Hello and welcome to today's episode of impact school. My name is Lauren Tecna and I'm your host and today we're going to be talking all things sales. So you're going to know exactly how to get your first client if you don't have one already, and if you do already have a client, then you're going to learn exactly how to get your next client or clients depending on how much action you're willing to take that said my guest today is a master salesman. He is incredible. His name's Cole Hatter.You can find him at Cole hata. And the reason why we're talking about sales is because it's what he is great at I like to bring on guests who are at the very top of their game and get them to give you actionable steps and strategies so that you have things to implement immediately. So throughout this entire episode. There is a lot of actionable steps. So just get ready to take action so that you can start seeing results. So please make sure you hit subscribe on this podcast impact school you are going To love what you hear listen to a couple more episodes today. If you can order the rest of this week over the next seven days and my goodness me, you're going to start seeing results in your business and your brand and in your overall life because the purpose of this episode. Well this book as a whole the purpose of it is to make an impact in your life. So you can make an impact in the lives of other people. So with that said, let's get into today's episode take a screenshot share it on your Instagram story tag me at Lauren ticknor tag call Apple Hatter and we talked about Facebook groups in this book last episode. I have a free Facebook group for you, which is called impact school, but it's Link in the show notes, or you can just go on to Facebook type in impact school click groups and then request to join making sure that your answer all the questions to do. So, so we started off this podcast episode with Cole giving us a background into how he got into entrepreneurship and becoming the sales guy so out of high school, I went straight in my fire academy. I was a firefighter for a couple of years to to be exact and then I got in the In a car accident that I was in a wheelchair for a short period of time there and had to figure out a new career Because unless you're in perfect physical health, you can't be a firefighter. And so that's why I turned towards entrepreneurship and my very first Endeavor was a real estate investment company that I still own now 13 years later and have dabbled in a few things. I always say I'm one of the biggest failures. I know I've probably started 30 businesses 24 or 25 of them have failed probably half of those cost me money, but the four or five I've got incorrect have More than enough money to make it all worth it and to provide for myself. So I think it's relevant to introduce myself as probably one of the bigger failures that your audience has ever listened to but you know, that's very common when you when you see these super successful people not saying I am but like you look at the Gary Vee I'll give yourself some cases some slack when you see these mega mega star entrepreneurs and you see the businesses that are working. You don't hear about the ones in the graveyard the third year so that went wrong and so importance context that my first business Has it started was real estate it did work and I still on a 13 years later. So I got lucky that my first try worked out but there have probably been 25 tries or so along the way that didn't and so I think that's important. But you know, what I do today is full-time dad and husband and then when I'm not being a parent or a spouse I do some business and you know, everything's in the sales. We're talking about sales even in my real estate business. I'm selling multi-million dollar homes and selling apartment buildings, right not as a realtor but ones that I purchased. The bait and then sell so every dollar I've ever earned his in sales. I'm a huge fan of sales and sales skill sets and that's it man. Just been selling stuff the last 13 years really nice. I absolutely love that. So I just want to talk about when you got in that accident and you couldn't be a firefighter anymore. So what feelings came about then and do you think of this pivotal moment? I mean, I'm such a believer in the fact that was the name of that happens is happening. Maybe for a reason is like changing the structure of your life. So, how do you think It change your outlook and the actions that you were going to be taking on. Well your next steps. Really? Yeah, so it really gave me purpose, you know part of the story is that in both accents? I lost my best friends. And so even more than losing my career losing people was what really screwed me up and it took me about a year. I was actually so physically hurt that I had to move back in with my parents because I couldn't even care for myself. So so I gotta crack so, you know, I'm a firefighter I'm living on my own because I was in a wheelchair and you know without getting too graphic I to be Carried to the toilet, right? Like I was I was really hurt. So how to move back in with Mom and Dad and so, you know, I lost a lot of my identity that I was no longer living on my own. I no longer had a career I'm being fed by my parents again because I was so broken and hurt but what was really what screwed me up the most emotionally was that I survived accidents that others didn't there was actually two accents or 66 days apart. And so that's where I had a lot of that introspective time to reflect of okay. What am I going to make this mean to me and I had some very very dark months. I I dealt with some pretty significant depression not just from the grief of losing people, but the guilt of being the Survivor. I didn't know how to process the fact that we all got in these accents together and I was the only one that made it and so it really screwed me up. And again, the grief sucks. The guilt was crash and Had some serious months and then I realized one morning and I remember it Rex is the afternoon right perfectly like it was yesterday. I realized that feeling sorry for myself and drinking and taking his pills that they were prescribed to me from the car accident, but I no longer needed to take but I was taking any way because I was all depressed. I realized that doing that was no way to honor my friends that I'd lost and that I couldn't do anything about the fact that that had happened but I could do everything about what that would have what I would allow that to mean to me and I could play the victim and feel sorry for myself and