I’m Not a Salesperson… Or Am I? The Mindset Shift Every Professional Needs
We have a phrase at Southwestern Consulting. What bothers us is that they have commissioned breath. You smell it the moment you walk up to them, you know what they're interested in, and they're not interested in you.
Laura Smith:Welcome to Prose and Comms: Engagement, Unplugged. I'm Laura Smith.
Brian Rowley:And I'm Brian Rowley.
Laura Smith:Today, we're letting you in on a little secret. If you think you're not in sales, there's a pretty good chance you're wrong. We're talking about how nearly everyone has to sell in some way, even if no one has ever taught you. We have an expert on with us today to talk about how to turn sales from the task you dread into a natural way of building relationships and driving growth.
Brian Rowley:But Laura, I think before we bring in the guests, let's just do a little self reflection for a minute. Would you consider yourself a salesperson?
Laura Smith:So in my twenty five years of my marketing career, I would say I started out, then I would have said no. I'm not a salesperson. That's, see, that's not my job in marketing, not in sales. But over time, I've realized that good marketing is sales. It's just without that handshake or that transactional moment at the end.
Laura Smith:Because it's really all about understanding people, building relationships, communicating value. So yeah, I've been selling, right? We're always selling, Brian, but we're doing that through stories or strategy or experiences instead of like a contractual agreement at the end of a of of that relationship. So historically, I would have said no because honestly, when I came out of school and I went into my marketing career, some people had said, oh, you should get into sales. And I was like, no, that's not for me.
Laura Smith:And I love the creativity side of marketing, so that's where I kind of moved into. But really over time, like I said, I just we are always selling in just a different way than the traditional salesperson with that title. What about you?
Brian Rowley:Yeah. I think for me though, it was, you know, we talk about it every day, with our teams and and and constantly ask them to look at this from the perspective of a salesperson. Because I think you and I really do believe that we are out there. And I've said this and I continue to say it. I think one of the major goals and roles of marketing is to be a value add to sales.
Brian Rowley:And the only way to do that is to be able to consider yourself in that role and understand some of the obstacles and challenges that those folks face. Because it is a very difficult job, no matter how you look at it being on that front line and having those conversations. And our job is to try to make that easier for people. So I think we have to be.
Laura Smith:Yeah. And I think it's a good example of that as at our organization is when we go to trade shows or big events, right? I mean, we are all told no matter what role you're in, marketing, sales, product, engineering, we're all here to sell. You know, that that's we can all tell the BrightSign story, and we can all help that process and help those salespeople get more, you know, deeper into those transactional conversations. So I do think we breathe live and breathe it every day ourselves, as well.
Brian Rowley:Yeah. I would agree.
Laura Smith:So let's jump in and and introduce our guest today. Our guest today works with leaders who have revenue responsibilities but would traditionally say, I'm not really a salesperson. She helps them stop fearing sales and start seeing it as a way to grow and succeed. She's worn every hat you can think of, leadership, strategy, team building, marketing, client retention, and probably more if there are any. So she knows what it's like to have to embrace sales while still juggling everything else.
Laura Smith:So please welcome April Williams. Welcome, April.
April Williams:Thank you so much, Laura. Thank you, Brian.
Brian Rowley:Well, we're really excited to have you. You've had such an interesting career path. You've gone from owning a marketing agency to now, you know, helping people shift their mindset about sales. So I'm just wondering before we really jump into this episode, can you can you share a bit about that journey? And actually what led you to the mission of helping quote unquote non sales people sell?
April Williams:Yeah, great question. I started a marketing and sales alignment agency in 1997. And what makes that story interesting is I did not major in marketing and I never worked at a marketing firm. So I would say some days I was brilliant and other days I was dumber than dumb if I had just known some of the things I didn't know. But I was always focused and believed, being raised by entrepreneurial parents, that marketing should drive sales.
April Williams:Like, that's just the way it should be. So I never saw it any different. And we actually built a process called SalesAmp that had salespeople sitting inside our agency following up on the leads we were generating for our client sales teams so they didn't get involved too soon and get discouraged by the lack of quality of leads. Our team took that on. So I did that for twenty five years and through a series of life events, stepped away from agency life completely.
