How to Sell a Lot More Courses with Harry Spaight

LMScast with Chris Badgett

In this LMScast episode, Harry Spaight shares insights into selling courses. He stresses the importance of adopting a sales strategy grounded in honesty and customer service.

Harry Spaight, a speaker and author of the book “Selling with Dignity,” advocates for a servant-based approach, particularly in an era where many people harbor disdain for salespeople. He advises overcoming mental health challenges like impostor syndrome by steering clear of a salesy image and focusing on comprehending buyers’ needs.

The significance of employing charm during prospecting, making a memorable impact at networking events, and streamlining the sales process is emphasized by Spaight. Addressing the common challenge of selling something one doesn’t enjoy, he underscores the importance of projecting an image of service rather than self-promotion.

Spaight encourages vendors to participate in networking, attend local gatherings, and prioritize brightening someone else’s day. He underscores the value of establishing genuine connections, acting with decency and empathy, and recognizing that understanding and resolving potential customers’ issues are often critical to closing deals.

Here’s Where To Go Next…

Get the Course Creator Starter Kit to help you (or your client) create, launch, and scale a high-value online learning website.

Also visit the creators of the LMScast podcast over at LifterLMS, the world’s leading most customizable learning management system software for WordPress. Create courses, coaching programs, online schools, and more with LifterLMS.

Browse more recent episodes of the LMScast podcast here or explore the entire back catalog since 2014.

And be sure to subscribe to get new podcast episodes delivered to your inbox every week.

2023 WordPress LMS Buyer’s Guide

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Here’s Where To Go Next…

Get the Course Creator Starter Kit to help you (or your client) create, launch, and scale a high-value online learning website.

Also visit the creators of the LMScast podcast over at LifterLMS, the world’s leading most customizable learning management system software for WordPress. Create courses, coaching programs, online schools, and more with LifterLMS.

Browse more recent episodes of the LMScast podcast here or explore the entire back catalog since 2014.

And be sure to subscribe to get new podcast episodes delivered to your inbox every week.

2023 WordPress LMS Buyer’s Guide

Exclusive Download! Stop wasting time and money researching online course and membership site tech.

Download the Buyer’s Guide

Episode Transcript

Chris Badgett: You’ve come to the right place. If you’re looking to create, launch, and scale a high value online training program, I’m your guide, Chris Badgett. I’m the co founder of LifterLMS, the most powerful learning management system for WordPress. Stay to the end. I’ve got something special for you. Enjoy the show.

Hello and welcome back to another episode of LMS cast. I’m joined by a special guest. His name is Harry Spaight. His website is sellwithdignity. com. He has a book called. Actually, I don’t have your book up. I have your podcast over here, which is sales made easy. And I believe your book title is selling with dignity.

So I got that. And let’s just jump right into this first challenge that people have with selling, whether they’re creating education companies or they’re an agency that serves that market, we all need to sell. But some of us just don’t like selling. And so we put it off and we put it off and then ultimately we have to face this beast.

So how do we sell if we don’t like selling?

Harry Spaight: Yeah, that’s a great question. And the, it’s so common Chris. So first of all, thanks for having me on your show. Really appreciate the opportunity. My goal is. Try to help someone today so that they can walk away and feel better about selling themselves or selling for their business.

So the big challenge is, that most people these days, younger generation does not want to come across looking like a salesperson. They don’t want to be viewed as salesy. They don’t like the tactics. And with the rise of Parvana and a lot of other websites like Amazon, where you could buy virtually everything, people can bypass the sales person.

Which is really for the first time in the last probably 10 or 15 years where this has become pretty normal compared to years ago. So we all want to avoid the salesperson, yet we have to sell. So what do we do? And I think the real key to this is view yourself as a servant for others, just like the server in a fine dining restaurant serves.

But they’re also selling because they have to ask for the order, but they do it in a way that is polite and respectful. And most people don’t even view the server as someone that sells. So that’s my thought. What’s your take on that?

Chris Badgett: I think that’s awesome. I, personally. Early in my career now I love selling, but I used to have that aversion to it and marketing as well.

But to me, selling is almost like a moral obligation to help people. And if you believe in your product, that’s a pretty easy job to do. But one area I’d like to dig into with that is some of the resistance comes from imposter syndrome. Or a negative connotation of not wanting to be perceived as like salesy.

So how do we get over that personal mindset issues on the front end?