people would understand. As I went through pretty tragic events and throw my life away, or I can let that Define me and so to your question of like how did that change my projected trajectory of my life it changed in every possible way. I didn't necessarily want to be an entrepreneur for what most people want it for, you know, the lifestyle in the freedom. Obviously that's important. But the reason I want to start my own business is because I wanted my full-time gig to be making an impact in the world to honor my friends that I'd lost. I made a commitment to them that that I would live my life big enough for all of us. Us and then I realized that I couldn't have a career job and still do what I wanted to do that. I would need more flexibility. So although I do live in a great home and I have my dream cars and a live a fabulous life the motivating factor of why I work as hard as I do is because the business is that I run give me the time for him Financial Freedom to do the different initiatives in the world like my wife and I we have an orphanage in Ensenada Mexico. We have 23 kids were caring for we work with pencils of promise and build schools around the world. We do clean water projects with a company called our Should call Planet changes in Africa where we're building Wells and water filtration plants and stuff. So we get to make a global impact now because the business is so long answer but I decided in that moment of what am I going to do with my life going forward? Am I going to try to rehab and go be a firefighter? Nope. I'm not and you become an entrepreneur because I want to make millions of dollars to make a huge impact in the world. And so that that moment of having nothing but time because I'm literally in a wheelchair unemployed living at my parents house trying to recover. I mean I had to like learn how to walk again. It was it was Big deal to traumatic brain injury because I got a ejected out of the car going 80. So when my head hit the ground I had my brain was messed up. So the rehab was long and ugly but it gave me enough time to reprioritize my life. And your I am 13 years later. Wow, that is so powerful. So listeners what you're hearing right now. We all go through we all go through rubbish. We all go through things that I'm so great. This is obviously something that calls been through that is to the next level was a massive massive pivot in his life, but it just goes to show that something that is Detective and is so so it's just such a bad time in your life. You can use that as fuel for positivity. And what you're doing right now is you're using it to make a positive impact in the world. And I think that's so amazing. And I think this brings me on to a point of that often I think sales is maybe it's from like the old car dealers, you know who were like a bit slimy and greasy people think that sales is bad. So I would love to hear about what you think like your definition of sales really like what do you see sales as so I think it totally Ali depends on what you're selling of that makes sense like these guys that go the used car dealer like you just said mentality. I mean if you're selling something that's going to improve the quality of someone's life. It's almost like you're you're morally incumbent to Salt I use my mom. I don't know why she has popped in my mind. She runs her own private practice. She's a therapist. She's a psychologist. She's well educated and she helps people through their problems and when you know, she has a website and she has a yelp when someone looks her up and calls her to say Hey, you know, my wife and I are my family and I are struggling we want a therapist. Really my mom's job to sell that person and coming in getting therapy because she restores relationships. She fixed marriages. She thinks you know adolescents that are rebelling against their parents and fixes a family Dynamic and so because of what my mom does specifically literally heels people's broken hearts and gives them the foundation to work better in life. Whatever it is. They're getting therapy recovering from something like I went through and losing people like who who could in the world say the my mom who's literally closing people. That's proper business. Hey, yeah. Yeah, here's what I can do for you. Let schedule an appointment like a cold lead the founder of a website She's Got a close then they show up and she gives in the therapy. So like for people to just generally say sales is bad, you know selling drugs is bad, right but selling a product or service that's going to impact someone's life in a positive way. It's like your duty to the world to do that. So, I think the first thing to really point out in distinguish about sales is believe in what you're selling and know that it works because either a you created it and you've given it your absolute best. Be you've purchased it, you know that it works. So some of the things that I've sold along my career are things for people like one of my mentors I bought I was sitting in the audience. I bought his program and I used it and I've benefited in my real estate business dramatically, right? It helped me make my first million dollars a year and he noticed and he said hey man, would you ever be interested in going and speaking at some of my events and kind of sharing your story with the world that is not my product, but I bought it I paid for it and it changed my life and it made me millions of dollars. I mean Tens of millions of dollars now because it's been 6 years and why wouldn't I saw that because I know it works. So I think that's the first thing to point out is that if you're selling something that you created be proud of it and know that you've literally give it your best. It might not be the best in the world, but it is absolutely your best effort and you can believe in and have integrity or if you're selling something of someone else's like a used car dealer whatever just make sure that the product or service is something you know that works and you can believe it don't sell broken cars sell cars that you know, I've gone through their hundred sixty point inspection have warranties and her great safe vehicles. Our mom's case sell a service that you created that you know will change someone's life or in this other case sell the program that I personally purchased and made me millions of dollars, right? So I think that's the first thing to point out that for anybody who has a sour taste of sales in their mouth just realize it's all dependent on what you're selling. And I mean if you've got the cure for cancer, why wouldn't you