April Williams:Probably easiest way to sum it up is burnout, and decided that there had to be something else but didn't know what next was. And I am in a CEO group where someone was being coached by someone at Southwestern Consulting, and they said April Williams has stepped away from a career and is looking for next. You should speak to her. And I remember going out to this phone call thinking, this is a sales organization. Ready?
April Williams:Like, I'm not a salesperson. Like, why would I be talking to them? It was a thirty minute call, and probably close to three hours later, this call ended. And it took me some time, but I joined Southwestern Consulting, that's the oldest direct selling company in the country, over 165 years old, and I work for the consulting arm based out of Nashville. I could not have gone further to the sales side than I did when I joined the company.
April Williams:I don't even think they had one marketing person inside headquarters yet. It's significantly different in the almost three years that I've been there. But it was a fascinating place to land, and I just started reaching out to my past contacts. And I belong to an organization called Chief, which is a women executive and CEO group, and I was reaching out to try to meet as many women as possible. And I remember speaking to the managing partner of a New York City CPA firm, and I said to her, one of the things we do is we do a free workshop on the habits of top producers.
April Williams:Would you like me to come in? Because she was saying that her mid level managers didn't know how to sell and didn't believe that they were salespeople. And she said, they won't come. No. Don't bother.
April Williams:They won't come. I said, why won't they come? She said, they don't see themselves as salespeople. I said, what if I call it, I'm really not a salesperson? She said, they'll come.
April Williams:And I went to New York and Boston and Dallas and LA and spoke to all those accountants. And several of them got into coaching and it completely changed their lives because they needed to become partners. They had to sell, but no one ever taught them. No one ever helped them. They just were like, good luck to you.
April Williams:So that's where the journey began.
Laura Smith:So why do you think that mindset's so common? I'm not a salesperson. Is it truly because you're not taught that? Like, where does it come from? Because it feels like that is a mindset shift that you have to work with these folks to help evolve.
Laura Smith:But where where does it come from?
April Williams:It's an interesting one. And one of the things I say is that I am a sales perspective changer. There's two different groups of people we're talking to here. The first group has sales on their business card, but it still makes them cringe. And unfortunately, we still refer to the used car salesman who gets rulled under the bus.
April Williams:We have a phrase at Southwestern Consulting, What bothers us is that they have commissioned breath. You smell it the moment you walk up to them, you know what they're interested in, and they're not interested in you. So we have a problem with the way sales has been done in the past. And so often people would like to rename it. Well, I do business development, or I do relationship building, and I'm leaning into, how about we just change the perception of sales?
April Williams:Because sales is a good thing. It's what makes us run as companies. So that's your first group. They know it, but they do it badly. The second group is usually your professional service group.
April Williams:They tend to wear multiple hats, and sales is nowhere on their business card. They need to develop business to be promoted at their company. Those are the people that I have a heart for, because truly no one is teaching them. There is no one. They have been tremendous.
April Williams:They've gone and they've majored in accounting. They've worked at the top four. Their clients love them. They're tremendous at what they do, and now you get the, oh, and you have to sell. And they are paralyzed and don't know what to do.
Brian Rowley:But haven't you seen because I think some of the best salespeople are people that just know how to have a conversation. And and I think to your point, you know, being trained to sell, I mean, there's obviously some fundamentals, right, that are a part of any job. But I also I I truly do believe, I mean, I think it's one of the reasons why so many companies are moving away from, to your point, the sales titles and moving in you know, where consultative sales or where, you know, customer coaches or where all of these I mean, there's a million terms that are out there. To your point at the end of the day at sales, but I I think you're right. I think there has been sort of this, you know, perspective of, you know, and perception of like these pushy people that are out there.
Brian Rowley:But I think a good salesperson is just someone who knows how to have a conversation and tell a story like Laura mentioned at the very beginning where that's our job. All of us are there to tell stories. And and and as a result of that, they hopefully will generate revenue. I I find it really interesting because I do agree with you. I think the title itself is is not necessarily the problem because it can be a very good thing.
Brian Rowley:We just have to get it to not be associated with that, you know, I feel slimy after that conversation.
April Williams:I think that's one of the biggest challenges is the people's perception. So I'm currently working with an attorney and she's in a new market, and she's responsible for generating business in this new market. And she's paralyzed by the thought. And to what you just said, Brian, is spot on. She's a relationship builder.
