2184 - Manifestation Selling and Goal Achievement with Rep Methods' Alison Mullins

0:05Hey there, thoughtful listener. Are you looking for introductions to partners, investors, influencers, influencers, influencers, and clients? Well, I've had private conversations with over 2 ,000 leaders asking them where their best business comes from. I've got a free video you can watch with no opt-in required where I'll share the exact steps necessary to be 100 % inbound in your industry over the next six to eight months with no spam, no ads, and no sales. What I teach has worked for me for over 15 years and has helped me create eight figures in revenue for my own companies. Just head to upmyinfluence.com and watch my free class on how to create endless high-ticket sales appointments.

0:51Also, don't forget, the thoughtful entrepreneur is always looking for great guests. Go to upmyinfluence.com and click on podcast. I'd love to have you.

1:05With us right now, it's Alison Mullins. Alison, you are a business development expert, sales leader, speaker, author. You are the CEO of Rep Methods, and you're also a marketing consultant with Alpha Colores Creative Marketing. Alison, it's great to have you. Thank you so much. I'm always excited to be a part of amazing people's work. So thanks for having me. Yes, yes. Well, before we get into talking about what your superpowers are, Allison, what are you doing for fun lately? Oh, my gosh. Okay. So my indulgence is I travel a lot, like a lot, Josh. I probably fly several times a month. So when I'm home, one of my favorite things to do is cook.

1:50I love to just kind of mess around in the kitchen and make random things and work on the grill. I have two dogs and a cat, so I'm a pet mom. So, you know, I'm a little bit of a homebody when I'm not traveling and I just love to be in my house. I also live on a beautiful lake. So spending time in nature is really how I wind down and connect with the spiritual side. Yeah. And cooking, is that something that you've always just been savvy in the kitchen? Or is that something that you've kind of become more so? I mean, I think I started at a young age. I mean, I was always trying to help mom in the kitchen when I was a kid.

2:31And my favorite thing to make is breakfast. Like I'm a big breakfast person. And I think maybe the more I travel, the more I appreciate eggs. And of course, in today's society, like with this whole like eggs are, you know, basically worth your weight in gold. So, you know, I love, I love coming home and being able to make breakfast. But yes, over the years, I got into a big health kick when I was in my college years and really tried to learn how to use different ingredients. You know, I grew up in Southern Appalachia. So, you know, we kind of culturally have a lot of heavier foods. It's not like Southern cooking, but it's country cooking, right?

3:10So there's two differences. Anyway, so learning just lots of organic ingredients and wild fusions. Because I think when I lived in New York City, like my whole world opened up with food culture. It was so cool. Like Manhattan, it's just, you can get anything there. And it was a way that I, I mean, I'd never had sushi before I lived in New York. I got to experience - Do you make your own, have you made, you've made your own sushi? Sushi? No, no, no. I mean, because that's quite an art. I go out for sushi. Yeah, exactly. I think I bought the mats, but they're just in the cabinet. Like I'm so afraid to try it.

3:52Everyone gets a sushi making kit for Christmas. It sits around for a couple of years and then finally we donate it to Goodwill. Exactly. No, no, no. But I do make a lot of Asian food. Like I love, like all of it. I mean, Indian, Asian, Pan-Asian, just anything. Anything from Asia, I'm like, I like to try to make it. You know, I have to, so for me, I, you know, I started a few years ago and I started with, you know, just like the meal delivery boxes and that really kind of got the engines going a little bit. you know kind of the everything would just kind of come pre-measured pre-cut and in the box and so forth and then um i i slid over to using uh chat gpt and so i used the sous chef gpt and i it is just it is what a gift from god well so have you ever seen this show chopped like on shoot everybody's seen that show right so i know my sister would say like if i i really feel like if i got on that show i might actually have a chance and i have no professional culinary because it's one of those things where like i really love to open my kitchen uh refrigerator and pull out just whatever i have random things yes and like and then turn it into something and like make and i'm also like the queen of leftovers because i live i live by myself so like taking something that i've made previously during the week and then completely changing it into a different and then i'll be honest with you like my go-to tends to be like i can put anything and a taco.

5:23Right, right. My mom was the queen of casseroles, but of course, that was in the 80s as well. So, Allison, let's talk about your work today. So, again, you're at the head of two companies, Alpha Coloris, Creative Marketing, Rep Methods. And then, of course, I want to talk about your books as well. So the newest book, I think in particular, we should focus on is it the art of selling? So the art of selling was my first book. Your first book. Okay. I was just going based on your website here. That's okay. Art of selling is my first, we make order makers. And that was the really the vision behind me starting rep methods a few years ago.

6:06And I just surpassed two years with my company open and super stoked where it's at today. So and then I wrote my second a book, Beyond Order Makers, which was really developed to tackle a whole nother side of sales. So everything I do is revolves around, you know, sales and business development and with a touch of marketing, because I feel like it's all very, very tied into selling products, selling services, running a business. You have to understand who your target market is. I mean, I think to the the pre videos you sent me today, like everything that you gave to advice to your, to your podcast guests is, is perfect.

