Paul M. Caffrey (00:01.563)
And as I mentioned, I'm delighted to be joined by Simon Harris, LinkedIn top sales voice, the sales trainer that sells. Simon, welcome to the show.
Simon Hares SerialTrainer7 (00:11.694)
Thank you so much. Paul, it great to be here and thank you very, very much for inviting me. I'm excited to do this with you.
Paul M. Caffrey (00:17.339)
Yeah, I'm delighted to have you on, especially before you go on a bit of travel.
Simon Hares SerialTrainer7 (00:22.318)
little bit of travel to Vancouver for a couple of months, we go every year, so it's a little bit of a pilgrimage for us but we can run the business anywhere just like you can when you go away too, so it's you know it's a good thing, it's nice to be excited, it's nice to be excited about.
Paul M. Caffrey (00:35.235)
Absolutely. And it's important to be able to, I suppose, serve the world as opposed to just that one little region, which has been a massive, massive change over the last number of years.
Simon Hares SerialTrainer7 (00:44.238)
just realized that my profile needs to be updated on LinkedIn says Simon Harris, a sales trainer that sells serving the world. I'll take that. Thank you so much. Bye now.
Paul M. Caffrey (00:50.779)
Serving the world. There we go. You are. Thanks for being here. There you go, guys. You'll find them in the world. So I guess where we tend to start is just a little bit of, well, I guess I'll just ask the question straight up. How did you end up working in sales?
Simon Hares SerialTrainer7 (01:00.066)
in the world.
Simon Hares SerialTrainer7 (01:11.886)
Well, it's an interesting one because ultimately I've always been in sales and it doesn't matter what you've done ever since I was this kid this high being given a load of pamphlets from the school for a super family fun day and you have to go around and flog them door to door for 50p and if you can do that whoever sells the most then wins a prize and it was some random teddy bear or some shit I don't know but we had to go around with these things and of course...
The estate was big, so I had a lot of space and then I'd poke going to other people's things and get more. I didn't win, I was gutted I didn't win. I didn't sell them as many, but I soon realised that actually knocking on people's doors and smiling sweetly into their eyes and saying, would you like to come on Saturday to our Super Family Funding? We've got lots of great things. And...
the school actually saying why people should buy a pamphlet and then use that as their admission to come in. You know, and I think I'm 56 years old now. So when I would go back to when I was 10 years old doing that, you know, the school is telling me about the reasons why they should, you know, give you 50p, give you their money. And you just think that's a great start. But it was moving on.
you just realize that actually everything you do is sales and everything we do is sales. If you post on LinkedIn, then you're selling for likes and comments. If you're in an interview, you've got a sales proposal in front of you, we call it your CV. We all sell, we all sell. So it's an age old story, isn't it? We're all sales people, but unfortunately quite a lot of people don't.
Paul M. Caffrey (02:39.291)
Yeah. Yeah.
Paul M. Caffrey (02:47.067)
Yes. And some people try to deny it and even try to dress up their existing sales title as something else. I'm a consultant, I'm a solution engineer, whatever it all comes down to. Essentially, it's down to the value and serving the other person. I guess, when did you realize you were good at sales?
Simon Hares SerialTrainer7 (03:07.95)
Good is a powerful word. I don't know whether, I think I'm proficient and I'm experienced, but that doesn't necessarily mean I don't get it wrong. And I do get it wrong. We all make mistakes. We all make errors. We all come out.
But ultimately, if we want to see what to use a cliche, good looks like it is about that ability to use a process. And you know that whichever you're, whatever you're feeling with, you're feeling a million dollars or just $1, you know, a process is always going to back you up. And I believe that during sales where I haven't felt so great, or I've not really wanted to do it. The fact that I've got that sales process there to guide me is what's kept me on track. And when you know, you've got that.
know you're in the right track and I think today I tend to call them sales satnavs because sales processes are like a satnav you know what your destination is and it would be easy to say it's the close well it's not it's the next steps because not many people make the sale in the first thing so therefore you've got a direct route to get there.
But if you want to get off of that process, just like if you want to get off the route on your sat nav and go look at the flowers, have lunch in the town, go and visit friends, that's fine. But if you're on the way to a destination, you've got to get back on the main route. And that's kind of how I see the modern side of sales process today. It is a sat nav. I suppose just like a sat nav, some people will plug in the destination and it'll say ETA 1630. And you look at it and go, challenge accepted. So let's see if we can get there a bit earlier.
And maybe some people do try and shortcut the sales process. But ultimately, I think if you do try and shortcut it, you miss things such as valuable questions, you miss value statements, and you do miss the opportunity to move things to the next step. So we have to be thinking about that. So I suppose the long -winded answer is it's not a of knowing when I was good at sales. It was knowing that there is a proficiency I was aware of, and that comes down to that process.
Paul M. Caffrey (05:09.883)
OK, that makes sense. And from a, I guess there's more and more people under pressure to find more customers to grow their pipeline, whether you're working in sales individually or founder or whatever that might be. So what does the prospect and satin of of 2024 look like in your world Simon?
Simon Hares SerialTrainer7 (05:28.716)
Number one, it's around attitude.
It has to be around attitude. If you are constantly reading posts on LinkedIn that are telling us that cold calling is dead, then you're deluded. If I go into a new client and talk to a new client, call a new client, or you talk to them about how they currently operate in sales and you say to them, so how much cold calling do you do? And they might proudly pound their chest and say, Oh my gosh, we don't cold call that's so outdated. But then I then go back in and say, so let me ask the same question again, this is a different way.
