Paul M. Caffrey (00:01)
Hello and welcome along to another episode of the Work Before the Work podcast. I'm your host, Paul Caffrey, and today I'm delighted to be joined by AJ Maher, who is sales performance coach at Sellfire. He is a master of high velocity transactional selling. This person knows how to turn large sales teams around and get them achieving numbers they didn't think possible before. AJ, how's it going? How are you?
AJ Mahar (00:25)
Doing great, doing great. How about yourself?
Paul M. Caffrey (00:27)
Yeah, really, really good. And this is a conversation we've penned in for a good number of weeks now. We've had a couple of chats beforehand and two things jumped out at me. One is your love of scripting and formatting words that sell. If you could take me back, how did you discover that that was so important and decide to focus your career on that?
AJ Mahar (00:55)
Yeah, yeah, there's a long story to this, but I'll try to keep it short. So my very first job ever, didn't have sales experience before this. I started working for a company called the Profit Fuel in Austin, Texas. This was back in 2009. And the product was you're selling a website, you're selling SEO to small business owners, and you're trying to make a sale, a one-call close. So you're cold calling. 10 minutes later, you're asking for a credit card.
No visuals, no taking someone to a website. You're just asking for a credit card. So needless to say, that's like the wild, wild west of trying to make sales. We had a team of 80 sales reps. And if you were really good, you're making a sale. Like if you're in like the top 10 or the top five, you're making a sale one out of like, let's say 50 dials. The average salesperson one out of 300 dials. I was always in the top 10. So I think
I average like a one sale every 53, but there was one person on the floor who averaged one sale out of eight dials. And this is also including like voicemails and wrong numbers. So this one person was just like the complete outlier. His name was Butch Hodson. He's actually my business partner today. And he had a exact process and pitch that he would do every single time. Every...
pretty much everybody else, we had our own pitches and we were, nothing was a uniform. And so he went to the CEO and he said, I'm pretty sure that I can get everybody to be on this script. I can train them on it. And it's going to lift sales performance 50%, 100%, 200%. And so we tested this theory out with 19 sales reps. I was on this team and I was actually about to be promoted as a sales manager.
if I could perform well on the script. And long story short, after I think it was like 30 to 45 days, every single person on that team increased their sales by like 300%. And so we ended up rolling it out to all 80 of the sales reps on the floor. Same thing happened. And this caught the eye of another company in our space. And they had a different product, much bigger price point, but they ended up buying our company.
And Butch and I basically said, we could do this for this company as well. There's 400 sales reps, there's six different offices, the product's bigger, but we can use this same formula and process. And so we did. We jumped on the phones, proved it out with this new product, and beat every single 400 other people that were on the floor selling their own product they'd been selling for years, and just crushed the sales goal.
wrote the script out, trained all 400 salespeople, same thing happened. We got bought by another company. We did the same thing. Didn't matter what the product, what the industry was or the price point. We kind of just used this exact same formula and realized we could do this on our own. So we actually started our own consulting companies and did this for other companies and saw success. Eventually we wrote a book on this process on exactly how to do it.
and that book is coming out in March of 2025. So it's not out yet, but we also started a company on that, which is the company that I work for now called Cellfire, like you mentioned. And it is basically how to go from either one sales rep to 10 or 100 or 1000, all using the same philosophy and process.
Paul M. Caffrey (04:43)
It's very powerful stuff AJ because scaling companies are one of the most difficult things to do, particularly when most tend to rely on salespeople figuring out that for themselves. Yeah, you might get training on a sales methodology, a sales process, expectations to complete the CRM, to follow a sales stages and take us through a buying process.
AJ Mahar (04:48)
100%.
Paul M. Caffrey (05:06)
but a lot of it does stop before it gets into exactly how to run those conversations. For people listening, I'm sure they're gonna be really eager to find out more about that book when it comes along as it's had so many great, great results. If you, is there any lines that you use that are particularly powerful for, let's say, opening up a cold call or starting things off? Like even that first sentence, what do you recommend people do?
