Welcome to Close it now, an H Vac sales training podcast with Sam Wakefield.

Here we'll build your reputation in residential H Vac sales to be the expert influencer in your market.

You'll get insight into the top minds in the industry as they share their skills and hacks to help you on your journey.

This podcast isn't just about selling more.

It's about understanding your customers needs and building efficiencies behind the scenes so you can sell more but work less while being top of mind when people think H Vac.

Now let's get started with your host of the Close it now podcast.

This is Sam Wakefield.

All right, good morning, welcome back to Close It Now.

Sam Wakefield here.

I am so excited to come back into the studio.

I have been gone for a couple weeks now.

Actually spent a week up in New York at Joosten Campbell and then got back a couple days turnaround and I was back out to me and my assistant.

We flew up to Salt Lake City for door to door con 7 and it was incredible.

I have to just firsthand tell every single person if you were not there, man, you missed some massive personal growth.

Incredible, incredible lessons.

Some of the, some of the best speakers I've heard.

I'll break that down a little bit in this episode and give you a.

In fact, that's part of what this episode is going to be is I got the privilege to hear Chris Voss speak in person.

Founder of the Black Swan Group, also wrote Never Split the Difference.

Today's episode are some nuggets that I got from his talk which we're going to cover here in just a little bit.

But first let's do a couple things.

First is I want to highlight the review of the week.

Thank you so much.

This is a five star review and if you've ever gotten value from this podcast, I would absolutely appreciate and love you if you left me a five star review on whatever platform that you listen on.

That would be fantastic.

And for everyone who leaves a review, if I feature you on the podcast and you hear this and message me, you will get a gift that no one else gets.

So that is something that is something that's fun and I just love reviews as you do for your business.

So pop a review.

So this one is from goodyo53.

So g o o d y o 5 3.

Thank you.

It says the title is solid content for anybody in the sales industry and it is a five star thank you goodyo53.

Sir or lady, whoever you are, you took a minute to actually write some stuff so this review says this podcast is a gem and it's entertaining and insightful, providing valuable knowledge about sales.

The host's energy and banter make every episode enjoyable.

They go beyond the how of sales processes, exploring the why and delving into deep sales philosophy.

Whether you're a seasoned sales pro or new to in home sales, this podcast is a must.

Listen.

Sam offers practical and relatable advice that will enhance your sales skills.

They have a talent for making learning a delightful experience.

Oh, make it a delightful experience.

That's nice.

Just in.

Here's the cool thing.

Well, let's finish this review then I'm going to talk for a second about it.

And it says, I highly recommend Close it Now to anyone looking to elevate their sales game.

Prepare to be entertained, enlightened and equipped with the tools for success.

Tune in and you won't be disappointed.

Thank you so much.

Goodyo53.

You know, that's one thing that's really fun is, you know, if you think that the just the podcast is making learning a delightful experience, man, you should experience what an in person training event is like because it's insanely interactive when we do.

It's not.

I definitely don't just talk at you.

It's a conversation.

We're interactive and that's so we gamify it a lot of times.

And that's where so much of the learning happens is and not just the learning, but that's how people are able to walk away from my events and immediately implement and see insane number like increases.

Right?

Watch their sales numbers and their metrics increase dramatically right away.

Because what we're talking about is not just here's like a line to say if they say this, say this.

What we're talking about is so much deeper than that.

And it's awareness moments.

It basically expands your mind.

And once you're a mind that is expanded, can never contract, right?

Once the mind is expanded, it can never contract.

So that's why the results out of my trainings are so incredibly different than so many others because we have the ability to lock it into the level and it just makes cells easy.

Sales should not be hard, y'.

All.

Cells uneasy is what I'm all about.

And we make it that way because we, you know, I show people how to stop working so hard to make the sale and just work smarter, you know, change your language and change your results.

That was the topic of my workshop at the Door to Door Con and it was incredible.

It was so kind of reviewing what was happened there.

Man, it was full.

The room was full.

I got plenty of applause at the end, and not because I need it, but just because everybody was so excited about what we were talking about.

You know, it was awesome to be able to speak to a room full of people in so many different industries.

People in solar, people in alarms, people in pest control, people in door to door Internet cells or cell phones or insurance, or you name it.

It's incredible what people are actually able to, how they're able to serve and help people by knocking doors.

