Habits of Influence

Redefining Sales: A Humanized Approach with Veteran Dean Forbes

• Magdalena Hanah & Dean Forbes • Season 2 • Episode 26

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Get ready to unearth the secrets of a seasoned veteran in sales training, Dean Forbes, as we redefine the sales paradigm. With over two decades of experience under his belt and a whopping $279 million in sales to his name, Dean invites us to shed the stigma around sales and embrace a more humanized approach.

Our conversation with Dean challenges common misconceptions, suggesting that a robust sales training doesn't necessarily turn you into a manipulating machine. Instead, we unfold the idea of seeing if a person is truly qualified to buy before pushing products onto them - an approach that promises consistent and predictable achievement of sales targets. As we journey through Dean's personal sales adventure, we're introduced to the mentors who’ve been instrumental in his career and learn how to navigate the often misunderstood world of persuasion, objections, and discounting in sales.

Our talk with Dean extends beyond just theory; we delve into practical aspects of sales strategies, exploring how to identify and leverage unique selling points during a sales call and ways to train your team to maximize productivity and revenue. We wrap up with Dean sharing his anticipation for the upcoming changes in Habits of Influence. So, gear up for a deep plunge into the uncharted waters of sales with our expert guide, Dean Forbes. Don't forget to subscribe and turn on notifications so you don't miss out on any updates. You're in for an enlightening conversation!

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To connect with Dean, go to:

https://www.epexacademyhq.com/sales-accelerator

https://www.facebook.com/deanforbeslive

Support the show

You can always send us your feedback, and/or episode topic requests to: habitsofinfluence@gmail.com!

Magdalena Hanah:

Let's talk sales. Some people love them, some people hate them. Apparently, buyers love to buy but hate to be sold to. Every day, there's new sales trainings emerging and we get countless ways of how to improve conversions, overcome objections, persuade, sell with heart and others Looking at it from the outside. In sales are a bit of contradictions, but at the same time, the variety of approaches offer a way to incorporate the best sales tactics we personally feel good about and that work best with our personal moral standards.

Magdalena Hanah:

Today. Let's dive deep and find out if having a good, solid sales training truly means that you're an immoral, manipulative person tricking others by your persuasive tactics. And do those tactics really work in a world where we have more and more savvy and what follows skeptical bias? My guest today is Dean Forbes, a sales training expert, creator of the ASQ selling model, who, with over 20 years of sales experience and helping generate more than $279 million in sales across nine different industries, believes that the best way to consistently and predictably achieve your sales targets you need to learn how to humanize the sale selling process. So what does it mean to humanize sales and what should we really be doing to consistently hit those targets in our own business. If that is something you're interested in, stick around as Dean works his approach and gives advice that can improve your business as quickly as today.

Magdalena Hanah:

Hello, if it's your first time tuning in, oh, welcome back. My name is Magdalena Hanna and this is Habits of Influence a podcast for entrepreneurs by entrepreneurs, where we discuss the good, the bad and the ugly sides of building movement and entrepreneurship. Let's dive right in. Hey, dean, so awesome of you to come to the show. Thank you so much for showing up.

Dean Forbes:

Hi, magdalena, for having me. I've been looking forward to this day for a while because I think you're amazing, and so I just want to be here to add some major value to the audience that is listening into your show right now.

Magdalena Hanah:

The feeling is mutual. I've been watching all of your videos on social media and I am absolutely in awe of the way of how you approach sales, because it's kind of close to my heart, as in the way I approach marketing. I think there's a lot of misconceptions in this world, or in business in general, about marketing and sales as being something sleazy, manipulative, immoral, something that people just use to trick others to do certain things. Which couldn't be further from the truth. Right, and I can see that your approach to sales is quite similar. You see sales as an art form. You see sales as something that can be done in a kind, loving, service-like way. So could you please tell me what do you think about those misconceptions? What are sales to you deeply? What do you think sales should be and why do people perceive it in such a wrong way?

Dean Forbes:

Alright, so let's unpack all of those. First of all, what do I think of the misconceptions? I mean, it's really it's sad because it's just a bunch of BS around the misconceptions, and unfortunately, so many service providers and salespeople also buy into those beliefs, which is why their sales tactics and strategies actually suck and actually cost them way more money, time, energy and, worse of all, their reputation than anything else that they do, and so the misconceptions are actually dangerous to our industry. But I guess some people would say that that's why I have a job, right? So we would say that.