Harry Spaight: I think one of the key things is, that if you’re thinking you’re salesy, you’re not. I used to have this come up frequently with salespeople who viewed themselves as being pushy or over the top, and I said anyone who thinks or is worried about it isn’t.

It’s the ones and it’s just the same as true of the imposter syndrome. The only ones who are worried about the imposter, about imposter, syndrome are people who are not imposters. The imposters could care less, right? So the same is true if you’re feeling like you’re being a little salesy. You can ask people.

It’s okay. When you ask your clients, when you have clients, you can ask them. It’s like, how do I come across? Do I come across more as a consultant? Or do I come across sales? A because I’m working at improving and getting feedback from people that see you in real time can be very helpful.

Chris Badgett: How about I think let me just back up and say in marketing generating the lead.

These days, a lot of folks do content marketing in a way. That’s what we’re doing right here. We’re creating useful content. And if the people resonate they, go deeper into the relationships with the people they’re seeing there. But there’s this friction, especially in the early days of being an agency or a course creator, where if we have a.

Email, or if we don’t have an email list. And we’re still trying to validate Hey, will anybody buy my course or my coaching or my agency website building service? It can make sense to go out into the world and actually do some prospecting or working with cold leads that don’t know you from Adam.

And that I think is the most scary part. It’s one thing if somebody has raised their hand and they’re sitting in your email inbox, just like the, restaurant example of you’re in the restaurant, you’ve already raised your hand. Like I would like to eat the food here, but if we go out into the world, how do we do that with dignity for outbound prospecting or outbound

How to Sell a Lot More Courses with Harry Spaight: sales?

Harry Spaight: Yeah, that’s such a great question. And it’s funny how you mentioned that, but that used to be the way always was for sales. So imagine right before there was a telephone, people were selling and they did it face to face. And then the advent of the telephone made it a little bit different where there was more opportunity to reach people without visiting them.

Then email came in. Probably a few other forms of technology. I’m skipping, but each one you were less than face to face each improvement. You are further removed from the face to face. And so even in difficult circumstances in sales, I’m going to answer your question. I’ll try to be sure. But in the difficult circumstances in sales, I always want to be face to face.

You want to be able to see what the other person is saying with their face while you’re speaking because they’re going to give you micro expressions off of their mouth and their eyes and either a little bit of a half smile or frown that you’re going to pick up on and then you’re going to be able to respond accordingly.

You can’t really do that over the phone and you sure as heck cannot do it over email. And this is a huge mistake because a lot of people will go and try to close a deal or work on a big issue through email. And it’s so much can go wrong with interpretation. But getting back to this, question.

So the face to face, if we think about it is really very normal. And when you put yourself out and I, I have to do it as well is I’m going to go out to community events, network with people, chamber events. I have been in the car, folks, with my fingers clenched onto the steering wheel, all sweaty, thinking, Oh, my God, what is going to be in front of me when I go in there?

Are people going to like me? Am I going to look stupid? Am I in the right place? Is there going to be a good old boys club or something along all these negative thoughts? But then when I bring it back to reality, I say, okay, I’m gonna go help one person. I’m going to make someone’s day and give them some of my time.

I’m going to give them the listening that I can give them, I’m going to ask them questions. And I’m going to make them hopefully feel good about what they’re doing and show genuine interest. When I do that, All the fear and all the nonsense goes away. So when you’re talking to people, I think the key thing is how can you make someone’s day, bring a smile to their life.

Yes, we’re going to make asks throughout it, but bring a smile, be charismatic, do something that not everyone else is doing. That’s really my thought on that. What’s your take?

Chris Badgett: I think that’s great. And to sell is just a conversation. It’s being human. And again, you’re just trying to help people. Instead of waiting to come to you, you’re going to find them.

And they, might, that will make their day. If you can help them and with your offer, your product, they’ll be glad that your, paths have crossed and you made the effort to make those paths cross.

Harry Spaight: Absolutely. I

Chris Badgett: was wondering, Harry, if you could describe the sales process. Sometimes it takes it may be just like one interaction.

You go from just meeting to closing a deal. Other times it could have a long sales cycle, like six months or something like that, or even longer. There’s these stages of sales ending with the close qualifying the lead and all these fancy sales terms. But could you explain like the choreography of sales?