And gosh, I can tell you, I literally saw and met hundreds of people who earn 500 to seven figures a year door to door.

I mean, I've met a guy that earned $2.2 million last year, personal income from his efforts on the doors.

And it's just, it's incredible what happens.

And I'm here to tell you, if you think you can't do that in the H vac space, you're wrong.

I am looking for that person that says, this is me.

Let's go.

And I will work hand in hand with you.

Is that you?

I'm throwing the gauntlet down.

Is that you?

So, but the event was awesome.

Saw Chris Voss, saw Kent, heard Kent Clothier speak.

If you've never heard of Kent Clothier, that's K E N T C L O T H I E R. He's definitely going to be a guest on the podcast coming up.

Go follow him on Instagram.

Incredible.

Definitely hear from him soon.

I got the privilege to hear Shaun White speak and Lance Armstrong.

Wow.

Talk about two people who are the best in the world at what they do.

And listening to the mindset of a champion is man.

Just talk about.

So incredible.

It just elevates your own mind.

So, gosh, I'm so excited to talk to y'.

All.

One of the things I learned from Kent was income does not equal wealth or time freedom.

Your income does not equal wealth or time freedom.

You have to do different things to achieve those.

So, oh, my gosh, next year, you've got to get to door to door con.

If you don't go to any other conferences of the year, that's the one to get to.

It's pretty powerful.

So let's get into today's content a bit.

So the Chris Voss, his keynote speech was, of course, as you can imagine, was incredible.

And some of the things that I really got from it, you know, I've read the book several times, so it wasn't necessarily new information, but to hear it presented from the stage from the band directly is always really powerful.

And I wrote a couple things down that I guess I didn't pick up from the book the first time.

There's a couple things that are really incredible that tie together that I want to go over with you.

And it's about.

In the conversations with Chris Voss, so much of his philosophy is how to give everybody context, Especially if you've never read the book or if you never heard who that is, then one you owe it to yourself to read or use your drive time university and listen to never split the difference because it's an incredible book.

However, breaking it down a little bit is his whole philosophy is based around the idea that if you're asking for yes answers from people, they feel like you're painting them into a corner.

And it's almost like trap questions.

And it's one of those things that by getting a no answer, the act of saying no or thinking no makes people feel safe and protected.

One of the things he said that really made me kind of agree with this is he's talking about people will fail to make a decision to better their environment if it costs them their autonomy.

And that's a lot of what all of this is about.

This is one of those episodes.

We're going to really dive into some psychology here because it doesn't matter what you sell, good or service, the psychology is the same.

And I can understand where this concept comes from because it was developed in the world, of course, of hostage negotiation, negotiating with criminals, and really painting the picture.

And the stories that he gave as examples of this makes so much sense.

And then when we apply it to a sales conversation or we just even think about it in our own lives, people are so resistant to change.

And the moment people feel, I mean, really, especially if you're in North America, think about how important someone's individual's autonomy is.

I mean, looking back across the last few years, how resistant everyone was to, for example, wearing a mask in the middle of the pandemic, right?

Because, oh, you're telling me what I can and can't do with my own liberties for my own body.

Which, of course, that opens the door for a huge can of worms, because, you know, which we won't drive down.

Because if you should have autonomy for one thing, you should have autonomy for everything, all the decisions for your own body.

That's my personal opinion.

But the whole point is people will fight and die for their autonomy, right?

For their own.

The ability to make their own decisions.

And if we're constantly only after yes answers.

Then a lot of times people feel like they're painting them in that.

Painting them into that corner.

So some of the quotes that really were standouts to me from his session were, you know, one of the first ones had to do with, you know, any interaction is not what it means to you.

You know, we go into these, into our cell situations, and we are so focused on how we know we can help them.

Right?

How we know we can help them.

We can clearly see what their problems are, and we know that what we're offering is the solution to those problems.

However, the problem arises when the homeowner doesn't see that those are their problems, or they don't see that the problems are as big as they actually are, or they don't see that your solution is worth the juice for the juice coming out of the solution is worth the squeeze.

Right?

They don't see that the solution is going to give them a big enough difference from where they already are for the value of money that you're asking from them.

Right.

And so it's not any interaction.

It's not what it means to you, it's what it means to them.

You know, that's why I've said a lot of times in the past, it doesn't matter what we say, it matters what they say.