How much prospecting do you currently do for a new business in your business? Suddenly they open up like a bird. But part of that process is that there has to be phone outreach. So therefore, when I ask them about phone outreach, they'll turn around and say, well, we don't do very many cold calls because people don't like cold calls. You go, okay, fair enough. That's one voice. So how are you currently reaching out? And what do they say? Well, it's about email.
So you suddenly think you're quite, you talk down about cold calling and prospecting like it's a bad thing. But by the same token, cold emailing and blasting people with spam is absolutely acceptable, isn't it? That's what you're saying, because that's what you do. So that...
That's not right because surely you understand that if someone receives a cold email from you, they will do exactly the same as you would do with that and just delete it and not read it because it has low relevance. But if you've got a better chance of being relevant, you've got a better chance of connecting by talking to somebody.
Simon Hares SerialTrainer7 (07:01.678)
And I think that, you know, when people get into that state where they think about cold calling and you see these posts about cold calling is dead, they're usually delivered by people who either don't like selling or have had a really bad experience by someone trying to sell them, probably using some sort of crappy disruptive technique like, hello, my name is Simon, I'm calling you from Serial Trainer 7 today. This is a cold call, do you want to hang up? I mean, what does that say?
You know, I heard the other one which was, this is a cold cordu fancy rolling the dice. Who says that? I mean, really and truly, what does that say about you? You're not connecting with that person, you're not building trust, you're actually saying it's a bad thing, that it's a game of chance. It just makes you sound like a dick. And it's, don't do that. Connect with people by saying to them, I wanna talk to you today about this. That's because...
I do stuff with your competitors, in your marketplace, with people you know, and it's worthwhile us having a conversation. I think you should give people some sort of get out of jail free card where you give them something for nothing as well. Some sort of piece of information, piece of white paper, something that they can value that's worth their time. So what you're doing is you are selling.
an exchange of time for an exchange of information that they can walk away with, even if there's nothing in it further for you. At least you're giving them a different experience. But some people believe that why would you give something away? But the rule of reciprocation, if we think about Cialdini's rules of influence,
reciprocation is a powerful thing and in fact it's one of the fundamentals of negotiation. So why wouldn't we try to give somebody something to sweeten the way, make the path a little bit more pleasurable and again if people don't believe that that works well let's have a look at the cosmetic industry shall we because the cosmetic industry have been giving away samples for years and it seems to work to generate business to those people that wouldn't normally buy their products so guess what if it can work for them social proof says it's where work
Simon Hares SerialTrainer7 (09:08.272)
for us. So you know these if you get people who will give me a million reasons why they shouldn't cold call I'll give you two million reasons why you should.
Paul M. Caffrey (09:09.723)
Yeah.
Paul M. Caffrey (09:18.715)
Yeah, I think you touch upon a lot of things there, Simon, which are really relevant. So I guess the first is actually showing the other person that you know them a little bit. And there's a little bit of a reason behind your call, whether it's their company is in the news or you are actually working with competitors in their industry or whatever. Having that reason does get people to lean in. I really agree. I really like the idea of giving them something.
because let's face it, if you give them something that's actually valuable and interesting, you do have a higher chance of them giving you a meeting or giving you the time to actually put forward a proposition. The key, I suppose the key piece with that is make sure that it is good and it is not just something which is average or bad, because if your free stuff is average, your paid stuff is probably not going to be much better or you're not going to get the chance to show this great paid stuff if it comes along.
And I think one other thing is knowing what you're going to say before you go on to the call call. I think that's where a lot of people, they trip up and they, you know, they, they delay and they're really, really slow and doing it. And for me, there's the two sides of it is number one, you know, being prepared and having something safe for each call is great. But if for some reason that's going to cause you to procrastinate or that's going to cause you to actually only do five calls, then.
just go after 50 or 60, just make the calls and go a little bit more generic, but get like getting the calls done. And there are less people calling these days. Interesting anyway. So yeah, absolutely key. What...
Simon Hares SerialTrainer7 (10:48.27)
There are. There are.
There was a post on LinkedIn a few days ago that said somebody professed to say that if you spent all day cold calling and you made 100 calls and you didn't get through to anyone and that you were rejected on all of them, then you have just wasted an entire day. That is a complete waste of time. And I sat there and I thought, well, not really because...
That person now has got 100 calls worth of experience in cold calling, in prospecting. So actually they're probably more proficient and more practised than somebody who never does it and proclaims that it's wrong or not right.
So I've got quite a lot of respect for someone that actually says, you know, I've done a lot of cold call and I haven't had a lot of success. Well, at least you've been doing it. You know, it's great. Cold calling is like the equivalent of leg day at the gym, isn't it? I mean, no one really wants to do it. But the fact is it's not forever. It's just a muscle group you have to work to support everything else. So you may as well just do it and just get it out of the way. It's not forever. But is this person who makes a hundred calls in a day and they're all cold, are they all the same call?
Paul M. Caffrey (11:48.243)
Yeah.
Simon Hares SerialTrainer7 (12:05.07)
Do we now have a position where actually they're probably able to self -correct a little bit on some of the things, learn from some of their mistakes? Well, yes, and why? Because they're doing it. So I don't believe that that person is wasted a day. That person has made a lot of contacts.