sell it as hard as you could to the world, right? Yeah, that's something that's the first thing and then another thing is, you know, how people sell some people are more pushing than others and there's a a lot of reasons whether they lack the skill sets to actually know how to sell and they have what I call commission breath where you're at the car dealership where ever you are and they're just like trying too hard clothes you because their financial life depends on it and you can kind of sense that you know, that's no good either and then I love what you said just that and the quickly because it's like if that fine if their financial World depends on it, I feel like that's so true because if someone is totally depending on that one thing selling that one thing then that's going to be like, oh my gosh, I need to sell this right now. And there's so time pressed. Whereas I think if people I have found personally in my own business when I think okay this I need to think about the lifetime value of a customer rather than them being just one instant purchase and I think when I kind of switch this mindset and for me, this is only actually been quite a recent thing starting to think okay this person might buy something from me. Maybe they went by now, but maybe they'll buy in 6 months 12 months we were talking about this just before we came on the show as well. Like someone might not by someone might not want to go to an event right now, but they might want to do it in like 12 months time. The next time it comes around. I think that that is where people also kind of rushed into things and they think it has to be instant. They need to get that money in the bank right now and short that would be really nice but it would be better to leave a good footprint. I suppose on that person's mind. So they think you wasn't a good honest and like just an authentic person of than just a bit having a bad experience. And even if you then come up with a product that is perfect for them in the future. They might not buy it from you and then my goes somewhere. I was because they just have this bad experience. Yeah, totally. So we call that nurturing and and I also own a digital marketing agency and a lot of what's that? Well don't you do underwater basket weaving? I don't do but no. Yeah, I own a digital marketing agency since 2016. So it's in your business I own but you know, we have stolen some of the best talent out there. So although I personally understand pixels and retargeting and display ads and all that the actual implementation. Are some of the most brilliant people in the world that we've literally stolen because hey that's business and if we have a better opportunity they come but that being said of a digital marketing agency in one of the things that we teach people is a lot of you're going to have the low-hanging fruit that convert immediately but a lot of the conversions will happen after what you call nurturing and that's what you're just talking about off of first touch. They might not want to do business but by incubating them and you know, depending on what the format is whether it's a funnel or trip mail campaigns or even in-person conversations multiple touches is a lot of Times where most people will convert and some I have an event called Thrive. We're in our fourth year right now and I've probably gotten a dozen or so messages from people that say coal. I've been watching for three years and we either a I wasn't financially capable of coming and now I am I'm so excited to be there for the fourth you or there's literally some people that say dude I was a skeptic of you because what we teach at our Venus make money matter and it's had a creative business. It's a for purpose business and it's such a different thought than mainstream entrepreneurism that another people who are maybe lean towards being Skeptics or even Cynics in some cases instead of being open-minded. They immediately say nope. Not interested. And I've had a few people that message me and say call me watching for years. I was skeptic, but now I get it and I'm coming for the first year. I'm so excited. I'm like, yeah, dude, you're my I love getting converts. Like you're my favorite people to have the ones that were talking smack and now are like evangelists, right? So so that's important to to understand that what you know, when your quote unquote selling a product or service to realize that a lot of people will be low hanging fruit and will convert right there. But don't leave the sour taste as you said and have a follow-up system again, very industry-specific to what it is that you do but whatever the follow-up looks like, whether it's emails newsletters or actual phone calls or whatever you need to do to follow up with people because a huge amount of business is what you call like the cup filling up and tipping over or the funnel or however you want to refer to it again, depending on your industry of continuing to build future clients. That might not be ready today, but will be Reading the future and continue to generate more on this on the front end those people that have been incubating come through on the back end and now you're getting still low hanging fruit and then still has later conference and that's how does a scale so I think it's important part of sales is the follow-up to a man like you said not having commission breath and being so pushy but realizing. Hey, you know what today is not a fit. Here's my card or whatever. The interaction is. Let's stay in touch and when you're ready, I'm your guy or gal exactly. No love that so listeners, you know if you're wanting to sell something and I'm sure you are if you're listening to Right. Now you need to have those systems in place so that when you come into contact with a customer, you can let's just say you're capturing their email address. You need to have a way to actually capture that emerges and when you've got that email address you need to have something on the back end that allows you to nurture them. So this can be done through email automations. It can be done through booking a phone call with you. Like you said, all of these different methods are going to work it will like Cole said be totally dependent on your industry and all that. I think for a lot of people listening. They're more personal brand based businesses. So typically it will be that email marketing messenger Bots as well are getting big now, all of these different methods. It's all about trying and testing and seeing what works for your particular audience. And this brings me on to my next point which is is