If we can get them to say it, then they own it.

And so that is a massive philosophy that is super powerful for it doesn't matter what you're selling.

Because in the beginning, we've got seven to 10 seconds to establish trust and competence.

Trust and competence.

And one of the big questions is, what is costing you trust at the beginning?

A lot of that is people fail to make decisions to better their own environment if it costs them their autonomy.

It's just incredible.

Some of the mindset shifts and changes that will make such a big difference in your results.

So changing your language patterns and changing your language will change your results.

And this is a great example of it.

So the first thing we have to do when we're in an appointment is what he says, the way he calls it, it says to demonstrate an understanding of the landscape and what by that what we mean is, and I'll tell you the story that he, of course, the example he told was negotiating a, you know, a hostage situation in Haiti.

And it really had to do with the terrorist.

He wasn't asking for this huge amount of money or anything like that necessarily for the sake of the money.

He was asking for repayment for 500 years of wrongs to his people.

So when the spotlight was on just the $10 million he was asking about, the negotiations were going nowhere.

But when they took the spotlight off of the dollar amount and they shined it on, oh, this is what's really important to you.

And then basically what they did is what's called an accusation audit.

And they went through and just labeled every single atrocity to his people for the last 500 years.

And he said, that's right and that's it.

So to show that you have an understanding of their situation to the level that they say that's right is crucial.

So how do we apply that to what we do in sales?

So it's so important.

That's why I'm in the close it now method in the process that I teach and train.

That's why it's so important.

Early, early, early in the appointment to do an incredible discovery, we don't rush our discovery session, the questionnaire, we don't rush that because that is truly asking about what they are experiencing and what their concerns are.

And when you get that very crystal clear and then you recap it for them and say, okay, if I'm hearing you right, it's this and this and this and this and this.

And they say, that's right, then they own you both have agreed that those are the problems and they see that the problems are as bad as they actually are and they agree with you verbally.

And so that means they own the problem.

So what we're doing is we're widening the gap there and we're just really helping them see being realistic about the issues or the concerns and the problems they have.

Because what happens so many times, especially with homeowners in home improvement, is it's kind of like they'll start to get used to things.

People naturally start to gloss over and paint their own picture better than it actually is.

And it's just human nature, it's just psychology.

It's what people do over time.

And so it's our job to ask questions in a way that it shines a spotlight on what their problems are and it brings clarity to the conversation.

And we're removing their jaded, their rose colored glasses from their face and we're removing the jaded lens that they're looking through at their problems and helping them really just see them for actually what they are.

Now, what I'm not talking about is fabricating something that doesn't exist.

What I am talking about is just helping them see clearly that their problems are much bigger and worse than they thought they were.

And then of course, step two is they don't have to live like that.

Step three is, which is the part that most people miss.

And this is why you get think about it.

And people that want to do it but don't want to do it right now, that are hesitant to take action is maybe you do a great job of exposing the problems and exposing the pain points and helping them see that they are truly bad.

But then you've missed out on the second half of that, which is showing them what life is going to be like once they have whatever it is you offer.

Once they have the new heating and air system installed, once they have the solar system installed and turned on, once they have their alarm, once they have whatever it is.

We've always, like so many times, fail to paint the picture of what that life will be like after that.

And we need to start saying those kind of things, like, won't it be awesome knowing that?

Or wouldn't it be a great feeling?

Or man isn't going to be incredible when you don't have to live with this anymore.

And it's also going to be, here's what your experience is going to look like after.

Because we have to remember, if they understood what we did, if they truly understood what we can do for somebody, if they truly understood what our products do, what our services do, they would already have it.

So the disconnect has been either we haven't told them about it, or we just haven't painted any kind of a picture of what life is going to look like once they do have it.

And so that's always been the disconnect in any home improvement industry.

And that's just the disconnect in sales is people don't understand how life is going to be different after.

So that's why testimonies are important.

That's why those reviews are important, all of those kind of things.

Because that's social proof that what you do actually does help people and change their lives for the better.

So this is the message, right?

And I love it.

And one of the cool phrases that you said that I want you all to hear, and this is a really incredible one, it said, when the sun comes up tomorrow, you'll be in one of three positions the same, better or worse.

When the sun comes up tomorrow, you'll be in one of three positions the same, better or worse.

I would encourage you to choose better.

And it's really fun.