6:46It's so aligned, like having people identify exactly who they're talking to, you know, before they make a move. Um, it's really about strategic business development. So, um, thank you for, for bringing it up. You know, becoming an author was not a dream of mine. It, it certainly, if you would have asked me 10 years ago, if I'd be writing a book, I would, I would have laughed at you probably. I had no idea where this all just started to develop after COVID. I think a lot of us went through these dramatic changes on how, how can I do something that I love? How can I help? Well, for me, it was, how can I do something that I love and help others.

7:32And I really wanted to change the dynamic of the type of selling that I do. I wanted to, you know, make it feel less transactional. I tend to be a type A, so there's not a lot of fluff going on in my life and my business side of me. I'm very just motivated, direct, straightforward. And, you know, there's people who have a really artistic value of being able to engage a customer and have a touch of personality involved in that relationship experience. And I've been working on that for a really, really long time. Great. So Alison, and by the way, both of your books have come out in recent fashion, which is why I initially thought that The Art of Selling was your new book, because that just came out in 2023.

8:20Your new book, Beyond Order Makers, you talk about something called manifestation selling. And it really seems like it's kind of primarily focused on both brand management, target and target marketing. Why are those two things so critical to success for business owners, particularly our friend that's listening to us right now? Right. Well, I want to break your question apart a little bit, because in the first part of your question, you're asking me about manifestation selling and why that's important. And then the second part is the target marketing and brand management piece. So first up, the manifestation selling aspect, I have seen so much proof in how this helps people.

9:07Just yesterday, I was with one of my coaching clients. She's a young lady actually here in Richmond. And we align professionally, very similar backgrounds. And so I'm strategically helping her to understand how to build more sales and meet her sales goals that, you know, she has a boss that's over top of her hounding her daily on why she's not meeting her sales goals. Right. She was out sick for a few days. And just yesterday, we were able to look at the deficit from the last two weeks of April, take the number that she needs to at least hit her goal. right? She's just behind. And we were able to take that number and break it down into a bite size little baby piece that gives her a singular goal every single day for the next two weeks.

10:01If all she can do is complete X, not only will she meet her goal, but she will exceed those goals because there's residual sales that come in on the background. And so she can do this one thing each day for the next two weeks, we're going to get her there. We're going to get her there and build back that confidence. And, you know, my, my role as a, as a coach in, in the sales industry is really about helping these people who were like me at some point in my life to, uh, stop getting beat up by like some boss out there. Who's telling you that you, that you're not doing what you're supposed to be doing.

10:41And the negativity that goes into the mental space of people who are in the sales world, because you're just, you're not performing. You're not good enough. I mean, we could go on and on about the psychology behind that. You know, my job and what I believe in the manifestation process is really getting somebody out of the gutter and performing. Okay. Well, how does one do that? Again, think of our friend who's listening to us right now, they're in a room with us right now and you're teaching them. What would you teach them? Right. So I would teach them to look at the number that you are trying to achieve and figure out how to simply do a little math and divide that number into a weekly goal and then daily goals.

11:24check exactly how many working days you have left in the month. What type of hours do you work? Are you an eight hour person, a 10 hour person, a six hour person, whatever it is, and figure out how to take that big massive number and try to break it into. In her case, it's, I wanted her to sell two bundles of slabs a day. She has to identify two customers for each day that she can be motivated to either go visit in person, get on the phone, start the texting conversation and motivating that customer with a need, figuring out what that need is and how she's going to fulfill it. And if all she has to do is do it for these two customers every single day, like I said, she's going to meet that goal.

12:08Well, that takes a whole lot of pressure off of the big picture, which is she needs to sell$200 ,000 in two weeks. Mm hmm. And so it's a when I get when I spoke about this at a big conference in Las Vegas in January, the response was overwhelming. You know, people really love this because it's a simple practice, Josh. This is not rocket science. I am not a genius. I'm just somebody who has learned along the way how to self motivate and how to take away some of that overbearing pressure. Yes. Performance. So so our advice to our friend that's listening is a number one. break it down into simple things.

12:47Number two. Keep breaking it down until you can get to a singular number and work at hitting that singular number on a daily basis and stop thinking about the big overall number. Got it. Okay. James Clear would probably agree with that premise, atomic habits, right? So just, You know, what are the daily habits that compounded are going to get you there? Because I agree, you know, looking at the mountain, you know, from far off is like, are you kidding? I can't climb that thing. Whereas it's really just one step at a time then. One step at a time. Okay. All right. Good, good, good, good, good. Okay.

13:31So the transformation that one would have from reading Beyond Order Makers, Allison, how might this show up for them in their life if they were to focus on? And again, I'm not sure I understood what manifestation selling means. And manifestation selling is literally focusing on that singular number to get you to your goal. And when you are focused and working and doing actionable steps, so the manifestation process is if you can see it, if you can identify it, you're more likely to hit it. So clearly in the psychological aspect, if we have this one thing that we have to do and we can visualize that one thing every single day that we've got to hit this one mark, if that's all I have to do in a day, we will manifest the essential parts of the sale.