Paul M. Caffrey (12:14.427)
Yeah, absolutely.
Simon Hares SerialTrainer7 (12:20.27)
But to your point where you have to send them something that's really relevant, if that person who've made all those calls with no success then followed up by saying, I know you didn't want to go anywhere and say, but I thought I'd just send you this because I thought it was interesting for your business and it is interesting. Well, that makes the next rung on the ladder a little bit more sticky, doesn't it? So it's more relevant that he's got that opportunity or she's got that opportunity to call.
Paul M. Caffrey (12:48.123)
Yeah.
Simon Hares SerialTrainer7 (12:48.142)
So I think that, again, to your point where you said about making what you send relevant, if I'm talking to someone about management development or sales development,
One of the things I talk to for a decision -maker, especially if it's sales managers, is I'll talk to them about how difficult sometimes it is with training to measure the impact of it, to keep it alive, because otherwise it's just a nice day out, all of that stuff. So what I do is I've created a canvas that I use on having effective one -to -ones catch -ups with members of staff. And I just give that away. I just give that to them and say, this is a really cool way to have that conversation. It focuses on the key.
things that are important in sales, the metrics, the measurements, the mental health, all of that stuff. And it just acts as a prompt. You might like it, it might have better conversations, but I'll send it to you and you can use it. Well, here's the thing. Most managers are criticized quite a lot because they don't measure effectively. Their managers are quite, you know, being criticized because maybe then they fell into management. They were good at their job, not necessarily because they were a great manager, but they fell into it because they were a great salesperson, all of that.
So let's give them something that can help them. It's just something I put together, they can put out. It's like easy, easy. Like I say, make it relevant.
Paul M. Caffrey (14:04.603)
Yeah, absolutely. And what I really like about that is it's the first step, right? Ultimately, if you're managing a sales team or salespeople, you want them to actually deliver a number at the end of the year so that they're happy, you're happy, the business is happy. And a prerequisite to that is, yes, you're one -on -one meetings to make sure that things are on track, to make sure that they feel heard, that they have what they need, that any problems they have can be addressed. So in essence,
that's a first step and they get results from that, then it does set you up to come in and actually go and do the other part, which number one, you couldn't leave away if you wanted to in a download or a PDF. But number two, it does put you at the front of that being there. And a lot of us have good assets. People are probably setting down, but there is a lot of decent assets or case studies typically within businesses that you can share or that you can pull or it can be some industry insider news as well that you can that you can send across.
Simon Hares SerialTrainer7 (14:58.892)
Absolutely.
Paul M. Caffrey (14:59.675)
But I guess if we play through the call call, let's say you've played through the call call and then the your prospect has listened and then they kind of they think it's interesting. So they kind of think it's a little bit interesting. OK, Simon, what what should that what should that person who's made the call call do next?
Simon Hares SerialTrainer7 (15:19.022)
Once they've actually got that initial in and there is interest, it's important to find out why there's interest. So why is it that you're interested right now? What is it that I've said that sparked your interest? To find out exactly what it is that suddenly made something go off in their mind. If you know from what they've said that it is about something very specific, then pick up on that.
ask them things about what's the most important thing right now for you to talk about, how can you get the most value from this conversation with me and start to explore and do that discovery piece. Ultimately your biggest friends are going to be the questions that focus on time qualification, process qualification and also kind of the belief qualification. So your questions, you know we talk about open questions like we're you know blue in the face,
And you start talking about open -ended questions to salespeople they switch off But you ask a salesperson which of the main open questions delivers you an answer which will contain a process Many of them can't tell you when the answer is actually how You ask anyone a question beginning with how you get a process in return. How do you currently but plan your training? How do you currently evaluate your sales ability? You're looking for process if you want a time frame one most salespeople will get that but they forget and they're not conscious enough of when questions are
When are you looking to do something? When do you need that buy? When is your strategy being delivered? When are your costs reviewed? And the third one is the most important, which is why. And many salespeople are scared of asking why because they believe it's too nosy, it's too pushy. But the interesting thing is that all why questions, I say all why questions, 99 .9 % of why questions, are answered with the word because.
And if we analyze what that answer contains, it starts with because. It contains the truth from the client's point of view, even if they're wrong. So if you're selling advertising and you were to say to a customer, why did you choose to advertise in this particular publication or on this particular website? They might say because, because they told us that they were the market leader and that they had the biggest audience. Now,
Simon Hares SerialTrainer7 (17:32.27)
you might know that you're the market leader and that you've got the biggest audience. And if you go ahead and you contradict them and you correct them, well, well done you for being right. But being right isn't necessarily always best. What we forget in asking that question is that this person has actually already bought advertising. So that's really good. So why would we want to undermine their decision? Support them, even if they're wrong, and then weave in the benefits of what you do when it's appropriate a bit.
later. Don't be a smart ass. But use the questions in discovery to the best effect. Why, when, how are great things because they give you process, time frame and rationale and belief. So that puts a slightly different spin on your band qualification, which I still stand by because in 35 years of selling,
I still have to qualify someone as to whether they can actually afford what we're dealing with. I need to know I'm talking to a decision maker, duh. We've got to find out what they want, yes, and also we need to know when they want it. So when I think about the needs, the most important, I use the mnemonic wind up. And wind up stands for wants, intends, needs, desires, urges, and problems. So really straightforward. It's going to be one of those. We hear in sales now it's all about solving problems, but remember not everybody has a problem.