AJ Mahar (05:33)
Yeah, great question. let's say that you are, you know that the prospect that you're calling is, is Paul Caffrey. You can make an assumption that Paul is likely a male. So if a male answers the phone, you should assume that that is Paul. So if they answer the phone, hello, this is, Paul's lock shop to say, Hey Paul,
as if like you recognize their voice. Because if I say, hey, is this Paul? Immediately upfront, what are you thinking in your head? You're going, this person doesn't recognize my voice. This is a stranger. Stranger equals danger. This is probably a sales call. And now my guard is, now your guard is up. And your chances of setting an appointment or making a sale have just, if they were a hundred percent prior to,
answering the phone, now they're maybe at like 85%. And so I like to think of sales as like a video game. Do everything you can to keep your health up and assume the decision maker as soon as they answer the phone. It's little tiny things like that where it makes a massive difference to making a good, a really good first impression. And as I've mentioned before, first impression is the most important part.
Paul M. Caffrey (06:54)
I like that. And are you strict on keeping a neutral tone and acting like this is no big deal, that I'm a peer or do you recommend something else or does any of that even matter? Does it just jump into your head?
AJ Mahar (07:07)
No, no, that's a great question.
Tonality is the most important part of your entire pitch. These customers can't see what you look like over the phone, but they are going to make a, and they're going to have an idea within about five to 10 seconds of what you look like, even if it is not who, even if that is not accurate. So you really got to come across as, especially in the first five to 10 seconds, very like enthusiastic.
and upbeat and professional. Get straight to the point. These customers don't like the, hey, how are you doing? They know that the sales rep doesn't care about how they're doing. It's like a platitude that immediately upfront, just there's like, yeah, what do you want? So get straight to the point and be really professional. You've got to come across as an expert in your field in those first five to 10 seconds. And you could do that with your tone.
Now don't want to stay enthusiastic the entire time. There are times to like calm it down, slow it down, especially sales reps, the speed in which you speak is extremely important. So if you're going too fast, which most people do, it's hard to understand what you're saying, but you also come across as nervous. So speaking really slow and speaking really deliberate is also very important.
Paul M. Caffrey (08:32)
what we're talking about is the first two or three seconds of the call. And already there are so many different things that you've called out, which people again were aware of it, but maybe not following it religiously. Do you train any two call closes now, any appointment setters and then into let's say discovery and traditional route, or is it still all, you know, one call closed transactional selling that you're primarily doing?
AJ Mahar (08:58)
Yeah, no, it's a two call setup, which as you know can turn into a lot more than two calls. But the idea is to make an outbound call, set an appointment on that call, and then you're running a 30 to 40 minute presentation of your product, and then you're trying to close on that call. So it might only last 40.
30-40 minutes because you've done a really good presentation and you've only you only have to answer a couple questions or it might last an hour because You're doing a bunch of objection handling or answering questions. But yeah, we're trying to close in two sometimes it turns into another callback or maybe a few more But the idea is to try and close it in as short a time frame as possible
Paul M. Caffrey (09:42)
Okay,
excellent. And I've looked at the data on this and there doesn't seem to be any one sales methodology which outperforms another, but following one or having one overarching your sales process absolutely helps you perform better. In that two call close,
Have you seen any methodology or any criteria that worked well to qualify so that your sales call is of a standard or gives you the ability to close?
AJ Mahar (10:14)
Yeah, yeah, that's a great question. So it depends on the product and the price and everything. But as you know, there are certain like a lot of people will qualify at the very beginning of the call. And I actually do the opposite. I want to give everybody a pitch. Then I want to set up a time with a customer so that I know that I've gotten the time in the calendar and I've got the email. I've got everything booked.
Once I've gotten that, then I say, and actually I have a couple of questions for you just to make sure that we're on the same page here. And then I'll ask questions and then depending on the product or company that I'm working for, as you know, there are certain criteria on whether this customer is going to be a good fit and whether I should run a presentation with them. But the number one thing that I always ask is, is there anybody else that should be on this next call?
for you all to make a decision on whether or not this would be a good fit for you. So getting all decision makers onto that second call as much as possible, because the worst thing that you can do is you can run a presentation, then at the end you're like, so how do you wanna pay for that? They're like, I gotta talk to my business partner. That's a somewhat difficult objection to overcome. But if you can proactively eliminate that objection upfront,
by getting both decision makers or all the decision makers on the call, then that is a great sales strategy. Proactive objection elimination is one of the biggest things that I like to do.
