Brutally Honest Advice To Become A Sales Machine

0:00This episode is brought to you by Accenture. When your advertising operations fall out of sync, everything else follows. Spotify and Accenture are working together to reinvent the rhythm of ad sales, using automation, analytics, and smarter workflows to simplify campaign delivery and access better data across the business. The result? Less time spent on operations, more time connecting brands with the moments and fandoms that matter most. Learn more at Accenture.com slash Spotify. This episode is brought to you by Palmolive. Family time isn't just the big moments. It's weeknight dinners, sitting around the table, everyone talking all at once.

0:39So when the plates are empty and the sink is full, use Palmolive Ultra. Palmolive's most powerful formula removes up to 99.9 % of grease, leaving your dishes sparkling clean. And the new convenient pump makes cleaning even easier, so you can spend less time tackling dishes and more time together. Shop now at palmolive.com. Chris Do just sat down with me to share his brutally honest advice to become a sales machine. Chris and I have a combined 50 years of business experience, and we've sold to some of the biggest companies in the world. There isn't a thing we don't know about sales. Here are the eight brutally honest steps that will get you more sales than you can ever imagine.

1:17Chris Do:Chris, what are we going to learn today? Number one, say what you think. Most of us are afraid to ask for what we want, clarifying information, budget, scope, all that kind of stuff. And there's a lot of tension and resistance that builds up in us. And we think the stress comes from saying it. What I've learned in my life is the way to release stress and tension is actually speaking out loud. The example I like to give to people is if you have a friend who's staying with you and has overstayed the welcome and is creating tension between you and your wife or your partner, that's the tension part.

1:46Chris Do:The part that you're afraid of doing is saying, buddy, yeah, so can you find another place to stay? Because my wife and I, we need to get on with our lives. And so when we're able to say it, all of a sudden that stress that we've been feeling is automatically released. and now we're good. So I learned this lesson early on in my business life when I hired a business coach, when he audited my sales call. And he asked me this question, like, how do you know what the clients want? And I was like, what do you mean? I'm supposed to know. I'm the designer, the director. They give us a script and I start spitting or pitching ideas to them.

2:19Chris Do:Isn't that how it's supposed to work? He goes, no. If you had them in front of you, what would you want to know? Well, what inspired this idea? And then he asked me, why don't you ever just ask that question? And I thought it was crass to be able to ask people what they want. Like in your relationship with your wife, where do we eat? What kind of cake would you like? And you would want to know those things. But if you ask, then all of a sudden some of the romance and the magic is taken away. So we're supposed to use some magical powers of observation and just intuit what people want. That's a silly way to do it because I would rather ask than guess and be wrong.

2:51Chris Do:So say what you think. So when you want to know what the budget is, just ask him, what's the budget? If you want to know how many people are pitching on the project, ask him how many other people are pitching on the project. He gave me permission to ask and say what I think and to say it in the most simplest way possible. And at first, it throws people off because they're not used to that kind of direct level of communication. Well, most clients, when you say, what's the budget, they'll say, well, we're still thinking about it. They don't necessarily like you asking it. Right. Or if you ask how many other people are bidding on the project, they don't want to tell you.

3:21Chris Do:They want to keep it a secret. They think that revealing some information, you're going to take advantage of them. My whole thing is, if you're dealing with a real business person, an entrepreneur on the other side, we understand for us to do business together, we must provide information that is critical to us solving the problem. So you want to hold that as a secret? That's cool, but then maybe I'm not the right person for you. Exactly, exactly. I actually once asked a client how many other people are pitching for the project. They told me 18 people. I instantly stopped working with them. They're just using you.

3:48They're just trying to get ideas out. If you're working with two people, maybe three people, you can understand. I just think that by asking awkward questions, you think they're awkward, but they'll actually save you a lot of pain later if you actually understand how the other person thinks. So what you think, say it.