Paul M. Caffrey (18:47.995)
Cool.
Simon Hares SerialTrainer7 (18:54.286)
So sometimes their strategic direction and cold calling and prospecting will establish this. If we think about most businesses, their strategic direction with sales or something is either to grow, improve, change or maintain for strategic directions. You know, and sometimes people can't grow unless they change.
They can't improve unless they maintain. So you've got to find the right level. It's not always about growth. Sometimes that can be the ego answer. So when we're doing this prospecting piece and somebody does show you an interest, find out where you're going to go. Think about where you're going and ask the right questions that give you the most you can deal with. That's not just about saying, oh, ask open ended questions. Ask questions that are open that give you something magical back. That's really important.
Paul M. Caffrey (19:16.283)
Yeah.
Paul M. Caffrey (19:43.707)
Yeah, I think I think there's there's so there's so much there. I didn't want to interrupt you. I want you to keep going because it was really not the readers. There was a lot of different things. There's two things that jumped out at me. And one is it's a very simple question. It is something that's glossed over and there is this readers contented out of curiosity. Why is this important for you? Just me. And sometimes we.
Simon Hares SerialTrainer7 (19:48.142)
I know I did yap on, didn't I? Sorry.
Paul M. Caffrey (20:08.219)
We might get the textbook answer, well, the business needs that. But a lot of the time we find that, well, there's there's emotion behind it or some other driver or actually something has happened before and they've had their hands burned, whatever it may be. So understanding that it can be pretty important and really help you actually guide the process. So when you speak with.
somebody and let's say you've trained a management team or maybe individuals or whoever you would have in your coaching sessions. How much qualification do you recommend that they get before, let's say, booking a next call, be that maybe it's discovery or demo or the next step in your process?
Simon Hares SerialTrainer7 (20:51.854)
I would probably say that they need to get as much as they can, but not in a Mickey Mouse way where you're just going to say, so you make the decisions, right? And you've got some money, yeah? And you need it because of this, and you need it then. It's not that. It can be a far more elegant and should be a more elegant thing. And actually, that qualification side of things can take a number of calls.
You know, we don't live in this perfect sales world, you know, sometimes we have to have many, many telephone calls, but the important thing is that actually we pick up on those calls every time by saying the last time we spoke, we discussed this, this and this, has anything changed since we last spoke? No? Great, let's carry on. And once you actually get all of that qualification out of the way and that discovery out of the way,
you're going to then be in a position to take it to next steps. But if I may, just on discovering problems, we need to be clear that, and I said just now, not everyone has problems. Not everyone has problems that they are necessarily comfortable talking about. And the art of a good salesperson.
is to influence somebody to believe that you are somebody that they would want to talk to so that you will get past what we call the known spoken problem. The problem that they know they have and they're really happy to talk about. But the fact is they're talking about that to everyone that rings them up. So it gets boring and sometimes gets a bit convoluted.
What we have to do is we've got to find out what that problem is, but sometimes we've got to find out what's behind it, and sometimes that's another problem that we might call the known unspoken problem. And you mentioned just now they might have been burned with something, they might have done something, they might have even made a decision they were ashamed of, they might have made a mistake. You've got to get to that.
Simon Hares SerialTrainer7 (22:40.206)
but where the real magic lies is in the problem that as you start continuing to talk with a client and they start telling you things and that trust is built, that actually you start tripping on thoughts whereby you're thinking, I've had this conversation before, I've seen this before, I know where you're going and it could be a bad place. Where you as the salesperson with your expertise that you have and your skill of the marketplace actually uncovers the unspoken unknown problem.
Not something they're going to know about, not something they're talking about because they don't know it, but actually something that potentially they hadn't considered that you can then solve. So when we start to think about these problems, yeah, there's the stuff therapy to talk about, of boring. Maybe there's the stuff they're a bit more nervous about. Yeah, let's get some of that. But then there's the magical stuff where actually you could put something into their mind.
where actually they think, yeah, that's it. I hadn't thought of it that way. That's it. Unknown, unspoken.
Paul M. Caffrey (23:42.971)
Yeah, that's so that's such a great way to open people's eyes up to, I guess, the unconsidered needs. And also it turns you from being somewhat transactional into providing a solution and definitely separate you from the competition. Hard to do, but worth the effort of trying to do it, because then it becomes something else entirely.
And some I suppose some questions and conversation starters to maybe help people get in there to come to mind and you could maybe elaborate and improve upon these or tell me that they're completely wrong. That's also possible. Well, there you go. Yeah, next time, want to roll the dice on this? Yeah, yeah, there you go. The show has just ended.
Simon Hares SerialTrainer7 (24:20.046)
Oh, I'd never do that. As long as you're doing it, it's never wrong. Unless you're bringing it up going, hey, I've got some up, won't I?
Simon Hares SerialTrainer7 (24:29.262)
It's cheap. Really cheap. You're gonna want it.
Paul M. Caffrey (24:38.203)
What we find is when people have problems or they have a North Star that they want to take the business towards, the outcomes of your solution may actually help people get there. You buy CRM, you can improve sales by 30%. And that's just proven there's metrics, stuff behind that. But ultimately, what we want to find out is what do they believe is missing from their business? What do they believe is causing them not to be able to do that today? And kind of going into...
into that neck of the woods to try to find those unconsidered needs and maybe also challenge their thinking. If it's a case of they think it's X, but you know, from your experience, you've seen others solve that problem that, you know, that's not really going to get you to that 30 % growth or whatever it may be that you're after. I'm interested on your thoughts on questions or how to open up conversations to get people into that unconsidered needs territory.