Dean Forbes:

So for me, you know, when I here's a funny thing, the funny thing about sales to me, and maybe it means something different to other people, but for me it's about impact, right? So what I found my philosophy has always been wake up every day with what I call an impact first mindset. So before you make any decisions around what you're going to do, it's what's going to be the impact of my next decision. How's it going to impact that person, this group, these people, my loved ones, how is that going to impact the circle that I'm about to touch? Once I have that in mind and my intentions are set, then I can serve right. So sales about impact, and sales has just been the vehicle that I've found to be the best at actually creating massive, wide and deep impact on other people, because we live in a world of buyers who need stuff, services, everything else. The question is, how do you guide someone to making the best decision they could possibly make for their lives? And that's what sales is to me.

Magdalena Hanah:

I love that. I love that, and I wish more people realized how much not only power lies in sales, but how much good can it bring if it is done the right way, Because it's not about pushing things onto people that they don't need. I mean, like you said, of course there's going to be people who do it. It's all about it, all about the money. The only goal is to actually sell, sell, sell, push, push, push, regardless of what the person needs. But a real salesperson and correct me if I'm wrong is the one who is actually going to dig so deep that they're going to find out what is the best solution for the person, rather than just wanting to make a sale at all costs.

Dean Forbes:

Correct. That is 100% true. You know it's interesting. What we're saying is when you're in a sales conversation, if you take away all the fluff about you know having the mindset this, that and that, here's the attitude. The attitude is really is this person even qualified to have my services? And by qualified I mean do they need it or do they just want something and they need to buy something Like are they really qualified? So, in other words, it's not.

Dean Forbes:

If I believe in what I do and I know it's going to create the results that it's supposed to create for the people who need it, why would I let you in to half ask my stuff and ruin? My rep Can't do that. So it's about are you even qualified? So there are lots of times in a conversation I'll let a prospect know that in one, some form or another, that I'm literally quality. I'm interviewing you right now to see if you're even qualified to actually work with me Right now. It took some time to develop that level of confidence but honestly I mean I reject probably 30% of the people that I talk to. So you know you gotta go to the surface.

Magdalena Hanah:

I mean, the reason why I'm laughing is because in my own experience and I I do sales course as well in my business, outside of the other people that do them, but I like to do sales course, which is surprising because most people actually stay away from them. They don't want to do them. But the funniest part is when you actually you know, obviously you say that upfront, right, If I'm not the right fit, or if you're not, I'm not the right fit, I'm going to recommend you to somebody else. I'm going to recommend you some resources that you could have for now. But people are actually so surprised when you say, well, I'm so sorry, but I don't think that this is right for you.

Dean Forbes:

Yeah, every single time. And you know what's funny is, 15 minutes into a conversation that's booked for 45 minutes. I'll probably know and I'll just call it out, I'll stop and I'll say so. I probably. So I don't even know what. So tell me again, why'd you book this call? Then you tell me and I go well, so it sounds to me like you need this and this. Is that some right to you? Yeah, well, interesting enough that that's not something that we do here. So I'm not sure if this is the vehicle for you. So what was it that made you book a call with me, specifically Like why did you do that?

Dean Forbes:

And sometimes they'll tell me something I go oh, okay, well, now that makes a little more sense. Or they'll tell me something I go Well, it's not fit. And then there are times I go look. So I'm gonna leave it up to you, magdalena. You know, when you came on, you said and B, which is not something we do. Then, when I asked you really why we dug deeper, you said X, y and Z, which is exactly what we do. So why don't you tell me where would you like to go from here? And then they tell me and that's how I know I just ask the question, all right, and rather than going around and around in circles and making it all awkward and then that's when it gets kind of sleazy, because you're trying to convince the person that they should be in your vehicle, even though they're trying to be on the bus.

Magdalena Hanah:

There you go, boom, boom. And, by the way, for anybody watching or listening, this was a real life sales training right on the spot, right on the habits of influence. So pay attention to your notes how you should do it.