A language that we can all understand. Oh my

Harry Spaight: goodness. I’ve been known to keep things simple. I do not like to use terms that people can’t relate to. So closing is just bringing the order to completion. Doesn’t mean the end of the sale, because there should be a lot of follow up afterwards. But way I look at it is selling should be easy.

So when people struggle with sales. Frequently, they’re speaking to the wrong people. So they’re trying to bring to fruition. They’re trying to close business. They say things like, I have a lot of conversations. I just can’t close. The first thing that needs to happen is that we need to be speaking with people that recognize they have an issue.

If they don’t recognize after a conversation that they have an issue, you can have the best thing in the world. It does not matter if they don’t see themselves as having an issue, they are not going to buy. I don’t care how persuasive you are. The second thing they need to do is recognize if this is worth money.

Whatever the money is, if they don’t see the value in it and say things like before I had a coach, the first time I spoke to someone that did coaching and went, wow, oh my God, that’s a fortune. I didn’t have any clue. I had nothing to benchmark that against. And so the poor person was trying to defend themselves and chuckle back.

It’s I didn’t really have a problem and I certainly didn’t want to invest it, but that all changes when you recognize if I really want to grow a business and I want to know all the things are to know about marketing and so forth, I need somebody and then saving me years. Is worth the money.

So that’s just the thought to help your people are doing programs. So first thing is, speak to the right people. And then the next thing that you want to do is I just have a servant minded attitude. So instead of leading with your product and service, find out what they need. What are they trying to achieve?

When you find out what they’re trying to achieve, you can then typically tie in Your product or service to help them get what it is that they want. Okay, so talk to the right people go in with a servant minded attitude. Get what is important to them. Once we do that, we figure out that. Hey, now there’s an opportunity here.

We do simple discovery questions. We should have a list of 5 to 10 questions, not a million questions, but a few questions that help us determine what they have done before. If they’ve ever investigated something like this, someone might say, Chris I want a learning management system and you’re going to go great.

This is what I have. And this is how much it is. You want to do that. You would take through it and you say, why, right? What, would you use it for? You would ask all of these questions. And those are the things that we should be asking. Then we get to the point where we’ve asked the questions.

Everything looks to be pretty positive. The next step at that point is. say I use the perfect clothes from James Muir’s book, The Perfect Clothes. He simply says a good next step for many at this point is we review a proposal or we speak to one of our clients that’s doing something similar. Whatever that good next step is, lay it out and say, is that a good next step for you?

And if the person says yes, You’ve got a good next step. If they say, no, I’m not ready for it. James suggests say good or just say, I understand. What is a good next step for you? So you always have a forward moving process here instead of it getting stuck where someone says this is all great. I’m going to think it over and then the inexperienced 1 will say, what’s there to think over right?

And it’s now we’re challenging them instead of being polite, respectful and getting on the same side of the table as them. And then saying a good next step. Normally, when people say they’re going to think it over is that they will talk to one of our clients. Does that sound like a good next step for You You get sure no. And then you’ve got a good next step that they’re going to give you. And now you’re just following along until you bring it to a good next step. At this point is we drop the paperwork. Does that sound like a good next step for you? It’s that simple.

Chris Badgett: Awesome. I love that and getting agreement along the way and you’re ready if they’re not ready to help them figure out if what might be the next step for them.

Could you say 1 more time that the perfect close line again, a good, you could say that 1 again. Yeah. So

Harry Spaight: you can say something along the lines put your own personality on it by say a good next step for us. Chris is typically we review a proposal. Does that sound like a good next step for you?

Nice. And you’re going to get yes or no. Yes. You’re going to review the proposal. No means what would be a good next step for you? And you’re not just putting a ball back in their court. I had

Chris Badgett: a question for you about quote, objection handling, but you’ve already answered it with just follow them down the path they’re going, and if they need help, Oh, maybe you need to see some case studies or talk to somebody who’s already purchased before.

Is there any other advice you have around when a quote objections pop up?

Harry Spaight: I love how you’re doing that. So there’s, why are you saying it objections like that? I’m just curious. What’s coming to mind for you?

Chris Badgett: I think about aggressive closing tactics where Oh, I’m not sure. I, need to talk to my spouse and then an aggressive salesperson would do something like potentially saying, trying to override that way of thinking and be like, you have, you can make this decision without them or something or.

Harry Spaight: Yeah. Yeah. That’s really good. In fact, I used to be really good at overcoming objections. And then I realized that I was winning, right? It was winning. An argument was not winning a customer or winning a client. So I just stopped that. Once I had the awareness, I stopped using the word objection and started thinking about concern.