Simon Hares SerialTrainer7 (25:32.974)
think when you you mentioned just now this what's missing thing that when you mention the bridge what's missing.
When we coach people, and I coach and counsel people as well as little extra things that we do, one of the most powerful coaching questions you can ask is actually what's missing. And it's not what's missing in your life right now. It's nothing as grand and flamboyant as that. It's just, so what's missing? And when you start to use a very explicit question like that with somebody, you're not gonna get an answer immediately. You're gonna get a pause.
And when you get that pause, it's very easy for you to fill in the gaps because we get nervous, we don't like that silence. In coaching, when you ask a question that's that direct, that short, what's missing, you'll get a consideration space open up in front of you that that person needs to think about. And yes, they might come back and say, I don't know. They might come back and say nothing, but they're more likely to come back and say, well, if there was something, it's probably going to be around this or that, and they'll keep it general.
and it gives you a place to start. So it's not about necessarily going into any form of prospecting call and just say, right, what's missing? Because that's not going to work. It is about doing those discovery questions, but thinking about where you can drop in these amazing kind of depth charger questions that go in a lot deeper and explode someone's thinking in a way that's.
more than just the average. So I believe that when we start to think about our discovery, we should lean on those people who are coaches, who are very good at asking really great questions, really good questions. There was a book that came out recently that I was recommended by a guy called Antin Morgos, and he posts every day on Daily Stoic, posts every day, it's amazing. But he recommended this book called The Book of Beautiful Questions. And it's not,
Simon Hares SerialTrainer7 (27:33.952)
It's not a sales book, but it's a book that makes you think about the way you ask a question. So if we circle right the way back to the beginning of this where we talk about asking people about cold calling and they go, oh no, but then you say, what about prospecting a new business? If you change the dynamic of the question, you will get potentially a different answer.
So therefore if we spend time thinking about the questions we ask, which questions do we ask that give us somebody's multiple points of view? What were the considerations or what were the problems that you had that led you to think that you needed a solution? And they'll list them. What conclusion did you draw after seeing all of those different things that then led you to think you needed to see something else? And they will give you one answer or they'll give you multiple answers.
think about the way that we put those questions across. It's so important. And actually, it will just open up your discovery. It really will. But it's worth spending a lot of time, but it's worth being specific as well. You can't sit there just doing discovery all day long because otherwise it gets boring. But one thing I do want to just add onto this with discovery is that if you expect a customer to listen to you and answer all of your questions, you better bloody do something with the answer.
because otherwise you've immediately wasted their time. And it's no good doing the classic spray and pray. You can't do that. You can't go, oh, right, let me tell you how a serial trainer can solve all your problems and go, bleh. You can't do that. You've got to be able to say, so earlier you mentioned this, I believe we can help you with this. And that's because you've got to be able to pick the things they're saying and then you've got to be able to weave them in so that that person still feels like you're talking about them.
because it's not about you, it's about them. So we have to be doing that. And I think that often, you know, we see this amazing discovery and I coach sales people who go in and they do a great discovery, they do a brilliant job. And then you sit there and when they go into like the match stage and you just, they're doing the value piece and it's like, you haven't said a thing back to them that they told you. Not one thing. And the worst thing you did was to talk to them about your history.
Paul M. Caffrey (29:48.443)
Yeah.
Simon Hares SerialTrainer7 (29:52.818)
You know that brilliant piece that everyone does in a bloody proposal or in a presentation? Our history. How we got here? A little about us. Stop that!
Paul M. Caffrey (29:53.723)
Yeah.
Paul M. Caffrey (30:02.459)
Yeah, it's amazing how no one cares about that. You know, at a later stage, they might want to make sure your business is reputable if you're not maybe working for a well -known brand. But yeah, giving people the option to skip that generally is a good thing. Yeah.
Simon Hares SerialTrainer7 (30:15.47)
Please, please. It's funny, isn't it? Because actually you see again on LinkedIn, that's why I love it so much. You see so many people posting that when a client eventually decides to see you or talk to you, they're already...
and the numbers will be different. 65 % through the buying process, 70 % through the buying process. So the fact is that that missing piece, that extra 30 % is going to get you over the line. That's about you. That's you. You do that. So when we lean back on things we've been taught as sales children, that people buy from people that they trust like and believe in, that will help them make money, save money, reduce risk, think like buyers, that's where all that stuff is going to come alive.
That's where it comes alive. So you don't have to do all of that other stuff because the fact is they already know. They already know. They've done their research. I've yet to go into any company in 35 years of selling and 10 years of running my own business. I've never gone into a company where they have never done any research on me. And it's...
Paul M. Caffrey (31:21.979)
That's it.
Simon Hares SerialTrainer7 (31:22.958)
They've been to the website, they've seen stuff. I mean, once and once only, I went to a recruitment agency where I was treated like a apprentice contestant. And the guy just sat there and went over my CV from LinkedIn, which he thought was my CV. And I ended up just saying, I don't think we're going to do this. I don't like the way you're talking to me, treating me. And I think we're going to, I'll leave now. And you went to shake my hands and I said no, because I wasn't wearing gloves. So.
Paul M. Caffrey (31:50.875)
Well, at you should have known where he stood.
