Hey hey,
This one's for everyone who would rather do the work than sell the work.
The Level Set:Â My first sales job was a wall of shoes.
Sixteen years old, New Balance store in a ritzy Dallas neighborhood. Everyone assumed I was there to fold boxes in the back. Instead I broke national sales records that still stand, and I broke them because I figured out the whole thing standing on that floor: you have this problem specifically, and I have this wall of shoes that represent a solution set.
That is the entire job. Match the problem to the solution. Twenty-five years later I'm running the same play selling six-figure engagements, and the mechanics have never once changed. Better shoes. Same floor.
On September 11 I'm teaching that floor, live. More on that at the bottom. This week: the five moves that do the most heavy lifting in high-ticket sales.
And if this is resonating, come to my FREE 5-hour Sales Intensive next Friday!
Expert Insight of the Week
There was a study where Google, CEB, and Motista studied 3,000 B2B buyers across 36 brands and found something that should make you rethink your whole approach: the personal value a buyer feels carries TWICE the weight in the decision that business value does.
Read that again. Your deck is doing way less than you think it is. The buyer isn't scoring your slides. They're deciding how safe you make them feel.
This Week's Shift: From Pitching → Matchmaking Most sellers walk into a call with something to prove. Walk in with something to diagnose instead.
Sales is matchmaking. You're eye-to-eye with a peer, matching a specific problem to a specific solution set. And when there's no match, you say so out loud and point them somewhere better. That's not you losing the deal. That's you being the person they refer for the rest of their career.
Here are the five moves, in the order they show up in a real deal. 1. Ask what the problem costs them every month.
On your first call: "What is having this problem go unsolved costing you on a monthly basis?" Then be quiet and let them do the math out loud. The gap between that number and your fee is the whole conversation. You never have to justify a price again. The problem justifies it for you. 2. Give real value away on the first call.
Every strategy call should end with 2 or 3 things they can go do TODAY, whether they hire you or not. Be known as the single most helpful person in your space. You're putting marbles in the karma jar, and reciprocity does quiet work on your behalf the entire time. 3. Talk price early.
Budget is an intro-call question, and asking it is a kindness. Nobody wins when you spend three calls falling for a prospect who has a tenth of your fee. Clear is kind. Unclear is unkind. 4. Let them do 65% of the talking.
On a discovery call, your prospect should carry at least 65% of the airtime. Ask the question. Then, and I mean this, do not speak. That pause you're so desperate to fill? That's your prospect selling themselves. 5. Walk away faster.
When the fit is off, name it on the call, refer them to someone better suited, and ask who in their network you should know. "No" is a complete answer. Every hour spent selling to a wrong-fit prospect is an hour stolen from a right one.
What This Looks Like in Real LifeYour next strategy call, you open with this: "You'll walk away with 2 or 3 things you can act on today. There is zero pressure. If I sense a strong fit, I'll say so at the end. And if I don't, I'll say that too."
Then you run the moves. The cost question. The silence. The free value. And you land on one of two endings: a booked discovery call, or a warm referral and a request for an intro. Both are wins. Only one of them wastes your time, and it's neither.
Why This MattersMost of the people I work with are grown-ass experts. They can deliver at level 11 and still flinch or hedge the second it's time to sell.
Here's what I see that they can't yet: that flinch was trained into them. It's playing small dressed up as professionalism. And anything that got trained in can get trained out, and it does not take years. It takes reps with the right moves.
→ Your Next Move
Your next move is simple. Show up live.
On September 11 I'm teaching all five of these moves in real time, with the exact scripts, and so, so, so much more than I could ever cram into an email. The LevelUp Live Sales Intensive. Five hours, noon to 5pm ET, on Zoom, free.
This isn't a webinar you half-watch with your inbox open. Five hours because we're going to run these moves on your actual deals, in the room, together. You bring the deal. I'll show you the floor.
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