Speaker 0 00:00:01 Welcome to grind grind, sell elevate with your host Tyzer Evans, a podcast dedicated to bringing you the top minds in all areas of business, entrepreneurship, sales, and leadership. Let’s elevate together.
Speaker 2 00:00:22 Everybody. Thanks so much for joining me on grindstone elevate. This is Ty Evans today, sit down and talk with Ryan daddy. She’s the CEO and co-founder of social sellers academy. Ryan helped her and her partner help people take their sales game to the next level by revolutionizing the way that you do social selling online. So there’s a really fascinating conversation with Ryan. It’s an area that I’m not an expert in social selling. So I love bringing her on, in breaking down exactly what she does and she helps her clients with if you guys haven’t done. So please subscribe to the podcast. If you could drop me a five-star review, leave me a comment. It makes it easier for other people to find and tag me online at ties Robbins everywhere on social media, but without further ado, here’s my conversation with Ryan.
Speaker 3 00:01:14 All right, everybody. This is Ty on grindstone elevate, and I’m here with Ryan daddy. Who’s the CEO and co-founder of social sellers academy. Ryan, thanks for joining us.
Speaker 4 00:01:26 Thanks for the opportunity. I’m excited to be here.
Speaker 3 00:01:27 Yeah. So you were just, we’re just talking a little bit that we already have a rivalry since you’re in Kansas City and I’m a, I’m a Raider fan.
Speaker 4 00:01:36 There are few things in life worse, to be quite honest,
Speaker 3 00:01:41 I was always raised in
Speaker 4 00:01:42 Life insurance for living
Speaker 3 00:01:45 Right there. Chiefs and Broncos were like sworn enemies to me as a child growing up.
Speaker 4 00:01:52 But for me it was always just the Raiders. Like I can handle the Broncos. I don’t have the hate towards the Broncos. Most chiefs fans have, but the braiders, it just can’t do it. Yeah.
Speaker 3 00:02:01 Goodwill for context purposes. Why don’t you go ahead and introduce yourself to the audience and I’m while you do that, I will not. I’m going to open my door because my dog is at the door, but we’ve been talking about perfect.
Speaker 4 00:02:12 Yeah. Yes. Such as life in running a business and sales in 2021. So, uh, my name is Ryan Dowdy. I, as Ty said, am the co-founder of social sellers academy. So I spent about, uh, 15 years in the corporate world. Uh, selling advertising actually started my career selling radio, went on to sell digital marketing solutions, and finally woke up one morning and decided that I did not want to climb the corporate ladder anymore. So become an entrepreneur, started my adventure in, um, teaching female entrepreneurs, how to sign their first clients. I just kept seeing all these brilliant, talented women with really cool businesses that weren’t making any money. And, um, sales was obviously my entire skillset as my career. And I did not know that the things that came very naturally to me, the things that did every day did not come naturally and were not normal for others. And so that’s where I started my business. And then, um, through a partnership with, with Kelly Roach, who actually was my business coach, um, and is now my business partner, we launched social sellers academy, which is designed to help, uh, rapid growth impact-driven entrepreneurs, uh, build and grow, you know, high-performance socials sales teams, leveraging social media as their primary sales tool.
Speaker 3 00:03:24 Awesome. You’ve got quite the background. I’m just curious. When did you know that like sales were like your jam, Mike? You’re like this, I love this. I just want to do this.
Speaker 4 00:03:35 So when I first got into sales and then when I decided to really own it, and there’s a gap in that, right? So I got into sales on accident. I always say, um, I interned in a PR firm in college and I thought PR was my jam. And then I learned that PR and sales, public relations and sales were kinds of the same things. But when somebody said yes, in sales, like you got paid commission and that was not the case in PR, right? Cause we were pitching magazines and different stuff like that. If somebody placed your stuff in a magazine, you did not get paid commission for that. Right. So I was like, okay, sales is for me. And so then I kind of dawdled for about six years as a mediocre sales rep, Thai, um, didn’t really care, but I was young. I had just moved to Florida with my friends, just having a good time.
Speaker 4 00:04:13 I was making enough money. I worked in radio advertising in Orlando, Florida. Like we had a lot of fun. Um, and when I decided to really make sales, sells a profession, meaning I really started to learn it and get good at it and really understand it came several years later. And it was when I went to work for a startup based out of DC. And they literally like flew us in and did the really formal, really good sales training. And I was like, this makes so much sense. Like, and again, all things I was naturally doing, but not things that had ever been described to me or talked to me, it was just my talent of talking to people and solving problems and asking good questions. Like I just intuitively knew to do those things. So that’s what I really started to study and made it when like, oh, it’s just this thing I do to like a profession. It’s the thing I wanted to get really good at.
