Disrupting Conversations #4

Can your prospects truly trust what you’re asking them?  

Welcome back to the 4th issue of the Disrupting Conversations newsletter! I’m so glad you’re here.

In this issue, we have a wonderful podcast episode about when calls go badly due to the sales professionals inability to prioritize the prospects narrative, and instead focus and pursue their own.

In the ‘Think Different’ section below, we look at our human evolutionary ability to build trust by predicting a conversation exchange to determine will the interaction harm or help us (key in both dating and sales!). Additionally, we’ve got an inspiring quote about the value of trust and laugh-worthy meme to close it out.

Thanks for joining me again, and I’d love to hear from you any time you have questions or feedback.

–Dan

Breaking Sales is my podcast to connect with those who are ready to break free from the chains of old sales methodologies that don’t work.

Have you ever been on the receiving end of a bad sales call?

👉 “I need to learn about you” isn’t a trendy catchphrase. It’s one of the core components of building trust. Saying this phrase and not executing on it is one of the quickest ways to deteriorate trust.

In this episode, Kristie shares a recent experience where she was the prospect being sold to. She shares how the sales professional emphasized learning, but was only concerned with sharing their expertise and demo in the hopes of convincing her to buy their services.

Ironically, the salesperson’s frustration with not being able to align their solution could have been avoided if they had done simple research and actually invested the time to ask questions and learn about Kristie’s business.

This breakdown will help you avoid making the same mistakes.

Think Different: Trusting the Exchange

Admittedly, there’s a lot to take in from this article, but I felt an obligation and desire to share. I see too many sales professionals getting tripped up by a sneaky, self-serving mindset that impacts every aspect of their outreach and conversations. I hope you enjoy…

Trust, at its core, is our ability to predict an exchange - to use our intuition about how a conversation or interaction will unfold, so we can maintain a sense of control and safety.

That exchange could be emotion and energy, could be something as simple as exchanging a smile or eye contact. But it’s also exchanging experiences, outcomes, it’s about harm or help.

When a human being meets another human being, whether at a networking event, social, or business meeting, each human being is assessing something with the subconscious assumption, “Is this interaction going to harm or help me?”

This comes from evolution.

Forty thousand years ago, we survived by determining which groups of fellow early humans were safe to trade and commune with, and which were not.

One tribe would have shelter and fire, and another food. One would approach the other with hopes of combining resources but had to be really quick at deducing, understanding, and picking up patterns to assess safety.

Since then, we have continued to evolve trying to assess patterns to determine harm or help.

Only now, instead of wondering whether the tribe on the other side of the valley will be friendly or not, we’re wondering whether someone is just looking to get money out of us or 👉 has an intent to serve themselves versus help us.

Think of dating. You meet someone for the first time, so you’re assessing patterns to determine really quickly whether this “exchange” is going to harm or help you. While “harm” may not be getting mauled by another tribe’s leader, the prospect of being taken advantage of, led on, or even simply disappointed, looms.

You sit down over a cup of coffee and look at what they’re wearing, pick up on subtle cues in their demeanor, energy, eye contact, and speech. Consciously and subconsciously, you collect countless bits of data from this interaction, your brain analyzes it with record speed, and you get a feeling or thought about where this date may go.

❓ “Are they being genuine?”

❓ “What did they think when I said that just now? I saw them look away for a second. I wonder if they’re upset.”

❓ “I wonder what their intent is.”

Guess what… It’s the same in sales.

When we email or call a prospect, they’re trying to figure out what the exchange will be if they accept our invite to make an introduction or connect. The prospect is trying to assess and predict if the experience with us will harm or help them.

❓ “What are they expecting from me?”

❓ “If I accept their invite, will they use the time to try and sell me, or will they share something of value?”

❓ “Is this person going to pressure me to do what they want, or are they trying to understand my needs?”

In dating, in sales, and even in our earliest interactions with ancestors, everyone is trying to determine the experience in an effort to seek or maintain control and achieve safety.

The safer your prospect feels, the more likely they are to accept your invite and invest into the conversation with more honesty. 🚀

Benevolence is the first indicator of trust. Here’s three skills that are greatly impacted by your ability to infuse benevolence (intent)...

• Outreach - make sure you shift your intent from cultivating a sale (your agenda) to offering an objective conversation regarding how and if you can help.

• Starting a conversation - using benevolence, provide the prospect with a brief synopsis of how you think the conversation should proceed (set the tone). Break the prospects use of pattern recognition as they try and determine if the conversation will harm or help them.

• Asking questions — if the question serves the best interest of the prospect you should ask it. There are two major trust principles that come from the process of asking meaningful questions.

  • Empathy - this tells the prospect you are thinking about them

  • Listening - this shows the prospect you actually care

A lack of benevolence is why you…

• Generate poor outreach responses - the prospect predicts a conversation that is harmful.

• Struggle to engage certain prospects - the prospect is busy trying to determine what the interaction will be.

• Receive surface level answers - the prospect doesn’t trust the intent of your question.

This is why most sales training doesn’t work. The sales professional is focused on the outcome of trying to get the prospect to do something that they want them to do.

To achieve great results you have to build trust, and to build trust - you have to apply benevolence to your skill and strategy.

🤝 Give the prospect a sense of control and safety and everything changes. Why? Because at our core that’s what we all want.

It's Bigger Than Sales

Prior to the events of 2020 I really enjoyed the experience of live public speaking – the energy, the process of making new connections, disrupting, helping, and having an impact. A few weeks ago I had the opportunity to speak at an event for one of our long time clients. They invited over 100 of their valued centers of influence and partners. The energy and interaction was fantastic.

Admittedly, I felt a bit out of practice when preparing for this live event. Though the topic (trust) is something I’m very passionate about and have spent years researching, coaching, and experimenting with – I felt like I was breaking that speaking comfort zone for the first time. But the more I prepped and practiced the more momentum and confidence I gained.

It was a great reminder to me that no matter how skilled and experienced we think we are at something, if we are slightly out of practice – it’s important to double down on our preparation.

Whether learned or natural, don’t take your strengths for granted. Invest in them.

Thanks for reading!

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