So if someone is concerned, they’re making a big decision and they want to talk to their spouse about it. Is that something we want to discourage? Or do we want to encourage that? Yeah.

Chris Badgett: We don’t want to be the person responsible for starting a fight later the day or when they’re

Harry Spaight: buying my stuff. Come on.

So getting getting other people involved, it’s a committee, it’s a committee decision that this happens all the time. Incorporated very rarely do people make a decision themselves. There’s a committee. So if they say things like I have to get the committee involved. It’s okay, great. Who, makes up the committee?

How can I help? When someone says that about their spouse, for whatever reason, we’re thinking that’s, terrible. I think it’s a good thing that they’re moving along the buyer’s journey and making a, this is what their next step is. Now, sometimes they are going to say that just so they don’t have to make a decision and get it out of their hands, but that’s a whole, they just don’t want to say no.

And that’s a whole nother issue that tells you that they’re not ready, which is fine. Okay, but laying guilt on them is not the answer. So overcoming objections to me is helping people deal with what their concerns are. Moving my chair on their side of the desk and saying, I’m here for you. I’ve had similar concerns.

That’s in essence what we want to be saying. So yeah, I love how you approach it and totally can relate. Does that answer your question? That

Chris Badgett: does answer it. And I want to dig in a little bit more on sometimes you get a no or a rejection or they’re saying something like, Oh, I need to talk it over with someone, but they’re really just trying to exit the conversation.

How, as a salesperson, should we deal with rejection and how do we tell the difference between that’s a real concern or this, they’re just trying to get off the phone or whatever

Harry Spaight: Yeah, And it happens. So no is simply not now. For most of us in sales, if you’re talking to the right people.

So again, picture your ideal client profile and say, I am working with coaches that need this program. It’s going to say that X and whatever, whoever your ideal client is, you want to be speaking to those people. The numbers show, and this came from Chet Holmes. Who did this study over years and years that typically 3 percent of the population is in the market for what we’re selling at that moment.

So he’s, had people raise their hand. Who was today. It was ready to buy tires and these huge crowds, 3 percent of the hands would go up. So that number is pretty consistent. So some people are not going to be in the market today. Doesn’t mean they won’t be. Another 30 percent or so will be interested, just not ready.

And another 30 or 40 percent will be curious and there’ll be opportunity in those numbers as well. And then there’ll be a smaller percentage that will just never be interested, nor will they want to do business with you. We want to get through those people, excuse me, that are polite, but they’re never going to do business with us.

And they’re not in our ideal avatar. They don’t have a need. There’s no point in spending tons of time, but there’s plenty of people that have a need that you can talk to. And that 30 or 40 percent that are either in the market or will be it once they find out about you. And then the thing is just a timing game.

So you stay in touch until they’re ready to do something. That’s where email and social media can help as well.

Chris Badgett: I love the quote that the fortune is in the followup because it’s true. You just have to follow up. Stay connected and don’t be annoying stay connected to people.

Harry Spaight: Yeah, a hundred percent. And this is a huge mistake. It sounds like it’s not a mistake for you is people think no means. Forever. Not now. It’s no, I got too much going on. Does not mean forever. It could be give me a call in three months and things settle down. This is another great opportunity where people say I’ve just got a lot on my mind.

I can’t do this right now. Instead of trying to push your offer to the front burner, I relate. I want to go, I want to let them know that there are things that I have on my mind at times and I can’t think of anything else. So I’m here for you. First of all, is there anything that’s on your mind that I might be able to give you a referral or somebody that might be able to help out?

That would be one thing. And then as the thing softened at a guard drops a little bit and they feel like you’re now a friend versus someone trying to sell them something. You can say Chris, I really appreciate you telling me this and spending the time with me. Sounds like you do have a ton on your plate these days.

When would be a good time to follow up? Would you say 90 days? Does that sit well with you? And then you get the yes or no, right? The yes, you follow up 90 days. No is yeah, gotcha. When do you think would be a good time to follow up? It might just say, give me six months. And now you put that in the calendar and say, I’m going to pencil this in my calendar six months from today.

Is that cool? And yeah, they’re going to say yes, because now you’re respectful and now you’ve got, again, a reason to contact them. It’s in the calendar. They’re going to get a notification, keep the sale process moving.

