Strikingly Different Selling – Dale Merrill

 

 

Transcript:

Mon, Mar 28, 2022

SUMMARY KEYWORDS 
client , movie trailer , book , people , sellers , selling , strikingly , sales , meeting , sales cycle , oral presentation , contrast , billboard , stand , capture , engage , world , outcome , mind , memorial day

SPEAKERS
Dale Merrill & Christopher Smith

Intro
Welcome to the Sales Lead Dog podcast hosted by CRM technology and sales process expert Christopher Smith, talking with sales leaders that have separated themselves from the rest of the pack. Listen to find out how the best of the best achieve success with their team and CRM technology. And remember, unless you are the lead dog, the view never changes.

Christopher Smith
Welcome to sales lead dog. Today I have joining me Dale Merrill, managing director of sales performance practice at Franklin Covey. Dale, welcome to sales lead dog.

Dale Merrill
Thank you, Chris. Delighted to be here.

Christopher Smith
So, managing director at Franklin Covey. That’s terrific. And we want to talk about that a little bit. But we’re really here to talk about is your book strikingly different selling six vital skills to stand out and sell more? What’s the idea behind or what’s the seed of the idea that launched this plug?

Dale Merrill
Yeah, this goes back many years ago, where many of our clients came to us and said, we’re struggling to get meetings, or we’re getting meetings, but they’re not going anywhere. Or they’d say, we’re just not winning enough. You know, can you guys help, and we coach people and work with people, salespeople all around the world, and sales leaders and teams. And as we started looking at that, we decided that there was nothing that was meaningful that had hit the sales world for like a decade. And so, we kicked off a multi-year research project to figure out how can sellers stand out. So, they can actually find a cherished place in the mind at heart of their clients and have it go somewhere. And so that kicked out the whole project, it started as a project on momentum. And as we did the research, and it morphed, it turned into something that we call strikingly different selling. Yeah.

Christopher Smith
And one of the things that I want listeners to really understand what this book, this is not another fluff book about selling. And that’s my big takeaway from this book is, there’s some very actionable items in here, things that you can really use to help you get better. Can you talk about that?

Dale Merrill
Sure. So, we have found that there are a lot of blind spots and sellers out there. And one of the unique things that came about us we were doing this research is we were invited to work with several global technology organizations over a six-year period. And we had a chance to watch more than 20 100 sales professionals, arguably some of the best in the world, highly compensated, you should have been just amazing to watch, participate in almost 1700 meetings of those about 428 Were all oral presentations. And we expected to see wow, this is this is amazing. After each interaction, we have a chance to ask both the selling team and the client how it went. So, we went to the selling team, either an individual or a team of individuals. And we said, hey, how did that interaction go? As you might expect, Chris, they said, thumbs up. We nailed it. We did great we did we asked great questions, you know, the dialogues going somewhere, we’re in a good position to win. Then we went and talked to the clients. And these were all C suites people. So, think of Chief Executive Officer, you know, Chief Financial Officer, CTO, CTO, CMO, and so forth. And we asked them, how did the meeting go from your perspective? About 70% of the time, there was a long pause. And they said something like this. That meeting was a waste of my time. And they gave it a thumbs down. And we thought it was so remarkable that we could have literally thumbs up from one part of the meeting and thumbs down on the other. How could that possibly be? How can we have this big of a disconnect? And we were shocked for the first 400 or so meetings, and then we got used to it, we realized, this is what people are experiencing clients are experiencing around the world every day, lackluster meetings that don’t go anywhere. They’re not focused on them. And so that was really insightful. Because as we pressed back on the executives, and we said, if it was really a waste of your time, why didn’t you just end the meeting? Then they usually softened up and they said something like this? Okay, maybe it wasn’t a waste of my time. But it just wasn’t the dialogue I was wanting to have. And so, we can unpack that if you’d like. But there’s a lot of richness to that. And we started exploring, what do clients want to see and hear? And through hundreds of hours of working with these clients around the world on virtually every continent, we came up with what you find in the book, which are the six vital skills, things you can do to think differently and say and act differently that make an impact on clients.