And at the event too, I ran into.

So I'm going to give a huge Shout out to joker.

Sarah, I ran into, ran into Uncle Joe.

And you know, Chris Voss's statement here kind of really makes me think of the way Joe trains just with his question.

So when the sun comes up tomorrow, you'll be in one of three positions.

The same, better or worse.

Choose better.

And of course Joe right there would say, what should we do?

And that is actually a really good place and a good use for that question.

I don't always think that that question fits in some of the places, but that's a good one for right there.

You know, what should we do?

The same, worse or better?

Where do you want to end up?

And it's just a really simple, easy way to ask that, that question to your homeowner.

But we've got to understand and understand, demonstrate an understanding of the landscape.

So reviewing exactly what the problems are that they say they have through our discovery, they'll say, that's right.

And just ask them if we could improve on that, would that help you?

And when they say yes, they're giving you permission to offer solutions.

So that is the, you know, that's the flow, that's the process, you know, and gosh, you know, we have to constantly, constantly, constantly focus on being better and improving.

Adopt that 1% mindset.

The, you know, his message was, it's very similar to the book, so I highly recommend the book.

He kind of summed up basically just a chapter or two and retaught it.

You know, he taught the, the, the no question, right?

When people are ghosting you, when people are not getting back to you, you know, the act of saying no to make people feel safe and protected, but basically just sending the, have you given up on this message?

Right?

And so, and here's the thing, and I did a whole podcast on this a good while back and I may do another one.

But when somebody's ghosting you, what you don't do is pretty up your follow up emails and text messages and that kind of thing.

You send just this in subject line and the body and then in the text message just say have you given up on your, on this project?

And that's it.

So send that to all of your people that are not following up with you or people that are ghosting you when you're following up and they will get back to you.

But here's the trick and here's what happens.

They started ghosting you because they were tired of you pitching them.

They started ghosting you because they were tired of you pitching them.

So what he was saying is Once you send that have you given up on this project message, when they get back to you, you cannot go back straight back to pitching them.

You have to talk to them differently when they come back.

That's the reason they started ghosting you.

To start with.

And this is part two that most people leave out of this context.

Yes, send the no question have you given up on this project?

But when they get back to you, don't just start pitching them again.

Just start talking to them like a normal person, like a normal conversation.

Don't be scared to just call people out on things and say, hey, let's move forward.

Are you ready?

Why not?

What's keeping you?

Right?

So just.

But you can't just go back to straight to pitching them.

And that's the part that most people miss.

And we'll break this down and I'll teach you a lot of verbiage here in the near future.

How to do that or if you want to, if you want to learn the exact verbiage.

Come to my Come to my training March 21st and 22nd Austin, Texas.

You can find the link, email me samoseitnow.net and I'll send you the flyer for it for that event.

Let's hop on a discovery call, make sure it's a good fit for you.

Or you can join the Facebook group and catch the flyer there.

Or I'm happy to excited to announce my new website should be live this week.

So you should be able to.

You'll be able to find the flyer and the event announcement there.

Well so but come to myself masterclass March 21st and 22nd.

It's going to be incredible.

But I'm also going to do a podcast about this because my whole philosophy is giving you guys value.

You know, just like that review said.

I am not if you in fact, even when I talked at the event, I forgot to even announce that I have a course that's online that you can buy because my whole philosophy is really just focusing on value.

If you resonate with what I'm saying, then you'll ask about different ways that we can work together.

And the way to contact me is samoseitnow.net you can pop me a text at 512-364-8559 and also go join the Facebook group.

Just search close it now.

Sales training on Facebook.

It will come right up.

Join it.

I do a ton of trainings in there and it's an incredible place to stay connected and to hear about events and trainings and things that I'm doing that close it now is doing.

But really at the end of the day, though, the whole point is having a normal conversation with people.

Stop being weird and start selling.

That is the beauty of what we do is we don't have to put on that creepy salesman voice and use all these, you know, overly used sales statements and stuff.

Yeah, I teach you guys a lot of our bits.

But more importantly, you know, I'm teaching you the psychology and I'm really teaching you how to think for yourself.

That's really where mastery happens is, you know, I'm teaching you the ways to, especially with this podcast and my trainings, man, I'm teaching you the way to think about it.

And once you understand the brain pattern and the way to analyze and look and think about the sales conversation, the actual specific words become less important because we start to understand the importance of asking clarifying questions.