Speaker 3 00:05:02 You know, what’s interesting about that. And I’ve talked about this a couple of other times, so hopefully, people don’t remind me, uh, don’t mind me repeating myself, but I always kind of feel like we knew people graduated their high school or college or, you know, whenever they’re done with their, their learning, that’s like it. And then they go in and they get a job and then it’s just like their skill set never really levels up. And then we’ve just created a whole society in some regards of mediocracy are at least allowing ourselves to accept it. Um, and, and I, and I went through the exact same type of journey you did. I just relied on my natural God-given ability would usually put me as a top producer, but I didn’t realize that there were so many other strategies in hundreds of thousands, if not millions of dollars, I’d missed out along, along the way by not, you know, taking my skillset really carefully. And seriously,
Speaker 4 00:05:55 I agree. I say that the time, like I didn’t really learn a lot about the mindset part of the sales game until I really became an entrepreneur. Like I never worked for a company and it really focused on, you know, that part of what we did. Um, and I like sometimes when I think about it, I still get angry. Cause yeah, I mean, if with millions and millions of dollars on the table, by not really mastering the mind part again, using my God-given talent, I was able to get so far and you know, the tactic was worked for me, but like until I really learned the mindset piece of it, um, yeah, it still sometimes fires me up. I don’t think about it too much.
Speaker 3 00:06:31 Well, one of the first things I wanted to ask you before we do kind of more of a deep dive into social selling was I had read, um, on your profile at about how, how we should think about accountability was a key. It was a keyword that popped out at me because I think it’s something that’s super important for spells sales leaders, especially. So I want them to get your, uh, maybe take on sales, leadership, accountability, and then also just accountability as a salesperson, yourself, kind of what we are talking about.
Speaker 4 00:07:01 Sure. So I think it’s really interesting and I’ve only worked in sales departments, Thai. So I cannot tell you what other departments do inside of companies. But sales is the only field that I’ve seen from the outside looking in that we want to just manage the results I want to be like, okay, did Thai sell anything today? You know, and we just want to manage the results without understanding the activity, without understanding what needs to be done every day to make that happen. And what I’ve seen happen over, like in tons of companies year after year is people like, I don’t understand what my sales team sucks. I don’t understand where my salespeople are performing. I don’t understand. Like I told them what to, you know, I told them what was expected of them, but then there are, there’s no accountability to getting it done.
Speaker 4 00:07:46 Right. There’s no accountability like, okay, you, you said this week, you were going to close the two, two deals, where are my two deals, right? Or you said this week you were going to close or you’re going to book, you know, 10 consultations or 10 sales calls. Like where are my 10 sales calls? Did you book them? Why or why not? And how can I help you do that if you did not? And there’s just that I’ve never seen sales leadership done in that way. Um, until much, much, much later on in my career. And I was like, well, this is why so many sales organizations are struggling is because they just tell their salespeople what number to hit, and then that’s it. Right? And so when I talk about the accountability piece is we have to hold our people accountable for those numbers. We have to hold our managers accountable for the numbers and we have to hold our salespeople accountable for the numbers.
Speaker 4 00:08:30 And yes, as salespeople like we’re accountable for ourselves as humans. But, um, you know, it’s really having somebody checking in on how’s the progress towards this. And also using that as a coaching moment, I’ve seen some, you know, surveys on LinkedIn about the lack of coaching and support that people get on the sales side. Um, it kind of blows my mind a little bit, right? So there’s no accountability and there’s no coaching and support. And we’re pissed off that nobody brought me my two deals this week. And so that’s where accountability I feel like is really, really important.
Speaker 3 00:08:58 I th I totally agree with all that. It’s interesting. I’ve also seen it. I feel like there’s a, and I’ve, I have some people that I used to manage are now living this where you have someone who’s a quote-unquote sales manager, and they can teach you product all day long, but they’re not teaching you sales. Right. And there are two totally different things that a lot of sales managers go in. They teach you all the product knowledge and they go, go hit your number, which is not the same thing. So maybe touch on that for a minute.
Speaker 4 00:09:28 Yeah. I worked for a committed company actually, um, that I built a lot of their sales training. That’s what it was. They hired me to do sales training and I was training on products. I was like, this is not sales training. Like this is product training. And we literally revamped their entire sales process. I was like, this, this is not so straightforward. Like I’m not a product specialist. Like I know marketing inside and out. I can tell you what SEO is and what paid search is, but that’s not the point. Right. We need to figure out what people want. Are they buying it? Right. Um, so for me, I think that’s a very common misconception. That is that sales training is product training. And I actually think those are two different things, frankly, fall under two different departments. Right. I think that you know, product training product knowledge is, is more comes from the operational piece of the business, right? What do we do? How do we do it? How do we fulfill it? How do we wow. Our clients? How do we get them really fantastic results? Those are super important parts of the sales process, but none of that matters, right? Like it doesn’t matter how good the product is. If we don’t know who’s buying it and why they’re buying it and all those different things. And that’s where the rubber hits the road, to be honest.
Speaker 3 00:10:26 Yeah, totally agree. Now I do, I do want to spend some good amount of time on, on social science. If there’s a lot of people that, uh, you know, have pivoted to online businesses are having to work online now. So it’s more relevant than ever, uh, due to COVID. Um, you know, it’s interesting that the COVID spin page pain in the ass and unfortunately costs a lot of people their lives. Uh, but it’s also taught us how to pivot and develop new skill sets and kind of change the whole landscape on selling and business, which I think has been an early extra positive thing, um, in some regards. So I want to get your take of what social selling is and why that was, uh, a niche that you specifically wanted to become an expert in. So,
Speaker 4 00:11:08 So to me, the way I describe it to people most simply is like, okay, there’s inside sales, there are outside sales. And then there’s social status, right? Inside salespeople versus the phone is their tool, right? Outside salespeople. They leverage face-to-face belly-to-belly networking in person, you know, and then social salespeople leverage social media. And as I said to you, before we hit record on this, to me, it is not an either-or right. We’re not using the phone or LinkedIn or social media, right. We’re not using, we’re not going to in-person networking events or picking up the phone. We are doing all of the above, right? The reason why I love social media so much is a, it gives us so much more insight into our ideal clients. Right? Makes it so much easier to connect and to build a relationship.