Paul M. Caffrey (11:44)
Yeah, the top performers will pull those objections forward into the start of the middle of the process. Everybody else does it towards the end and then things stall. Would people push back and say, want to have that presentation, but do call out that there will need to be, let's say you're speaking to a manager and a director might be needed to get things signed off, but they want to see it first. How do you handle that? Or how do you recommend reps handle that AJ?
AJ Mahar (12:10)
Yeah, so what I would do is I would try to get all the decision makers on the call. If you can, great. If not, don't lose the sale because you can't get all the decision makers. Instead, run that presentation. And then if you know you can't close it, you should end the call with something along the lines of, so I just went over all the pricing and the product. So let me ask you, let's say your other business partner was on this call.
They loved it, they wanted to move forward with it, and they asked you, and they said, hey, now it's totally up in your hands. Would you be moving forward with this product, or do you have other questions? So you have to be able to get a very confident yes from that manager that you're speaking to, or that non-decision maker. Make sure they agree that they would move forward, and then try to set up.
And then also ask them additional questions like, what questions do you think your director might have about this? And possibly try to set up a second appointment with all decision makers on the call because what you don't want to do is you don't want to have that non-decision maker try to pitch your product for you. Usually that doesn't work out nearly as well. You want to try and impress them enough for them to become an advocate and set up a second call with all decision makers present.
Paul M. Caffrey (13:34)
agree with that completely. you do go down that route, will get feedback of, board has kicked this out until next quarter or it's something that we're looking at in a few months time. You'll get those those excuses for sure. So when when it comes to positioning, let's say that next call with the executive director, the decision maker.
AJ Mahar (13:44)
Exactly.
Paul M. Caffrey (13:56)
I'm guessing you look at making that a little bit shorter and more punchy or do you deliver the same thing again or what do you recommend people do? Because they'll probably be wondering, am I going to get my guy to sit through the demo again? Will they?
AJ Mahar (14:08)
Yeah, I think it probably depends on the situation. Like I would likely, I would try to run a full presentation if I can. Now, if I know that this is like a CEO and he literally only has like 10 minutes, I might have to just show them a few, a few important things that are, that are important to them. and I would get that information from the other non decision maker that I ran the first presentation with.
But if you can, I would recommend running a full presentation with the CEO as well, or whoever that your, this final decision maker is, because then you're showing, you build presentations to show as much value as possible. So I don't like to cut my presentation short and run a half a presentation or a quarter presentation and skip over things. I build processes where I know it works for everybody and I want to try and get through all of it. If I can, I will make exceptions sometimes, but
Paul M. Caffrey (15:02)
So cool.
AJ Mahar (15:04)
You know, I try to run the full presentation.
Paul M. Caffrey (15:06)
Makes sense. So for context, then we're probably talking maybe a 20, 30 minute meeting presentation. That's maybe 10 or 15 minutes. And then there's five or 10 minutes of chat at the front so that you can position the right aspects of what you're presenting in this faster sales-paced world.
AJ Mahar (15:25)
Yes, absolutely. So we always have like an agenda where we ask very specific questions that are pointed. Each question has a purpose where I need to get a very specific answer so that I can then use that throughout the presentation to like, if I know that this, I'm talking to like, let's say an HVAC contractor, I'm going to find out.
what types of jobs that they specifically want more of that they're not getting and what is the typical return on investment on those types of jobs so that at the end I can show them exactly how I'm going to get those types of jobs how much return on investment they're going to get and then compare it to my price so I can say look if I just get you one of these jobs and my product costs $200 a month that's a five to one return on investment.
So I'm asking very specific questions at the beginning so that I can use them at the end.