that as you know, making sure that what you're selling you are selling it to the right people because you could have the most amazing thing in the world like like I know an online course about let's just take for me. For example, it's like good impact your Niche teaches people how to find a niche dominate their niche. You crush that somebody who already has mastered that neat and they literally have mailed it. Like for example, I had this dentist person like contacting me the other day if I was then like no no you need to buy this course because basically so I can get your money. That would be really bad on my part because I'm not being honest there and I'm not actually providing a solution to them. That's not really going to add any value to them other than thinking. Oh Lauren's just trying to make money off of me. How cold would you how do you how do you filter people out like because I feel like a lot of times people are like know I can sell this thing to everybody. It's going to be great for everyone. But how do you determine who is actually going to be the right person for you? And how do you know when it's okay to be like no, it doesn't matter if I didn't sell it to this person. Yeah. So you said a moment ago. I think you said the majority of our audience are like personal branded like online types. Yes. I have a cool stuff because I know that your audience doesn't like Theory but wants like two plus two equals four. What do I do? So here's what I would suggest in that space if you are. An online personality or brand and you've got various digital courses or products or Services, you're selling online your customers where you might not ever have face-to-face interaction. That's the easiest way in the world because the internet is infinitely scalable. And so what you're going to want to do is play the numbers game and what I would recommend somebody does is first things first create a private Facebook group for your audience where you are regularly streaming live to that audience. So although they're not paying to be there. It's it's not just you streaming on your personal page or your public page for the whole world. There's a bit of exclusivity. So there's an incentive for them to join again. They're not paying to be in that group, but it is exclusive to the sense that they have to ask and you have to approve them or or whatever it is or even if it's just free for all and anyone can join and recommend people your publicly broadcasting and a very 30,000 foot overview of what you do and inviting people to join your group. And then in there you're giving them free content free content free content free content then from there I would Having a may be paid Facebook group so that they're now leaving the free group to pay something. Very small, maybe like 47 bucks a month or 47 Bucks ever to have that which is now a smaller number of people we're now you don't just broadcast to but you engage you actually are doing Facebook lives where you're reading their questions and their comments and you're engaging like, oh Lauren has a question on personal branding. Let me answer that so instead of having like a pre pre-scripted talk or you just teaching you're actually engaging with them and that's why they're paying that premium. Liam and then from there you just take them up your funnel or I should say down your funnel up your price points to what it is you're doing and so another thing that's huge for your audience to incorporate are what are called chatbots. I use a company called many chat in a NY like there's many of them Ma and why chat CH 80 and many chat is an automated chat box in Facebook Messenger where you can Auto talk to people and you were just talking about how to find the right type of person. This is what I do we get Tens of thousands of people that come into our various pages in our different sites and they go through the many chats and it's very clear. It's like you have to create sequencing where it's like a bee answers. Like if they don't want this cool they go here if they want this they go here and you take them down the course of saying hey, is this something you're interested? No, cool. Enjoy the group. Enjoy the free content. Yes. Okay, and you do a series of like if this then that type questions where like if they say yes, then they get this message if they say no they get this much of this. Yes, and it's a be binary right a Orbeez and what you end up with of of the tens and thousands of people the several hundred or the Thousand or several thousand. That's a yes. I am interested in continuing this and so now through leveraging social media and Technology, you're finding the right people just by shotgun approach. You have something that's free to participate in where people are being in Doctrine in your message and your in your like we just talked about being incubated or being nurtured and then through automation whether it be email Or in this case since it's all done on Facebook with free Facebook pages and then potentially paid or sorry free Facebook groups and then potentially paid Facebook groups using many chat to be able to have I'll tell you this. My email open rate is something like 15 to 20% My many chat chat bot open rate is 80% So if I email you 20% chance of going to see it if I send you a message on Facebook 88% chance of going to open it. So we have these whole sequence has set up through many chat where Are getting messages from cold to them that I really did right, but I only wrote it one time and it goes out a thousand times a day and then it just asks them questions and they answer it and based on their answers. They get uniquely funneled to me now knowing what they want more of and that's all done through Automation. And now I show up and provide the product or service. So as far as getting very tactical I would recommend that any beyond that I would have to know their specific industry Niche or what it is that they're selling. But all of you can have a public Facebook page that's open to the public and then a private Facebook page. And then all those participants you obviously have their Facebook user names. So you set the mini chat campaigns or there are other services like many chat. That's just the one I use these chat Bots and then it asks the questions for you to find the right type of people and you know, if there's 10,000 people in your group, maybe only 500 would do business, but you're going to know who those 500 are. Yeah exactly. It's that 1,000 true fans thing isn't it? But I think that's such a good point. I mean, I'm just waiting for when