4 Lessons from Our Top Sales Conversations in Q2

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0:35Pick up that guide today at belaysolutions.com forward slash gravy or text gravy to 55123. This is the Sales Gravy Podcast. Hi, I'm Jeb Blunt, bestselling author, fanatical prospecting, objections, sales EQ, and inked, and I'm here to help you open more doors, close bigger deals, and rock your commission check. Welcome back to the Sales Gravy Podcast. I'm Jeff Blunt Jr. and your host. I've got Ashley Bunt with me as a special guest today because we are going through the best episodes of Q2 2026 for the Sales Gravy Podcast. These are the highest viewed videos and we wanted to give you some extra commentary, some extra resources and ways that people have implemented these tips into their sales lives every single day.

1:14We're going to start with my first conversation with Mark Hunter. Because I tell you what, when we elevate others around us, it's amazing what happens. There's a phrase that I love to use. I want everybody to have a big ego. I want everybody to have a big ego. Well, it's not what you think it is. It's E-G-O, empowering greater outcomes. When I empower greater outcomes in other people, it is amazing at what happens. And this is really what you're doing with customers. You know, it's interesting. I have a phrase I use, sales is leadership, leadership is sales. And my definition of sales, my definition of leadership is exactly the same.

1:49It's helping others see and achieve what they did not think was possible. Stop and think about that for a moment. Show me a good salesperson. What are they doing? They're showing their customers how to see and achieve what they didn't think was possible. Show me a good leader. They're doing the same thing. So this is really at the core of what it is that we talk about. And when you put the other person first, it is amazing at what happens. It's kind of what I refer to as quiet leadership. It's leadership that occurs when you're not there. And this is what a good salesperson does because you create relationships with customers where things happen when you're not there.

2:29They talk about you to other people. They talk, they share with other people how good your company is. And that's the mark of integrity selling. And this is what happens because I firmly believe that when you sell with integrity, you get clients who have integrity. If somebody is destined, is determined to take advantage of people, they're repulsed by people who demonstrate integrity. They are turned off by them. They just don't hang out. But what I find is when I sell with integrity, I attract a higher caliber of client that I could close at a higher price and a higher margin. And you know what?

3:11They're not the ones who come back and nitpick, nitpick, nitpick. You know, I'm sure you've had this experience where... You're not be filing. Don't look at the... Stop watching YouTube right now. I'm not reacting to this at all. It's that low price customer, right? The low price customer is the one who doesn't understand your value proposition and nitpicks you on everything. And you're never, ever able to satisfy them. And that is so tragic. It's funny. I coach some very high level CEOs. And it's interesting, they pay me on a regular basis. We rarely connect. And when we connect, we connect for like a 10 minute call.

3:51Their time is valuable and they just want a quick input. That's it. And it's people who I coach who are a low level. It's like, oh man, you're draining me. You're killing me. You're killing me. Integrity allows you to play at a higher level. And what's not to like about that? So I love what Mark was saying about the ego. I absolutely have an ego for my team. And I think it definitely elevates the customer experience that people have here at Sales Gravy. So encouraging greater outcomes within the team and like selling with integrity. You know, integrity is a value here at Sales Gravy. It's cool to see how that bleeds through the team as a leader that like naturally encourages that.

4:31Obviously, you had the interview. So thinking back to when you first started hearing him explain that, how do you see that when you're coaching your clients or how are you encouraging them to lead in that way? The big takeaway from that conversation about integrity. Yes, it's a value. And I think it's one of those words that we talk about a lot in business. And everyone says they want to work with integrity. At least I don't know of any business that I've walked into where someone was like, yeah, let's use less integrity. At least in my experience, that's not just that's not the conversations that I'm having with business owners.

5:06But I think that integrity is a lot harder to hit than we give it credit for. Some of it's just the little details, how you treat somebody when they're in the interview process, how you get to understand someone's motivation. So, for example, I had a coaching conversation with a director of sales for a small business that came to Augusta, and he was trying to learn how to build stronger teams. And while we were having this conversation, it wasn't that he didn't have integrity, but he was struggling with pushing people with KPIs and accountability without understanding their core motivations. If you look like disk profiles or Working Genius, which we use in our office to help understand why people make certain decisions, why they communicate in certain ways, integrity is, as a leader and even as a salesperson, diving deeper into that person's motivations.

5:59People like me are not necessarily motivated by money. There are some people who are motivated by making a big paycheck. There are some people who are motivated by time spent at home. There are some people who are motivated by a big trip they can take or adventures they want going to go on. There's lots of different ways that people are motivated. So if you have integrity in sales or integrity in leadership, you're taking that extra step and helping people achieve what they want to achieve. You're not helping them achieve what you want to achieve. And as a sales leader, that's more sales, that's more revenue.

6:29As a business owner, that's more sales and more revenue because it helps you achieve your goals or whatever that is. But for the individual human being on your team, having integrity with them is being able to sit down and say, hey, you're not getting closer to proposing to your girlfriend with a nice wedding ring because you haven't been doing the prospecting, but you told me that's what you wanted to get done this year. How can we help you get there? And letting them have that conversation with you. So some of that conversation was around, you know, how do you take yourself out of the equation so that you can make room for others?