Christopher Smith
You know, and then I think whenever we’re selling or engaging with anyone, we want it to be positive. We want it to, you know, we want to feel good about what we did there. So, I think it is really natural for people to give the thumbs up like, hey, that went really well. You know, I’m looking for those body signs, and I got the buy signs and yeah, but we’re not mind readers. And unfortunately, not do Yeah, it’d be so much easier if we were probably not that great. Honestly, we might come out of the meeting really depressed. But, you know, so the way you’ve got the book structured out, as you said, it’s, it’s all around these six skills. Let’s talk about skill, number one, capture attention with verbal billboards. What do you mean by verbal billboards?

Dale Merrill
So your listeners can imagine with you and me that you’re driving down the road, the everyman driving down the road, and you happen to look over on the side of the road, and you notice something that really captures your attention, a billboard, either a visual message, you know, a visual, a picture or a few words, and you go, wow, if you’re like me, now, I’d become student of billboards, you know, I swerve and I’m in tell my wife says, Hey, Stan road, right. So, the advertising industry has mastered the art of capturing our attention, and planting a seed in our mind that that tends to pop back up. We took that a page from that industry, and we created something called sales, billboards that are all intended to capture the attention of your client right off the bat, whether you’re trying to and it works everywhere in the sales cycle, from the very end of the sales cycle, with your proposal, your oral presentation, how do you actually capture the attention of the person, which is the client or the team that client executives or whoever the deciders are? How do you capture their attention, and with your core message in such a way that they want to listen and engage further? So, it works at the end of the cell cycle, it works in the middle of the sales cycle, and it works beautifully at the front part of the sales cycle, to get a meeting for the first time to start a meeting, right? And then to end the meeting so that you have momentum going forward. So, it’s all about your core message about how do you capture attention and engage the client in a good way?

Christopher Smith
Yeah, and I think that’s a big struggle for a lot of companies. You know, before I had 15 minutes before we started the session, so what I do what everybody does, I’m going through my email, and just I’ve got a backlog of several 100 unread emails that I’m trying to get through before the end of the day. So, you’ve got a really, if you’re engaging with me and trying to sell through email, you’ve got a very small window to get me to stop and read your email, because I’ve got my goals. I’m wanting to get through those 100 emails as quick as I can.

Dale Merrill
No question, right?

Christopher Smith
So, if knowing that, hey, that’s my audience that, you know, if I’m trying to gate through this channel, and I got the sliver of a window to get their attention. How do I get how do I do that? That’s really hard. How do I do that?

Dale Merrill
Yeah. So, here’s another stat that I’ll show out. I’ll share with you is we worked with a firm called primary intelligence that does win loss reviews globally. And I’m good friends with a CEO. And I said, hey, can we partner on this? And he said, Sure. I said, I want to look over like an eight-year period at 1000s of interactions between b2b, you know, buyers and sellers. And this see, and I have some particular questions on differentiating. So, we designed the project, we dove into it, we looked at more than 14,500 interactions between b2b clients, the buyers and the sellers, 42% of the time, the buyers could not tell the difference between vendors. This is in the oral presentation; this is at the end of the sales cycle. So, if you go to the front of the sales cycle, it’s like 90% of the time everybody looks and sounds the same. So, with that in mind, we started really going into how can sellers really stand out wherever they’re trying to stand out in a sales cycle, when there’s a few secret nuggets that we when you read the book we’ll get into and I’ll share a little bit here with you. You have to have contrast. Now, it’s no surprise to any seller that you have to bring contrast. That’s like a kind of a thing to say, right? The thing that’s not done is that most sellers try to pop contrast in a way that doesn’t work with the client. So, you have to define contrast the right way. And so, we define that as being strikingly different. And there’s three criteria this this these three and then I’ll get back to the billboard part how you apply it. You have to be relevant, distinct and memorable. Relevant means focused on what matters most to the caller. Not to you as a seller, not to me as a seller, right? Distinct means show them something different and better from their perspective, not necessarily about you and your solutions. Everybody talks about themselves and their company, their technology, and their people and their processes. Stop, it is not going to work focus on the client. And the final thing is make it memorable, easy to share and hard to forget. So, if you think of that relevant, distinct and memorable, and repeated, almost like a mantra, or a song, kind of put an ear worm in there. Have you ever heard of that song? The Baby Shark Song? Chris, any listeners? If you have children or grandchildren, you have heard Baby shark? Baby shark doo doo doo. Oh, god. Yeah, sure. Yeah, so I just put an ear worm in your ear. Sorry about that. It will be with you. So, you have to coming back to a billboard, your message has to be focused on the client with contrast. And here’s the golden the secret nugget that pulls relevant, distinct and memorable in use from two comparisons. Where from is the current state to is the desired future state. And if you can get them the, by when you can help them achieve that, that would be a great thing. But if you can contrast for the client, with symptoms and emotions and outcomes, what it looks like it feels like today in the current state, with what it can be in the future, by taking a different approach by using a different product or service. You don’t even have to mention the product or service by name, fact you shouldn’t, it should just be the outcomes. That magic, put something in our minds. And we don’t know all the neuroscience behind it. But we studied this about 100,000 times now. Each of us paints in our mind vivid imagery and vintage vivid feelings that associate the from going to the to almost all sales books out there. And almost every marketing firm out there focuses on the two. Very rarely, if ever, do we see a contrast between the front and the two? It’s simple. But it’s not simplistic. And it’s powerful. In in a billboard, you’re contrasting that from the two with the client, how they can go from this to that by a certain time period. And it’s just magical for them.