Chris Badgett: I heard a fun, an acronym for that called BAMFAM, book a meeting from a meeting.

Harry Spaight: Yeah, that’s easy to remember.

I’ll probably say it wrong though. Book a meeting from a meeting. Great stuff.

Chris Badgett: Let’s talk about pricing and perception of value. I find that as people get into online business or really any kind of business they really start to deepen their understanding of what is product? What is sales?

What is marketing? In my view, like pricing mostly sits in product. Like it’s part of the offer construction, but of course sales needs to talk to product and give that real feedback of what’s coming from the market and marketing needs to communicate to product. Hey, what are, how to, how are people valuing this?

So just, that’s just a setup to the question, which is in the education companies, what I’ve noticed is there’s three pricing buckets for courses and coaching programs and membership sites, there’s low, medium and high low is anywhere from free to 200 medium is from like 200 to 2000 and high ticket or whatever is 2000 and up.

And so this is mostly a question. For mid and high prices. If you’re in a sales conversation with somebody by email or on social media or face to face in person, wherever it is, and you’ve got somebody who’s really fits your ideal customer profile and you’ve sold. Similar people like that. And they’ve been very happy and successful with the program before, but the feedback you’re getting in the sales conversation is, whoa, this is a 5, 000 a year investment for this intensive coaching program.

They may not say it outright, but they might be thinking, I don’t know if it’s worth 5, 000. How do we help substantiate the value without an aggressive salesperson in terms of explaining the value or helping them see the value.

Harry Spaight: Yeah, this is a great question, Chris. So I look at it as really having the conversations and find out what the potential buyer needs.

And if we’re not having that conversation and someone says, Harry, how much is your pricing program? And I say, it’s 7, 500 for three months. Okay. So that’s a lot of money, right? I want to do that. I could say that, but I’d say first, before we even talk about pricing, let’s see if there’s a fit.

What is it you’re trying to achieve? And if they’re telling me that they want to achieve something that I can’t help them with, I’m not going to offer 1st of all, I’m not going to make an offer to somebody that we’re not on the same page with 2nd thing is. If they’re selling stuff for 20, they have to sell a lot of that, even just to pay for the coaching.

You take 7, 500 divided by 20, that’s a big number, so it may not make sense to them. But if they’re selling 10, 000 and up or 5, 000 and up services, you now say, you can now justify by saying, look, it’s one and a half sales. Will I help you get to where you want to be faster, which I believe I will.

And if someone is saying I’d rather not spend the money, but it’s going to take me 2 years to develop those skills. How much money are you leaving on the table going through the trial and error methodology, which happens for the majority of people who say, I don’t want to spend the money on a coach.

It’s okay, but over the next two years when you’re struggling, not that I’m wishing that on people, but a lot of people struggle in sales. People who are really good in sales, I’d like to think I’m pretty good, is we have tons and tons of hours. Think of the 10, 000 hour rule. 10, 000 hours plus role playing, right?

Doing real life stuff and having this be part of our everyday lives versus someone who is casually doing it to grow their business. It is two different things. So whenever your program is being viewed as high. You first want to make sure, did you ask what the person was going to get outside with their pro, with your program before you gave them the price?

If you, they ask you a price, you don’t want to hold back and you say I got three programs there 500, 7, 500 and 150, 000, whatever the number is, you now then want to have a conversation. But they might be shell shocked, right? So this is all. So I try to say before I give you the numbers, we have a little bit of a conversation.

I want to find out what you need and see if I can align a program that fits what your budget is and get that ahead. And now you can ask some questions. These will be your discovery questions like we talked about earlier. What’s your thought on all of this, Chris, a long answer for a short question.

Chris Badgett: No it’s a perfect length.

It’s I think that’s fantastic. Once you understand the value of their pain point or the opportunity, then you can relay the value. And I think the, it’s just as important, like you mentioned, to focus on the opportunity costs what if you don’t do anything about this, how will that impact your time and money and so on?

If you, this goes back to the first sales to yourself, if you really believe in your product and know what it can do, you should like how impactful and effective it can be when it’s used with the right people.

One of my favorite parts of selling is. Expansion revenue, like selling more to existing customers who are happy and helping them get even greater results.

But sometimes I see sales folks get super focused on always like closing new business. How is there any kind of system or strategy for expanding sales with your existing customer base?

Harry Spaight: Yeah yeah, another outstanding question and I’m being very complimentary here, but I’m legitimately impressed by the question I refer to this.