6:58And that works in so many different spaces. Maintaining integrity and sales for the individual contributor as well as, you know, a combination of like keeping your pipeline honest. What are the challenges that you're having? And then also, I think a lot of people focus in on the integrity with the clients when you're actively selling them. But you also have to implement that like within your daily process. Like, are you having those honest conversations with your leader when you need help? Because they can't help you if you're not. What are some ways that you are sold to with integrity or deal with, you know, customers, leadership that you believe has integrity, not just that sales gravy, but like extend a little beyond that?

7:35ways that you can implement integrity into sales as the individual not you know not just as a leader but as the individuals like you know being honest about your pipeline are you accurately documenting everything in there so when it gets to post sale the client has a good experience is there something that you potentially miss like going back and reviewing those notes and then on the client side of it when you're interacting with the client if there's something out of stock let them know. If there's something that you're going to get back at a certain point, let them know. If there's a challenge while you're in the discovery and you start to find that, that's one of those things that you take to your sales leader and say, this discovery call is going great.

8:15Here's the challenge that I found, which could turn into a potential objection. How do we handle this? Versus just trying to sweep things under the rug. The integrity in sales goes on both sides of the conversation with your leaders and with the client. I like the concept that you work for the clients that work for you. Creating value is not a one-sided equation. Integrity in a sales organization comes from your ability to sort out what is best for both parties, whether that's you and the customer themselves or whether that's your entire organization and maybe their kpis that they're trying to hit the challenge for most sales organizations that they focus on the numbers they focus on hitting the revenue goals you know making the dials getting the margin getting the new logos in you're creating more for their bottom line and these are all great things i mean you can't do business without those numbers very difficult to have a business without profit.

9:19The challenge is that there are a lot of conversations that don't tie those numbers to the real outcomes you provide for your customer base. And I've worked with a lot of sales organizations and a lot of salespeople, and I've been the salesperson where you close the deal because it felt good to win, but not because it was the right thing to do. And it's not as black and white as, you know, you were doing a bad thing and you should own up to it and be completely honest about how you made mistakes. Sometimes it's a slow burn. Sometimes it takes years for the consequences of a potential sale to hit a business.

9:56It was a bad fit because their organization wasn't aligned with yours in terms of your philosophies and core values. Maybe the margins were great, but they had expectations that didn't make any sense for what you can actually deliver. And as a sales rep, you have to be someone who has enough integrity that there are times in a prospecting call, I have to be the one that says, you know what, this isn't going to work. I don't want to waste your time anymore. I know this is going to be something we can solve for you, but I can tell you that two years from now, this isn't going to be a good partnership.

10:27And though I can make money on it now doesn't mean I should. The could and should are very different words. What Mark's talking about in this conversation is the difference between could and should in a lot of cases. And when you take yourself out of the equation, you actually use his ego framework. What you're doing is you're taking yourself out to give room for others. And he mentions in this Zig Ziglar's quote, if you help enough people achieve their goals, you'll achieve all of yours. The challenge is that achieving other people's goals is not making a sale with them. Sometimes it's not making the sale with them.

11:00And choosing those two different paths takes integrity. It's not a focus on numbers. It's a focus on making sure you do the right thing even when it's hard. This next clip is a great continuation with your conversation around integrity. So y 'all take a moment, watch the clip and we'll jump right in. And I think actually there was an example which I can probably share, which was challenging. It was actually probably one of the only times I've ever cried about a sale because I'm never that connected to the outcome. But it was more about the situation and the same client. And I remember quoting, we've been working with him for a number of years, quoted a solution that had taken a long, you know a long time to design we've got a specialist involved we delivered it we were told that we were that we were going to win this and they ended up on the Friday and waiting I'm in the office before because we go to the pub at lunchtime on a Friday and I'm in the office waiting for this purchase order to come in nothing so I ring him and I'm like hey we still getting this oh yeah sorry we've given the purchase order to somebody else and it was like a punch in the stomach and I remember I was just on the phone sat at my desk and I said look sorry what do you mean and he said yeah we got another quote and it was cheaper it was better than yours and I was so just so astounded by the fact that a it hadn't been communicated but b somebody that could beat me because I had deal registration which means you're protected and you've got this pricing I'm like tearing up on the phone I was like okay all right I'll speak to you next week and hung up and I burst into tears and the procurement manager's behind me and he came over and gave me a hug like awkwardly and he goes well at least we know you're human so there we go everyone learned that that you know I do have feelings but then after that the the way I turned it around was I I then spoke to our rep from the from the vendor I spoke to a couple of other people that have been involved and I said like how has this happened because I never put anything as as as a as a done deal until I know it's a done deal and this was a done deal and so in the end spoke to the rep they looked at the quote that was provided by the other partner and said it was different and so I was able to go back I contacted our client and said hey just just ahead can you just send me the the quote that you went with and just because I would love to learn from it because I'm you know you either win or you learn so I'm all about learning so he sent me through sent me through the quote we spoke to the rep they said yeah it's completely different and they'd missed out three key things that the client had asked for and it was extension of the maintenance and management around the licensing.