Christopher Smith
Oh, yeah, you think about the anyone selling exercise equipment. It like infomercials, that’s what it’s all about that you can look like this gorgeous model that we have on here, just by spending 10 minutes a day, you know, squeezing your thighs together, whatever the heck it is, right? That’s what they’re selling the outcome. They’re selling what this is what the to be, you know, this is what you could look like.

Dale Merrill
Yeah, which is great. And if you really start paying attention to this, I can’t look at any corporate website or look at any email, I have an email list of good and bad emails. And I have about 90% of all that I receive in the bad. Very rarely do I get in the good. Except for our clients, of course. And they have they’re good. And they’re, they’re winning. It’s it really, it’s an amazing thing.

Christopher Smith
Yeah, it really is it amazes me, even with books like yours that are out there that can really help people and transform how they sell how many bad sellers there are. It’s not that they’re bad, but it’s just their approach or whatever. I was talking about this on a previous episode of the show where I was, I had gotten in my car, I was heading to the airport, or I was in an Uber really heading to the airport, I had some downtime, and my phone rang. I didn’t know the number, but I’m like cannot answer it. And it was someone trying to sell me. And I’m like, Alright, here we go. Let’s see how they do it. Because I love like your inbox or your bad. And I try to capture these as well and file them away. And this person just launched right into a cell, and he’s just pitched didn’t connect with me at all. It was just gone right into his pitch. And I’m thinking to myself, like opportunity to last, you know, you haven’t done anything that I needed, you’re not even engaging with me at all. And then I would just there I listen for a while and I’m like, hey, you know what? Not a great fit for me appreciates the call. See you later. And I moved on with my day. And I’m sure he moved on to whatever’s next on his list.