Instagram allows many chat inspiration because that is going to change the game so Nobody but just a little another little bit of tactic ality. He's not even one for the Facebook group. So you can actually ask the members questions when they come to join and so something that I have found works really well is I have a free mini course, which I just use as a lead magnet really and I kind of set it up to say. Hey, are you interested in building and monetizing your personal brand? If so, make sure to head to this link and sign up for this for this free email after this free video training this free four-part video training. Then people can just go ahead and go to that and pretty much like 95% of the time people say yes, I've already signed up or yes. I just signed up just now and So that obviously you said like your email open rate is quite low. I know somehow - still quite high but I think that's because I've are when I first started what I was doing in my emails I'm sending out SQL is like you said before it's just not drink people. It's just adding value to them as just doing it in a different way. So it's exactly what Cole said, but he was just like mentioning it through Facebook groups, I think. Think they both work and it's just trying a few different things and seeing what works best for your audience and for your ideal client. So I absolutely I love that strategy. So I feel like a lot of times and I think for my audience this is probably where they're at their kind of at the beginning. There may be a bit scared to start selling. They are worried about being pushy or they're worried and thinking cells is evil like we spoke about before how do you advise people go about getting their first handle of cells like what would you say is the first few steps? Mistake. Yeah, so this is ours that question do you sell to friends and family and you know, I would here's what I would do if I was someone just getting started. I would look through your network and find someone who's the most influential whether there is big as a garyvee or just someone who has more followers than you do and I would provide your product or service for free and then I would say hey in lieu of me doing this for you. What I'm going to do is use you as a testimonial and ask that you endorse me, and I've had this happen In so many times. I've had people build websites for me and they say cold. This is a 20,000 dollar program or product or whatever it is. I'm going to do all of this this branding and redo your logo and your website and all the stuff for free but then I'm gonna put my little thing at the bottom your website and then I am going to in my email marketing and messaging say we did Cole's website and I get a lot of people and a lot of times I'll decline because it's just not something I need but a lot of times I will say yes, because like, oh, perfect. I need that and you want to do it for free bring it on and they're going to over-deliver or in this case you would need to Liver because even though you're providing the product or service for free you want to give the absolute best to this person because you're using their reputation to sell your stuff. So a lot of products like with TV commercials and radio ads will pay a celebrity like an Ashton Kutcher something to say. Oh this face cream the cleared up my zits and maybe they used it. Maybe they didn't write but they're a paid endorsement and they're a celebrity. So we're supposed to be like, oh well if Ashton uses that face cream I must to and I don't even know if that still works anymore. I'm assuming because I still see it out there. But what's even better is for me to go to you're going to just give me a shout out and now on your podcast you like. Hey, everybody, by the way, go check out my new website and this guy Cole made it he's fantastic and now maybe I get two or three paying customers because your followers are loyal to you. And if you are willing to endorse something and then I go to your website and I see that it looks beautiful. I might reach out to the guy that built your website since you recommended them on your shelf. So for someone who's just getting started to get your first couple of sales go. Do your best to get the person that you have access to because again, like if I keep using garyvee as an example, you probably won't build his website. Like the guy probably won't even take your call. So who you know, you can get access to and who will actually hear your proposition as high up as you can go say I'm going to do this for you for free. I'm going to ask this is that if you like the result that you endorse mean you should have Quick videos saying hey cold it as for me. I recommend using coal and then it's a numbers game. Game when they say yes, that's how I would do it. So, for example, I have a buddy that's a business coach and he called a few big influencers the biggest being Kevin Harrington who eventually said yes, and he coached Kevin Harrington on something Kevin was doing online and it ended up making Kevin like six figures that month by doing one quick tweak on one of his websites. And so Kevin Harrington the original shark from Shark Tank whose you know, one of our speakers Thrive said, hey, man, this guy was an amazing business coach and from what he taught me the First month, it netted me an additional six figures that guy took that video and blasted it everywhere and ended up starting an entire coaching business from that one endorsement because he he had somebody he knew give him an intro to Kevin's team and then Kevin's team accepted and that was a result. So that's just a real life example of if I was just getting started give your product or service for free to an influencer as high as you can possibly get and then you know spread that endorsement to the world. Yeah, you're going to give away for free and like I do think sometimes You have to give without expecting anything in return as well. But I do think sometimes you know, you may have to kind of put something in place to say. Yeah, you can have this. If you do this in return, I think if anyone doesn't have any influence or contact right at hand like they literally no no influences. You can DM people on Instagram. You can send out emails. I think it's just not being afraid to put yourself out there to put in the work like I do think that the first few sales that you make is always the hardest that goes without saying because you don't have these girls and so I mean I know for sure I found this I found that the first you know when you have nothing to show like maybe I didn't even have