4:01Chris Do:Connect these two things. They're the same. So otherwise, you're going to deal with all this weird anxiety in here. And that's how we get rid of it. I think I've been married 23 years. I think that's basically, I tell my wife, just tell me exactly what you want. And then I know what to do. Just make it easy for me. I love you. I want to make it work. How's that going for you? So far, so good. You know, every week we think about getting a divorce, but so far, so good. Eventually she tells me, and then I can say yes or no, I can do what she needs to have a good life. Number two, questions are greater than answers.

4:30Chris Do:What I would do is if I were in a workshop with people who are trying to learn sales, I would ask them this question. It's like, what do you believe is more valuable, more powerful, questions or answers? And then there's some debate. And it's one of those kind of questions where there's really not a right answer or wrong answer. And eventually some people say answers. I'm like, okay, let's talk about that. And some people say questions. So the answer to people, they would say something like, well, answers are more powerful because, you know, in school, you have the answers. You're a smart one.

4:54Chris Do:You get all the questions on the test correct, you get an A. You go to university, you get a scholarship, you get a grant, you move on in life. I say, okay, how about you question people? Like, questions are more powerful. I'm like, why? And they would say all these things. And I said, well, if you believe that questions are more powerful than answers, why did you answer a question with an answer? What questions do is they open conversations, answers close conversation. And the problem that most of us have is we presume to know and understand the question. So we provide an answer. Because we're trained like dogs.

5:24Chris Do:Now, if you and I are talking and we're talking about sales, sales is essentially, you desire some future state. You have a desired future state and then you have your current state. And what sales would be is to try to help you change, to improve your life or to remove pain. Either one is good. So before I can give you a solution, I need to know where are you now and where would you like to be? And so oftentimes when a client would say to you, like, I need a logo. Like in that example with the woman you will speak to later today, she should have asked you more questions, but she was like a deer in the headlights, of course.

6:00Chris Do:So she should say, why do you need a logo? What is wrong with the current logo that you have today? What is it that you're looking for and have a dialogue with you? So one of the things that happens is when you ask questions, you make this person, the person in front of you, feel really important, heard, seen, and possibly understood. And those are feelings that are close to love. Because in relationships where you don't feel seen and heard or understood, you don't have those positive emotions. And so no business is going to be done if I'm in a negative state of mind. So what I want to do is encourage people, wherever it is that you're in front of, learn how to ask a really great question, an open-ended question that isn't baked in with an agenda or is a binary thing that's leading down to a very specific path.

6:41Chris Do:I love this point. I've built a whole career. What's your dream? a totally open question that allows you to figure out where someone is in their stages of life instantly. By their answer, you can understand where they are in life. My seven-year-old the other day answered something. He didn't actually know the answer. It's baked into us to like, I know it, I know the answer. He didn't, but he gave an answer. It's something we should really reset in ourselves because it's naturally in us to ask questions to understand the person we're talking to. But for some reason, we think we need to have the answers.

7:10Chris Do:So there's a shift here, Simon. We've been taught to be great problem solvers. So we're really quick to rush to the solution. If we just spent more time understanding what the problem is, we're going to build the natural rapport, possibly empathy, and see angles and problems we hadn't been privy to until we asked those kinds of questions. So we want to shift away from being problem solvers to problem seekers. What's a good problem? We need to solve a big problem, a problem that's going to be impactful to your business. So if you want to get more deals, stop selling, start closing. ask better questions.

7:46Chris Do:Number three, listening, believe it or not, is your secret power. What people do oftentimes, they ask a question and they just stop listening because people ask questions or just wait for an opportunity to speak again. So we're not in conversation to understand, we're in conversation to respond. So the way I can tell is if somebody asks me a question and I give them the answer, you give me a question, I give you an answer. And what you do is you give me another question, you get another answer. And we see this in interviews a lot. I would tell people, I don't like being on podcasts where there are checklist interviewers.

8:19Chris Do:Maybe you know them. Maybe you've done it. Maybe I've done it. I don't know. When you have a list of questions and you're like, it doesn't really matter what you say. Because you're not listening to the person and what they're saying. So you're not following a story. You're just following the list. I'll say something that's weird, shocking and disturbing. Like, whoa. And then just move on to the next question. So I know they don't even care. So the thing is, if you ask a question and they give you an answer, now you must listen. And listening requires a lot of brain power. I'm sorry, this is a bad brain, but you have to really think.