13:29It was a certain size of capacity and a couple of other things. So I was able to send content because of the relationship I had, I was able to reach out and say, just so you like, that's, you know, look, I'm not bitter. It's all, you know, if you have genuinely found another solution that suits you better, I'll fully stand by it and I will learn from this. However, there was three things that you highlighted and these are the three things and they're not included in the proposal that you are signing off on and he didn't know that and so he then went back and had a look at it with his team and then I got the pips order so I won it back called it back and because I fought for what I believed to be true and I think a lot of people will fight for what's true but not necessarily with any backing from it or not be prepared to lose and I'm okay with losing if I'm not the best option.

14:21But if I'm the best option, I'm not okay with losing. I loved this interview with Harriet around consultative selling. And she echoes the conversation that you and Mark had around integrity. And, you know, in this case, this was a sale that she had been working towards for quite a while, put a lot of effort into, and then was crushed because, you know, she didn't win it. She finds out they've gone with another vendor and she chooses to learn from it, which is awesome. And this is where like the integrity and the relationship that she's built with this client with the way that she approaches the sale is so important because as she's taking this as an opportunity for herself to learn and better herself, she also realizes that, you know, the things that the customer relayed to her that were most valuable and important to them weren't echoed in the quote that this other vendor supplied them.

15:12And because she had built that relationship, she was able to bring this to their attention and she could have just found it and turned a blind eye and not said anything. And, you know, in this case, it turned the tide for her and she was able to win the deal. And it's fabulous. And that's part of the value of truly understanding your clients and being able to deliver at such a high level, even in the beginning of the process. Going into a follow-up call, I want every important note right at my fingertips, not buried somewhere in a scribbled stack of notes. And with Plod Notepin S, I always have them because it's a wearable, portable note taker that lets me stay present and focused on customers during every single meeting.

15:55Plod captures the conversation and turns it into organized summaries and action items so I can follow up faster. And if I need a specific detail, Plod's Recall has that ready for me. And that's why Jeb Sr. and I and all of Sales Gravy trust our Plod Notepin S. Try Plod and stay focused on the conversation while it handles all of your notes. Go to plod.ai forward slash jeb. That's plod.ai forward slash jeb and use code JEB to get 10 % off your purchase. The conversation with Mark is parallel here easily. And if you listen to Harriet's story, what I noticed most about what she did wasn't the big concepts and winning the client and the relationships.

16:35I mean, all of that's important. But if you listen to the choices she made, they were hard choices. They're easier choices in a couple of contexts. One, Harriet's a fanatical prospector. She likely had enough in her pipeline that yes, she was really attached to this outcome. She's the only deal she cried over, but I guarantee you that it wasn't the only deal she had in her world. And the reason she was able to make hard choices about what to do next, like asking for the quote and asking for more time with the CEO who wasn't gonna buy with her and creating a conversation about a decision that another business leader made about their own business that she had no reason to be there for anymore.

17:20Those are hard choices. Integrity, it has a lot of different expressions. And to me, that came down to the choices that she made. The first is she asked. A lot of salespeople, including myself, and a lot of people in life, they just don't ask. She asked for the quote, I lose or I learn. in most cases I lose and learn. So I'm going to choose to learn today. Would you mind sharing with me the quote so that I can understand what was going on and why I lost here? Even if there's nothing here that makes any sense to you, I just want to make sure that I have an understanding of what I may have done better for your business.

17:53That's a harder thing to do than we think it is. It sounds easy right here sitting in this conversation having a podcast about what somebody else's story was. But when it actually comes down to it, it can be very difficult to go back and face that kind of rejection. Like, what if they say no? What if you ruin the relationship? What if they never talk to you again? What if, what if, what if? And instead, Harriet asked. And she was only able to save that deal because she asked. Then she made the choice to actually read that quote. You know, not just look at it and say like, you know, there was a lower price point and they just undercut me.

18:26And, you know, all the narrative you can spin about how a competitor beat you because they, they, they. She read through it all, found that, hey, these three things that you mentioned to me were not illustrated in the contract, and then making the choice to pick up that phone call and go talk to that business owner and say, these are the things you told me, and these things are not in this contract. I just want you to be aware of this. That's a difficult conversation to have because there's a lot of narrative. You could probably spin that in a way where they're going to hear you and think you're just trying to go back and undercut whatever decision they made.

18:58Oh, you're making the wrong decision is what that might come across as to the business owner who signed off on a PO that was from a competitor of this other salesperson. I mean, there's a lot of risks here that Harriet took. But if I look back at my career and I look at my mentors and people that I care about and have cared about me in this profession, they are professional risk takers in a way that most other people aren't willing to. They're willing to go put their ego on the line and fail. And And there's 100 times out of 105 times where that conversation does not end in a sale. That conversation ends in a flitter.

19:33Okay, thanks for letting me know that. Have a great day. And that's just the game that we play. But in people who sell with integrity, people who operate like Harriet and operate like Mark, they ask. They ask hard questions. They put themselves in uncomfortable situations because they know that when it counts, it means way more than the things that they've lost. You're absolutely right. that willingness to ask and put yourself in those uncomfortable conversations are key to you know serving your clients well and also improving yourself along the way and it makes a difference for you long term that customer that she signed i bet would be with her you know to the end of time because that customer knows that harriet sells with integrity and when we have those situations usually you get a lot of grace because things go wrong but if you're able to truly have that level of integrity, which we're going to say that word a million more times, but if you truly do have that level of integrity, customers give you a lot of grace when things go wrong because they know you're going to fix things.