Dean Forbes:

That's how you should say it.

Magdalena Hanah:

All right, Dean, so could you please tell me why sales? I mean, you've been in it for a very long time now 20 years, that is a huge chunk of time. What made you go into sales? What sparked that interest? Why did you decide, yeah, this is for me. What was that pivotal moment that you said hmm, I'm really good at this, I want to do this and I'm going to do this for a very long time now.

Dean Forbes:

That's a great question. You know. What's funny is I didn't choose sales. I didn't really choose sales until I was doing it for about 10 years. So it's been 23 years. So here's what I mean by that Sales actually chose me, because I mean, I've probably been in sales for probably 30 years if I'm not, if I'm telling the whole truth, to be honest. But I didn't choose it probably till 10, 15 years in.

Dean Forbes:

And here's why my first real time recognizing that I even had a sales job like that it's sales was when I worked on Wall Street back in 1999 to 2001. And I was actually delivering presentations to companies and you know C-Sweets on what commodities they should buy, and my boss at the time would, you know, close the deal. But I was doing the presentations. But the truth of the matter is the sale happened in the presentation, obviously, but I at the time I was a communication liaison, right, so it wasn't even dub sales, right, but I was literally selling in presentations. And so years after that, in 2003, I started working at L'Oreal. You know, after the whole 9-11 situation and everything else, I ended up at L'Oreal working for this company called Redkin and I started out of all places in finance, to be honest. But again, I would be on the phone selling the forecast to distributors from the finance department, right? So even then I didn't realize it was sales, right? So then back to the mentor.

Dean Forbes:

I told you about Ann Minsee. We do a symposium, this like 2007, in Las Vegas, with 10,000, you know beauty professionals coming to this whole thing, and by this point Ann Minsee and I had developed a relationship, became like my mentor and everything else. She was the VP of communications at Redkin L'Oreal, and so that morning there was a pep rally for all the team leaders who were leading their teams to actually have the rah, rah, rah before we get started to serve our people. So she watched mine because I was leading the team that was serving the education department and the gallery where we're selling products and services. So she watched mine and then, about 15 minutes after it was over, everybody was dispersed to go do their thing. I get this note from LaShada, who was my second in command at the time. She said Ann Minsee wants to see you now in her dressing room. Now here's what's funny Ann Minsee's like the icon, right? So when she wants to see you, either good or you're in trouble.

Dean Forbes:

So, I wasn't sure. So I was like but now she's like no, no, no. Now she said right now you got to go. So I go down to Ann Minsee's dressing room and she's such a she makes you feel like you're the only person in the world when she's talking to you. She's got the mirror in front of her. She sees me in the back of her, she goes, spins around, she goes Dean, there you are, bless your heart. Now come sit down here with me.

Dean Forbes:

So I go sit down with her and she says you know, dean, I've been watching you now for a few years and you know you're amazing. You know you're incredible and you know I think you're meant for like great things. And I'm like where is this going? And she goes there's something I'd like to give you. It was given to me by my pastor about a decade ago because of some things he saw in me, and I now see those same things in you, and so I want to give this to you. And she took my hand, put it out like this and then she put an index card in my hand and clasped it with my other hand and she said this is what you're meant to do. So I take the index card, I open it up, I look at it and I had one word on it others, that's it. She said, dean, you are meant to extract the best from other people. This is what you are charged to do, and I am charging you to do this from this day forward. Then, after she called me on stage that same evening for the grand opening and everything else, when I talked to her later on at dinner, she said I want you to look around this company and I want you to find the space where you can have the greatest impact on the greatest number of people.

Dean Forbes:

Well, that was sales. And so, when the opening came, to be Director of Sales in Division 100, I went straight to the top and said I want this job. As a matter of fact, I went to another mentor, ed Bullock, and he said I said, hey, ed, this is a job coming up. I think I can do it. And he said what are you doing in my office, dean? I said what do you mean? He said well, that was passive. Nobody's ever called me passive before in my life. And I was like Ed. What do you mean? He said tell me what you want from me. What do you want. I said, okay, well, there's a job in Division 100 for the business development position in sales and I want to know who's going to be in that job, because I want that job. So when you hear about it, I want you to tell the person who's in charge that I am the guy for the job. That's what I want from you. And he said, okay, I can do that and I get out of my office and done.

