start.
01:02:34
Hey, they just did the.
01:02:36
Ipo, that's right.
01:02:39
Speaker 3: That's it All right?
01:02:42
Speaker 2: Well, thanks again everybody.
01:02:43
Thanks for the comments.
01:02:44
Great comments, mark.
01:02:45
We'll get you a copy of the book when it comes out.
01:02:47
Great comments, Mark.
01:02:47
We'll get you a copy of the book when it comes out.
01:02:49
We'll have you do the forward here and Brandon Carson.
01:02:53
Thank you, carson, do you want to wrap?
01:02:56
Speaker 3: this up, mark.
01:02:56
I'll see you in a few weeks, yeah.
01:02:59
Speaker 4: Beautiful Mark.
01:03:01
Thank you for joining us.
01:03:02
Tom Brandon, great as always.
01:03:04
Audience.
01:03:04
Thank most of you Maybe all them won and until next time,
01:03:10
happy, modern selling.
01:03:13
Speaker 3: Bye everybody.
01:03:21
Speaker 1: Thank you for joining us today on Mastering Modern
01:03:23
Selling.
01:03:23
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