a probable website at that time for my courses and stuff, but I was just damning but I was saying look here is my value proposition is what I can offer you I was posting on Facebook groups like Niche Facebook groups giving value and it's all about just like giving that value first and then people see this free value and then they're like, well if this is their free value, imagine what they're paid by you must be I know how you feel about that, but I agree with that and one thing I should clarify to is. I mean I'm going to stab using gate. He's an example, but you don't need to go to Mega influencers like a Kevin Harrington to yeah talking about someone who has a thousand followers on Facebook of those people like you trust people you follow and so, you know, Lauren there's there's people who follow you and because I listened to your podcast and maybe they're in your dreams maybe even bought your courses before they trust you and they klt they know like and trust you you indoors from your platform. They immediately are going to trust more than if it was a cold advertisement. So just to the audience who's like Cool Cole great suggestion. I don't know any freaking a-lister multi-million followed on Instagram blue check marked influencers. So that idea won't work for me. I'm talking about even some with a few thousand followers. It's a numbers game. You might get one client, right? And so that's the point is is go to people who you know have audiences again. Not not your aunt because she's in a bunch of women's group and has a lot of followers. But isn't in the same space as you Someone Like You Lauren who has a business podcast if I was providing a business service, you would be someone I would go to and if you said no, thank you. I'm not going to cry and roll around on the ground. Like I'm a failure. I move on to the next one and asked and asked and asked so let me just clarify that that you don't need somebody who's got 3 million followers on Instagram to endorse you that would be great if they would but even some of the few thousand followers if they endorse you that's a few thousand eyeballs that are going to see for a free and then be from someone they trust so the conversion rates are the trust. We'll go up. Yeah, no, exactly surgery and it's like yeah, the whole point is you could use the biggest influence in the world. But if that's just one of these let's just take I know for example, you took him out that business coaching if you were to then go and pick some random influence. So who's got like 5 million followers, but never talks about business and it's just constantly posting photos like holding skinny jeans like doing ads all the time and not necessarily trusted by the audience people and maybe following them for the Aesthetics. Not really. Any kind of substance behind it was something then that's probably not gonna be the right person. It has to align with what you're selling. This is so incredibly important. It's way better to have an influenza who is a big fish in a small pond and to have a small version of flipping massive ocean. That's what I always think is the same in life. Like if you are someone who's trying to build a following as well, like you'd rather be that big fish in that small pond. It's just a more captive audience isn't audience as more engaged and like you said, there's like, even if you're looking strong get kind of brand deals or something. Let's say One here is a blogger and their winning streak to get brand deals for that particular Niche like more brands are going to contact you. If you are a big fish in a small pond rather than just trying to be like the biggest person in the world. We see ya know amazing cool. I think we've covered a lot about sales here. I think the final thing I would like to ask is just about about kind of that friends and family thing like if would you actually go to friends and family do you think it's a good idea so it depends on the product or service, but you know I have A buddy who was literally just talking to me. He will not involve his family in any business to the point. Like he says that he takes business calls outside. He had someone stopped for business or as a business colleague stop by his house and just in the kitchen brought it up literally took the guy the backyard and said I don't discuss business run a family. He's on one extreme end. My dad is my business partner my real estate business. My wife is my business partner co-founder and Thrive. So not only do I do business. I have I start businesses with family as far as going and selling and friends and family. That's always the question. And for me, it totally depends on the product and service if that makes sense. And so I let me give you some examples. So for Thrive for instance, I will let some my friends and family come for free. I'm not going to make them buy ticket because I have over a thousand attendees and having a dozen or so that are there that are unpaid because they're my family or whatever sure but I do have a paid Mastermind, which I limit to 100 people and if they're going to take a Spot from someone else they're paying for that if that makes sense, and I'm not going to force that on them, but I'm going to say hey obviously friends and family. I mean, I'm not making my dad pay for this thing. Right or my wife pay for the Mastermind. They help me facilitate it but some of my innermost close friends that are a part of my daily life pay for my Mastermind pay for it every single year and it's because it's like Listen by me letting you in for free that's taken an opportunity from someone else that would be in there because I can't have an infinite amount of people. It's capped at a hundred always every year period And so again to pan the product or service I have no problem. Only my friends our family back to what we started this off by knowing that they're going to get an Roi and so for my close friends that still pay me to this year for my Mastermind. It's because I've seen them make connections in that group and years previous or I know going forward that they well that's going to more than be worth it and there at the end of the day going to feel like they stole from me that that I created way more for them than they created for myself and that's a philosophy. I follow always is I want anyone I do business with to feel bad for me that they got way more than I got Because that you know over-delivering mentality always comes back in spades. And so so again the question is what do I think about working with friends and family? I do it non-stop selling to friends