We start to understand the importance of listening, the importance of stating back what we think we hear to make sure we have it clear, telling, really interesting to the homeowners that what you have to say is important.

I'm not here.

You're the one that lives here.

I'm not here to tell you how you live here.

I'm here to listen.

And then once I've listened and heard, not just listened, not just listen to respond, but listen to understand to what the concerns that you're telling me, then I take measurements and I calculate and I measure and then offer solutions like a professional would and not just guess at it from the street corner.

We're not just shooting from the hip.

So once we demonstrate that level of competence, that is when the magic starts to happen.

That's when the price objections go away because the confidence that the problems that they talked about, that will definitely be solved by your solution.

That means that the need for multiple bids goes away.

That means that the need for a price objection goes away.

The need for, you know, I've got to talk to so and so goes away because they have the utmost confidence and certainty that you're going to solve the problems.

So who cares if it's dollars or how many hundreds or thousands of dollars different than any other company?

If the other companies aren't going to solve the problem, then it doesn't matter what the price is.

So many of you will say, oh, no, it's just the price.

Just the price.

That's not true.

If that were true, then the person that is telling you this would not be driving the car they're driving.

They would not be living in the house.

They're living in.

People choose things that people buy what they want, not what they need.

So remember that.

And it all has to do with their understanding of what life is, how bad life is, and what life is going to be like once we've solved those problems.

So that is my message today.

So I just wanted to bring that to you and just recap the Chris Voss keynote because it was super powerful.

Highly recommend reading his book.

Take his masterclass.

I'm sure that I haven't done it yet, but I'm going to.

Personally, I'm constantly working on growing and better, getting bettering myself.

I have a business coach, I have mentors.

In no way would I ever, ever, ever say that I've reached, you know, mastery or reach to the point that I can't learn anymore.

You have to always be coachable, always have yourself a business and a personal mentor, a fitness mentor.

You have to constantly, always be learning and always be training someone else.

The way that you master something is by teaching others.

So if you want to grow quickly in life to become someone worth buying from, invest in yourself, hire coaches, hire trainers, pay for training, pay for going to events, and also help someone else, train and teach and mentor someone else and become that conduit that the information flows through.

And don't be the damn where it just stops up.

Be a conduit where it flows through so more information and more knowledge can be poured into you because you're constantly training others.

And that's how you exercise and practice it is by teaching others.

So that is the nice little bow on the end of this episode.

But everybody reach out to me.

I've got an episode.

I've got a training coming up in March that you do not want to miss.

I'm capping it at 35 people.

That's all that I'm going to let in or shoot.

I say that we're shooting for 40.

I'm expecting roughly, roughly 35 to 40, but I'm already getting applications.

This will sell out.

This will max out.

And if it does, I'm not going to let you in past that.

You'll just have to catch the next one because I want to keep the room small enough where we can get some really intimate training time, get some really lock in the learning and the mastery of what we're talking about with the close it now system.

So just like these reviews of people online have said, going out and changing numbers so insanely, dramatically, strictly from listening to the podcast, it's that much better if you do it in person like my guy Patrick in Raleigh.

His average ticket went from about 9,000 to 16,000 the very next month after I was there.

And it stayed there.

It is staying there.

And that's what happens is the numbers go up but they don't taper back off.

They stay there.

Because these are awareness items.

Once the mind is expanded, it can't contract.

So if you want to, if you're the person that says I'm tired of being mediocre or just average, then Message me sam closeitnow.net Text me 512-364-8559 or join the Facebook group and check out the flyer because the event is going to sell out March 21st and 22nd.

I'm super stoked about it.

It's going to be incredible and going to change some lives.

So message me about that.

Otherwise everybody has been a great episode.

I am excited to get this out to you and we man watch out for some incredible stuff this year.

There's no reason 2024 shouldn't be the year that you dominate your market, dominate your city, make some noise in this industry.

It is time to disrupt this industry and do things on a grander scale.

It's time to raise the standard of our industries and become someone worth buying from.

So more on that later.

I am excited you're here.

Thank you everyone for listening.

Go leave a five star review on wherever you listen and until next time folks, go save the world one heat stroke at a time.

Go save the world one frostbite at a time.

Thanks for listening.

To Close it now with Sam Wakefield.

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