Simon Hares SerialTrainer7 (31:53.358)
Yeah, the thing is that there's something to this as well is that, you know, salespeople sometimes forget that they've got a value and then we're not all absolutely desperate. That's the thing. You're not a desperate salesperson. People can smell that like blood in the water.
And if you are the type of person that doesn't value who you are as a sales professional, then you just come across this desperate person with his Larry Levine calls it, you know, cashew -tosis or commission breath. You're just an empty suit. And that's all you are. But, you know, that's why it's important to close off certain inquiries as well.
you know, you've got to get to a stage where a client where you're chasing them for follow up and they're ghosting you. But if it gets to a stage where, you know, they're not going to use you, then tell, give them the opportunity to say no by sending them any form of message, video message, yes, any form of, you know, email, voice message, whatever you want to do, telling them that you're going, despite contact, you're going to close their inquiry.
unless they tell you otherwise. And by doing that, you're actually saying to them, I'm giving you the opportunity to say no to me. Very few clients actually say no. They'll give you an objection, but they won't say no. What you have to do is give them that opportunity to say, yeah, we're not going to abuse you. So you can close them off so you don't waste time. But at the same time, you also get those clients who have said, oh, no, I'm so sorry. We've been a bit slip -shod. We've had other things going on. Yes, we are still interested, da da da. And then you can pick it up.
But you've got to know your value. You've got to be assertive enough to be able to know that we're not just sitting there at the end of a phone waiting for their call. We are interested. We do want to work with them. So within this prospecting piece, you've got to be able to know your value, know when to shut up, know when to stop the process, move on to the next thing.
Paul M. Caffrey (33:28.283)
Yeah.
Paul M. Caffrey (33:49.083)
Yeah, that's and that's so important, making it easy for them to say, no, I'm not interested or it's whatever that easy. And to your point, so many of those emails do come back and, oh, no, no, sorry, just busy or, you know, and sometimes people can be out of business sick for a couple of weeks or anything like that. You know, just you don't know what's going on. But then you do tend to get a response because you're sending a real message back. You know, this is where we stand and take it or leave it. Yeah.
Simon Hares SerialTrainer7 (34:02.018)
Yeah.
Simon Hares SerialTrainer7 (34:15.342)
Yeah, I do it a lot and I also do it by video message because when you've got somebody looking at you down the camera and using talking to you, actually it's a lot harder than so, you know, they are going to respond one way or another. And I think the video messaging platforms that are out there these days, I personally advocate Vidyard. I love it as Bon Bon as well. You can do it through all sorts of platforms.
Paul M. Caffrey (34:22.683)
I like that.
Paul M. Caffrey (34:31.579)
Yeah.
Simon Hares SerialTrainer7 (34:41.71)
I just think that it's so powerful. If everyone's doing it on TikTok and Instagram, doing their filters and doing all of this, you can do it for business and people love it.
Paul M. Caffrey (34:53.019)
Yeah, absolutely. And especially companies like Vidyard, I mean, you can you can set that up for free and use it. You know, there's no no threshold there. Obviously, it's they have a great model when they notice so many sales reps are using it in an organization, then they will reach out. Yeah.
Simon Hares SerialTrainer7 (35:06.562)
Yeah, I mean...
I love it and it's right there. I think about, I've done two today and you just think it's just a daily part. But I suppose when you think about what's on your phone as well, let's always remember that every phone comes with the Salesmaker app and it's free and you can talk to people in real time and they'll talk to you and they have their own unique code pool, which is your own unique way of reaching them and they can talk to you and answer you and leave you messages. And this magical
Paul M. Caffrey (35:20.697)
Hmm.
Paul M. Caffrey (35:26.775)
Wow.
Simon Hares SerialTrainer7 (35:37.936)
box stores those details so you've always got it and the sales maker app is great because it's free so why aren't we using that? Free free it's all good. Every single phone. That was our QBC moment wasn't it?
Paul M. Caffrey (35:45.883)
Yeah. On every single phone, since the start of time, I really like it. Yeah, there you go. OK, well, I guess that kind of naturally brings on, we spoke a lot about prospecting. What is your number one prospecting tip?
Simon Hares SerialTrainer7 (36:04.622)
If you don't do it, everything will get smaller.
It's as simple as that. You have a client universe, this this big. It only takes one client to stop using you. That client universe has just shrunk by one. So what are you doing to top it up? The pipe is king. That's what we say. So therefore, if you don't prospect, everything gets smaller.
And when we hear founders of businesses or people starting their business, and I work with people as well who, you know, we're just starting out and spend a lot of money on marketing and a lot of money on the website and all the stuff, they press go and hope that that happens and wonders why it doesn't.
At the end of the day, if you are not actively selling, if you're not doing it and not talking to people, because God knows you're going to have to at some point, then that client universe is going to shrink. And you can't set up a business hoping, hoping so much.
that you will get a client who will retain you. And I've heard, if I had a penny for every time someone said to me, if I could just get two or three retained clients, I'd be made. I mean, what is that mentality? That means you're just going to rely on them for the rest of your life. You know, I've worked with big clients for, you know, companies for a long time. I worked with Dickie's Workwear for four years. But the minute I landed Dickie's Workwear,
Simon Hares SerialTrainer7 (37:25.262)
my mentality was now I've got to replace it. Because if that goes, I've got to replace it, I've got to keep going. Even if that means little businesses or little pieces of work, you've got to keep it growing because you can grow that. And it's easier to grow what you've already got than sometimes the stuff you haven't got. But you've got to start from somewhere and that's where prospecting starts. So my tip is if you don't do it every day, everything will shrink.