14:31Yeah. Okay. So help me. Cause I think I'm trying to find this groove here because initially you're saying kind of break it down into the simple activity. But also you do want to focus on the big goal. So in the case of your, your friend that had this$200 ,000 that she had to sell, like that was the mountain for her, right? That was the manifestation. Absolutely. You're saying don't. I'm just trying to understand like in what way do we worry about that? In what way do we focus on that? In which way do we focus on the activity that gets us there? So in her particular story, this is one scenario that's over the course of two weeks.

15:04When I work with a long-term client, we actually identify what that one number is and we apply it to a lot of different reasons. So manifestation selling is all of the actions combined. What does that mean? Picking up the phone and speaking to a customer.

15:24Responding to emails and making sure that we're providing offers and opportunities. Outside selling and personal visits, being able to actually touch the customer on a personal level versus just the virtual email. I think that's a blind course of selling, right? And maybe it's spending part of your time during your day and calculating what needs to happen for four people per se. So if we're using the magic, I call it the magic number formula. If you're using the magic number four, right, it means that you're going to outreach and find four new customers each day. You're going to follow up and call for previous customers or ongoing customers that you have currently in your pipeline.

16:19You're going to do four actionable items that would be promoting future sales with current customers that maybe you don't have in the pipeline. And all of your actions revolve around this one number four. And you're focusing on, I got to get four done today. I got to get my four done today. I have to call four people today. So if you can focus on just hitting that smaller number, gradually over time, the snowball effect comes into play. This is what I talk about in the book. It just continues to grow and build and become bigger and bigger. And before you know it, you've actually formulated an infallible pipeline, a pipeline that didn't exist before you had a focus.

17:02And so that's the mindset piece. It's just focusing on the small human-centric actions that you can do each day to keep building a portfolio and a pipeline. Allison, tell me about the work that you do with your clients. Is that through repmethods.com? Yeah, yeah. That's through Rep Methods. Most of my clients are small business owners who can't afford big, huge sales training companies to come in and do crazy conferences. This is actually designed to be almost like an ad hoc sales manager to assist with training processes, to hold the sales associates hands, to do some coaching along the way. And eventually I have this formulation called boot camps where I can actually come out for an extended period of time and work with the client one-on-one to help keep improving their skills.

18:01And this takes the pressure off of a business owner who is typically in a small business outfit. They don't have a lot of HR in our industry, in the construction industry, and in the services industry that's dealing with construction and remodeling. It's usually mom and pops or somebody's aunt is kind of the hiring manager or payroll person. Maybe it's even a fractional CFO. They may not even have somebody on staff who handles these types of things. So I become sort of like a 1099 consultant within their company to hold and develop the team. You also do, Allison, a lot of speaking as well. And by the way, I mean, we should point out, your background is in college.

18:47You studied geology, right? No, actually, no. You had a focus on it and your LinkedIn, you said that you had some interest or involvement. I was fascinated with, I was fascinated with geology. That was like the only science I ever wanted to be a part of, which I thought was just ironic because no, my actual degree is, I have one degree in fashion merchandising and I have a degree in marketing. So I graduated from Radford with those. And again, I spent my first few years out of college up in Manhattan, working in textile development and apparel development. So I got my sourcing jeans fitted when I was actually working in the city up north.

19:25And I transitioned into the stone and surfaces industry. Stone and surfaces. Yes. Okay. That's what the industry is. That's where my home is. I'm in the stone and surfaces industry since 2010, 2011. Oh my gosh. If we had more time, I would love to hear more about that industry. You have some great photos on both your social and on your website. Your website, by the way, repmethods.com. That's where our friend can find your two books, The Art of Selling, and then the new one, which is, by the way, already in the bestseller category, but it's called Beyond Order Makers. And again, those are both available from your website, repmethods.com.

20:09Anything else that you'd recommend in terms of, again, our friend that's listening and what they might do if they want more Allison in their life? Oh, that's so sweet of you, Josh. Yeah, absolutely. Drop me a line. I am on all social media channels, but if you read my book, you'll find out that I'm the anti-marketing marketer. I really don't. I just stay in social media. So I'd love if you just give me a shout. One of the best things you can do is subscribe to my newsletter. I only send out one newsletter a month. I keep it really simple guys. And then I do one blog post all with tips and tricks, but the industry newsletter is super cool.

20:47Uh, keeps in tabs with what we have going on, on our side of the business and just fun in my travels podcast that I'm on, uh, meetings that take place. Pretty, pretty awesome. Alison Mullins, Alison Mullins, business development expert sales leader, speaker, author, surfaces guru. And again, the CEO of both Alpha Coloris Creative Marketing and Rep Methods, your website, repmethods.com. Alison, thank you so much for joining us. Thank you, Josh. Y 'all have a great one.

21:24Thanks for listening to the Thoughtful Entrepreneur Show. If you are a thoughtful business owner or professional who would like to be on this daily program, please visit upmyinfluence.com and click on podcast. We believe that every person has a message that can positively impact the world. We love our community who listens and shares our program every day. Together, we are empowering one another as thoughtful leaders. And as I mentioned at the beginning of this program, if you're looking for introductions to partners, investors, influencers, and clients, I have had private conversations with over 2 ,000 leaders asking them where their best business comes from.

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