MBA2661 Everything You Need To Know About Sales

0:00Sales. It's a word that makes many people flinch. They think sleazy tactics. They think pushy pitches. They are being forced into something or they're forcing somebody into something. But I learned early on from my own father, my dad, who was a car salesman for over 25 years, that sales isn't about pushing. It's not about tricks. It's not even about persuasion. Sales is actually about helping people make a decision. Tim, I'm going to give you everything you need to know about sales. the mindset, the techniques, the strategy, and the human side of it that not a lot of people talk about. These are the hard-earned lessons that I learned from my own experience in business, as well as from my dad's experience in sales as well.

0:46My first job was actually working at the wash bay, wash cars from nine to three, and then three to nine when the dealership closed, I'd watch my dad go to work. I'd sit there in the showroom and learn things I never forgot. And today I'm going to share them with you.

1:07Welcome back to the$100 MBA show. I'm your host, Omar Zinhome, where I deliver practical business lessons three times a week, Monday, Wednesday, and Friday, to help you start, grow, and scale your business. The first thing I want to address is that a lot of people think that sales is all about closing and saying the right thing and being a slick talker. my dad was an immigrant from Egypt to the U.S. English was a second language. He spoke with an accent. His English was broken. And he was the top salesman for the brand of car he sold, which was Acura, which was the luxury brand for Honda in the U.S.

1:43My dad used to say that sales is really about clarity and that if you're honest and clear with someone, you don't have to convince them. They'll convince themselves. And that stuck with me in my head for a very long time, hearing that from a young age of 13. Too many entrepreneurs try to twist arms, trying to force sales upon people. But the best salespeople, they guide. They don't push. They ask good questions. They listen. They clarify the value. And then they shut up and let the customer choose and buy. Again, sales is really about clarity, removing confusion, answering questions like, what is this?

2:22Who is this for? Why do I care? Why is this important? How does it help? That's all it is. At the end of the day, if they don't have the answers to those questions, they don't buy. Simple. If you have something that people want, that they like, that they need, all they need to know is the information to convey that. Once they understand that, then it's a no-brainer. They sell it to themselves. People want to buy, by the way, right? A lot of us, we just justify why we buy anything. Often we have to talk ourselves out of buying things. We have the tendency to just like, oh, I want to buy that jacket because I'm in the mood of buying something.

3:02And then you realize, oh, maybe I don't need a jacket. I have plenty of jackets at home. But if there's information to show that they actually do need this particular jacket, then they don't need convincing. They're ready to buy. The second piece of wisdom I want to share with you is you want to lower the fear. Then they can think straight. A lot of people, they can't think straight when they're buying because they have all this anxiety and fear. People don't buy when they're scared. And my dad knew this when people are making a big purchase like a car. Buying a car is probably the second largest purchase people will make after buying a home.

3:36I saw him reassure nervous customers again and again. He didn't say, this car is perfect for you. He'd say something literally like this. He'd say, hey, let's take it for an extended test drive for a few hours. Give me a copy of your license and go and take it home. Show it to your wife. Show it to your family. If she hates it, just bring it back and we'll sort you out. That little safety net, it turned browsers into buyers. Why? Because of this idea of risk reversal. There is no risk. Just go ahead and enjoy this product. Enjoy this car. Okay? Go ahead. Show it to your wife. And if you don't like it, no hard feelings.

4:12Bring it back. This is a demo car. The whole point of the car is so that you can test it out and see what it's like to live with. This is why risk reversal is so powerful in business. Money back guarantees, try before you buy or trials, cancel any time type of terms. These aren't gimmicks. They calm the nervous system. They allow somebody to think clearly. And that's when the real decision happens, when they can stop worrying about, you know, this is a disaster. What if I can't get my money? What if this is a scam? Relax. It's OK. hey, I trust you. If you trust me, I trust you. And if you don't like it, no worries, no harm, no foul.

4:50So it's very important at the very early stages of the sales cycle to lower the risk so that there is no fear involved. Number three, the damaging admission technique. Thanks to my dad and Robert Cialdini. Robert Cialdini introduced me to this concept formally in his book called Influence. But I actually saw my dad using this technique way before I read about it in a book, right? That's how he used to word it. Never pretend a car is better than it is, right? Point out something small before they ask. I remember my dad saying to a customer, this car, this model is fantastic on fuel. It's great for the city, but honestly, it's not the quietest ride on the highway.

5:34If that matters to you, let's look at something else. Guess what happened? They bought that car. Why? Because the immediately believed my dad. They trusted him because he's telling them the truth. He's telling them, here's what's good about it, but here's some flaw about it that you should know about. And it's a trade-off. And what happens in buyers' minds is that they justify the purchase by kind of diminishing the negative, saying, you know what, I don't drive on highways that much. I actually just zip around the city a lot. And I want to save money on fuel. That sounds great. So they're kind of convincing themselves without my dad even getting involved.

6:14You see, the customer believed the rest of what he said because he was willing to admit one thing that wasn't perfect. And now they don't see my father as a salesperson. They see him as an advisor, somebody who's actually giving them solid advice. Hey, you could do the same on your own sales page, on your calls, in your videos. We did this in our software company, Webinar Ninja. We used to say, if you're a Fortune 500 company and you're doing 12 webinars a day with 5 ,000 attendees on every webinar, we're not for you. We've created Webinar Ninja for creators, authors, speakers, solo entrepreneurs, or small teams that are running webinars that sell their products or services.

6:56We are perfect for you. It's all in one and it's affordable. We tell the truth. It's more persuasive than pretending. By me, it's just saying we are not for these people. You automatically become more appealing to the people that you actually serve. They're like, yes, I'm not like those corporates. I'm one of the scrappy, awesome entrepreneurs that is all about profit. These people are my people. Number four, your message has one job, one job. Listen, my dad was an immigrant, like I mentioned, but he could outsell college grads that were well-educated, eloquent, native speakers, because he knew how to speak clearly.