Dale Merrill
Right. And the unfortunate thing is, as you probably well know, that happens to the whole sales cycle. Yeah. That’s why the global win rates in our research are 17%, on average, across industries from $100,000 deals up to billion-dollar deals. And we looked at about 20,000 different deals to reach that conclusion. When we talked with the clients. I’ll give you one more tidbit here. This isn’t in the book. So, this is this is some secret sauce for your listeners here, right. We asked the client executives, what are sellers doing wrong? They said three things. One, you talked too much. Right? And you being salespeople talk too much about yourself and your solutions and your technology and your people and all of the things like that. You’re not focusing on me, too, if you’re not talking too much, you tend to flip to the other end of the spectrum and interrogate us. And we don’t like that. Can you just listen to us and engage in a peer to peer dialogue, peer to peer. So, if you’re talking to the CEO, you’re right here at the level of the CEO. You’re not above them being arrogant. You’re not beneath them being subservient. You’re right there. And you don’t have to have the same title or compensation are years of experience, you do have to bring thought leadership so that you can share something different and better to them. The third thing is they said, we can’t tell anybody apart. Right now. We found this in our experiential research. We saw it in spades. And then we found that in hard science, when we looked at the data 42% of the time, they can’t buyer’s count till any sellers apart. And so, we said, well, how can you? How can sellers, pop contrast, that’s where we came up with the From and to comparison from the mouth of the of the actual clients themselves. So, imagine, I know, this is a, I don’t have a visual image here. But everybody thinks about wanting to buy an Apple, let’s imagine you’re in the market for apples. And you want a different apple, and you go to one particular vendor, and they have all these beautiful apples, but they’re all red. Okay, you got another one, they’re all green, what they’re really looking for, let’s say there’s three apples, three competitors, trying to compete for your business, to a red and one’s green. If green is what the clients in the market for, if that’s relevant to them, clearly, that’s going to pop. And the way that we found that the apple pops is not just the color, but the taste, and the texture, and the smell and the experience of that. So, with everything being equal, if you bring the concept of relevant, distinct and memorable, and apply that you in your communication, you in the way that you connect and engage with the client in the eyes of the client will pop as different and better. And that’s how we really got into the research. How could you if you’re looking like everybody else? How do you step up, if everything really is the same? It’s in the experience in the engagement, it’s the sellers who understand the needs of the buyer the best, and then articulates that in a way that we would describe as relevant, distinctive, memorable. And so that’s another secret nugget that you can apply. And we have a lot of examples in the book of really practical ways to do that, that makes the difference.

Christopher Smith
Yeah, you know, I, years ago, I attended a sales training put on by one of the vendors we partner with. And the person said, hey, imagine you’re selling a by an eight and a half by 11, sheet of white copy paper, that’s your business. And there’s a ream of competitors that are all the same as you they’re in half by 11, piece of white copy paper. How do you stand out when you’re all look this to the to the triple your sums, you all look the same? And so, I’ve always imagined myself whenever I’m talking to someone, I’m that piece of white paper, how do I stand out? You know, and so it’s like, it really is humbling when you look at yourself like that, that it’s like, you know, from their eyes, you’re not any different, you may think you’re the greatest thing since sliced bread. But in their eyes, you’re just eight and a half by 11 piece of white paper.

Dale Merrill
Exactly. So well, what’s the answer? Chris? Did you find the answer?

Christopher Smith
It’s, it’s a lot of what you said that it’s the outcome. And then that was a big hook for me is when I don’t where I got that from, I think I’ve written a book recently, that is don’t buy technology, or they don’t buy, you know, whatever a service or whatever, they’re buying an outcome. And if you don’t understand what the outcome is they’re looking for, you’re not going to win that deal in it, but so much of it is it takes so much more than just understanding that outcome. It’s like you said it’s the texture, it’s the smell, it’s the feel of it, you got to get all that right as well.

Dale Merrill
Yeah, have you think about this, that’s what we’ve found, as well as that when you think about relevant, distinct and memorable of those three, are, are relevant is the most important by a factor of three. And that means you’re doing what you just said, but matters most to the client. And that’s how you differentiate even if everything’s that same, at least on the surface. I don’t believe it ever is exactly the same. But if it were, you can pop the contrast that means something to the client by being relevant to them and articulating it in the words and phrases they use. Almost like you’re part of their team. And if everything really is the same, but that, then you’ll look very different and feel very different to them. And you’ll be able to, you know, jump into the lead position there.

Christopher Smith
You know, I’ve learned so much more from asking people why. Why did you guys pick us? What was it about us that stood out? I’ve learned more from those conversations and being able to get early language, the phrasing that they use and then parroting back that the way those C level people were talking to me parroting that back in my next deal that has resonated and help me way more than anything else I was trying to create on my own.