It’s account based marketing, cross selling expansion. Selling is the first I’ve heard of it. So thanks for clarifying as to what that is. Yeah, you it’s a whole lot easier to sell to people that already have you your stuff and already love you. So we’re many, businesses are missing out on opportunities.

You have already done the work. You’ve already established trust. They already love you. They have other things that they need your stuff for. So you got to think through that. Just, I would pull a, just, I would create a little spreadsheet of who my clients are and what my products are. So now with this spreadsheet, I can say, okay, here are the gaps.

I’ve got these higher paying clients. They’ve got this product, but they don’t have this. Now I’m not looking just to sell product. I want to uncover what their needs are. You just have to remove yourself from the sale. And the longer you do this, the easier it is. And just say so a good thing to do is to have business reviews.

Understand how your client is using the stuff that you’ve sold, whether it be with technology or your services or your coaching for that matter, and say, I just want to invest some time here with you. See how everything is going and understand what you’ve gained so far. You’re going to get all kinds of reference testimonial.

Capability on this, you’re going to be able to say, can I quote you on that? Which is going to be great for another reason, but then you’re going to uncover, right? When you start showing that you’re really a trusted advisor, you’re going to uncover different opportunities. And that is where you can say, I might be able to help you with that.

I’m not sure a hundred percent, but I might be help be able to help you. That was you want to explore that a little bit. You’ve already got the trust and I’m not going to be, Oh my God, I can help you with that. Cause that’s, way too eager. Just pull it back. Just use words like might possibly things along those lines show that you’re not in there for the hard sell and that stuff really works.

So yeah, a hundred percent recommend that whole approach there for you.

Chris Badgett: I love a a good expansion revenue model. And, this is why, even if you’re a one person business, if the sales department talks to the product department, cause in those followups, you learn things in the product. Or the service may not be ready.

There may not be an offer there yet, but there could be in another month or six months or a year. A fun.

Harry Spaight: Yeah, this is really good. Yeah.

Chris Badgett: example from Lifter LMS is we created the software and people were successful with it. And they bought our payment stuff and our different things for it to do different things.

But then we started hearing from existing customers that they were like, can I sell? This course one to many to like companies or schools or groups of some kind. And there are answers like not yet, but a year later we have that product. And now that’s just part of their buyer’s journey. Once somebody finds success, they start thinking about scaling and getting more sales and that’s just like a software example of when you follow up and you hear what the next.

The buyer’s journey doesn’t just end at the sale, you deliver the product, they activate, they retain for another year, and then they expand into more stuff.

Harry Spaight: Yeah so you, earlier you mentioned how some people view the close as the end of the sale. It’s the middle, right? It’s exactly. Yeah. I love it.

Chris Badgett: I think about that marketing and sales up here and then customer success is below and it’s, just as important.

And that includes selling expansion stuff down there. Yeah.

Harry Spaight: And the, idea that people are bothering their customers by trying to sell more to them. I, go back to what you said earlier, right? It’s your obligation. Who would your customer rather do business with someone who is a complete stranger or someone they’ve already been working with that knows them that can help them solve another problem.

So yeah, I appreciate your approach to that. It’s really good.

Chris Badgett: You you flew over something really quick, but I just wanted to pull it out, which was sure. You made a comment to remove yourself from the sale. And what I want to dig in there with is. Where I’ve learned this lesson and I want to ask you specifically around money mindset, particularly with somebody who doesn’t come from a sales background and maybe they’re selling yoga classes and they’re not really trained in sales or business.

But and maybe they’ve had a hard road, which a lot of bootstrap founder folks have and, they’re they had to be frugal and stuff. And maybe they have their own like head mindset issues around money and costs and everything. So I wanted to just ask your advice around money mindset as is and not projecting on clients.

And I’ll just add one short story is it always amazes me when I come across. Somebody making a purchase that is not price sensitive at all, they just come in, boom, they buy the most expensive thing. No objections, anything. And there’s, and maybe you’re not like that as a consumer out in the world, but there are people that are like that and that’s, them, but just talk about removing yourself from the sale, particularly around money ideas.

Harry Spaight: I think I understand the questions years ago when I was brand new to sales, I was living on the edge of poverty and. I was reading or listening to cassettes back in the nineties and I think it was someone really famous, Brian Tracy, I believe it could have been Tom Hopkins. But the line that stuck with me is act like you want the sale, but don’t act like you need the sale.