20:32They do. You're absolutely right. And I think that's a good point that your clients do give you more grace than you realize. They are willing to be understanding. You have to give them the opportunity. Speaking of hard conversations to have, a lot of those happen at the very top of the funnel, especially when we're prospecting. And this next clip is Jeb Sr. working with a rep about a particular kind of objection you might get a lot on a prospecting block. And it comes down to reducing buyer friction. So one of the challenges with prospecting is getting into the door, selling the time it takes to have a real business conversation.

21:12So if you have a lot of integrity and you can practice that in sales conversations, that's fantastic. but it serves you no purpose if you cannot get someone to spend time with you. So this is a really interesting conversation that Jeb was having with a rep on Ask Jeb. I look forward to y 'all watching this clip, getting that information. Then we're going to talk about how we can turn this into a real practical exercise that you can use every single day. Enjoy the clip. When they say, how much does it cost? You can say, that's a very good question. And it's one that I expected you to ask. And that's exactly why I want to get together with you in an appointment when it's convenient so that I can learn a little bit more about your business, understand your goals, and then I can tailor a package that will help you achieve those goals.

21:55How about we get together on Thursday? What's the best time for you? Or how about I bring lunch to wherever you're going to be on Thursday? You bring pizza. And by the way, I was out with a rep who was doing this, he bought pizza and we went and sat on the back of a guy's work truck and had a business meeting on a job site eating pizza. And we ended up getting a deal done right there. So you think that's what someone says that you go, that's exactly what I expected you to ask. And that's why I want to get together. Because what I want to do is learn a little bit more about you and your business, understand what your business goals are.

22:35And then we can tailor a package that's going to be right for you. How about we get together? Like, how about we get together for lunch on Thursday? I'll bring pizza wherever you are. I love that. That's great. If people say they're busy, you say, that's exactly why I called because in your business, I knew you were going to be busy. And all I'm looking for is a time that's more convenient for you. How about, and then offer another time. How about I bring breakfast? How about I bring lunch? Because with these guys, right, they're working. I mean, they're out and they're tough, but they like a free lunch.

23:13They like coffee, you know? They sure do. So I would look at it that way and think the objection isn't so much to having a meeting with you. The objection is I'm really, really busy. Typically, they're overwhelmed in the moment. Like when someone says I'm busy, they're overwhelmed right now. I'm busy right now. I'm in the middle of doing something right now. They're not thinking about next Thursday. They're just thinking about right now. And all you got to do is say, I figured you'd be busy. I mean, in your business, why wouldn't you be? That's why I called. I want to find another time that's more convenient for you.

23:42Look, I just want to understand your business a little bit better so we can tailor a package. That's exactly why I called. I actually heard you coaching one of your clients this morning on this exact topic. Yeah, I work with a lot of BDR reps and SDR reps as kind of a specialty that I have at Sales Gravy, mostly because I am the phonetical prospector here in a lot of ways where I'm making lots and lots of dials to build my own business. And what Jeb's talking about here is psychological reactance. It feeds into how we handle our own biological response to rejection. And it's also feeding into how we can reduce buyer resistance.

24:19Victor Antonio and I had a conversation earlier this year, which I really love, and he's an engineer by trade. And he thinks about planes of friction. So if you put two triangles on top of each other, like you're building a pyramids and you're trying to drag a block up the pyramid, how can you reduce the friction of the dragging from the bottom point to the top point? You know, a lot of it has to do with things like the word choices that you use. So he's saying things like, that's exactly why I called, or I figured you would be. And meeting somebody a little bit more in the middle of the conversation rather than trying to force them into a particular meeting style that works for your sales process.

24:56And saying things like, that's exactly why I called, or I figured you would be, are ways for you, number one, to provide yourself a ledge. And by a ledge, I mean you're going to have a biological response to someone giving you an objection. I'm too busy is something you're going to hear a lot. I'm too busy. And most reps say, well, I know you're too busy. I understand that business owners like you are busy. But if you just spend 20 minutes with me, I can show you how I can save money. It's not that you're being disingenuous. You probably can. But using that word creates an immediate standoff. You know, suddenly you and the prospect are in this argument about whether or not you can take their time.

25:40And they're not going to let you because now they don't care if you can save the money. They care if they win that argument. It's so off-putting. And the minute somebody says something to me along those lines when they're prospecting, it's an immediate no. It like flips a switch in your brain. You're like, absolutely not. Whatever you've got to say, don't care. I want to get off this phone and I want to stop talking to you. When someone tells me I'm too busy and I say something like, I figured you would be, that's exactly why I called. It paints a different pattern. Their brain knows that salespeople typically say things like, I understand, but.

26:13And when they hear it, they just drop it into a bucket in their brains and they know how to handle it and they know how to get you off the phone. If you say something like, I figured you would be, that's exactly why I called. They kind of don't exactly know how to respond to it. It's not that they don't have words to say, but they're sort of searching for what the appropriate response would be, which gives you a magic quarter of a second to kind of put yourself back into control. Your frontal cortex, your higher functioning brain can get back into a casual conversation with somebody. And then he says, like, how about Tuesday at two so that I can tailor a particular package for you?