Dale Merrill
Yeah, one other thought that might be helpful here, too, to add to what you mentioned, it’s job to be done. What job is the client hiring your product or your service to do? For example, people don’t go to Home Depot or Lowe’s to buy a drill. Yeah, they go to get something to help them make a hole. Right? Yeah. So, if you’re just focusing on the features and benefits of the drill, it’s not going to be very compelling, right. But if you do a really good job helping them, see how, what kind of a hole they need, how deep of a hole? Do they mean? Is it through concrete? Is it through wood is it through, you know, something else, they might not need a metal drill, if that titanium bit, they might need a high-pressure water thing to get the kind of precision they need, right? And so, it’s just about thinking about the job to be done that the client is hiring you and your products and services to do if that lens comes on for in the forefront, then you’ll have a much higher likelihood of connecting

Christopher Smith
up skill number two, we’re not going to give them all away listeners, you gotta buy the book. But skill number two, treat excitement with movie trailers. I love how you guys laid this out, too, by the way. Yeah, can you I know where I want to jump into the movie trailers? But how did you come up with this? This really made it easy to understand. How did you guys come up with this approach of how you structured your blog?

Dale Merrill
We listened to our clients, and then we innovated? So, the billboard concept came when we were watching a client executive expressed great frustration directly to the solid team saying, Hey, folks summit up, you know, give me give it to me in a billboard. He said, we sold, you know, we like that, that we like that concept. And that was in the context at the end of a meeting, right? But we took it and you as you read the book, you’ll see different examples of how to do that. For movie trailer, we decided to look around and do a Southwest Airlines approach. By that, I mean, if you know anything about Southwest Airlines, they’ve had a rough go the past few years. But if you go back 30 years ago, I used to do a lot of work with airline industry. Southwest Airlines was the laughingstock of the industry. Because the global airlines were saying who’s this fledgling little upstart company? You know, what do they know? Well, Southwest decided they’re going to do two things really well. And I’ll get back to movie trailer here quickly. He said we want to be the most friendly airline on the planet. And we want to be the most on time departure and arrival time airline on the planet in our regional hubs. Who are we go? Well, did they go look at United Airlines and, and TWA, the others that have gotten some that have gone out of business? No. They decided first we’re going to hire for personality and train technical. And second, they said we’re going to go to NASCAR and see how the pit crews actually take care of the cars quickly to get them back on the runway or onto the racetrack. And they did that same thing. What so what we did is a Southwest approach, we decided to look around the world to see who has done the best job of all industries that we know of creating excitement of people. We looked, we poked it a lot. We came back to Hollywood. And we realized Hollywood has nailed it. As far as getting us excited to watch a movie. And the movie trailer industry is an industry in and of itself. They have their own academy awards. They have their top 10 Best Movie Trailers. It’s a multibillion dollar industry. So, we went and we said what formula do these people use to build on the capture attention we found it’s a three part formula. They capture attention quickly. Then they create excitement. They create interest and excitement by pulling you into the storyline with cinematography and beautiful music and splashing the actor’s names and other things like that, then they call us to action. So, capture create call. So, we went and borrowed a page from the movie industry on how you can do this in sales. So, for a sales movie trailer, once you’ve captured the attention, you have to give them enough additional without going too far. It has to be in 90 seconds or less we found to be able to move things forward. So, we created this thing called the sales movie trailer And we found that it’s just absolutely brilliant and effective. Anywhere in the sales cycle again, going to the front of the sales cycle, it’s a great way to get a meeting, it’s a great way to start a meeting, first 90 seconds, and then you kind of get into the agenda of the meeting and you understand and discover what’s important to the client with respect to that. You can do it at the end of the of the sales cycle. If we have time, I can tell you stories about clients that have done this, that’s been so successful in your oral presentation. And, or, and so you can do it in writing in an email, or you can do it verbally. And it works beautifully.

Christopher Smith
Give us some Yeah, I’d love to hear some stories around that. Because I think it’s hearing the concept. Yeah, that’s great. But how are people actually doing this?