April Williams:She connects with people. So even right away reframing, there's a perception they have to go out and sell on the first conversation, which is atrocious. That's what gives sales a bad name. So it's even reframing process and helping understand that sales is an activity game. It's not a results game.
April Williams:Results is because of the activity. And the activities around serving others, connecting with people, truly being interested in helping them find a solution, even if it's not you. It's being good people, right? And so one of the things I constantly say to people is what you do is not for everyone, nor is everyone a fit for what you do. So your one role is to talk to as many people as possible.
April Williams:It's conversational. It's building relationships. And I can see the shoulders go down, and they start to take a deep breath and think, I think I can do this. And I'm watching this young woman begin to soar because she's just had a reframing and we're giving her the skills and we're scripting and we're helping her get comfortable with language. And so it just changes the game for them.
Laura Smith:It's interesting because I come from many years in the agency side where I was a relationship, you know, managed relationships, right? But as part so there's a role of like, that's organic growth is gonna happen because you have strong relationships, you're helping clients understand what their marketing problems are, helping them solve them, and with that does come additional revenue. And so that feels much more natural. That always felt much more natural. Then there's the other side of the agency world where you have go pitch business, and you have to be in front of the room, you know, and sometimes virtually, and really sell.
Laura Smith:And that makes that made people cringe. And there were people that just you can't do it because it feels too forced, whereas but if you're good at that, that also is a relationship discussion. It really is about understanding the landscape, understanding what the opportunities are, but that all that you had different personalities who could maybe do the organic side, but they put them in front of pitch. And that word pitch alone makes it feel icky. Right?
Laura Smith:So but that hasn't the agency model hasn't changed. It should. I that's a whole other conversation. But, you know, that's where I think many people would say, well, if I have to sell and we have to say, you are selling. You're owning a piece of business.
Laura Smith:You're managing that business, and it's growing. So you're you're doing something right. So it just it's so familiar just coming from that world where it was if you didn't think about it, you just did your job, and your job was that relationship building. It it just it comes naturally. But but I think the pushy there's still pushy people out there.
Laura Smith:I mean, I just got a car not long ago. I mean and traditionally, was a better process than it was years ago. But there are really pushy salespeople, and I think how do we we we're not gonna remove that perception if that doesn't change. So I do you encounter people who are still those innately pushy people that you have to almost move them away from that?
April Williams:Oh, they get they get free trainings when they do that to me. Yes. For sure. I'm like, this is gonna be for free. We're gonna talk about what's happening right here.
April Williams:But I but I think it's important. Zig Ziglar has a quote that says that if you have a product or service you believe truly fulfills a need for someone, you have a moral obligation to sell it. So it always starts for me back at, do you believe in what you do and that it's impacting someone's life, then why wouldn't you share it and help someone? So I think that's it's a big part of people again are like, I don't wanna be seen as pushy. I don't wanna be seen as salesy.
April Williams:We have to just reframe. You're just serving them. And if it's not for them, then you thank them and you move on.
Brian Rowley:Yeah, I wanna go back to a point that you made and you had said that salespeople are there to actually have conversations. And I agree with that. But at the other side to that, I also think a good salesperson is also a good listener. Because how many people right now are walking into sales appointments this afternoon as we're having this conversation that have already decided what it is they're gonna sell that person and it's the first time they've ever met. And I think that's where some of this pushiness comes in.
Brian Rowley:Because again, just like any relationship, in order for a relationship to work, you have to know the person that you're trying to have a relationship with. And if you don't and you come into it thinking this is what I'm here to do and have no clue as to what they actually need, I think that's a part of where this stereotype comes from.
April Williams:You couldn't be more right, Brian. That is such a critical piece and the conversation shouldn't be a dialogue. It should be a conversation and really about uncovering needs. And again, if you're truly serving and have a heart to truly help the people that you are speaking with, you might say, I am not right for you. That's the ultimate servant that is like, but I can help you find someone.
April Williams:So I think that's the part. If we go in scripted with I must sell, that's commission made breath. People know it the second you start speaking that you have one thing to do here today, and that is to close this deal or try to close me. And by the nature of who we are as humans, we all recoil from that. We're like, No, thank you.