And when I, immediately that was like really simple for me. Cause I knew what needy looked like, and I did not want to look needy. So when I watch salespeople around me. Say this is the best thing since sliced bread. You really need to do this. This is great. You’re going to love it. And there’s all this stuff I would use this may or may not be a fit.

And I got my share of deals and I got the trust factor way faster than I realized that this was a much more consultative approach, which I stumbled across, but it wasn’t like. I need, I needed the money folks. I was living in a, not a three bedroom apartment. A three room apartment with a sink that was not in the bathroom.

I had to walk, we had to wash our hands in the kitchen. And so we were living on the edge of poverty. But I just kept acting right. You, it’s not the fake until you make it, but you just have to act like you don’t need it and it will come. And I just Going back to my beliefs and faith was that I read and over the years that I did mission work is like every worker is worthy of their wages.

The birds of the field or the birds of the heavens are going to be fed things like that. Lilies don’t feel they’ll worry about things. I just started to apply all that stuff and said, I’ve got the mindset. I know this will come, I just have to just have faith in the system that it will all work out.

And it does. Alex Ramos, he said, there’s two, two outcomes. One is you’re going to succeed. And the other one is you’re going to quit. There’s no, and I was just like, Oh my God, does that guy say anything that isn’t brilliant? But that’s it. It’s like you stick with it long enough. You’re going to have the outcome.

Gary V I remember talking to someone. He was saying something along the lines. It’s like you haven’t put time in at two or three years, five years, 10 years, then talk to me, but two or three years, that’s not enough time. And so we, a lot of us might have this perception that we quit the job to be an entrepreneur and we just show up every day, the money comes in.

It’s not quite like that. What’s your thought on all that,

Chris Badgett: Chris? Yeah, that’s awesome. The yeah, I love that. I’m definitely going to hold on to that one. I’ve, heard it called commission breath.

Harry Spaight: Yeah. That’s another term that’s out there. Yes.

Chris Badgett: Where someone is peers, very needy for the sale.

And when you’re doing it, like once you get the self awareness for it, it’s Oh, wait a second.

Harry Spaight: Oh yeah. Yeah. It’s if a person is. Saying that they might go elsewhere or they’re going to, they’re going to shop around. Our first reaction is we, might feel a little bit hurt at that rejection.

I’ve got, I’m being rejected here. I put a lot into this and I spoke to someone who felt this rejection. And I asked, I said, do you ever shop around? I do it all the time. So yeah. So why do we expect that others aren’t going to do the same to us? We all do it. So just say just relax.

Here’s the key. Is when you’re sensing this feeling, just breathe. It’s really that simple. It’s like the Navy seal trick. Just exhale and inhale and exhale. You practice the breathing, the tension in the shoulders drops, and you can say consultant, right? Consultant, not a needy salesperson. And then you start acting like you.

Care about the person more than the sale, and they’re going to see that and say I really like this guy. Chris is really trustworthy. And I just wanted to see what he was thinking. If I said that to someone else, I said that to jump down my throat for saying that. So that could go that way, too.

Chris Badgett: Yeah, 1 thing I’d add to that is people aren’t just listening to what you say. They’re also watching how you listen. And being a good listener ties into my next question, which you mentioned, I try not to weave too many questions into one, but a couple are here are, you mentioned Alex Hermosi who sells selling and as a, as an art, but He’s very charismatic.

So that’s one question. Why do you think so? The other is some people are more introvert and they’re like, Oh, can introvert sell? And they absolutely can. I’m an extreme introvert and I’ve sold a lot of things. And but I want, so the question is around charisma without losing our authenticity.

And maybe we’re super extroverted, maybe we’re not. So help, us step into our charisma or our power as a salesperson.

Harry Spaight: Yeah, that’s really good. You’re, bringing me in places I don’t normally go. So I love these questions. Are you making me think here? So first of all, Alex, we’re not all Alex or Mosey or Gary V.

Those guys have very strong high deep the disc profile personalities. I’m not like that. I’m more introverted than extroverted. I recently took a test and my score was 52 introvert, 48 extrovert. So I always was thinking, am I an extrovert? Should I be doing this while in sales? Should I be should I be sitting with the people who are driving the Porsches and the BMWs and the wearing the Rolexes?