Speaker 4 00:11:52 We have access to billions of people, literally with a B without ever leaving the house. And it increases efficiency. And I will tell you this, as a former outside sales rep, as a former avid networker, I used to love networking. And I think of the amount of time it takes me to leave my office, go to the lunch, sit through the lunch, meet the people, do the things, start back to my office. And we’re talking two, two and a half hours. Right. I live in Kansas city and everything is all spread out in two and a half hours. If I were to just sit down on, on social media. And I mean, I could literally connect with hundreds of people in that amount of time. Right. So from an efficiency standpoint, um, that’s just through the roof, right? So for me, I leverage social media for that tool.
Speaker 4 00:12:35 And like I said, I think for that reason, and I think it’s a great tool to complement what you’re already doing. Right. And so the reason I chose to, to really kind of lean a lot more into that is that I’ve done all the jobs I’ve been in inside sales. I’ve been in outside sales and I’ve not found anything more efficient that gives you the connection of person to person, right. Through social media for zoom, whatever. But then it also gives you the efficiency of the phone. Like, to me, it’s kind of an image of the two.
Speaker 3 00:13:00 I like that. It’s a really good take. And you’re right. I mentioned to you before he recorded, I came from a meeting and I had to start getting ready at 10 45. And meeting was at 11. Right. You know, we got done at 12 and I got back to my house at like one and that’s three hours chunked up for a 60 minute meeting. Um, versus I had a meeting this morning. It was from nine to 10 and I just carried on with my day. I carried on with my day. Wasn’t it. You know? Um, now I did want to talk a little bit about, so if you’re someone who’s like, okay. Yes. I know that my ideal target is specifically kind of online and the social selling vertical, but I feel uncomfortable reaching out to strangers, you know? Um, I don’t know these people. So how do you start to break that down and get people to be buy into the idea? Cause we, you know, bounce with you. When I think about it hitting some on LinkedIn or Twitter, I feel like it’s very personal. So I would stay away from it. Although I’ll get more insight on who they are. Right. So I don’t know for me, I just want to get your take on it. Maybe make me feel more comfortable with it.
Speaker 4 00:14:06 Yeah. That’s so fascinating to me though, because you’ll walk into a room full of strangers. No problem. Right? No problem.
Speaker 3 00:14:12 Pick a phone.
Speaker 4 00:14:13 No problem. Somebody gave me your phone number and it’s on the back of a cocktail napkin. And they told me I’m want to call you no problem. Right? No, it’s interesting. Cause like I have people on the, like the polar opposite. They’re like the phone don’t make me pick up the phone, but they’re like, I’ll stop you on social media all day. No interesting that the difference based on like what you like, who you are and where your background comes from. To me, my philosophy on social media is social media. Love it or hate it. It is literally designed to put on display what you want to put on display like that. If I want to tell you on social media, how amazing I am. I am telling you that because I want you to acknowledge it. Right? So for you to find somebody on LinkedIn and be like, oh yeah, this person’s my ideal client. If you’d go through and look at the content that they’re sharing and the way that they’re interacting on social media and bringing it back to that, you know, Hey Tai, I love that podcast that you shared last week about blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. I think it’s super smart. Like keep up the great work. Like would you not respond to
Speaker 3 00:15:09 That message? No, of course I would absolutely.
Speaker 4 00:15:12 Right. Because you shared your Podcasts on social media because you wanted people to listen to it and not, and I hate to say that because it makes us all sound like vain jerks, but we kind of like, it’s just the human design. It doesn’t mean that person, you know, but that’s why we share, we share, right? Like people are giving you their opinion on Twitter because they want you to know what their opinion is. Right? People are posting pictures of their food on Facebook. We said, watch it to know what they had for dinner. Right? People are posting their vacation photos on Instagram because they want you to know about their vacation. Right? I’m not saying that like you go dig up stuff that you can’t like from like three years ago, it’d be weird about it. But it’s like, Hey, looks like your vacation was fantastic. Hope you got, you know, hope it was relaxing. Um, and that you feel really recharged, you know, and just leveraging what people are already sharing to start conversations. And that is what we teach our clients. That’s, what’s worked really well for me is what are people already talking about? You know, everybody’s favorite topic is themselves. And as long as you make it about them, it doesn’t matter what medium you’re using.