Dale Merrill
Yeah, we have, we have a client, it’s a $600 million client, annual revenue, their goal was to go to a billion in three years, they engaged us last year to come in and help them to become strikingly different. And when we started looking at their proposals, and their emails and everything, it was atrocious, it was a bunch of red apples, right, and you can’t tell anything apart. So we coached them, we installed all the skills of strikingly different got them going. And this story is really a fun one. They were invited. So, by the way, these, this firm was constantly getting beaten by the Big People, the big consulting firms around the world. And they were rarely invited to be in the top two or three finalists, we call it down select, you know, being down selected, they were not in that, they were usually in the first 10, then they never got down selected to three. So, a month after we got them thinking the right way and working the right way. They were consistently being down selected to three. In this one example, this client, got them down to the top three, and said, hey, we want you to come and present. So, our client was really excited. They told us and they had used some of our language. And they said, what can we do on the proposal, we said, use all the stuff, use a billboard, your core message, build that into a movie trailer. And then with a flashback, which we’ll get to here with your credibility built do that. So, they built the whole proposal around that. And then they got off the call from the client, and they said, hey, we want you to come present at three o’clock on Memorial Day week. This is Memorial Day weekend, three o’clock on Friday, before Memorial Day weekend, right? And they said what are we going to do? And so, 30 people from our client wanted to participate in the orals. And the leader said, Nope, it’s going to be me and one other person. So, they that was good. They did the whole proposal and a strikingly different way with the movie trailer at the start. And they sent it over two days in advance. And they did it with not one PowerPoint slide. They did it with all micro sites and cool little experiential things. When it came time for their presentation, they stood up. It was live, they stood up at three o’clock on Memorial on the Friday before Memorial Day. And they said, hey, we know it’s Memorial Day weekend, we can see all of you are heading out the door. And so, we’re going to give you a 30-minute presentation. Not that it was invited for two hours from three to five, they said we’ll do it in 30 minutes. They did it in 29 minutes, they started with a movie trailer that had from two you can go here, our overall idea for you is that you client can go from x to y within the next 12 months. And underneath that we had they had three from two sub headlines you can go from this to this, this to this this to this. They had some compelling stories they shared with that. And at the end of 29 minutes, they said, we’re done. And we’re happy to talk with you next week, we want you to get out the door to your long weekend, the client stood up and said, wow, that was amazing. You just went from the number three position to the number one position we’ll get back to you next week. So next week, they call the head of a q&a for an hour and a half. And then they told them on Wednesday, because Monday was a holiday. They told them on Wednesday, you won. And it was a significant piece of business that they would not have won had they not been crisp and concise using the movie trailer format, which by the way, is an inductive way of thinking, which means state your conclusion first and then here’s the conclusion you can go from x to y by a certain date. And it’s because of this and this and this as opposed to most sales presentations are come up with the deductive method because of this and this and this therefore you’ll get this conclusion. You’ll notice the whole book is pretty much wrapped around inductive. The only time you change that is it the client doesn’t want that. Right. So, we have story after story that I love that they want on Memorial Day, the Friday Memorial Day and they took a very different approach when all their competitors came on that same Friday. You had the nine to 11 spot you had the 12 to two spot and they were supposed to be three to five. Everybody else took the full two hours. They didn’t but it was so crisp and tight that they won. See and

Christopher Smith
that’s what I love about that too is that it gets back to Like, give me the content sit down. I don’t need a two-hour presentation. If you know what you’re talking about, if you have a clear message to convey, you don’t need two hours.

Dale Merrill
Right? Exactly. I hope not. Yeah. Yeah.

Christopher Smith
And, and so that AB, just the fact you get them out of there. And because I mentioned like, oh my god, who’s the guy who scheduled this three to five, Friday before Memorial Day, thank you very much. But then to be that tuned in to say, hey, look, we’re going to come in so prepared, we’re going to get the heck out of here to where you really want to be. But we’re going to leave you with something to think about, you know, that that you’re getting what you wanted in 30 minutes versus two hours.

Dale Merrill
Yeah. One more story on this client, they we have dozens of stories with many different clients, this is a fresh and recent one. So, it’s really fun. They want it to go from 600 million to a billion. They’re making great and three years, right? We just got a note from them a couple of months ago, where they said, we were so excited to let you know, we just want a $210 million deal. To do the math on $600 million company is the biggest deal in their history. They would they had never previously been down selected. By applying the mindsets and skills of strikingly different selling, they gave us full they said, well, we just want you to know this stuff works. They stood out as crisp and fresh to this client. They beat some big, huge global competitors, and they won this $210 million deal. They’re going to get to a billion dollars in about 15 months, not three years. So, they’re well on track to get that done.