April Williams:I don't even know if it's good for me anymore. You're clearly one-sided. So I think you've nailed a big part. We tend to see that a little more in your sales is on my business card, and I'm going after it, than your folks that I'm dealing with. Because my bigger challenge with some of the folks that I'm dealing with who would say they're really not salespeople, they get really good at the beginning conversation, but they can't ask for the business.
April Williams:So they become really great conversationalists, but they don't close deals.
Laura Smith:What are the first skills that those folks that you're talking about, those accountants, those lawyers, those consultants that you're working with, what's the first skills they should develop to become more effective? How to hold a conversation, or what do what do you what do you start in your trainings, in your sessions?
April Williams:I think that's the excellent question. Normally, the very, very first place we start is mindset. They've got to let go of what's between their ears and what they're telling themselves, or I mean, if you go into a meeting the whole time as you're heading in thinking, I'm not a salesperson. I can't do this. I'm not a salesperson.
April Williams:I'm not a salesperson. That's not a good beginning. So mindset. But then the second thing that really help break down the entire even sales cycle. Like, what is the point of your very first phone call?
April Williams:What are some things that you can say and be asking? When you have a discovery meeting, you should do more listening than speaking. You should be asking really great questions. Don't feel the need to present anything. Walk away from that, digest that.
April Williams:Go back with a presentation that fits what you heard them say they need, not just the standard template. And then you have to really start down the path as they have to be comfortable closing. And closing for a yes or a no. The one kiss of death closing is the maybe or not now. But how to help them close for a yes or a no.
April Williams:And then we'll get objections. And that usually freezes people right in their tracks, and they don't know how to respond, and they just fold. As opposed to understanding what are some common objections they can face, and how will they be prepared to present earlier on them so people know what the objections that could come up or they'll actually be able to help have a conversation and close through them.
Brian Rowley:Yeah, when we were actually discussing this episode, and you referenced this just a few minutes ago, but you mentioned that even like accountants, lawyers, consultants, right, are sort of have this expectation, right, to bring in business. And and there isn't anyone who's actually teaching them how to do that. So, you know, what are some of the impacts of that gap in training? Like like, how do we solve for some of that? Because, you know, to your point, I I if if you said to me an accountant or a lawyer is someone who is carrying a sales role when they're wanting an organization, I I can see people rolling their eyes right now, right at that because they're like, that's not my job.
Brian Rowley:So how do you fill some of those gaps? What's the impact of
April Williams:that That's such a great question. And I've got a couple of very interesting examples. By the time someone is inside a professional service firm, a law firm, a CPA firm, an engineering firm, by the time this conversation comes up, they're already moving up the ranks of promotion, right? They're not entry level. They are now on the heels of becoming a partner.
April Williams:That's when revenue responsibility usually kicks in. So you take these really smart professionals who have excelled at their career, they're now about to get promoted, and you change the game. And you say, now you have to sell. And pretty much for most firms, it's good luck. Go talk to people.
April Williams:So I had a woman say to me, am not She wasn't doing it. She couldn't sell. And she said, and if I don't get help, I will quit because I will not stay here and be seen as a failure.
Laura Smith:Wow. Yet she's so successful.
Brian Rowley:But that one term is the thing that like really threw her.
April Williams:Well, and she was trying, but she didn't know what she was doing. And she's going out and she's networking, but she's not asking any questions and she's not moving the dial. And so it's gonna come around for whether or not she's promoted because she's up she's up for the promotion, and she's gonna be denied because she didn't hit her revenue goals.
Laura Smith:So in comes April?
April Williams:Ideally. I am I am on a mission to find all these people and be like, you can do this because they're they're smart. And if and we're talking about the large, large professional service members. Many of them have internal trainers that are helping. We're talking about below that is where it gets really dicey for these folks who are on a path to partnership and don't know how to do it.
Laura Smith:Do you see people exit by choice? Have you seen people This say, okay, is not my
April Williams:year, quite a few.
Laura Smith:Do they stay in that same role, but in a different organization in hopes that they won't have to?
April Williams:Depends on different different firms have different requirements. So one, they could find a firm that has softer requirements, or they'll go and be in house as opposed to work for in the public accounting or public in the a law firm. They'll go internal.