Speaker 3 00:16:09 Yeah, no, it’s super true. So how do you then kind of coach people to make that transition from, Hey, Ty loved your podcast. You’re so good looking and you provide such valuable content. And I just had to throw the X with my wife, listens to the show left, so right. No, but for just being genuine because I see us on LinkedIn all the time, Hey, we’d love to make you a part of my network. And then I’m like, oh shit, I’m going to hit. I want to hear from this person in 48 to 72 hours with their value prop. So how do you, cause I feel like sometimes it’s disingenuous and then that will start to kind of pivot people away from reading a DM or a message when you, when you really are trying to serve and be of help. So how do we make that smooth transition from introducing yourself, making rapport and they kind of easing our way into why you’re really there,
Speaker 4 00:17:02 The exact same way you do in person, right? You just start a conversation. Hi, good to meet. You know, you’ve been to this networking event before. What’s your favorite thing about it? Oh, the football game. Did you see that this weekend? What do you think? Dah, dah, dah. Hey tag. We should grab a cup of coffee sometime. Hey Ty, what do you do? Oh, this is what I do. Oh, Hey, there’s some synergies there or, Hey, actually we’ve been looking for a new life insurance guy, right? Like it is literally the exact same process. But again, the reason that I think social media has the edge is that you could provide value ahead of time. So say I start a conversation with Ty and I’m like, Hey, you know, love your podcast, all this good stuff. Didn’t see that you work in insurance. That’s cool.
Speaker 4 00:17:39 Hey, we just recently put out this podcast about whatever, you know, I thought just based on your industry that you might find this super valuable, send it over, take a list and let me know what you think. Right? Like I’m already providing value to you, which again, we can’t do as much in person. Right. So to me, yeah, I think social media gives us that edge. Um, another way I have our people create a lot of familiarity around engagement, right around the DMS, around commenting on your content, around interacting with you in different ways. Um, I think at some point in time, you’re just going to have to make the ask. And I always tell people that, you know, no is where the relationship starts, right? Because it’s summer time, we’re going to build some rapport. We’re going to have some things in common. I’m going to ask you for a 15 minute connect call or I might just say, Hey listen, Thai.
Speaker 4 00:18:23 Um, we’ve been hearing from a lot of, you know, insurance agents that leveraging social media as a sales tool, feels a little bit foreign to them. And um, you know, we have a really quick 15 minute demo we can do about how our clients are leveraging social media to build better relationships faster without wasting three hours about going to meetings, going to meetings, like, is this something you’d be interested in learning more about? And what I think salespeople both in person and on social media do poorly is Ty’s going to say, no thanks. I’m good. And we’re going to go home with our tunnel between our legs and we’re going to never talk to Ty again. What I always recommend is you’re going to say, no thanks. I’m good. I’m going to say, cool, no problem. Let’s just stay in touch. If I can ever be a resource for you, let me know.
Speaker 4 00:19:02 And I’m going to be like, Hey, Tai this podcast, I think he find this really helpful. He taught, we just did this YouTube video. I think your sales team would really love this. And I’m going to continue to build a relationship with Ty and Ty’s going to be like, you know what? She was right. We’re really not leveraging social media. Well, I really do need help with that. Right. But because I was willing to work past the no work past the no, thanks. Um, you’re way more likely to trust me then if I took my no and took my choice on my account, which is what 97% of people do. And I like to tell people no, just to see how they will react. And it’s usually like an insult of some kinds like, well, if you don’t, you’re not, you’re not interested in making any more money.
Speaker 4 00:19:36 That’s fine. Um, or, or they just will never speak to me again. And I’m like, just because I’m not market right now. Doesn’t mean that I won’t be. So, I mean, I gave you a really loaded answer to your question, but that’s the process that we teach, create familiarity, find them, you know, build a relationship. And then at some point in time, we’re all, we’re all on. Especially LinkedIn, I think LinkedIn in particular, we’re all there to do business, right? Like I’ve made a lot of amazing friends in business. Some of my best friends are people that I’ve done business with or we’ve worked together in some capacity, but we’re all here to do business. Right. And I think that pretending like we’re doing anything else is silly.
Speaker 3 00:20:11 Totally agree. Yeah. That’s why I think, uh, you know, going back to sales and asking that old adage of asking somebody how they’re doing, or you know what the weather’s like, like we know that you don’t fucking care, let’s just get on with it. You know, I know why you called me. You don’t give a shit about my days going, um, when you are reaching out, they’re like, I know LinkedIn’s probably the most I, you can touch for RA, but I would, I would assume probably that the platform you teach on the most,
Speaker 4 00:20:39 Not necessarily actually you work with a lot of online business owners that leverage Facebook groups. And, um, primarily as they’re my first business, we built it all on Facebook. I didn’t touch LinkedIn. I tell people I had corporate PTSD. I was just like, we’re just not touching that platform. Um, so it just depends on where I was talking about go where your ideal client hangs out. Right. And again, I work with a lot of online business owners. So, you know, if I worked with one woman, who’s a parenting coach, right. She wants to connect with moms of littles. You know, there are, but jillions of Facebook groups full of bombs of littles, right? Go where your ideal clients are and build relationships with them there. Um, you know, a lot of people, again, in the online space, Instagram is their jam. A lot of like health coaches and stuff like that are connecting with their ideal audience on Instagram. If those are your people, that’s where you need to be. So, so it’s go where your people are. We’ve got people leveraging clubhouse, we’ve got people leveraging tick tock
Speaker 3 00:21:33 Makes total sense. Now the reason I was asking that question was kind of a setup. I’m always curious because I, I can tell like when a, um, a bot hits me for engagement on, on LinkedIn or on Instagram, Instagram is way more obvious. I think LinkedIn is a little bit more a creeper mode where you’re not always, you’re not always sure. But, um, how do you feel about that? Do you feel like that’s a good way to hit a lot of people and then make it authentic and engaging once they’ve they’ve reached out, are, are, do you think that, Hey, now you should always just, you should bring up something authentic and creative to begin with.