8:47Chris Do:It does look like my brain. Only with the marker. So it's like, I have to process, what does this mean? I have to literally understand the words, unpack what we'll refer to as suitcase words. Suitcase words are words that have multiple meanings inside them. So you have to unpack that and really understand. And then we have to read the subtext. What are they not saying in what they're saying? So if you ask your wife, is it okay if I go and hang out with the crew for lunch? And she's like, whatever. You're like, cool, I got permission. You're not understanding subtext here. You don't understand tone.

9:21Chris Do:You're missing everything. So you better stop in your tracks and say, wait a minute, something is wrong. Maybe I've done something prior to this moment. I need to go and figure this out. So when you ask a really good question, the thing that you want to do is just listen and then ask another question about the answer you just got. Until you reach - Prove you're listening as well. if you ask a question of what you were just asking. I think so. And, you know, then there are threads that you can pull on. And I think sometimes people do this subconsciously to see if what they say matters to you. I think Kevin Daly writes about this in his book, Socratic Selling.

9:54Chris Do:It's called Full Value Listening. And it's telling the other person, everything that you say is really, really important. So I suggest people take notes. So we can get a little notebook out. and there's this idea that eye contact is really important and i have a problem with eye contact mostly because i'm an introvert when somebody's looking at me when i'm telling them very complicated things the whole time i'm thinking are you going to remember any of this but if somebody's got a notebook out and they're like um yes sir okay and this you know when they have restaurants where they're taught not to write down your yeah i always i'm always amazed when they can do it But you're also terrified the whole time.

10:34Chris Do:Like, are you going to get my lactose intolerant, gluten-free diet right? And I like my protein or whatever. Prepare it a certain way. And it's amazing, but it's very anxiety-producing. I think so. And it says you're really important. Think about the most important people, CEOs, presidents of countries or corporations. You know who's in charge because they're speaking and everyone else is doing this. Because what you say is important. So I would say take notes and let people know. I'm not looking at you because I think what you say matters and I don't want to miss anything. We need to listen to understand, right?

11:08Chris Do:Versus to listen to respond. And that's the problem. So even when you think the person's done speaking. This episode is brought to you by Accenture. When your advertising operations fall out of sync, everything else follows. Spotify and Accenture are working together to reinvent the rhythm of ad sales, using automation, analytics, and smarter workflows to simplify campaign delivery and access better data across the business. The result? Less time spent on operations, more time connecting brands with the moments and fandoms that matter most. Learn more at Accenture.com slash Spotify. This episode is brought to you by Palmolive.

11:48Family time isn't just the big moments, it's weeknight dinners, sitting around the table, everyone talking all at once. So when the plates are empty and the sink is full, use Palmolive Ultra. Palmolive's most powerful formula removes up to 99.9 % of grease, leaving your dishes sparkling clean. And the new convenient pump makes cleaning even easier, so you can spend less time tackling dishes and more time together. Shop now at palmolive.com.

12:18Chris Do:Wait three seconds. Make sure. And if you say something and they're about to say something, stop. You're just so excited to say things and to prove that you're smart, that what you're doing is you're just being really annoying. It's true. Yeah. I mean, being patient and listening is so powerful. I think it's a skill that you think is saying nothing. It shouldn't be a skill. But it kind of is. Control your mind and your impulse to you. So if we can just learn to stop, pause, listen, fully process what's going on, ask deep follow-up questions, we're going to do ourselves a giant favor. Here's the good news for most of you.

12:50Chris Do:Listening is one of the most natural things you can do. It requires almost no skill that you have to develop. You just have to be quiet and process. The quietest amongst us, the most introverted person I know, this, in fact, is your superpower. If you want to increase your sales, one of the smartest things you can do early on is build trust. And a simple way to do that, a professional-looking domain name. Just like Chris Do is emphasizing, perception is everything. And the right domain name instantly elevates how your brand is seen. I always recommend starting with a domain name that instantly communicates what you do, especially if you're selling something online.