Magdalena Hanah:

So you sold yourself to him. Basically, I did.

Dean Forbes:

It's one of the best presentations I've heard he made me do it. He literally said that sounds passive to me. I don't know what you want from me.

Magdalena Hanah:

That is great.

Dean Forbes:

And at that point I focused on sales and then I was able to just really play and work with a lot of incredible people, Many of them incredible women actually, because it's the beauty industry, so it's predominantly women and so that was one of the most incredible times of my life and business career everything.

Magdalena Hanah:

That sounds awesome, so it sounds like a great career path. It sounds like something that can really make a person excited and something certainly and I know for just looking at it myself it's something that you can constantly evolve in. Why do you feel that people hate sales so much? I mean business owners specifically, because when we're not talking about customers right now, why? Do people hate sales.

Dean Forbes:

I think people hate sales because nobody really likes to be sold to or sold, basically, and because they've been sold for so long and then get burnt. I think people are just burnt out on a whole idea of sales and I think that every salesperson is like bringing snake oil right, and I truly think that again, because salespeople, unfortunately and I'm going to go ahead and say like 90% of them also buy into that stigma and so they conduct themselves like they're trying to hide the fact that we're snake oil salesmen, and so it comes across as that, so it looks terrible right Comes across as manipulative and pushy and just tricking and things like that. And also it's like nobody understands how to disarm a person ethically Right. It's so bad that I want to use that terminology to somebody. I think I did it on Facebook once and then I did it in person once and I said how do you disarm your prospect? And they got all up in arms about me About what.

Dean Forbes:

What do you mean? Disarming your prospect? That's so wrong. They could not grasp the concept. That understand that psychologically, we are all armed with a barrier of skepticism and I don't trust you. We are armed with that. You have to learn how to ethically disarm your potential client before they can hear you. If you can't do that, you're in trouble.

Magdalena Hanah:

Well, there you go, boom. And I think a lot of people are very bad at sales. Unfortunately, and I know that both you and me we agree on something it is that constant fight, especially in our industry, which is like coaching and consulting to DM or not to DM, which I personally, and I know you stand on that same kind of side as me. I see nothing wrong with sending private messages. In fact, it's a great way to connect with prospects, with potential leads, and it's just a case of you knowing how to speak to those people, not in a way that is pretend friendship Sort of thing, or being like really disgustingly upfronts like hey, would you sleep with me?

Dean Forbes:

Yeah right, Like let's go to bed together.

Magdalena Hanah:

Yeah, exactly, so there's such a great area and such a nice, you know, atmosphere in between of those two things that people do not understand. And I really find it funny that a lot of people are so defensive about it, saying, oh, would you want to sell me? It's like, obviously, you know, if I'm in your DMs, I'm not trying to take you for a walk in the park, I'm not trying to, you know, find a friend, because if I'm messaging you from my business profile, I might be looking for a collaboration, a mutual agreement of some sorts, where we can, you know, perhaps help each other, or you might be my potential client, but either way, they are all business arrangements, right, but I'm not going to know unless I speak with you.

Dean Forbes:

Exactly, exactly. I don't know why people get so open arms about any type of communication. Here's a problem. People believe that the vehicle is broken, when the truth is you're getting into the vehicle broken. You are broken. That's why you can't use these vehicles and there's nothing wrong with these vehicles. The context is perfect. Your content sucks. Your content sucks. I mean, here's another idea.

Dean Forbes:

I jump into your DM and I say hey, you know, magdalena, I noticed that you're a coach in marketing and I typically help marketers in coaching and things like that. But before I ask you any questions about your business, I'm just curious how do you typically use Facebook? Like, why do you actually? How do you typically use Facebook? Because I don't want to. You know, I don't want to come off and do anything that you wouldn't appreciate. Every time I ask somebody how they typically use Facebook, you know what their answer is. They laugh like a funny line. They go well, yeah, you know my inbox is full of this kind of stuff, but I appreciate you asking me that. Typically, I'm here to do that and all of a sudden the conversation is open. Done, I mean. There you go, guys, I just gave you like a million dollar tip. Honestly, use it. Ask the person how to use Facebook or wherever you, wherever, whatever platform you're on, they will tell you Absolutely.