Paul M. Caffrey (37:48.091)
There you go. Very, very clear. And absolutely, there's no truer words than that. Simon, what's your number one sales tip?
Simon Hares SerialTrainer7 (37:59.232)
Sales is about, and I'm going to quote, I'm quoting somebody on this because I love it, and I'm going to quote Carson Kresley, and he said that design is about giving the customer exactly what they want and more of what they didn't realise they needed. Sales is the same. Sales is about giving the customer exactly what they want and more of what they didn't realise they needed.
The words are very clear here, needs are essential. If you can find other ways to deliver additional value, then give them more of what they didn't realise they needed, maybe through the unspoken unknown problem.
Clients today must have exactly what they want rather than you giving them what you think is better. If you go into retail shops, you see people who've got new products and they gravitate clients to those new products because they think that's what they want. It's not, it's what the salesperson wants to talk about. So therefore, you know, think about the fact that when you're talking to someone and they tell you what need and they tell you what they want, talk about what's relevant. Don't oversell it because otherwise the sale is here and it swims in front of you and you keep
talking and over a cell net, swims out of the way. So give them what they want and more of what they didn't realise they needed and do it the right way by adding value that way. That's my kind of sales tip.
Paul M. Caffrey (39:19.387)
Yeah. It's a look, it's a really great tip and it really brings forward the thinking of, well, you know, Apple are a great business, but they come up with products people never knew they really they want it or needed. And now all of a sudden you can't live without them. So bringing that a great way to bring that into your sales world. A lot of account executives, a lot of people listen to this are constantly looking to advance their careers, get promoted, move into maybe that next sales role. What?
tips would you give somebody who's looking for promotion at the moment?
Simon Hares SerialTrainer7 (39:51.438)
The number one tip is proof. You have to prove you're good. It's no good talking about your value. It's no good talking about how brilliant you are. You've actually got to prove it. And we have to understand that when people are advancing in a company, they're looking for usually salary progression, pay progression, and also positional progression. We have to remember that a company will give you more money based on the fact that you're within a market rate. There has to be that.
There also has to be your own contribution and your own what you have done and also company's ability to pay. There isn't a magical pot of gold at the end of a rainbow. So don't necessarily think that if you're going to get advancement within your career, that pay and position need to go hand in hand. Sometimes you'll be given a position, you've got to show that you've earned it and then you get the money and it might be backpaid. That's a bit more of a strategic approach to it.
But the fact is that in sales, you should always be looking to capture all of your wins and record them in some way, every day, anything that went well, so that you can show your manager, this is what you had before I started or in this period of time, and this is what you've got now. Because otherwise, your manager could fall foul of something called recency bias, which is where they'll just look at your performance in the last couple of months. And if that's all they're doing, sometimes all the good stuff you did before that can get completely overlooked.
So you've got to be able to back up what you're saying. So when anyone wants to go to someone for any form of progression, I want them to put a business case forward. I want them to put a sales proposal together as to why they should be promoted, which will evidence all the key benefits in value as to what they've delivered. If they're using benefits in value in their sales calls and in their sales presentations, it will be very easy for them to do it.
but it's a really good way to check how they're selling, but it's also one of the best ways that you can back up your own case for getting promotion. It's not enough to talk about it, you've got to prove it and evidence it in writing. So get it down, make your manager's job easier because it's probably not them that's going to sign off, it might be someone above them.
Paul M. Caffrey (42:04.731)
Great. So, so much great advice there. Yeah. You know, walk in the talk. Yeah, there you go. I'm excited for this next part, because we spoke before and I think you're going to share something we haven't heard before. What books do you recommend people pick? What sales books do you recommend? Now, that's probably the wrong question to ask, because, well, you're going to share with us what you're what you're going to share.
Simon Hares SerialTrainer7 (42:09.23)
That's the management's clue, what we do there you see.
Simon Hares SerialTrainer7 (42:30.19)
Well, I read a lot of sales books and you and I clearly do and you're a great author with your fantastic book. And I think that when you look at all the sales books that are out there, it would be, it's too hard to say there's one. It's too hard because there's so many great stuff. If you look at the stuff that, you know, Mark Hunter turns out, Bernard Mclelland turns out, Larry Levine puts out, Jeb Blount puts out, there's some amazing, amazing stuff.
We know that the good stuff comes and it's great but there's too much to pinpoint. So what I've done is I've picked you one from the past, one for the present and one for a salesperson's future.
So from the past, one of the most influential books for me is this first edition of Robert Caldini's book of influence. And you'll see how much I love it because it's filled with post -it notes. It's really dog -eared. I've got the latest edition which includes the latest rule of influence, which is unity. So we've got that. But this book, we had him speak at a conference at a company I worked at.
He definitely changed my life because I realized that actually it's not what you know, it's how you say it sometimes to get those points over. Once I understood how interpersonal leverage worked, manipulation, persuasion, coercion, all of that, understanding influence was easy. And this I find from the past is probably one of the most influential books for me. So from the past is this one. And there is a modern version of this now. For the present with sales.