Laura Smith:Wow. So moving on to those those folks that are true salespeople that may have that in their title. So they might be wearing multiple hats, but focus so so focusing on the sales only, I guess, role that aspect of the business. They could be managing. They could be, you on executive level.
Laura Smith:So but to focus on that that sales only role can be a challenge for them. So how do you help people create the time and the space to narrow in on the actual sales and the growth and revenue opportunities.
April Williams:Another really great question, Laura. You asked me the skills we start, and I said mindset. The second is your schedule. The second is managing your time and really getting your time set. We work like we have a client that just came in and we managed to get eight hours eliminated from his calendar weekly.
April Williams:So trying to find time. We tend as a society to believe that everything is urgent. So we are in our work environment with Slack or Teams and email and cell phones and texts, and every single one we lift our head and we go look. And that's called intermittent time change. Every time you stop something your head's down in, it takes you about twenty minutes to get yourself back in.
April Williams:So the very first thing we're talking about is how do you time block, bunch things together in time blocks and stay focused on something and then be able to lift your head. So even things like when are you gonna even check email is a spot in your calendar. It's not every time you have a minute. So it's really getting very focused time. It's the part we spend the most conversations with people, because it absolutely flips them out.
April Williams:Because we're talking about, you start Monday morning, and you know every single thirty minute spot in your calendar for the week you are going, where you are going to spend your time. That's ideal. And we say, you can't live an ideal week if you don't even know what one looks like. But I've been striving to live ideal for three years and would tell you I still haven't hit I don't think it's something we hit, but at least I know where I'm heading and what I'm trying to do.
Laura Smith:Yeah. Because that's mean, I'm like smiling and kind of laughing beyond the scenes here because we could all use that. I mean, that doesn't know, as as we're talking, of course, my phone's blowing up on the side with those messages, and it's hard to be so focused to say, I'm only gonna check email at 03:00 every day because the world in which we all live in is like immediate gratification, and everyone wants to have response quickly. So I'd be interested to hear how successful mean, I'm sure you have some successes, some failures, but when people are successful in that, like, what do they say? Like, what's what's the outcome from that change and that shift?
Brian Rowley:To be honest with you, a calendar that that is that program, stresses me out quite a bit if I'm being a 100% honest. Like that doesn't necessarily help.
April Williams:Whenever we're doing these workshops or trainings and we talk about this, there's two looks up I see all the time. One is absolute peace and joy that someone finally gave them a solution. And the second is pure terror, there's no way. But I'll give you an example. I was working with someone who was a manager inside Aflac and he had a team, but his number one role was recruiting new people and managing his team.
April Williams:And that was what everything fringed on, his revenue, his bonuses, everything. And so when I came in and had a conversation with him, I said, show me your schedule. And he pulled up and it had like four things in it for the entire week. Like it was the main appointments.
Laura Smith:Must be nice.
April Williams:Right? And I said, where's everything else? He goes, well, you don't get it. It's one fire after another. I just come in and all I'm doing is putting out fires all day with my team, with my clients.
April Williams:And so we talked about doing the ideal schedule. He goes, I can't do it. That won't work for me. You don't understand my life. We call that terminal uniqueness.
April Williams:No one has it, but we all think we have it. And so I said, I need you to trust me, and I want you to work on a schedule and map it out, and you're gonna send it to me every Sunday night. So he did. And within six months, he hit his first bonus that he hasn't hit in four years. And he would tell you, this was the number one thing he did was stop believing the lie that he couldn't manage his time.
April Williams:Like he says, my team needs me. I said, well then what if every day you had two and a half hours blank on your calendar that you had out on the side of your office door that said, need me? Come in at this spot right now. So it's a reframing. But everyone has This is the one thing that everyone has objections, but the people that actually nail it, which means you're probably living 75% of your ideal schedule, get a lot done and hit their goals.
Brian Rowley:Yeah, I wouldn't say that know Laura, I mean, we both do it, right? It just like, I mean, I'm the type of person that you know, the night before I leave my office, I print out my calendar for the next day so I can like, I'm like that person. I am a little like, won't lie that that is but it does I mean, it does stress me out a bit. Like, when I see all that in a day because, you know, there are those fire drills that do come up and there's to Laura's point, like we're constantly being pulled into something where like, didn't see that coming. Like, if you look at our objectives from the beginning of the year to what we needed to do and then how many additional things we've taken on before the year end.