26:45And one thing I might add to that in his advice is I would say something like, if this doesn't make sense for you, at least you have all the information so that in the future when you are making this decision, you've got the up-to-date information and we can shake hands and walk away. If it's a thumbs up to keep talking, at least we've got something that we can work on for your business. How does Tuesday at 2 work? And it's an assumptive close almost. I'm not being pushy, I'm just being assertive. Relaxed, assertive confidence is what we train. People will tell you no two or three times and I let them go.

27:14But what I've learned is there's a big hybrid in my sales meetings. Some people, especially in the more transactional space, I don't need to have a big Zoom meeting with them. It causes friction. I don't want to get on a camera and have to be ready and be in the office and, you know, in between all of these other things I have to do. I have to suddenly smile on camera with this random salesperson that wants to take my time. Let's do a 15-minute phone call next week. And then we can determine whether or not this is worth our time. and too many sales reps get so dialed in on if they don't have the 30, 45 minute conversation with somebody, they're not gonna get anything from it.

27:47You can learn a lot about a business in about two minutes and whether or not you have enough integrity to say to them, you know what? After about two and a half minutes of conversation, I don't wanna take any more of your time. I'm gonna send you an email with some of this information. If anything changes, you let me know. That person will likely come back to you and say, you know what? Actually, I do wanna do business with you because they can see the value that you bring, not just your service and your product, but what you bring to the table. It's how you level up from being just a salesperson to being an executive consultative business person in that conversation.

28:17So those are some of the things that I see, especially related to the language that Jeb is using around these prospecting conversations. If someone says, I'm too busy, everyone's too busy. You gotta learn how to have a conversation with somebody whether or not they're busy. Otherwise, you're gonna have a very empty pipeline and you're gonna have very hungry kids. It differentiates you from the field of competitors because every other one of your competitors are cold calling people and saying it that exact way. So you're going to stick out more in this person's mind that you're prospecting while advancing a deal in a way that works for you and the client.

28:49Thousands and thousands of calls. This is not a magic bullet. There's ways to change your language that give you a higher percentage chance of winning that meeting, winning that conversation, or disqualifying somebody in a really quick way so that you don't have to spend time that isn't worth your energy or their energy. In fact, that's part of integrity is, you know, making sure that you are not taking time that you don't need. That's both for yourself, for your business, and for the customers that you work with and prospects you work with. I think that I want you to take away from this is that it is a higher percentage chance, but not a magic bullet.

29:19I've done this thousands and thousands of times. I've lost more than I've won. And so that conversation is really fun to have because you can walk off of a cold call where you didn't win the time, but you feel confident either way. The challenge I have with SDR and BDR teams is they walk off of calls and they tried to argue somebody into a meeting and then they lost that call because they didn't get the meeting and their shoulders slump after they get out of that call and they don't have any more confidence for the next one. When I have this conversation with people and I use those turnaround frameworks, I use that language, I walk off that phone call knowing that I did everything I possibly could have to have a good business conversation.

29:54And that just wasn't one for me. And I'll move on to the next one. Continuing the conversation around on reducing buyer friction, your conversation with Jake Stahl, he starts to discuss like allowing the buyers to have a backdoor so they don't feel like they're pinned into an area. So take a moment and watch this next clip and we'll dive in. Many times, Jem, and I'm sure you've taught this as well, giving the person permission to say no is 90 % of getting them to say yes. And as salespeople, we often don't give them permission to say no. We're so bent on getting those four yeses in a row that we never give them the back door.

30:30And let me paint a picture. Jeb, you're in a room. You're sitting in a chair. No windows. One door. And at that door is a guard. What's the only thing you're thinking about while you're sitting in that chair? I'm never going to get out of here. Right. How do I get out of here? Right. So all you're thinking about is getting out. Now let me give you scenario number two. You're sitting in a room. No windows. Sitting in a chair. There's one door with a guard at it. The door behind you is wide open. So you have two doors. Now, are you thinking so much about how to get by the guard? No. Yeah, you got a way out.

31:05As a matter of fact, you're pretty relaxed, right? It's like, listen, if anything really bad happens, I can get out of here. But we rarely give our customers permission to say that. One of my favorite things to tell reps to say is say to your customer, listen, feel free to say no. If this is not a good fit, let's just call it quits here. And what reps find is that nine times out of 10, the person goes, no, no, I'm good. Yeah, let's let me hear you out. But now you've given them that open door behind them and they're not panicking, thinking about where they need to go. And inevitably, most of those calls do that.

31:37This conversation with Jake was interesting to me because of how much psychology goes into the art of conversation. I want to add to his tactic here, which is giving people the option to say no. Before I add to this, usually we have kind of a prescription to be relaxed and assertive and confident. In our previous conversation, saying how about Tuesday at 2 is not necessarily giving somebody an out in that scenario. So it's sort of picking and choosing where you use the superpower. But I find this to be the best when it comes down to your sales process. So at the end of the sales process, when you're closing and when you need to get time on somebody's calendar for an initial first time appointment, like these are the two areas where I think giving somebody a way out a no is really, really powerful.