Speaker 4 00:22:11 I think the front end of the process, a little bit of automation is okay. You know, like sending the connection requests, sending the welcome, like, Hey Tai, thanks for being a part of my network. Super excited to learn more about you. Like the really basic stuff. I think it’s fine to automate past there. We wouldn’t, I wouldn’t automate. Um, I just wouldn’t, I’ve seen it done. I’ve seen it done poorly. I’ve seen people put their foot in their mouth with automation. It just, and again, it was instant loss of, for me it was instant loss of credibility, right? Like if you can’t be bothered to like, actually want to have a conversation with me, then I’m not interested in buying from you. And when you’re ready to talk to me as a human I’ll buy something from you maybe. But, um, the beginning end of the person, I do think that there is something to be said for the efficiencies the way I like it. It is it’s no different than a Facebook ad, right? Like if I’m gonna run ads to get into your newsfeed, to start that conversation, to do kind of those front end touches and create some of that familiarity, I’m not opposed to that. But like as soon as we’re actually in a back and forth conversation, I’m done with the automation. That’s my opinion.
Speaker 3 00:23:12 Yeah. I don’t, I don’t disagree with that. Um, I I’ve just seen two more though that like, I keep getting hit with stuff for like AI technology and shit. I’m like, I’m an insurance. I don’t know. I’m like we have a CTO you could reach out. I don’t know what to tell you. You know, I’m not the dude. I am the dude, but I’m not the dude. Right. Oh boy, this is good. Like afternoon ones. I’m a bit, I’m a more awake.
Speaker 4 00:23:43 Yeah.
Speaker 3 00:23:44 So, um, I wanted to get your perspective on this too. Where do you think that the next evolution of sales is going? And that’s a big loaded question.
Speaker 4 00:23:54 I think it’s swinging back right now. So I think, you know, I started my sales group back in what, 2004, 2005 with very old school. Right. Like I still have to print them out directions to get where I was going. Um, like, you know, and then we went on this like, holy cow, look at all this technology, automation, automation, automation. And I actually think we’re, we’re swinging back. I think today’s consumer is so over automation they’re so over, you know, we always, we have a social media posts that my social media manager shares all the time around. Like how often have you been on the phone and be like, I just need a damn human. Like I have one question and then you keep pushing zero. And it’s like, I’m sorry, that is not an option. I would like, I think that’s where today’s buyers are.
Speaker 4 00:24:39 Um, I think we are swinging back to, again, like you said, the very smart use of AI on the front end of a process, but nobody wants to feel like a number. Nobody wants to feel like they don’t matter. I mean, we tell our clients all the time, it’s about making people feel seen, heard and understood. And I think we’re, we’re, we’re, we’re, we’re coming back to that. I think we got away from that for a little while when we got access to technology where you’re like, this is so cool. We could talk to so many more people so much faster. And they were like, oh, you know, people don’t like this, right. They don’t want to be forced through some funnel. They don’t want to, they just don’t like it. So I think that’s where we are right now. And I think we’re going to wind up somewhere in the middle. I think we’re going to wind up in a really good balance of AI used in a, in a thoughtful, strategic way with the human to human element. Always necessary. I think as humans, that’s just how we’re wired. Like, I mean, it’s just how God made us. I don’t think we ever get all the way away from it. I think we wind up with a really good marriage as time goes on.
Speaker 3 00:25:32 Yeah. Well, that’s a very positive perspective and I would agree, you know, I, I, my wife and I have often joked and I think it’s very relevant to sales and this discussion is like, I enjoy getting the mail, you know, 15 years ago, people didn’t enjoy getting the mail cause they’re like, oh, it’s just a bunch of mailers and shit in here. I’m like, the last thing I want to fucking do right now is go through my email. You know what I mean? Because it’s look, I mean, haven’t emails I’ve got on here. I’ve got a bunch of text messages. I’d be like, you can see, I don’t know if you can see that I’ve got 24,000 unread emails. Right. It’s so insane that like, I look forward to like different ways of people trying to communicate with me. Like yeah. If someone would drop me a handwritten note right now for, oh my God.
Speaker 3 00:26:19 You know what I mean? I think those are two that, that, that human touch and L element that a lot of sales reps could use as a differentiator. Irrespective of what channel they’re, they’re they’re selling on. Um, is there any type of cadence that you kind of coach people towards as far as, um, social selling? Is it like, or funny thing I guess maybe might be depending on vertical, but I’m always curious, like it’s once a month enough to start to help with that familiarity or is it once a week, every other day? Like how do we start that type of cadence when we’re trying to build a new relationship?
Speaker 4 00:26:53 I actually do think it depends on what you’re selling. I think it depends a lot on what you’re selling. Um, but for me once a month is definitely not enough once a week. Probably not enough. Um, you know, and here’s why not because we want to be stalkers, but you just case in point, you just made my point for me, you have 25,000 emails. Okay. So you have so many messages coming at you. You can’t even think straight. So when we think through the cadence and the touch points and creating that familiarity and creating that relationship with somebody like you’re going to have to show up often enough to stand out and that’s not going to happen just once. If somebody, I forget what the data is now it’s crazy town, but the number of messages, marketing messages, social media messages, email messages, text messages we get in any one day is so astronomically high, that for you to cut through that noise, you’re going to have to, you’re going to have to make a little, you’re going to make a little more.