13:27That's why I love using.store for e-commerce businesses. Big names like MrBeast, Rihanna and Ronaldo use it because it's clean and clear and tells customers exactly what to do. In fact, websites with.store domains have seen up to 87 % more traffic and double the Google ranking, which means more visibility and more sales. Right now, you can grab your own.store domain, just 99 cents, using the code Simon at the link in the description. And when you do, you'll also unlock free access to Elevate.store. That's over 2 ,500 US dollars worth of perks from top tools like Canva, Shopify, and more. You can buy your.store domain through GoDaddy or Namecheap, but the discount code only works with the link below.

14:07Chris Do:Number four, never justify. So pathological liars tend to think that by explaining and over-explaining and providing an excruciating amount of detail to things, that their lie has credibility. And so one of the signs of pathological liars is they tend to be overly verbose. They say so much. So when somebody asks you, what's your price? Say it's$1 ,000. Stop. Full stop. Don't say any more. The other way that I see people do it, it's like, it's$1 ,000 because I work really hard. You know, I went to this school and you have a lot of different needs and there's a lot of touch points. it makes you sound really, really weak.

14:41Chris Do:And the reason why I think you're saying it and justifying is because you don't believe it yourself. And I pick up on that. You're signaling to the other person, this, I'm inexperienced. I think I might've charged more than I think I'm worth. I don't know if you need this. There's all kinds of things about that, right? And here's how we make it personal because we're going to get into dating. If you were to meet somebody that's really attractive and you say like, would you like to go on a date? And they say to you, why would I date you? I'm like, there's no reason. I would just get up and walk away.

15:09Chris Do:Why do you hold such a superior position over me that you're going to ask me to justify myself to you? And if I have to, the relationship is going to be lopsided and you're going to be abused the entire time. I would say to them, I'm curious about why you think I should date you. I just flip it on them and no one likes that. So you didn't like the question. Why did you ask me that same question? We arrive in a business relationship as equals. There are things that you do to cede higher ground and justifying is one of them. So never justify. Just say what you believe and stop. Even if you don't believe it, just stop and see what happens.

15:45Chris Do:Bite your tongue. It's so true. It's so true. I was just thinking the other day, someone asked me to do a speaking gig and I said 50 ,000 US dollars for the fee and it's just a text. I didn't say anything after it. And then I could see they were thinking about that. And then they sent me a message, why so high? And I said to them, I don't need to explain it. It's a yes or no, really, isn't it? You said that? Yeah. Okay. What did they say about it? They said yes. Oh. But my point is, you know, like, I can try to explain that, you know, I've been in business 35 years. I could be doing other things during that time.

16:16I could probably do a video that would make that money or I could spend time talking to the audience they want me to talk to. I could do that. Yeah. And I do think it starts to belittle the thing that I believe to be true, that I have value. So it's an interesting thing because, again, when clients in particular, people listen to this and they're pitching to a client, A client wants you to justify it so that they end up in the power dynamic of being in control of the contract. Whereas if you don't explain it, it's really powerful.

16:39Chris Do:Yeah, I think there's two concepts attached to this. And I'm no, like, person, wordsmith person here. But there's the word just, and there's the word justice that must be related to the word justify. When I think of justice, I think of, like, the scales of justice. Like, it's all balance, right? And so they say, well, there's a big price, and they need to know this other thing. They need to find balance in that. It is not my job to tell you why it's worth this. It's my job to provide you the information that you need to ask you smart, open-ended questions so that you can determine if what I do is worth the amount of money.

17:14Chris Do:That's it. And the word just, we know that if you put the word just in front of anything, what just does is it diminishes that thing. It's just cleaning the car. It's just another change order. It can't be that hard. So people use this language to make what you do seem smaller, trivial, and less important and less valuable. So I'm concerned about these two ideas as connected to justify. I don't want to justify. Number five is how to handle objections. There's a couple of things we need to know about objections. And if you're not familiar with sales, you might be thinking to yourself, what is an objection?