32:27The first example I want to give is at the end of the sales process. Often we get to three or four or five or six calls, depending on how long your cycle is, and you're trying to close this deal. The only next step is to sign the contract. And that could be a lot harder of an ask than it seems like because you say, hey, this is the end of the process. We want to send you over a contract. And they go, yeah, I'll have to think about it. Or I'll have to send it to my accounting department. Or I'll have our team review this. And we'll get back to you when we're ready to go. And a lot of sales processes just sort of in there and they don't really go anywhere further.

33:00You know, prospect goes to you or it's six weeks and you haven't heard back from them. And your manager is, hey, what's going on with that deal? And everything seemed really, really good. And you're forecasting this deal in the pipeline because you made it all the way to the end of the process and it's gone. So one of the challenges for buyers is that they have decisions to make. and when people start chasing them, they have a weird way of running away. And so making a decision at the end of the sales process is still an emotional burden for the buyer as much as it is for you who hasn't gotten the deal in the pipeline and your manager's breathing at the back of your neck.

33:36So one of the ways that I give somebody a way out is to say, what's a reasonable amount of time for me to give you before I follow up on this? That lets me know what amount of time they're gonna choose to allow me to keep them accountable. And when they're able to choose that, gives them autonomy. And then when I do follow up with them, or I put my language around that follow up call, it is not that they have to sign a contract the next time they meet with me. Otherwise, they will ghost me. They will not show up to meetings where they feel the pressure that they have to say yes, or they have to say no, or they have to sign a contract.

34:07I say, great, let's get together in two weeks. That seems like a reasonable amount of time for me. I'm going to put something on the calendar. All we're going to do there is a thumbs up or thumbs down on whether it makes sense to keep having this conversation, just having the conversation. That gives them the out that in that conversation, they might not know. They might be in a place where they're confused about what the decision looks like, or they haven't had time for it, or they've got different stakeholders they need to pull into it. And if they're not pressured into signing a contract when they know they might not be able to, or have the authority, or the cash isn't there, or they've got other priorities on their plate, just a thumbs up or thumbs down and continue the conversation gives them that kind of backdoor out.

34:43I find that people are much more open to continuing in the sales process when I have more of that softer approach than trying to just close them on the call. It also allows you to continue to maintain control of the conversation and verify the buying signals as you're working with them. So again, if you do detect that maybe there's some resistance or hesitation of some sort, it allows you the opportunity to dig a little deeper into the conversation and work from there. And I like this tactic as well, what Jake's talking about the beginning of your sales process, trying to get that time on somebody's calendar for an initial appointment.

35:17This goes back to the conversation Jeb was having with our guest on Ask Jeb. There's an objection that you're going to get a lot in a lot of industries, which is we're good. We already have a supplier. We already have a vendor. No, we already have somebody in place. We do this internally. You know, some version of that, like we're already doing this. You could try and turn the objection around with essentially an argument. We're better. You should take a look at us. I promise we've got everything you need. I know you've already got this taken care of internally. But if you just look at what we've got, you're going to see how amazing we are.

35:45And it kind of ends up turning into this argument with a prospect rather than a conversation. With a first-time appointment, if I hear that objection, one of my first responses is, you know, that totally makes sense. Most people have a supplier or a vendor in place or they're doing this internally. I think it would be worth a conversation because I can show you what I've done for other companies. And look, at the end of that conversation, if it is not worth our time, we can shake hands and walk away. But if it's worth 15 minutes to have an apples to apples comparison of what other vendors can do, at minimum, you can keep your current vendor on their toes when they come to the negotiating table.

36:19Does next Tuesday at two work for you? That conversation is, honestly, it's much more strategic. If you go to that call and it's 15 minutes with somebody and, you know, truly they have real objections and they have a real vendor in place that's doing work that you're already doing and there's really not a big opportunity for you to make a change there. Well, great, you know it now. and you didn't just shy away at the, oh, we just have a vendor. The other thing is most of those customers are giving you a reflex response anyway. They're just saying what they know will get you off the phone because they've gotten a thousand other salespeople off the phone with that exact line.

36:50When you get into that conversation, if there is an opportunity there, they're going to be much more open to having that conversation, not feeling pressured to allow you to sell to them. They're going to feel much more empowered to give you information because you have positioned yourself as somebody who's gonna consult with them and give them a straight answer. And I find that that conversation is a much more quality conversation than when I kind of wrench somebody into a demo or some first-time sales appointment because I had some slick turnaround framework that I used on the phone. Branching off of our conversation with Jake Stahl and actually everything we've talked about in this episode, it really boils down to reducing friction in conversations you're having with people.

37:29This next question is in an Ask Jeb podcast asked by a leader to Jeb about how to help and guide your sales team as a leader using empathy and giving people the option to say no, taking different paths to start a conversation with somebody, making sure you ask the right questions, especially when you've lost a deal, having integrity as a person and as a business leader and as a salesperson in business. All of that is kind of wrapped up into this question, because if you're a leader, you've got to exercise all of these tactics. But for someone who is inside of your business, when we get back from this clip, listen to what Jeb says.

38:09I'm going to throw it over to Ashley because she leads a lot of teams here at Sales Gravy. And maybe we can dive into some of these areas where it's going to be really tactical for you if you're listening to this podcast. Enjoy the clip. So I'm a sales manager. I have a question related to this role. So as a sales manager, how do you effectively demonstrate empathy when you address your team members' concerns, problems, and also maintain a positive attitude because you're in a leadership role? Sure. That's a great question. Because if you think about your role as a coach, essentially you're mirroring the same type of behaviors that you want your salespeople to have when they're standing in front of customers.