Speaker 4 00:27:46 And you’ve got to be pretty persistent. The day that when I was selling radio advertising in 2005, 2006, we used to tell people that the frequency was three. Somebody needed to hear your message three times before they would pay attention. I don’t even want to know what that number has to be right now, Ty, like it has to be insane. I actually, I don’t know if you’re a big Jeff blunt fan. I love Jack wrote the book, fanatical prospecting, and um, you know, he talks about now the data’s telling us it’s like 30 to 50 touches. If you’re like totally cold, unknown brand, they don’t know who you are. And um, you know, so for me, it’s, we’re not, you know, 87 pings a day, but like, I’m going to connect with you on Monday. And I’m going to comment on something on LinkedIn on Tuesday.
Speaker 4 00:28:27 I’m not going to go like your Facebook business page on Wednesday, and then I’m going, you know, so it’s not just like the same thing. We’re not just banging our head against a wall and doing the same. It’s like creating this kind of, um, a presence of, okay, I know I saw that. Why do I know that name? Okay, now, now this name is in my inbox. Right? And now they’re calling me. That’s where, I mean, like it’s, it’s, it’s all of the above. It’s creating that familiarity and all those places. So I always tell people, I never want a full week to go by without some sort of touch. I would prefer two to three a week, just depending on again, who you’re calling on. Um, I think it will vary just based on your audience in general, I’ll give you a perfect example. Like doctors, I used to call on doctors. It was awful, but you never got through to the doctor, right? You were always calling on a gatekeeper. So calling that gatekeeper three times in a week was not going to get you in the Black list, your ass or real fast, like it was done by the third phone call, right. Versus this, you know, I’m reaching out to the CEO of a small insurance agency, right? Like that cadence is going to look very different depending upon who your person is,
Speaker 3 00:29:30 Makes, makes, makes total sense. Uh, what about, you know, for me, I’ve always felt like there’s a couple of things that I was able to do. Well, innately that we talked about, one was asked great questions just cause until, you know, both of us are talkers and we’re inquisitive people, right. So I wanted to get, um, walk through how people should be thinking about the questions they’re going to answer, as opposed to just, I feel like a lot of reps, they just, they just say shit and then it doesn’t, it doesn’t go anywhere. You’re like, what is the point behind that? So I was had my reps list out 10 to 15 power questions and help them lay that throughout their sales process. So they, you know, they could stay on the track and ask things or relevant to move them down the line a bit.
Speaker 4 00:30:13 So we teach kind of two different processes, one for prospecting and then one for actually in the sales conversation. So for just like prospecting and lead gen, we teach a process called the six pillars of qualifying. So there’s like six things we need to know to find out if this person is a qualified buyer and then we help people build like questions around those pillars. So one of those pillars is, um, you know, uh, words are hard, um, on a, my previous buying decisions, right? Pat historical buying decisions, right. History tends to repeat it themselves. Right. Has somebody invested in this in the past and you know, there’s 14 different ways to find that out, right? Like, you know, Hey, Ty, what have you currently been doing for your life insurance needs? Uh, you know, versus like, are you currently working with any duty or life insurance?
Speaker 4 00:30:59 Like I can ask that question 87 different ways, but the reason I’m very careful to not script people is because I find that we have a tendency when we are too scripted that we forget to listen to the answer because we’re just trying to ask the next question. Um, so we teach, I teach kinda, then these are the six things that we kind of need to know. Um, but I’ve always really, um, I always try to coach them through the idea of always asking a relevant question. Like we talked about with the, Hey, how are you? Like nobody gives a shit. You do not care how I am, like stop it. Right. But it’s, it’s asking, you know, very specific or basket questions that are thoughtful and asking people, questions about themselves is always the most important part. Um, so that’s kind of what I teach.
Speaker 4 00:31:40 And then during the sales process, again, I teach kind of a framework for the sales conversation. That again, allows us to get what we need to walk away to make a good recommendation, but not to interrogate. Um, so our people all build what we call a DM tree. And so they, they know what their six pillars of qualifying are. They know what information they’re looking for. And then I encourage them to come up with like 20 or 30 or 40 different questions you might ask to get this information. So then that way you don’t wind up becoming too scripted. And you’re always, ping-ponging off of the person you’re talking to. So I like to teach in frameworks instead of structure, because I have, I’ve tried, you know, early on in my days I had to create this really great, like scripted. And I found that people were just like taking in my word and I was like, that’s not what I meant. Right? Like, and again, the way I can say is totally different than the way Todd can say or do something. So I try to work in frameworks instead.
Speaker 3 00:32:30 Yeah, no, I love it. I think that, that makes sense, because you said everybody’s going to, um, have the will, you would hope they put their own take and spin on it. And so you’re giving them the, to be able to do that by preventing the framework. Um, one of the other questions I wanted to ask you was how should, you know, having a marketing background as well, how should sales in look at utilizing marketing more as a, as a teammate, as opposed to a they’re just providing me with shitty leads I can never sell.