Paul M. Caffrey (16:24)
I really like that. it's something I was curious to wonder if you're going to go down there. You're effectively building a business value math and building a bit of the business case ROI in that call, which is not an easy thing to do if you're not prepared or practiced at doing it. So for sure, you're always looking to.
AJ Mahar (16:39)
100%.
Paul M. Caffrey (16:43)
I guess, you know, there's going to be two outcomes, right? There's the minimum level of success that we reckon that we could get, then there's that maximum level we all know is probably going to land somewhere in between and that delta between investment in you and belief that you can deliver versus what they stand to gain from the, I suppose, minimum or maximum level of success is absolutely key.
So are you then you're typically talking through that with them and then sharing we're going to share a docuSign or an electronic contract or whatever you go straight into that and then talk about nearly onto onboarding and the success of them starting to get value of it in life all in that short space of time.
AJ Mahar (17:24)
Yeah, so typically what we try to do is we will have a presentation, so maybe some Google slides, and then also show, sometimes the slides have also like what the product is, or you might need to show a demo account. But you're always going back to slides at the end where you're talking about pricing, and then when it's time to actually ask for the business,
You're like pausing things and you say, okay, I just sent over a doc you signed. I want to make sure that you got it. And you're trying to like do some trial closing right there. And so I don't like to get off the phone and then have them sign things because there are people as I'm sure you know, say, yeah, sounds good. Send over the paperwork. I'll sign it. I'll sign it in five minutes. You get off the phone, you get the paperwork done, you send it over and then you get ghosted.
So what I typically try to do, if possible, it's not always possible with current systems, is I try to get the verbal commitment and a written commitment all on that call. And I try to make it as easy as possible for the sales reps that I'm coaching to be able to send everything all at once and get them to get the customer to fill it out if you can on that phone.
Paul M. Caffrey (18:42)
And people sometimes appreciate you giving them the help and then showing them how to fill out documentation. And then the other side of that as well. So many times I've seen contracts sent out for signature electronically and the other person hasn't received them. And the salesperson is waiting a day or two and is starting to wonder when they finally do put that call in, then they find out they haven't even got it. So yeah, making sure they have it is absolutely fundamental.
AJ Mahar (19:08)
Yeah, that's the bare minimum to at least say, I want to make sure that you have it in your inbox.
Paul M. Caffrey (19:14)
I absolutely really like that. And when it comes to your approach, and this may or may not be relevant, but is there upsell referrals or any of that ever been relevant for any customers that you've helped?
AJ Mahar (19:31)
Yeah, absolutely. usually, usually I don't work in like six months later and like, how do you set that up? I'm more upfront. How do you get the most sales possible in the, in, the very beginning? But we've absolutely done some work with that. And then there's also some opportunities where once you've gotten the credit card information or you've gotten them to fill out the docu-sign, you then present some other options to them, say like,
By the way, I know that you really like this product. There are some other options where we can actually get your monthly price down, where if you prepay six months or you prepay 12 months, I can get your price from X to Y. Would you like to go ahead and do that? And now you've, because you've already gotten their go ahead and their information, now you can do some upsell opportunities where you get better pricing payments.
or other opportunities like, I know we sold you this product. There's also this thing available. Is that something that you'd like to take advantage of? Some people will do it, some people won't, but there are definitely some tactics there as well.
Paul M. Caffrey (20:40)
Yeah, and if you think about when you're buying something online, we often experience order bumps all the time. And again, some people do like it, some people don't, and you'll get levels of success. You won't get any success if you don't ask the question, that is for sure. You spoke a bit about metrics before when we had a previous chat.
AJ Mahar (20:46)
yeah.
Yes.
Paul M. Caffrey (21:03)
If a founder or a sales leader is looking at this from building, I suppose, from getting opportunities into the pipeline to getting opportunities closed, what are important KPIs that they should be looking at and they should be measuring?