38:50So, for example, listening and being empathetic. And one of the toughest challenges for sales leaders when it comes to empathy is differentiating sympathy for empathy. So sympathy is agreeing with their position. In a lot of cases, you know, salespeople are whining at you. They're pushing back because you're asking them to do really hard things like go face rejection. Empathy, on the other hand, is the ability to stand in their shoes and see things from their perspective without being attached to it. In other words, you don't have to agree with them. You can see it with detachment. The lack of empathy is when you don't even take the time to try to understand where they're coming from.

39:37And the best way to demonstrate empathy as a sales leader is to make sure that you take the time to listen before you formulate what you're going to say or what you're going to coach. So when you sit down with someone, and this is true with anyone, and we all have to practice this as leaders. I know I'm absolutely guilty as a leader of not being as empathetic as I should be in some cases, but it really all comes down to listen. If I just take the time to listen to you and allow you to completely express yourself, that allows me to stand in your shoes. And even if I said, Lou, I get where you're coming from, because if I were in your shoes, I would feel the same way.

40:17Let's talk about how we're able to, even in this circumstance, move from here to where we need to go toward our goals or our targets or the behavior change that I need you to make in order for you to stay on my team. But for you as a leader, primarily it's going to be listening. Actually, given that you lead a lot of teams at Sales Gravy and revenue teams as well who are in a performance job, how do you start to utilize what Jeb's talking about in this clip so that it supports your team's performance and helps them do a better job of what they're doing every single day? One of the ways that we exercise that is in the one-to-ones, giving people the opportunity to speak and, you know, in Jeb's point, truly listen.

41:03So you're actively listening as we do in our sales conversations. You're actively listening to the people that you're leading and allowing them the space. Sometimes it might be a form of venting. Sometimes all they need to do is let that out. having multiple avenues for them, but not allowing it to just go beyond that vent session. Show them the empathy, allow them to get it out, really listen to them. And then one of my coaches favorite things to do to me, which I also employ, is asking what's within your control. You know, and really looking back and dissecting the situation sometimes. Sometimes it is just a frustration of they've made a hundred dials and they've gotten a no every single time or nobody picked up and it's just frustrating because you didn't get anything out of it.

41:46And, you know, But other times there is like a true challenge that's come up and it's being able to identify where they need the coaching and the help where they just need to be heard and then coaching them from that point. I work with a few CEOs who are split between operations and finance and accounting and then trying to lead a sales organization for, you know, a 10, 20 million dollar business. but they do not have 25 levels of leaders underneath them to kind of delegate a lot of work to. The challenge for leaders who are on the front line and people who have maybe a more flat organization is that they are only listening to the problem and they have a hammer.

42:34And everything looks like a nail when you have a hammer. And so as a leader, sometimes our inclination is to hear someone's challenge around, I'm too busy to get X, Y, or Z done. And I can hear leaders asking, well, what are you so busy with? Kind of that line of questioning. And then it gets into, well, how are you time blocking well? Well, what do your time blocks look like? Well, you just need to get back more into time blocking. And yes, you're right. So I want to give people validation that you are correct in how you lead in that way in giving them that suggestion. The challenge is that your sales rep is not going to hear it.

43:12And that's, I think, where we miss. We're right, but it's not going to be heard, so it doesn't actually make a difference. And when I work with these folks, I often have to ask them the deeper question of, like, what does your sales rep really want from their career? What do they really want from the life that they live? In most cases, leaders don't know. Well, they put on their goal sheet six years ago that they want a boat and they want to own their own house. And I'm like, great, why do they want to own a boat and own their own house? And the leader goes, well, because, duh, doesn't everybody want to own a boat and they're in a house?

43:46And like you sort of like that's as far as you got with why someone's motivated to do their work. With empathy, you're able to look at a situation, step into their shoes, see it without the attachment to the outcome. But you can also say, you're saying you're too busy. And I can tell you're frustrated because you're not able to close X, Y, or Z deal because you can't get your hands into the CRM long enough to actually answer their questions. And you're having to go to six different people to get answers. And I can tell that that takes a lot out of your emotional battery. You told me that you want to own your home so that you have a place to raise your family and you've got three kids and you want to spend more time with them.

44:21What are the things that are keeping you from getting home today at 530 so you can get to soccer practice. I think you're going in a great direction there because it's just getting past the surface level questions. So you're checking the box that you're hearing the active listening. You're asking the deeper questions to uncover truly what the challenge is. And I think that's where some leaders miss the mark because they themselves are so busy that checking the box, it just becomes part of the routine. That's where investing in your team and truly learning about them and understanding them beyond the role that they're playing is so crucial.

44:55to helping them succeed in that same role. I tell the story a lot. When I was in the field selling telecommunications, I became a top seller at a Fortune 100 company in a marketplace that was really neglected. I was the only person here. My sales manager, my sales team, was out of a different city about three hours away. I was really on my own here. I was determined to be number one in the company. I had a chip on my shoulder. I wanted to prove that I was worth the money they spent on me. You know, being from the sales gravy cut, I wanted to make sure that I showed that I could walk the talk. And I was a young guy and I was really, really good at sales.