Brian Rowley:Right? Like, I mean, you gotta find time for that somewhere. So it that that part of it is the part that does stress
Laura Smith:me out. Yeah. Because I also think it's like the other day, it was I looked at my calendar before coming into the office, the night before, and it's that all can't happen. I can't sit in all those meetings. Like, I just and get work done.
Laura Smith:It's not it's impossible. So there was a bit of shifting and a bit of, do we need to have this meeting? Is this a meeting? And where I came from previously, we used to always ask the question, like, pause. Does this need to be a meeting?
Laura Smith:Could it be an email? Could it be a Teams chat? We don't always have to be in a meeting. So I do think we try to carve that time, but even still in that day where I had all these blocks of, like, work getting work done, things came in the midst of that. You know, I still was getting sidetracked.
Laura Smith:So, I mean, I think we could all benefit from Maple's strategies, whatever they may be. And that's why I was asking, you know, what do people see? Like, where's that the the successes? Because that's that's huge gains, obviously, if somebody was able to do that. Gentleman at Aflac was able to have those.
April Williams:Because we've coached over 23,000 people at Southwestern Consulting, we know on average we increase people's time management by 58%. We see it work over and over. But one of the key things, Laura, that you just said, which is so important, when you build out your calendar, you need to build fires. Like don't fill an eight hour day. If you have a fire every day, is it average one hour, two hour?
April Williams:How much do you get blown up? Then actually plan out a six hour day and leave a block at the end of the day that you're shifting and moving things, but you're still trying to get the things accomplished. But we live this world where we know time is so precious. We know that we're gonna get bombarded and we still plan an eight hour, nine hour day of stuffed stuff.
Laura Smith:But my response to that is if I leave that hour open at the end of the day, someone will see it and they'll take it.
April Williams:You you need to block it. You need to block it like going to have surgery. You need to have something on there that's like, do not do this.
Brian Rowley:Yeah, but think about how many people within companies frown upon the whole blocking of calendar.
April Williams:Oh, yeah.
Brian Rowley:I mean, that's a real thing. People actually get angry with people who block their calendars, but we don't wanna tackle necessarily the bigger problem. And I think Laura, you just you know, nailed this one. Right? How many meetings that are on the calendar that are taking up our time really need to be meetings?
Brian Rowley:And if those weren't there, I wouldn't need to block my calendar. So I think it's also there's a piece to this that's being that, you know, being sensitive to the amount of work that everybody has, not just us, everybody, right? Prioritizing accordingly. I think April, I know the answer to this based on this conversation, but I mean, is it fair to say then like of all the things that we've talked about up until this point, that scheduling piece is probably the major thing that people should be focusing on when they're sort of juggling these multiple priorities
April Williams:without a doubt. Absolutely without a doubt. And it was even when I owned the agency, this was the magic thing we were always trying to figure out and it's cultural. Whoever is leading the company is driving, don't block, everything is an emergency. I mean, got very comfortable in my career when someone would be like, a phone call or something would happen, I'd be like, is this an emergency?
April Williams:Do you need me right now? And the answer was no. Was like, get on my calendar. But I think that the main piece really for us is to keep understanding that this is a process. This is a process that we're working on, but really finding, again, I was at the agency, I would block Tuesday and Thursday mornings at our company, nine to 11:30, everyone was heads down.
April Williams:You couldn't email people, you couldn't Slack people, you couldn't do anything, we were heads down and our productivity went through the roof. Yeah. So it's figuring it out.
Laura Smith:I know people that won't start their day. Actually, when I was part of chief as well, April, there was someone in my group that she blocked every morning until 10AM. And she said, I'm this is my time. Whether she's working out or whether she's heads down work, she but would not take a meeting before 10AM, and I was like, wow. That's fascinating.
Laura Smith:You know? But but but I've taken things from that. I'm not doing that every day, but I will block time to be like, okay. This has to be headspace or this has to be you know, when and no one wants a 07:00 meeting, but sometimes you take it, and sometimes you can have that free time until 10AM. But I just was like, well, that was a great great setting boundaries.
Laura Smith:I was I was impressed by her ability to do that. Awesome.
Brian Rowley:Well, April, lucky for you, the next five minutes on your calendar are all about what we call the hot seat time.