Magdalena Hanah:

Or shameless plug from the point of view of a marketer. Learn to do such good content that they land in your inbox, and I'll ask you that.

Dean Forbes:

Or that, or that, yeah, but yeah, there's always a good way of doing things.

Magdalena Hanah:

So, which is me greatly to what you actually specialize in, and I wanted to talk about that concept of humanizing sales. What does it mean to humanize sales and how can people incorporate that into their daily sales training or what they do with from potential lead or clients?

Dean Forbes:

Yeah Great question, and so you know it's really just bringing humanity back to the game. So what does that really mean? Well, people don't want to be sold right, and they also don't want to be told what to do, like every time I ever ask the question from say let's say, raise your hands right now, if you just love to be told what to do, if you love people to start a sentence by saying you know what you need to do, raise your hand right now if you love that. You know how many people raise their hand every time I ask that question.

Dean Forbes:

It is a whole. It's a whole. It's like crickets, right? So what does that mean? What that means is the best way to persuade a person to enroll or purchase your offer of any kind is for them to persuade themselves, and the only way you can get a person to do that is by asking them the appropriate questions at the right time, in the right tone and using the right visual cues. When you do that, they will persuade themselves as to whether or not they need your offer. End of story. That's how you organize a process. You put the onus back on the person.

Magdalena Hanah:

Absolutely, I agree with you. But there comes the echo of that sales guru from, you know, facebook or Instagram. And what about objections? Can you please, please, please, speak into that, because I know that we kind of stand on the same ground on this.

Dean Forbes:

So you know, if, first of all here's my shameless plug If you're a student of ASQ which is why I teach the art and science of questioning you'll find that you will probably reduce or eliminate almost all the regular objections that you normally get. That's the first thing. They're eliminated in the process of the questioning, right? And even if they're not completely eliminated, you actually have what I call leverage. But you need to use leverage responsibly, right? So here's an example.

Dean Forbes:

Objections are just concerns around like either fear, uncertainty or trust. Really, that's what it comes out to Fear, uncertainty and trust, like people need to be certain it's going to work. Sometimes, what people do is they always answer an objection with a rebuttal yeah, but where did it wrong? Oh, don't do that. I don't care what the objection is, as soon as a person makes it. Ask a question, get to the real concern, people, right? A money objection is not often a money objection. A time objection is not often an actual time objection, right? So you need to ask a question.

Dean Forbes:

I says that price is too steep. Well, magdalena, when you say the price is too steep, can you tell me a little bit more about what you mean by that? Because it's either you didn't add enough value for them to go okay, this is worth it, right. Or you didn't connect with them on such a deep emotional level that they get why they need to skate over to what you're doing. One of those two things is off. So you got to ask them, what do you mean by that? And say well, I know this company that's offering the same thing and they're offering for 5,000 less. And guess what most salespeople do. As soon as somebody says that, oh well, we can do it for you for 10 instead of 15, if that's what you want, that's different. So here's the problem with that. As soon as you do that, whatever level of trust they had in you or didn't have in you before, just one from 5 to now, you're done.

Magdalena Hanah:

Yeah.

Dean Forbes:

Because here's what they hear. Wait a second. You just told me it was 15. So when you said it was 15, it wasn't really 15. Oh, you're finished. Don't do that. So objections are really just uncertainty, fear and lack of trust. And if you can overcome those barriers a lot of times you know the sales done. I mean really the only barrier to any. If your service really solves a problem, at the end of the day the person just doesn't have two pennies to scrape together. Okay, done, deal. Now I'm not saying you're going to close at 100% when you go through ASQ, but you're definitely going to go at like 30, 35%, easy, you know, which is way above any industry standard that anybody's ever heard of. But that's just you know, just me. So yeah, Definitely.

Magdalena Hanah:

And something comes to mind I used to. I remember one of my shows last year was talking about discounting services and I have my own viewpoint about discounting services. But what would you say, based on what you've just told me and the potential pitfalls that it may cause to, is there ever a moment where you should or could discount and that is not going to reflect badly on your offer, on your service?