Speaker 4 00:33:02 Um, so yeah, the biggest thing is that I think that sales should dictate the content that marketing creates. So like, Hey, I’ve been asked this question six times this week, like we should write an article or a blog, a podcast about this, right? Like I, all the content I create either comes from students, like what I’m actually coaching in into, or what my sales team is feeding to me like, this is what we’re hearing. These are the objections we’re getting. This is what’s going on in the field. This is what our conversations are yielding. All of my content is created from that place. So I think that, you know, if sales is in the front, if sales is the front line, if sales is the one who’s having the conversations, they should be dictating back to marketing. These are the sort of marketing pieces we need.
Speaker 4 00:33:45 This is the Podcasts. These are the two videos. These are the articles. These are the blog posts. These are, you know, this is the messaging we need to fine tune. Um, that’s kind of the way that I think that the two should work together and then marketing takes the salesperson’s somewhat bullish overexcited way and puts, you know, nice spin on it. Or it’s like, eh, let’s, let’s look at it this way or make it a little bit more universal or that sort of stuff. So that, that’s how I would recommend sales and marketing work together. Um, and I always think it’s very funny when people are so pissed off about the inbound leads, marketing, get them, like, I don’t know about you. Well, you, you grew up in life insurance. Like I just, if somebody, at some point in time would be like, this is an inbound lead. Like I would have died. Like I sold up, I grew up selling radio advertising, like holding doors in Orlando, Florida in July, like stop it. And you’re mad about the shitty leads you’re getting from marketing right now. Like it’s.
Speaker 3 00:34:38 Yeah. Uh, well I had spent, um, and in California I had spent, uh, five years out in the field as a, as a sales person and a sales manager. I was doing personal lines back then, like auto insurance and stuff. And then I transitioned into the call center. They said, Hey, can you help us come revamp this, uh, this unit? So I did. And I was just like, I was like, fuck, all of you complaining about your inbound leads. I’ve been five years out. You’re starving, go off, fuck off. You know, I just couldn’t believe it. How do you expect me to sell anything with these leads? I was like, I don’t know, pick up your fucking phone. It works both ways. You know, she’s a,
Speaker 4 00:35:19 I saw posted a Facebook group about like recruiting sales talent. And if like, if the company is willing to provide bleeds for you, I wouldn’t even apply for that job. I was like,
Speaker 3 00:35:32 Oh,
Speaker 4 00:35:33 I can’t like, I don’t even have words for that. I’m like, what world do you live in? I don’t know.
Speaker 3 00:35:41 Right. Well, we know what we called them. We called them order takers. That’s what they are.
Speaker 4 00:35:45 Right. And that shit everybody’s worried about a computer ticket over your job. That’s the one that’s going to take over.
Speaker 3 00:35:51 Yeah, no, totally, totally agree. Um, one of my favorite questions to ask, because I’m an avid reader. My other Podcasts I like to plug for myself is all about book reviews. I do. I read a book a week and then I do a book review on. So I’m always curious for my guest on grinds. So elevate top sales book, leadership book, self-help book, spiritual book, huckleberry, Finn, whatever,
Speaker 4 00:36:18 Top sales book, banana for prospecting, hands down, blunt, top leadership book, extreme ownership. I don’t know that it’s the guys there.
Speaker 3 00:36:27 Yeah. Drop a willing Banff, I think, or something.
Speaker 4 00:36:32 Um, yeah. So those sales and leadership, um, oh, I’m actually reading something. That’s a little mind on me right now. Um, co happy pocket, full of money. It’s all about like wealth consciousness. Um, again, if you you’ve got to be into the wheel, don’t go there if you’re not into the wheel, but if you like the way it’s super interesting. Um, and this is like my third time through it and I’m really digging it, who writes
Speaker 3 00:36:56 Up, who wrote it?
Speaker 4 00:36:59 Um, I have no idea, um, happy pocket full of money. It’s written by somebody. I mean, it’s, it’s all very much in kind of the manifestation space, kind of the loops. And, but it’s really interesting about this like conception of, of wealth in general, which I think a salespeople is such a big part of what we do. I spend a lot of time on the money mindset piece, because if you are as a salesperson selling something that is more money than you’ve ever invested in something, there’s always winds up being a little bit of resistance, right? Like we think it’s expensive and we really have to work on that. So for me, I’m always like consistently working with my team, um, on those types of things, um, is, is really on that. Like another one is, uh, you’re a badass at making money by Jen Sincero.
Speaker 4 00:37:44 Um, again, very many it’s a little bit, obviously a female lens on it, but, um, it’s a really good one I could go on for days, but that’s what I’m currently thinking about asking again in six weeks and I’ll give you a different list. Um, but those are kind of my top ones. I, I love books as well. Um, Ooh, you know, a good one. Um, Ryan Sirhan, what was his first book? I did not love big money energy, but the first one sell it. Like, sir hands actually would probably really great for the insurance industry. Um, cause he, you know, it’s so much referral and relationship and stuff. Right. I listened to it on audio book on audible because he reads it, Ryan and he’s funny and he’s got a lot of personality. Um, it’s a really good one about relationships and referrals, sales and stuff. I think it’d probably be really good for your industry.
Speaker 3 00:38:30 Thank you. Sorry. I had to mute myself and the kids are going crazy again. No, um, uh, I can’t wait for school. Um, I have read a three or five of those, so I will a two out of the five. So I wrote those down. Those are, those are awesome. I want to get your take on this because you strike me as someone who’s been into personal development, obviously working on your money mindset, I think is extremely important. I always have a saying too is if you don’t invest in you, then your clients won’t invest in you. Right. And so it’s just like, if you, if you are going to work on like right now, the biggest contract I have out one is for $10 million. Right. If I had money issues with dealing with big money like that, no way that’s coming home to roost, like you were just talking about. So maybe what work have you done as far as personal development and how has that played out for you in your career?