AJ Mahar (21:18)
Yeah, great question. So some really important KPIs is, I mean, the most basic one at first is dials. How many dials are these reps doing? Because if you know one rep is doing 120 dials a day and one rep is doing 30, something's off here. You know that the baseline is, they're the best you could do is 120. So that's an important one. So you capture like how hard people are working, but then also like,
Contact rate is really important. So if you're making a hundred dials a day How many times is somebody answering the phone some reps might be at a 50 %? Contact rate rate others might be at 30 % What is that person doing to get 50 %? Whereas this person's at 30 % so dials contact rate decision-maker rates important so
How many times because as you know there's non decision makers that answer and then there's decision makers that answer so how many times did a decision maker answer the phone versus non decision maker so That'll be able to tell you how good is this rep at getting from the non decision maker to that decision maker There is set rate. So how many appointments did you set? So if you talk to ten decision makers and you set two appointments you have a 20 % set rate Which is actually pretty pretty average pretty good
Some reps might be at 10 % or 5%. So what is that person saying that has a 20 % set rate versus someone who's at 10? And then hold rate is important. Out of the 20 demos that you set, how many actually showed up to the appointment? That's important. And then close rate, obviously, as well. So if you held five demos, how many of those did close? So this is another thing that's very important as well. You need to make sure that you have software that can capture all of that.
very easily. And so a lot of people have these crazy tech stacks that you're using. I don't want name certain names, but using like four or five different softwares and a shameless plug here, Cellfire, the company I work for is a software as a service company. So we actually have a CRM plus sales coaching and we have a sales CRM that is specifically built for Hivalas.
high velocity transactional sales that captures all of this data for you so you don't have to be building nine million different reports and things. All the KPIs are there and you can coach to them.
Paul M. Caffrey (23:54)
Excellent. And I the key piece is we've got access to data now. We can see what top performers are doing. You should be able to see what your team is doing and make decisions and coach them off the back of that because the high level numbers, they don't always tell the real story. Even somebody is knocking out of the park, they might've got a few really big bluebird inbound leads that has got them top of the dashboard versus maybe other people who have that blend of business that you're looking for.
AJ Mahar (24:23)
No doubt.
Paul M. Caffrey (24:24)
Before we depart, how can people find out more about what you're doing and find out more about the book that you have in the works?
AJ Mahar (24:35)
Yeah, we have a blog. think there is a... So we have a LinkedIn. So if you try to search for Cellfire.com on LinkedIn or just Cellfire, S-E-L-L-F-I-R-E, you can follow us there and you'll be able to get all of our updates. You can go on our website, Cellfire.com. There's a way to sign up there as well.
following me on LinkedIn or adding me on LinkedIn. I think it's Alan Maher Jr. on LinkedIn. That's what AJ stands for, Alan Jr. So adding me on LinkedIn. And then the book I have is called Sales Lab Scripting. So that is coming out in March of 2025. And that is a blueprint of exactly how to do what we do at Cellfire. So.
What are the actual words that you should be saying? So I have scripts that are in this book on how to set an appointment, how to run an appointment, how to objection handle when somebody says, I want to think about it. What should you do right then and there? How to objection handle on cold calls when they say, send me an email. Then also like, how do you put together a team? How do you test all of these KPIs? That's what Sales Lab actually means is you're taking, if you have a hundred sales reps, you're taking 10 of those off the floor.
you're testing this new pitch, you're making sure they're KPIs, just like scientists do with the scientific method, you're testing different hypotheses and you're making sure that you're getting the results that you want, then you can roll it out. That's what sales lab scripting actually means. And so it's the whole process of training, managing, how do you manage to all of this? Because managing a scripted sales world is very different than non-scripted.
Yeah, so that book is coming out March 2025, but to get updates on that, just say follow Cellfire or follow myself and I'll be posting updates on that.
Paul M. Caffrey (26:32)
Great, well what we'll do is the top link in the show notes will be AJ's LinkedIn profile. So connect, give him a follow. And I guarantee that is a book which I'm excited to get my hands on. So I'm sure everyone else will be as well. And I'm guessing you'll be sharing that on LinkedIn. And as a former scientist in a previous life, you're speaking my language here. There's nothing better than proving my hypothesis or disproving it than doing something else. AJ, thanks so much for coming on. Really look forward to the next time we speak.
AJ Mahar (26:49)
100%.
Thank you very much for having me.