and family totally depends if it's an something like Thrive where I just throw a few chairs in who cares, but if it's where it would take the opportunity from someone else then they've got to step up and pay and if they're not interested in hard feelings and so I don't have a problem asking my friends and family for money for products where it makes sense. And again, I know that they're going to get Positive Roi and so that's just me again. My other guy that I was just talking about who literally won't even take a call in front of his wife because he wants to in his mind be able to separate his personal life from his business life. I can appreciate that too. That's just not my style personally. I love I love that. As soon as I get off this podcast. I'm going to go downstairs where my wife and my entire company's waiting for me. We're going to have a meeting today and my wife's going to lead it and she's gonna be sitting right next to me. I'd probably work eighty to a hundred hours a week which sounds like a lot And people like man, that's unhealthy, but eighty to a hundred of those hours or with my wife and only maybe 20 hours a week stuff. I don't want to like right now I would call this work. This is an hour of work, but I love this stuff. I could do this all day long. And so at the end of working 80 to 100 hours, maybe only 20 were things. I don't like like freaking bookkeeping or crap like that and the other 60 to 80 hours. I love because of stuff like this and I do it with my dad my wife or whoever at my side so I'm a huge fan of doing business with family and friends. You know the question then comes up as well. What if they're sucking like what if you need a fire them? I think that that almost always is about communication and if I have a friend that's working for me or family member that's not doing well. You cannot let it build up because then there's tension. There's regret there might even be a little bit of like frustration and then that can really ruin relationships. So it's so important to over communicate the family and friends that if there is someone Who you share DNA with then it is working with you isn't doing it immediately have that conversation and either is a your fault for not giving them the proper tools or training to do their job. Well or be something was going on in their life and you can just say hey man, or hey girl, whatever, you know, love you what's going on? Because I'm seeing a huge drop-off. You're not hitting your tasks or duties. What can I do to support you? Because obviously as a team, we're moving this ship forward and you know, we all have to be operating at the same level and so with that I mean my dad Business partner for 13 years. He's the best man in my wedding. We have a great father-son relationship. And although there have been times many times where we've been incredibly frustrated with each other in business. We're able to put our family relationship above our Business Partnership always and so that would be only my recommendations there. Yeah depends from person to person industry to Industry. I think if it's like Fitness coaching or something business coaching like all those other thing, I think personally I think friends and family like they They probably a really great prospects for you, but when it comes to yeah different things like if it's maybe like relationship coaching or something that might be a little bit hard. I don't know who knows what it really really Rose. Amazing Sokol also has an event called Thrive and I'm just letting you know about it because I went to the one in 2019 and it was awesome. He's going to be doing more in the future and he actually donates money from the proceeds to charity which is so cool. Sometimes, you know, you see success. Your business everything's going really well and I don't know me personally. I'm always like what next what next what next what next because you don't feel that deep sense of fulfillment and I feel like when you're actually using your income and what you're doing in the world for good and you're actually making a positive change like that and that is when that's when you feel so incredibly fulfill and the cool thing about this. I also think it's like it can be for anyone like no matter what business model your ends are G of attendees who are like from, you know, all sorts of different Industries, or do you see a Common common theme like is it kind of everything? Yeah, so it is definitely a diverse audience. All of them are entrepreneurial and the sense that this isn't just a motivational event for people who are planning on working a job the rest of our life, you know, if they have a career now, they've got a side hustle. So it is a business conference for entrepreneurs. I'm a real estate investor as I've shared and so for whatever reason even though real estate is not even talked about for the most part from stage. Probably 20% of our audience are real. There's our investors because they follow my social media for that with Fitness. Exactly. Exactly. And that's why was the next industry is going to say Thrive has nothing to do with Fitness, but I think because we had like Lori harder last year JJ Virgin the year before that and who else do we have Last Hero Shaun T from Insanity and you know Beachbody again, we probably have about 20% the audience that are that are in the fitness space. And so again, those would probably be too dominant markets. I'd say the other one. That's the largest is your audience on this podcast people who are trying to build personal Brands who have various courses or programs online because we have a lot of digital marketers calm like last year. We had Chris record and Billie Jean and these different guys who make millions and millions of dollars with online courses programs products Etc. So so I would say those are the three dominant Industries, but I mean I have chiropractors come who just have a chiropractic office with four employees. You know, I have dentists come you talked about See others and that guy comes from he's one of our like most loyal patrons. If you will he comes from Australia every single year and he's a freaking dentist. So he's 14 hours to come to thrive over years name's Angus loved the guy. And so anyway, just all business owners from all different niches come together and the content of Thrive is is specially catered so that it works for all of our all the attendees. Yeah amazing and I think it's super cool because it's super affordable as well compared to a lot of these events that you see out there you guys are I've made it affordable