17:47Objection is a question as to, like, I'm not ready to buy.

17:51Chris Do:It's how they express resistance. They're not ready to say yes. Most of us have really negative opinions about this. So we approach an objection with a bad attitude and probably respond with a violent comment. For example, they might say something like, an objection would be, why is it so much money? Or can this be done quicker? Or can I pay an installment? There's a lot of different things that hold up them from saying yes. So I'm going to reframe what an objection is. I'm going to use the thing from a dating book. It's called the IOI. Have you heard of this IOI? It's an indicator of interest.

18:24Chris Do:Okay. If I'm talking to you about a service that you're not interested in, my theory is you will never express an objection. You'll say, send me the brochure, send me a proposal, see you later, I got to talk it over to somebody. And that's the end of it. You don't ask more questions. So when people ask questions about it, they're actually really interested. And I take that as a positive sign, not a negative sign. So we need to reframe our mindset when we hear an objection. We need to pause and say, this is good. I think they're interested. It's like when you're fishing and there's a nibble on the hook.

18:53Chris Do:You're like, wait, wait, wait. Don't reel them in yet. Just relax. But there is activity here versus I'm not interested in the fish ones right away. That's what happens all the time. So typically speaking, not always, when the prospect says to you, send me the proposal, send it to me and whatever, it means no. It just usually means no in polite culture because they're not willing to say no. How do you handle objections? You handle it by embracing it. And there's like a mental jujitsu thing that we do. We embrace it and we pivot. I'm going to share a story. I'm in the meeting with some star architects, some famous architects here in LA, and they were looking to redo their identity system and their website.

19:34Chris Do:And I'm in the room with the three principals and one person says, Chris, I'm going to be honest with you. He's a really direct communicator. I appreciate that. He says, you're not the typical person we would choose. Everybody else that we're looking at has this much experience in working with architectural firms, understands our needs very well, understands the market. You don't have a single thing. So you're not our typical choice. So here's where we use a little word play and we kind of embrace that. So I said to him, you're right. We don't have the experience that you seek. The challenge here is when you hire firms that have done all this work, what you'll get is one of the things they've already done before that they're likely to do again for one of their competitors.

20:15Chris Do:If you want that, you should hire them because that's a safe route. to pick us would be to do something atypical. So you're absolutely right. We're not typical at all, but we're not going to give you what they're giving everyone else. And you have to decide if that's what you want or not. I love that. Close the job. It's psychologically so interesting because you're also like, you're taking off the table almost you as a choice. Instead of pushing you further towards, you're saying, look, hey, take off the table. You're right. If you don't want this thing that's different and unique and special and original, let me just take it away from you so i'm gonna do a little example a little illustration for you okay this is a waffle cone delicious handmade small batch say this is vanilla this is chocolate okay and i ask you what is your favorite flavor rise from what would you say chocolate okay the more i try to convince you vanilla is better what do you have to do just objections vanilla is better why would you say that simon you know chocolate's not good for you vanilla is the preferred is the most popular choice in the world what would you say i'd say yeah chocolate's my thing man okay so what happens is you have a belief even if you don't believe in it and as soon as you say it and i challenge you you're going to feel like you have to defend your your choice otherwise you're going to feel dumb so one of the biggest like not laws but like like things that drive us the biggest motivation in our life is the need to be consistent with ourselves you've heard this before Yeah.

21:42Chris Do:So we want to be consistent with ourselves. And when I ask you to be inconsistent with yourself, you're going to fight and you're going to push back. Even if you know you're wrong, you may have gotten into an argument with a friend, a spouse, somebody, and they know they're wrong, but they just can't back down. Or maybe you were the idiot that was wrong. You're like, no, I need to like, no, I've never said that. Even though, you know, in lack of your mind, I'm wrong. I should just admit it. So when you push against someone's request, observation, you're asking them to dig deeper. So not only are you convicted that chocolate is superior, you're now convinced that it's two, maybe four times superior now.