Christopher Smith
Oh, yeah, that’s amazing. And it really is, I truly believe it’s one thing I loved about your book as the title is, if you’re not strikingly different, in this marketplace, you’re gonna struggle. I mean, that’s just the reality of the world we live in today, because everybody has wish to say everybody has, but we’re all trying the same ways. And, and like, oh, my God, I, you know, we connected over LinkedIn, I connect with all my podcast guests over LinkedIn. But oh, my god, the barrage of messages I get over LinkedIn of people trying to sell to me is in, it’s just ramped up over the last 18 months, you know, a lot during COVID. It’s unreal. And they’re all doing it the exact same way. And it doesn’t work, the way they’re doing it

Dale Merrill
is tough to stand out in a three second world, it really is, unless you do something different. And on the, you know, relevant, distinct and memorable. If I would invite your listeners to do anything, just emblazoned that in your mind and get your head wrapped around it on distinct, it’s not enough to be different. We could you could put, we could put on an orange suit and lighter hair on fire and run-in circles, right? And that would be different. But it’s not better. So, it has to be different and better to the only judge and jury that matters client, right? That means forget about yourself and start focusing on helping the client succeed. And one question, it’s the acid test that I invite clients to think about Chris is, if you got compensated 100%, purely based on the success of your client, would it change how you interact with them? Would it change the level of energy and creativity and innovation you bring to them? And the answer most of the time is, yeah, I’m not bringing my full a game all the time. We have a client that’s literally 100% performance based; they only get paid when the client has success with the thing that this client does. And when I contrast that how they conduct themselves and how they approach their clients, versus so many other people out there, it became very clear night and day, they were the green apple that the client was looking for in the sea of red apples that everybody else was, yeah, it starts with your mindset, and then it gets into your message, and then your approach.

Christopher Smith
And they’re coming into the game like are we’re fully aligned with the outcomes you want. We’re driving to that outcome you want because otherwise, you know, we’ve got skin in the game, otherwise, we’re not gonna get our outcome, which is, you know, we want to make payroll and, you know, get what we want out of it financially. But, you know, if you don’t have that alignment, and be able to demonstrate it. You know, that I love that they’re willing to say, look, we are as committed to this as you are. And if we don’t make it you don’t pay us.

Dale Merrill
Exactly. So, you can imagine their clients love them, because it’s always a win win. Yeah, it’s always a win win. Yeah. It’s a good example.

Christopher Smith
Yeah, that’s great. We’re coming up on our time here and sales lead dog dealer. Really appreciate you coming on here. The name of the book, strikingly different selling, get it on Amazon. This is one I really, I really like it and highly recommend because I like things like anyone else, I want stuff, show me what I need to be doing. Just don’t tell me the concept, but how do I actually implement it? That’s what you’re going to get out of this book. So, if people want to reach out connect with you, then what’s the best way for them to do that?

Dale Merrill
Well, they can send me a compelling LinkedIn message. So, if you my email is Dale dot Merrill, M E R R I ll at Franklin covey.com. It’s also if you Google my name, and strikingly different, you’ll see me on LinkedIn. You can send me a note there, and we can engage together. And that’s probably the best way.

Christopher Smith
Yeah, I love it. We’ll have all that information on our show notes if you didn’t capture that. Dale, thanks again for coming on sales lead dog. Welcome to the pack.

Dale Merrill
Thank you very much. Have a great day.

Outro
As we end this discussion on Sales Lead Dog, be sure to subscribe to catch all our episodes on social media. Follow us on LinkedIn, Facebook, and Instagram. Watch the videos on YouTube and you can also find our episodes on our website at empellercrm.com/salesleaddog. Sales Lead Dog is supported by Empellor CRM, delivering objectively better CRM for business guaranteed.

 

Quotes

Links

Dale Merrill LinkedIn
FranklinCovey LinkedIn
FranklinCovey Website
Strikingly Different Selling: 6 Vital Skills to Stand Out And Sell More on Amazon

Empellor CRM LinkedIn
Empellor CRM Website
Empellor CRM Twitter