Dean Forbes:

Yeah, that's a great question. By the way, I get this one all the time, and most of the people who know me well know that Dean hates the word discount, right. I don't like the connotation it comes with, and so I use things like bonus or reward, and it's really so. People might say, oh, it's a trick. No, psychologically speaking, I am not trying to diminish my credibility in any way, shape or form, but the way you use bonuses and rewards is and if you want to call a discount, it's fine there must be purpose driven.

Dean Forbes:

You can't just you can't discount on the idea of price, because if you do that you will lose all credibility in the market. That's the bottom line in any day. You can't discount to meet the price of the market, right? Your price needs to meet your demand, right. That's pretty much it.

Dean Forbes:

There's no if, ands and buts about it, and so a discount to me when I use it, would sound like hey, look, one of the things we do here for sure is we work with decisive people, and you just got done telling me that you're a 10 on the process. I just explained to you that you want to do these things right here and that it's important to you to get it done within the next six days. Is that true or not true? Is I right about that or not? Yes, senior, absolutely right about that. Okay, great, so you know. Everything else aside, you would jump into this program right now. Yes, I would Perfect. Well, because you're decisive. Our fast action discount says that instead of 10,000, we're going to do set 9,000 right now, today, this one you just told me you should be ready to go. Where would you like to go from here? That's a discount.

Dean Forbes:

Okay, fast action, bonus, boom, that's how I do it, something like that.

Magdalena Hanah:

Fair enough, and just so you guys know those listening to the podcast or watching us on YouTube it's slightly different. If you have products, there's additions. The bonuses would be to increase the perceived value, for example. But a lot of things correlate and a lot of things would be similar as well. By devaluing the product price just because someone else has priced it lower, you're actually devaluing your product in general. So I'm also not pro any sort of discount. I'm also not a fan of all those what's it called? The?

Magdalena Hanah:

bonus stacks or marketing sets that people advertise, because I feel that the service or the product should stand for itself and if there is a value to the product and you know that the value is there, there is no reason to put in additional 50 things that you're going to give for free in some other periods of time and just call them as bonuses.

Magdalena Hanah:

This is worth this much. The perceived value should be there and the discounts, if they are there, in my opinion should be loyalty discounts. So a little bit different You've just explained here. So, for example, if a person is with you on a retainer, I would give a loyalty discount to people that wish to continue or wish to purchase another program or wish to get a discount, for example, for someone else that I refer, because oftentimes I do have a Rolex of people that I kind of communicate with and I know well, and if it's something that I can't help with we're not all geniuses and everything Then I just refer them to people and sometimes I have arrangements that, hey, if you go through me, if you say that you're from me, then you're going to get this for X and X less, for example.

Dean Forbes:

Exactly, I love the way you just put that. That makes perfect sense to me For sure. I love loyalty. Loyalty programs, right, I mean it makes sense and, again, purpose driven right, because those are the people that become raving fans and they can't stop talking about you anyway. So, at the end of the day, if you give away a few points for somebody to refer 10 people to you, what do you care?

Magdalena Hanah:

Exactly. How does it?

Dean Forbes:

work, take it, take it and go.

Magdalena Hanah:

So they're working with a lot of people. Because you are also helping people, you train teams and you train individuals in sales. What do you see is the biggest mistake that people make? Something that is kind of reoccurring, something that you come in and see over and over again, that it's kind of trumping people's ability to sell.

Dean Forbes:

All right. So, by the way, they pay me like 10K for this one. Yes, Extra people, habits of influence.

Magdalena Hanah:

Remember, subscribe and love.

Dean Forbes:

This is so much fun, so, actually. So, in all seriousness, magdalena, I'm going to give you and your audience one that I can tell you right now that 99% of the sales trainers out there are never thinking about and they're not teaching people. This Number one mistake or top three, let's just say is that most people in sales refuse to embrace their vulnerability. Okay, so, yeah, if you don't, if you don't embrace your vulnerability, it will come through. As you try to, you'll be thinking about you.

Magdalena Hanah:

The entire time, yeah.

Dean Forbes:

You won't be in your head. So if you're in your head, how do you expect to get your client into their heart? So you got to get out of your head and into your heart so you can get them out of their heads and into their hearts, because that's where they need to be. But if you're not embracing your vulnerability and accepting for what it is, then you'll be thinking about you and you're going to be here the entire time that you're talking. That's a huge mistake, plagues so many people.