and accessible for a lot of people especially because calls done something special for the listeners of the millennial Apple girls who have made it this far. So do you want to tell them or shall I yeah, if anybody wants to grab a ticket then I've left a special link which is by the way an affiliate link for Thrive and also a discount code in the show notes. So head there now, we only have about 200 tickets left. So we are going to sell out if you missed it. No worries. We're going to do it again next year, but there's a promo code which is Lauren and it's 20% off. Whether you're going to make it to this Thrive or the next one at the promo code or I don't know what it says discount code. It says something there just put in Lauren and you're good to go. Yeah, is it capital letters or just look ace high? I don't think it's case sensitive, but why not call it all capitals because it makes sense. But I think it works with lowercase to if it doesn't work put in Capitals in there you go. Now we go Bish bash Bosh amazing color. So I'm super excited. I can't wait to meet you. I'm really I'm I've never been to Vegas before either so ideas. Gonna be an interesting occasion and it's going to be super fun and I can't wait to connect with so many people see all these different speakers just it's going to I'm so excited. Honestly, I can't even tell you and I think that what you're doing is so cool and it's just, you know, using all these sales skills that were learning and then not only making money and an income for ourselves creating Financial freedom freedom of All Sorts because I would say I'm massively one of these kind of Freedom chases like I have tried working kind of -5 And stuff, it's just I just hate the lack of Freedom as a for me that's amazing. But then actually to create fulfillment through purpose through being able to give back. I think that's what it's all about. And it's all everything wrapped into one and that's why I think is amazing about it. So let me mentioning earlier. I would never endorse anything that I that I don't really believe in and so that's why I think this is cool because I'm able to really for me. This is just about sharing an amazing event with my audience. Like that's all it is like I'm just Making them aware of it. And with that said this this event was obviously in the past because I'm re-uploading this episode and because a lot of people have subscribed to the podcast since I uploaded this so I won't go into any more detail on that now but definitely do a 10-1 in the future. It'll be super fun for you events are amazing. You can meet a bunch of people but let's talk about sales. Let's go back to the topic of this podcast because here's the thing. I think that's so many people don't they don't make sales well first because they don't have an offer. But that proud of you need to be proud of your offer and tell people about it. Look I'm not afraid to tell people about my eight-week long accelerator program impact their influence because I know that it delivers results. I have had amazing testimonials and I literally know that it gets results because it is the exact guided framework that I used in order to build my business to where is that today? I literally give you the exact templates of things that I have out there the emails that I've said that I've made sales I give you them. So that you can use them for yourself things like that. So I know they get results now. Here's the thing when you don't think your thing gets results when you doubt yourself because maybe you aren't as well knowledge. Like you'd have as much knowledge as you could it's just a case of you going back to the drawing board and actually doing your research to make sure that you know that the information that you are going to be sharing in your offer does deliver results. So there's that there's also the whole fact of them. So there's that but then there's also laziness if you're not direct messaging people and You actually have a DM template. I will leave that link in the show notes. It's like then again the exact step-by-step DM strategy in order from finding someone for the first time who is an ideal client. So then actually going ahead and closing a sale with them. I've got like I think it's like 12 steps for you to follow it involves saving people into collections moving them from one place to another so that you can keep track of who's in conversation with you right now and who's on the verge of buying and all this. So yeah, definitely grab that damn template, but you know you Need to put in the work if you're not working the work you have no excuse like seriously, you're gonna have people say no to you so many times but you need to bounce back from that and you need to actually just be resilient here. So sales in order to be a great salesman and set ourselves woman. I'm going to do a whole book as episode on this. So make sure you have hit subscribe, but I'm going to talk about the key traits of a salesperson because my goodness me so many people who have an online business or they're trying to build their And they try and make a few sales but they don't keep trying off to that and if they get told no, they try making new product because they think that their current one isn't good enough but really is that you just haven't tried hard enough. So hope that actually strong enough makes you take action because I want you to make this happen. I'm making this free content with you so you can be successful. But whether you do anything or not with it is not down to me it's down to you and so I hope you do end up taking action download my My freedom template my DM strategy it is going to save you so much time. It's going to help you create sales in your business, and then you know that all my stuff does really work. So with that said, thanks so much for tuning in. Please do listen to some more episodes and I'll see you in the next episode of impact school.
LEARN EVERYTHING ABOUT SALES. This episode gives you the first steps to selling. Cole Hatter is our guest today and he is a master salesman and multi-millionaire who has an incredibly inspiring story, going from being in a wheelchair to where he is today. - Why selling isn't always "evil" - Why you need to nurture your ideal clients - Influencer marketing   The Impact School Podcast is a show by Lauren Tickner (www.laurentickner.com) designed to impact your life through giving you actionable steps and strategies to build your brand, increase your income, and become the best version of yourself. Hit subscribe for new episodes every Monday and Thursday. 