Speaker 4 00:39:17 Yeah, I mean, I, I’ve invested a lot in education in coaching in all sorts of different resources, you know? Um, I don’t know if I make it quite through a book a week, but I’m darn close. Um, I’m a big podcast or I love podcasts. Um, I like short, you know, actionable things. Uh, but I’ve invested a lot in coaching. I’ve worked with one-on-one coaches, I’ve worked in group coaching programs. I’ve, I mean, I’ve even been tested in sales training, which is so, you know, everyone’s like, oh, sales is your jam. I’m like, yeah, but somebody else has got a different perspective and a different thing. So I invest in it for both myself and my team. Um, and I just, I’m constantly learning. I’m constantly like watching and studying and um, I think it just that’s what has helped me overcome a lot of the drama that I had.
Speaker 4 00:40:02 I mean, even going from selling somebody else’s stuff to selling myself, like from salesperson to entrepreneur, how was a mind trip do, right? Like before you weren’t going to be right. You were just saying no to that stuff. But like, it felt very personal when I started selling myself and had to work through that idea of like not wrapping myself worth up in my business and in different things like that and really kind of pulling that apart of they’re saying, no, they’re saying no to the business, not you as a human. Um, and I, I mean, I, I do a lot of work on that for sure.
Speaker 3 00:40:29 Yeah. That’s, that’s a, that’s a really, uh, that’s a really good takeaway, you know, that’s my, why my wife’s an entrepreneur. What does she do? She owns an interior design firm. Yeah. So we have a lot of these different types of discussions and investment in you and how to think of money and whatnot. Uh, confidence in obviously is a big piece in sales, right? If you don’t have that, um, any advice you would give to a young salesperson who’s starting out and I, and I want to preface the coaching idea is great. I have a sales coach right now. I think you should. I think everybody should always have one, um, irrespective of how good you get. You should always look at having mentors and coaches.
Speaker 4 00:41:11 So the piece of advice is that like this actually advice was given to me when I first started, um, I was traveling, I was a regional sales trainer, um, traveling the country, training sales teams. And I used to get really anxious about like delayed flights and stuff because people were waiting for me, you know, I was like, oh, they’re waiting for me. They, they booked their whole calendar around, like me being in town to go run sales calls with them and all this other stuff. And I had a manager I’m printing is a pre Blankenship. And she told me, you know, Ryan, we, we’re not saving lives here. Like you’re not saving lives. It’s just, it’s never, if you missed the meeting, you missed the meeting. And I think that that’s such an important thing to think about as salesperson, right? Like, so what you put your foot in your mouth, so what you said, an asshole message, like, so what you got a little too pitchy and a little overzealous and you blew that presentation.
Speaker 4 00:41:54 Like once you are like legitimately saving lives, like we’re not saving lives here. You know, like it’s just not that serious. And I know when you work for a company that’s, you know, putting up, like breathing down your neck and you’re give a lot of pressure and all these different things. And obviously sales is a performance-based role, but it’s just remembering like, unless you were literally saving lives, we are not saving lives here. It’s not that serious. And if we would just relax and have a little bit of fun, like I’m even thinking about this conversation, I’m actually a little punchier than usual, but it’s because you are right. I’m like, we’re having fun and you want to be around people who are having fun. Right? You want to have conversations with people who are having fun. And that’s what I think is really, that would be the advice I would give somebody. Newer is just not that serious. Have fun. People want to be around people who are having fun. It doesn’t matter what you’re selling.
Speaker 3 00:42:39 Yeah. Love it. It’s fun to win and make money. Amen. Um, where can people connect with you, Ryan?
Speaker 4 00:42:45 Um, all of the places. So we are on Instagram at social sellers academy. I’m a very avid networker. You can literally find me on any platform, LinkedIn, um, you know, feel free some of your best sales pitch. I’ll pull it apart for you. If you want me to, um, to like resist to being like, can I rewrite this message for you? This one’s really bad. Um,
Speaker 3 00:43:06 This respond back F
Speaker 4 00:43:10 I could see Vida striking girl. Um, and we also have a podcast called daily sales on demand for CEOs again, for my more entrepreneurial minded friends. It’d be great place for you to hang out.
Speaker 3 00:43:22 Awesome. Well, I will try to, um, post several of Ryan’s, um, uh, spots where she hangs out, maybe not all of them, but, uh, the, the ones that are most relevant or her website and definitely her Podcasts. So I would please go subscribe to that. You’re going to learn a lot. I’ve watched her YouTube videos. She’s got content online as well. I’ve watched some of her other interviews, lots of info. Our business partner, Kelly, um, is also a ton of Infor, a wealth of knowledge and a ton of information and whatnot. So, um, they would be great. I encourage any entrepreneur to reach out to them, especially our female entrepreneurs. Um, they haven’t got a ton of experience, obviously we just went through it. So, Ryan, thank you so much for hanging out with me for the last 15 minutes. Yeah.
Speaker 4 00:44:09 Awesome. Thanks for the opportunity and for a fun conversation.
Speaker 3 00:44:12 Absolutely.