7:33My dad used simple language. He used short sentences. I remember he once told me, you've got five seconds before they tune you out. Tell them what it is, why it matters, and if it's for them. So quickly, in that first five seconds, this product is XYZ. The reason why it's so useful and powerful is because it does this. If you're this kind of person, then you'll love it. All the sales message does is clarify quickly, who's it for? What does it solve? Why you? Why should they buy it from you? That's it. You don't should be clever. You're not trying to be a poet. You're trying to be clear. Clarity converts.

8:11The golden rule of sales is a confused mind never buys. Number five, learn to sell before you outsource it. A mistake I see a lot of founders make is they hire salespeople before they know how to sell their own product. Huge mistake. My dad used to say, if you don't know what makes your product great, you don't deserve to sell it. It's so good because he's being honest. He's just saying, hey, you need to understand the valuable thing that's in your hands. You need to understand why it's valuable and why people need it. Because once you know that, then it's easy to sell. Then you are worthy to sell it.

8:50In the early days of the$100 MBA, I was the sales team. When I launched Webinar Ninja, I pre-sold it before it existed. We had a landing page of mock-ups and we sold 250 beta spots to our first users and those are our founding users and that was my green light to say keep going keep building we didn't build anything until somebody actually proved to us that they wanted it you know one of those 250 beta members you know one became two and three and four to 250 that was sales and that was also validation when you own your sales early and you understand what resonates with your audience you learn what makes people say yes and then you can teach it to others on your team and you can automate it.

9:29You can start infusing it in everything else you do in your business. Number six, stories are greater than claims. Another thing my dad taught me is that people don't want to be sold. They want to see themselves in the story. What did my dad mean by that? Well, he didn't say things like, this car is the best. You're going to love it, right? Instead, he would share a story. He would say, a couple came last month with the same needs as you. this car fit their needs and they really love it they actually been back twice just to thank me let me tell you a little bit about why they love this car and then all the things he would talk about were the things they would say that would resonate with them for example he would say they mentioned to me twice how much they love the stare of this car and how they love the fact there's a 12 disc cd changer in the back now this is the 90s we had cd changers in the back of the trunk but the point here is that he's sharing something that would mean something to them.

10:25He noticed that the husband was wearing a Grateful Dead t-shirt and that's a music band. You get the point. So stop saying best in class or the number one thing. Start telling real stories of transformation, yours or your customers. People don't remember features. They don't remember accolades. They really remember feelings. They remember the context of something. Give them that. Number seven, follow up like a friend, not like a robot. Most businesses fall down because of no follow up. 80 % of sales happen after the fifth touch point. 80%. Most people stop at one, right? But don't just check in.

11:05Don't just say I'm circling back. It's very robotic and no one wants to hear that. Follow up like a human. Share a tip. Answer a question they asked when they were with you or give more information on that question. Send a relevant customer story. Offer a new perspective. You're not chasing. You're continuing to serve them. You're continuing to giving them information to help them make a decision. You're giving them a reason to trust you again and to really think again about this purchase. Listen, a lot of people take it personally. They think, oh, they're not interested. They're not replying to me.

11:36They haven't called me back. People are busy. Think about how busy you are and how life gets in the way and how there's other things on your mind. And it's not that you're not interested, it's just that you haven't just come around to it. And maybe you need a little bit of a push, a little bit of an incentive, a little bit more information for you to be reengaged again. And number eight, my final one, my favorite one, you're always the head of sales. Even when you grow a team, you're still the one who owns the promise, right? You're the founder of the company. You are the owner of the company.

12:08That was something that I had to learn myself. As we built out our team at Webinar Ninja and we had other people selling our software, even when I wasn't doing the demos or when other people were doing webinars for me, I was still responsible for making sure the value was communicated properly. Because if you don't understand how to sell what you built, why should anyone else? You need to understand it very well and train your team and show them how it's done. This is true whether you're running a SaaS company, a coaching business, a local bakery. Sales doesn't end when someone says yes. It just starts there, right?

12:45So when the customer buys, you're continuing to sell to them, not just other products and services, but you're selling them on the value that they just bought and making sure they understand that they didn't make the wrong decision, that they don't have buyer's remorse, that they actually love the fact they bought from you and that you're now starting a relationship together to make sure that they get the value out of what they bought. If you made it to this point in the lesson, you're my kind of person, you're a completionist, you're a hard worker, you want to learn. And I want to leave you with this.

13:14Sales isn't dirty. It's not manipulation. It's not a grind. It's a service. It's a service to humanity, really, to help other people. It's helping someone make a decision that could change their life in a lot of ways. It could change their business. It could change their future. It's deeply human. My dad wasn't the best educated guy or the most eloquent guy, but he was one of the best salespeople I've ever seen because he cared. He actually cared about the person in front of him, about the customer. He listened. He understood fear. He spoke clearly. He followed up. He kept it honest. If you can do those things, you can sell more than any script or any funnel or any guru could tell you.

13:57And you'll do it with your head held up high, with dignity, with being proud of what you've done. because if what you're offering truly helps people, it would be selfish not to sell it. If you found today's episode helpful and you want more practical business lessons to help you start, grow, and scale your business, the best thing you could do is subscribe to this podcast. Hit subscribe or follow on your favorite podcast app, the one that you're using right now, whether it's Apple or Spotify or wherever you listen to podcasts. By hitting subscribe, you get our next episode automatically and it's the best way to support the show.

14:30It's absolutely free and it's a way for you to commit to growing your business. And now that you've subscribed, I'll check you in the next episode.