45:29Like in terms of conversations, I'm really, really good at the conversations, but I fail on the organizational side. And in this company, they had lots and lots of little approvals. You would send out a contract and it would have to be approved by six different people in the business before you could even really sign it with the customer. And I've got a month to turn around this quota. And I had all of these deals in my hand and I was selling these fiber optic deals that were better than anybody else on the team. I was continually hitting 120, 130, 140 % of my quota every single month. And I was burning myself out and I was really frustrated.

46:02And I got on these calls with my sales manager. It was sort of like these rant sessions because she was willing to let me talk because I was closing deals. So she was willing to listen to me. But I think at some point she recognized that this was going to be unsustainable. And so she asked me, why do you care so much if you get all these deals in every single month, like you could take some more time with these. And I went, that's not the way I work. I wanna be number one. Like I wanna be number one on the team no matter what. And the only way I do that is if I get these deals in every single month, I cannot wait.

46:33I don't like being number one every other month. I wanna be number one in the country. She goes, okay, well, what's kind of getting in the way of this? You see, you have a lot of deals, so what's the issue? And I said, well, it takes me a long time to get all these contracts done. I cannot get through these approval processes. It takes forever to get everything submitted. I spend four hours of my day every single day before I can even get out to more customers just doing this work. And she goes, what do you think would get you there faster? And I said, well, if I could just get some of this paperwork done faster, I would be able to reach my goal and I could get home and I've got two children and I want to be able to do things with them, but I'm just spending so much extra time not selling, sitting on my computer looking at paperwork.

47:09And she goes, great, send me your contracts next time you get a deal and I will work on it and I'll take it off your plate and I'll start working on these contracts with you. And the next month, I closed more than anybody else in this territory. And, you know, years and years and years, I quickly rose up the ranks to be top 25 seller in the company and then getting closer to the number one in the company. And all it took was her just listening to me and understanding that my goal was to be number one. And if she could just take some things off my plate, I would do that for her. I would be a president's club winning salesperson.

47:38And all it took was just her taking some paperwork off my plate. And that was the only leader I've had in my entire career who was willing to do that versus someone who goes, well, you should just time block better and wake up earlier and work a little bit harder. And you need to be more diligent with things and all the checkmark things that I knew I probably should be doing. But this person actually used empathy, detached from the outcome and said, you know what? I can profit off of this too. I can make a better world for the sales team if I can get things off of these people's plates. And she actually moved obstacles out of my way because she used empathy and not just sympathy.

48:13Like, oh, that sounds like it sucks. You know what? You're right. It does suck that you have to do all those paperwork. She could have left it there, but she didn't. And I really love the way that she exemplified what Jeb was talking about with providing real guidance and leadership to get me where I wanted to go. Now, I love that you referenced like removing the obstacles because, you know, that's a phrase that some of the people that I lead here, I've actually used that phrase with them. I've come to them and said, okay, I've done my part and I've removed the barriers for you. Now it's your turn.

48:41Let's dig in. But it's always that teamwork and together and the same thing, you know, when we're continuously working to improve processes and efficiencies and that sort of thing. The other question I ask myself as a leader is like, am I willing to do it myself? If I'm not willing to do it myself as a leader, they're not going to be willing to do it. So asking that question, because if I don't on the front end, preparing my team to go out there for success, then the backside of it is it creates the frustration for them. And then they come to me and say, this isn't working. This is frustrating or whatever have you.

49:14Or they stop coming to you. You don't want to feel the silence. You don't want your team to stop talking to you because that's where things start to go off the rails. Listening to all of those clips and having all of these conversations, it really does boil down to reducing friction in conversations. In sales, you are reducing friction, whether that's because you're asking for time, energy, or money with a prospect. And you want to have the right language. You want to have the right integrity. You want to have the right mission so that you can effectively bring in the right kinds of customers to your business and have the right kinds of conversations so that it does not waste your time or anybody else's time.

49:46And making hard choices, especially during the sales process when you've lost or when things aren't going your way, really does help you win business for the long term. And then utilizing the right kinds of language make that a lot easier. This is the same principle when it comes to leadership. Jeb's talking about sympathy versus empathy, but we all know that in a leadership situation, your goal is to remove obstacles from people's ways so that they can do the job that achieves their goals. And that way, they want to work even harder for what your overall mission might be as an organization. Ashley has provided a lot of context for us in different ways, but I wanted to provide some resources for you as you listen to this podcast.

50:26If you're this far into the conversation and you haven't given us a five-star rating, go ahead and do that on Apple Music, iHeart Media, or Spotify, or wherever you listen to your podcasts. And if you want to watch these clips, if you want to see our studios and you want to see these conversations of what people are talking about, go to youtube.com forward slash sales gravy. Leave us a comment there and ring the bell so that you know when all of our new videos come up. But if you're looking for extra resources, things to help you in your sales day or your leadership day, we have salesgravy.com forward slash resources.

50:52There's lots of free assets there that you can go download. You can also find all of our articles on the blog center and lots of our training programs so that you can take a look at everything we've got going on at Sales Gravy that helps more people sell more. We appreciate you listening to the Sales Gravy podcast and we'll catch you next time.

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