April Williams:I'm so excited.
Brian Rowley:April Williams. More like April, will you sit in the hot seat. That's our amazing producer, Joey, who's behind all of that. But so in our Hot Seat segment, we use this time, Laura and I, with our guests just to sort of ask random questions that we haven't brought
Laura Smith:to Random. Their I mean, they're pretty focused.
Brian Rowley:Well, I mean, about this episode, but I mean, they're random to them. They have no idea what it's about.
Laura Smith:What are you making for dinner tonight, April? Yes. So
Brian Rowley:our question for you is what's the worst or most outdated piece of sales advice you've ever heard and why should everyone stop believing it?
April Williams:Oh gosh, worst piece of advice I've ever heard. I think it is the sense that we can go sell anything like go sell Brian, you can sell him something. I don't believe that's true. I don't believe I believe if I really get to know Brian, what he needs, I may not have any offering for him today. I mean, it could be another day, but I think going in, it's part of what we've talked about from the beginning.
April Williams:When someone goes in with an agenda and they have to close, I mean, I think one of the biggest challenges we have as salespeople is we're a very competitive bunch. If you go into any organization, you don't see marketing teams competing with each other. We see sales teams competing with each other and that creates a culture of get something sold. I don't love that.
Brian Rowley:I think that's actually really, really good because I would agree with you. Because I think for many, many years, people have said, oh, what do you mean you came back and you didn't sell them anything? You're not a very good salesperson. But to your point of, I didn't sell them anything yet, I think is the big piece. Because once you get to know them and you start to understand needs and requirements and all of those things, that's when you can actually align yourself to sell.
Brian Rowley:I think that's that's
Laura Smith:And I think the competitive piece is interesting because it is, I think, how these teams are just formed and trained. And so there's just me versus them and who's the top of the leaderboard and that doesn't yeah. That dissolve it. That competitive nature just gets to looking for results. And I think you said what you said earlier, April, but it was like you can't get to results without some of the actions that
April Williams:Activity.
Laura Smith:Activity. Yeah. So you can't just get to results without the activity. So yeah. So thank you, April.
Laura Smith:It has been wonderful to have you on. We've learned a ton. I think we could spend probably two hours just talking about the schedule situation because we could all learn from it. So thank you again for shedding so much, light on this topic, and we appreciate you joining us today.
April Williams:I loved being here. Thanks for having me.
Brian Rowley:Yeah. Thank you.
Laura Smith:Alright. So, Brian, that was just I mean, like, I think every team and we're marketing people and we're not, you know, the CPAs or the accountants and all that. But I feel like
Brian Rowley:But I sold for years. I did sell. I've had sales roles.
Laura Smith:Well, well, you could wow. Have you woah. Have you have you taken on any of April's strategies when you were selling would be the question.
Brian Rowley:Yeah. I mean, I think the calendar piece is a really big piece. And honestly, I do think the listening piece is the biggest piece. I I I truly believe in order to be a good salesperson, that's the it's the conversations that people have versus that thought of I'm going in here with a mission for you to buy and sign this agreement, are the things that don't work.
Laura Smith:But that's fundamentally like relationships, right? I mean, no matter what relationship you're in, there should be two way communication. Listening is critical. So it shouldn't be looked at so differently than having any other, whether it be professional or personal relationships. That's what's kind of fascinating and where she brings that out, it just makes it seem so obvious.
Laura Smith:But the one thing that I love that she said that I wrote down was the commission breath, which is like that is a great way to put it because that's how some sales folks are are kind of trained and born and bred, and there are others that just are are fearful of it. Right? Like, encountering it. So I think that's a great way to put that in, you know, a productive light.
Brian Rowley:Car salesman. Most commissioned breath I've ever seen in my entire life. I mean, literally now I'm gonna walk in with a minion and just be like, I need
Laura Smith:to get rid of that. But but listen. How many people on LinkedIn are reaching out when I feel like cold selling? And I'm like, oh, back off. Like, back off.
Laura Smith:So I think the same thing. Yeah. It's across industries for sure. But Yeah. Really good.
Laura Smith:Well, thanks, everyone, for listening. And most importantly, if you liked what you heard today, be sure to follow us. If you wanna hear more from April Williams, you can find her on LinkedIn.