It's always and always will be for me about great habits and this stands head and shoulders for me every time. Every time. Those marginal gains that James Clear talks about. Everyone knows this book. You know, I posted a picture of me with this book when I first got it and it got something like 6 ,000 likes really quick and it was like it wasn't my mug and it wasn't the dog and he normally gets lots of likes. It was this book. So...
Simon Hares SerialTrainer7 (44:26.062)
For the present, it's about creating great habits and marginal gains. And in sales, don't we always talk about just one more call? So this is the good stuff. This is great for the present. But if you've got salespeople that want to improve and they want to improve their mindset, because sales is about mindset as well, then there is nothing better than Rick Denley's book, Reinvent Yourself. Rick's book is lean. There's not a scrap of fat on it.
Paul M. Caffrey (44:34.363)
Absolutely.
Simon Hares SerialTrainer7 (44:56.174)
He talks about grit, he talks about perseverance, he talks about mindset. Rick is an amazing leadership speaker. And as such, this book is so good at keeping your mindset where you need it to be. And if you are thinking about developing your career, improving yourself through marginal gains by using that, but also thinking about long -term development and improvement, you can go a lot worse than this. This is truly superb.
Very, very good. And all of these people you should talk to on LinkedIn as well. I mean, Robert Caldini is probably too big and famous to talk to, let alone me, but you know, I've spoken with James Clear and Rick Denley, so all good. So these are my three books, a past, a present, and a future.
Paul M. Caffrey (45:39.137)
Excellent. And I've read two, so I'm really excited to read the third. So Rick Denley's book, I'm going to have to go and get that and check it out.
Simon Hares SerialTrainer7 (45:48.046)
Connect with him on LinkedIn, tell him I sent you. He's a lovely, lovely guy. Really good. Really good.
Paul M. Caffrey (45:53.243)
Excellent. And I guess when it comes to sales preparation and getting ready, what does, let's say, doing the work before the work mean for you and your world?
Simon Hares SerialTrainer7 (46:04.27)
For me, that preparation piece is really important because you can over -prepare Paul, you really can. And that if you over -prepare, you will end up asking questions you already know the answers to. And you won't leave anything to talk about because you know it all and that's a bit short -sighted. Often people that over -prepare are a little bit shy about talking and then they're procrastinating on that as well. So for me, it's really simple. The work involves me asking myself, what do I already know?
What don't I know? What do I need to ask? And most importantly, how am I going to ask it? So kind of four questions. And then my little bonus thing that I always do is I try to think of the objections that I'm going to get. And then what I do is I choose the right objection and I say it to the customer before they say it to me. For example,
So we'll be talking about sales training. I might say you might be thinking that sales training is really expensive and you'd actually be right. It does require a significant investment.
So they can't then turn around and say, gee, you're too expensive. They might turn around and say, do you know what? We want to do sales training, but at the moment we just don't know when. There's never really a good time to do it. That's the objection. So what you turn around and you say, it's great to be talking to you now. Now I understand there's never a good time for doing sales training because they've got targets. You know, if you look at May last year, we had the coronation. There was never a full week, you know, all those things. There's never a good time to do it, but at least we're here now and we're getting the ball rolling. Guess what? They can't be.
and say, it's the wrong time of year. If you put in a little bit of preparation and you put it out there before they do, then actually you've dealt with it and you've dealt with it on your terms. So it's, especially with the price objection, you know, if you operate in a space where actually you are more expensive or you're in the luxury sector, or even if you think you're expensive when actually you're not, but you're a bit worried about talking about money too much.
Paul M. Caffrey (47:45.307)
Wow.
Simon Hares SerialTrainer7 (48:09.966)
Maybe when you were brought up, you were told don't talk about money because it's vulgar and never ask how much it costs. Well, kick that out the door. Salespeople don't need that.
If that's you, then actually get in practice to say, you might be thinking that something like this might be something that requires a lot of investment or something's quite dear or expensive. You'd be right. It does require significant investment, both in time and in money. Well, actually you're managing the client's expectations then, aren't you? So as part of your preparation to do the kind of, what do I already know? What don't I know? How am I going to say it? What am I going to say?
Add in a bit of what goes the objection that I think I might get or what's the most common objection, spin it round, stick it in front of the client before they say it, and then it's already being handled on your terms.
Paul M. Caffrey (48:57.143)
Excellent. That is so much sage advice there. Thanks so much for coming on, Simon. If people want to find you, find out more about your business, how can they do that?
Simon Hares SerialTrainer7 (49:07.63)
So the place that I hang out the most because I hang out where my customers hang out, which is what everyone should do, is good old LinkedIn because it is awesome. It's really cool. Put a lot of content up there. So anyone can contact me through LinkedIn and the messaging center there. You can also reach me on the serialtrainers7 .com website. You can reach me there. And all my contact details are on there.
and through this lovely podcast and you should hold up your book as well as well while we're here talking. Hold up your book, do a little bit of Paul Caffrey promo on your book because it is amazing. Yeah, but yours. There we go. There we are. That's a cool sales book. Let's have that. That's a cool sales book. That's the book we should be promoting.
Paul M. Caffrey (49:41.755)
I've so many of there behind me. There we go. That's mine. A lot of other books as well. Available wherever you get your books. Sorry.
Paul M. Caffrey (49:55.419)
Yeah, this one, this one, get this one. Simon, thanks so much for coming on. It's been an absolute blast. I look forward to the next time we speak.
Simon Hares SerialTrainer7 (50:03.566)
Thank you so much. Thanks for having me.