Magdalena Hanah:

I think I could just do this now. I wouldn't because it's very expensive, but I want to throw this now.

Dean Forbes:

You're toast, you don't embrace your vulnerability. Or toast You're toast? Oh wow, and it is dog. Smell that dog. Smell it. Dogs and kids, they know.

Magdalena Hanah:

Wow, I just, I just had a mind blown moment, and this is because, yeah, it all makes sense, it kind of it's going to, they're going to feel it, it's going to show it's going to show. If you're in your head, you're going to be thinking like my program, my program, the benefits of the features, the. How can I sell this? When do I ask what?

Dean Forbes:

Yeah, then all of a sudden you go oh my God, I forgot to button one of my buttons on my shirt, and now you're really in your head Zipper is down.

Magdalena Hanah:

Oh dear, oh dear.

Dean Forbes:

And now you're really in your head and that if you're in your head you're definitely going to get tripped up or they're going to see it and people don't trust like nervous people who won't admit they're nervous number one. But if you just seem a little, it's so subtle but people psychologically pick up on it and their resistance just go up.

Magdalena Hanah:

But it's so much like life. We just have this inherent need to be seen, to be noticed. And if you are talking to somebody who's continuously just thinking like do I have a spot here? Just like it's something on my I don't know my team for something like that, just like one time they have to make dinner, they're just not focused on you, they're focused on themselves and they respond and they're speaking to you. They can feel that and it's like the heck are you doing? Like, why are you not focusing on me? Where are you?

Dean Forbes:

Where are you? Where exactly are you? Where exactly are you? That is brilliant, and so you've got to yeah, got to get out of your head and into your heart.

Magdalena Hanah:

So what is? Obviously without talking to people who are all sales professionals, but as people being in business and those are the majority of our listeners we all should possess those skills of how to sell, even if we are outsourcing it to other people or an outside company. What is that one thing that people can do today in order to improve their sales just a little bit Like? What is that one thing that a person, whether mindset, tactic-wise, whatever you feel is important that can make that switch into becoming a better salesperson?

Dean Forbes:

Ah, wow, Magdalena, you just that's a tall order you just gave me. So let me think about that for a second. Like so, if I want to give you one thing today that you can flip the switch on tomorrow and it will make a big difference. So I'm going to stay away from the whole mindset stuff. We all know mindset is crucial to anything you're going to do, right? So let's stay away from that for a second and do something really simple that you can actually do today.

Magdalena Hanah:

Meat and potatoes. Yes, yes, yes, we like that, Okay.

Dean Forbes:

So flip every statement you will make in your next sales conversation into a pointed question.

Magdalena Hanah:

Good Done, that's it.

Dean Forbes:

Yeah, yeah. Instead of saying we're the best at this, ask the person so, magdalena, if you were to work with the best company in the world at doing X, Y and Z, what kind of company would you say that is? Could you describe them for me? And then they'll do it and say, okay, cool. So you're saying, if a company could provide this, this and this, you would consider them the best company on the planet. Okay, great. Now, when you sell your solution, say, magdalena, remember when you said you would consider the company the best if they provided A, b and C. Yep, okay, awesome. Well, when it comes to A, we do it da, da, da, da, da da. And we have a 100% success rate. When it comes to B, we've been doing this for like the last 20 years. What we found is that people who do this da, da, da, da, da da. And when it comes to C, this is what makes us really really shine. We love C why? Because we found that it's the best way to get our clients the best results.

Magdalena Hanah:

And this is brilliant. How does that sound?

Dean Forbes:

And that's what you do.

Magdalena Hanah:

That sounds brilliant. I know some people would struggle, though, into finding what is my unique selling point. I know you should do that as a marketer. I'm going to tell you you should do that, you should know that, but sometimes it's hard, like I said, to get out of your own head. And if there is something that I can actually add to this because I think this is absolutely brilliant is you can incorporate the question at the beginning of your sales call of asking the person well, why did you book with me? What would you choose me?