Or no, I always sat with like the techs I sat with people who are not in sales because I felt like I was one of them. So like you said, introverts can sell and do very well. And I often say to people who struggle with that, it’s like, who would you rather buy from someone who is loud, always talking about themselves, has to be in the front row, has to share how glorious how great they are, or do you want to be the quiet person that does the right thing and hardly says anything?

I know where I want to be. I want to be with those people. So those, if there’s an audience for those people, then there’s also buyers for those people, right? So that’s how that works in my mind. Now, the difference is so the authenticity is some days we feel like. Crap. Okay. We just were not in the mood like I come from the Northeast give me a slushy rain snow mix day and I’ve got to go out on prospect.

Not fun. However, when I’m in front of a candidate, a prospect, a living human being. You can bet I’m smiling and making fun of myself or making fun of the day or someone’s got to be out there. I’m going to make the mailman look bad. I’m going to use self deprecation humor to help bring a smile to somebody.

Those smiles will open up additional doors. So Is it faking it until you make it? Is it using an alter aspect of your personality? I think it is. It’s, I think it’s you saying that part of it that’s in us that is not always there, I’m not always doing standup comedy, but I know I can be funny at certain times as part of my personality.

I know I could be extroverted when I need to be extroverted so that I can lighten up the room or be there with my kids party or something. We all do these things to say I’m really introverted and I’m always quiet. I think you need to re examine that a little bit and say, really? Are you always that way?

Or you just could that possibly be an excuse as to why you don’t want to sell? And I think you might find that there’s opportunity for growth there. And I love the growth mindset. It’s read the book by that anyway, it’s called the growth mindset. It will knock you out as far as putting yourself to the test and saying if the beliefs you have are really good beliefs all the time.

I love that long answer.

Chris Badgett: I love that. There’s just that part too, about just being the consummate professional. Like a doctor may be having a bad day, but you’re in the office and they’re in character. They’re doing their, thing. Just like any, role you can tell quickly. That’s what makes us like great service providers and everything is that they’re professional and they they, do their thing that we’re there for, that we signed up for.

Harry Spaight: Yeah. And a lot, and sometimes it’s acting. And it’s not bad, right? You’re, putting on your best face because you know that you have to bring it for the other person. If you’re going to cheer up, say you feel like less than great, and you’re going to go visit someone in the hospital that’s has a terminal illness.

You’re not going to go there and bring the person down, right? That’s not your goal. And your goal, you’re going to say, I’ve got to put on a happy face. I’ve got to be positive. This is breaking my heart, but I’m going to do everything. I tend to be positive. That’s how you think. So the person that comes out in that moment, is that a fake Chris?

I don’t think so. I think it’s a Chris that’s drawing from his inner strength and his conviction to make the world a better place and to help this person. That’s not fake Chris. That’s a person that’s going the extra mile to do what he can to bring some light into this person’s life.

Chris Badgett: I love that.

Harry’s at sellwithdignity. com. His podcast is Sales Made Easy. Thank you for putting so much sales advice in this short episode. We’ve covered a lot here and you’ve given so much good tips and information. What can people do to work with you or go deeper and how else can they connect with

Harry Spaight: you? Yeah.

So if you go to selling with dignity. com, you can get a few chapters of my book under selling with dignity. com the book. And you can see if that’s an appeal to you. We can also reach out for a conversation there on the website as well. So happy to have a conversation and help you with sales. First call is.

Complimentary. I’ve tried to get past the free word myself. I’m always working on stuff myself, but free sounds cheap. First call is complimentary and happy to help you with something that might be struggling a challenge for you. That’s

Chris Badgett: awesome. Harry, thanks for coming on the call. One last question for you.

Who is your ideal customer that you help?

Harry Spaight: Yeah. I have this down. It is people who are leaving corporate that have done pretty well in the corporate environment and are getting closer to retirement. Feel like they want to make an impact, help other people be a consultant. I’m the person that can help you.

Bridge that gap from corporate to actually serving people and getting paid for that. So those are my ideal clients. Awesome,

Chris Badgett: Harry. Thanks so much for coming on the show. We really appreciate it.

Harry Spaight: That’s been a blast. Great questions, Chris.

Chris Badgett: And that’s a wrap for this episode of LMS cast. Did you enjoy that episode? Tell your friends and be sure to subscribe so you don’t miss the next episode. And I’ve got a gift for you over at LifterLMS. Go to lifterlms. com forward slash gift.

Keep learning, keep taking action, and I’ll see you in the next episode.

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