Magdalena Hanah:

You know, as a see of other people doing the same shit as I do, because now it's not so difficult to have hundred and fifty other marketing coaches, sales coaches, right. What made you choose me? And that person will actually tell you. What's that unique selling point? What was that thing that clicked? What was that thing that grabbed their attention? What was that thing that made you stick out or stand out from the crowd of people?

Dean Forbes:

Exactly, exactly. And then your responsibility.

Magdalena Hanah:

Dean's genius tactic and just like smash it.

Dean Forbes:

Well, you just go back and let me say remember when you told me that, well, this is why we blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. That's it. Remember when you what Remember? When you told me it's not, I told you, you told me, you told me yeah. That's it.

Magdalena Hanah:

remember when you told me oh, this is brilliant If you can do that, then you know game over, I love it. I love it. Dean, I could speak to you all day. I swear to God, this is so interesting and we will speak outside of this.

Dean Forbes:

I'm sure we will. I'm sure we will. This is great. This is awesome. Thank you so much.

Magdalena Hanah:

But for now, you're very welcome. For now, for our listeners and for people watching on YouTube. If anybody is interested in training their team, or training themselves, or wanting to get better at what they do in terms of sales training, how can they find you? How can I contact you? Is there a website? Is there a training? Is there a social media? Tell us everything.

Dean Forbes:

So the best way for them to contact me is really on Facebook and Messenger, because I live there, right. So then go to Facebook, right? You can find me. Just put in Dean Forbes and it'll probably pop up. I'm pretty sure it does. The website is epicsacademyhqcom slash sales accelerator. That's the training that they can go watch if they want to do that. So they put in epicsacademyhqcom actually, and just click free training. Go see the free training right there.

Magdalena Hanah:

Awesome stuff Easy easy, easy.

Magdalena Hanah:

Guys, remember that all of the links for Dean are, as per usual, going to be outlined for you in the description of the episode on YouTube, as well as in the description of all the episodes on all of your favorite podcast platforms, wherever you get your podcasts. So please do find Dean over there. If anything else, check out his training, reach out to him on social media. I do contest that. He is living on Facebook and Messenger. That's how we do that, so he is there for you If you have any questions, if you want to know more and Dean last thing for you before we wrap up what are the services specifically that you offer right now that people could actually tap into?

Dean Forbes:

Yeah. So number one and two, really just two. One is training service providers on how to actually master the timeless model of selling ASQ so that they can actually enroll more clients into their programs and go ahead and create that big impact that they want to create. So if you're a service provider of any kind coach, expert, whatever you want to call it then and, by the way, if you're doing less than 50K per month in your business, you have no business outsourcing your sales team. You should be doing that yourself, otherwise the people that come in will never be able to embody who you are. If you're doing less than 50K, you're not Tony Robbins and Dean Rossiosi, so simmer down people. Just going to be real, don't do that, ok. So I train service providers on that and, of course, if you run a company of a team of more than 10 salespeople, then I'm your guide to come in and help you train them so that you can take your productivity and your revenue profits to the next level. Basically.

Magdalena Hanah:

Fantastic, awesome, awesome, awesome, all right. So thank you so much, dean, for joining me today. It's been an absolute pleasure. Like I said, we'll definitely keep in touch and, for you guys, thank you so much for showing up.

Magdalena Hanah:

If you are new here, if it was the first episode, don't forget to leave us a little review about what you've learned from Dean. What was the biggest aha moment? If that wasn't the same as mine, I don't know what was. There were so many golden nuggets, actually that you can improve your sales today. So we did what we promised on doing.

Magdalena Hanah:

And if you're coming back, if this is yet another episode and you have not subscribed I know 70% of you are watching, but I'm not subscribed tap that Subscribe button and the notification bell so you don't miss any other episodes. There's going to be some changes in Habits of Influence soon. We're going to announce it to you. In the next week or two, I think, we're going to be doing a live on the channel, so please tap into that so that you know what changes are going to occur. But I'm really, really, really grateful for all of you listening and watching and supporting us essentially on the journey. So thank you so much and I'm going to see you in our next episode, dean. Thank you so much Again. Pleasure, thanks so much, thank you. Thank you, guys.

People on this episode

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Magdalena Hanah

Host
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Ian Manheimer

Co-host