Good afternoon, you've landed on Connect & Convert.

The podcast where we share insider secrets on sales success

for small business owners.

I'm joined as always by my expert companion Dennis Collins.

Dennis, how you doing today?

Excellent.

I hope you are Dave.

I'm doing really well.

I have to say, when I saw the topic of today's episode, I had to say to,

I had to really think hard if I've ever been a victim of that scenario.

That's good word, victim.

Yeah.

Well, have you ever bought, have you ever bought an HVAC system, a new

roof, a plumbing, electrical, remodel?

Any, ever done any of that?

I have, and at the same time I'm, I think that The only

thing that I place where I thought that might've, that this would work

on me would be in an emergency.

Like, a tree fell on my roof and I got a, the water's coming in and

I, somebody's gotta fix it now.

And I, I call a couple friends.

Do you know know somebody, and then all of a sudden a couple of roofers are calling

me and I'm, I'm gonna take probably, take the first one who's gonna fix my problem.

And at the same time, I, to me this goes against so much what

you've done over your career.

Because to me, the one close, the one call close, there's no rapport developed, no

relationship trust building, et cetera.

But this is still a technique that's used out there.

Well, again I would say this in response to what you just said.

Yes.

A lot of practitioners of One Call closes don't spend the time to build

the rapport, to build the trust.

They go right into presentation mode and say up or down.

Are you going with this or you're not going with this?

This is my best shot.

Okay.

And I wanna talk about the other side of that today.

Okay.

What's the other side of that?

There's another side.

Okay.

So the other side that's interesting.

Let me give you some thoughts.

Yeah.

One call closes have become kind of synonymous with that aggressive,

unethical, sleazy salesperson.

In one of our podcasts I referenced Glen Garry, Glen Ross and the character

Alec Baldwin played the sales manager.

And of course, it was always be closing A, B, C.

The high pressure, low rapport, no empathy approach is what was used

and still is in some places, however, it's not working much anymore.

You're getting blow back.

You're getting thrown out.

Ah, something had to change.

So is, Are there certain industries where this is

still a prevalent sales technique?

Or is, are there, industries in the past where this was

a prevalent sales technique?

Yeah, well it was mostly like car, why do you think car

salesman got you know that reputation because the stats are very clear.

Once you walk off that lot, your chances of coming back to buy a car are

slim to none and slim just left town.

Yeah.

So you can't let 'em walk.

Hvac which I'm very familiar with plumbing, very familiar.

Those are kind of one call closes, okay?

There's not a lot of, particularly if it's an urgent situation and

urgency doesn't mean the people all of a sudden turn stupid.

They're not gonna just, they might get four or five different bids, but it's

going to be a very tight one call closure.

You're not gonna have a lot of time to come back, if any.

So give me two, three quick bullet points on what the anatomy of a one

call close might sound like or look like.

It's generally Dave, a sales situation that needs to close

on the initial call or it's very unlikely that a sale will occur.

There's very limited to no chance for a callback or a do-over limited

chance to correct information, to add information or correct mistakes.

It's time to get it done on that first call.

What I have found in my research because, most recently, I've been out

on one call closes, actually observing salespeople, and it definitely has

special dynamics, very special dynamics.

So the idea that you cannot ethically perform a one call close to me is wrong.

It can be done ethically and it can be successful.

That's very interesting.

'cause again, it just, I, it goes against what we typically discuss.

What scenario would a one call close be required for?

For, for I, I, for example, I've recently been talking to some

people in the real estate business.

Okay.

And they're, they have a unique sales method and they have a whole

system set up and it's all about the relationship building, but also about

how many different times they reach out that, that old was it a telephone?

I forget what it was "reach out and touch someone:, right.

And, and they talk about all the various methods that they do before they actually

ask the person for, for the business.

And well..

That's, that's a longer cycle sale..

Right.

So where would this one call close come into play?

You know what, because to, to me, it's..

Think of it as a compressed sales cycle.

Okay?

Okay.

Instead of all those touches, and, if you read all the literature,

oh, you have to have seven touches before they're gonna say yes.

Well, guess what?

On a one call close, you don't have seven touches.

You got seven minutes, the way I see it.

If in the first seven minutes, having after you have encountered your customer,

if you haven't made headway in building some level of full of rapport and trust...

dead.

That's not, it's not gonna happen.

And you say, how the heck can you build trust that fast?

Well, you have some answers to that.

Okay?

So seven, the first seven minutes.

So that tells me that this is a longer call than, you know that

I'm thinking about right now.

I mean..

Could be.

Yeah.

Some of these are on telephone and that's a whole different animal.

We'll do another podcast someday on telephone.

I'm talking now where you're face-to-face.

Okay.

With a customer not on the telephone and it's a one call close.

You've got about seven minutes to build some level of trust for

them to allow you to continue.

Is there any science behind that?

Seven minutes?

What's that ma?

That magic

number.

Well, the science actually says seven seconds.

That you have seven seconds to get a first, a good first impression, right?

I extended to seven minutes because in one call close, you do have

some time at the beginning of the call to let set the table.

I seven minutes may be a little too long.

Seven seconds is way too little.

I tried an experiment the other day with some actual salespeople, and I told 'em

in two minutes, I gave 'em an exercise.

You've got to build trust with me in two minutes.

Two minutes.

And of course, they all said, that's impossible.

I said, no, it isn't.

Set the timer.

Go.

Guess what?

Most of 'em did a pretty good job.

So this obviously requires some skill and some

coaching and some rehearsal.

This is a highly skilled person.

You cannot send the new kid on the block who doesn't know anything about people

and anything about selling on this call.

This requires someone who has experience and who is highly trained

and has a defined sales process.

I'm a big proponent of defined sales processes.

Some people say, oh, my sales processes "I fly by the seat of my pants.

I'm random.

Whatever hits me."

Good luck.

We'll not close.

A lot of one call closes.

In fact, I'd be surprised if you close any.

So a lot of people push back at that defined sales process.

I don't want a, it's not a script, it's a framework.

Okay.

But if you skip any steps in that framework, there's a strong

chance you're gonna get a no sale.

So talk about the coaching part of that a little bit, because

as you said, you're not gonna send a newbie out on one of these calls,

and at the same time, those newer folks, or less experienced folks

at some point are gonna have to get proficient in this particular skill.

So talk a little bit about the coaching behind that.

We've talked a lot in these podcasts about two

concepts, deliberate practice, mentoring, and coaching.

I will be, I don't usually make definitive statements like this.

Yeah.

But I'm gonna make this one.

Without deliberate practice and without coaching, you cannot

master the one call close.

It is a very highly specialized type of sale, and if you're not being coached

or mentored, and if you're not getting feedback and practicing at the edge of

your capabilities and not skipping steps.

When I listen to recordings of salespeople who are supposed to

understand one call close, and they skip, maybe they skip three or four

of the steps in the sales process -you can't skip steps in a one call close.

You have to hit every point in your own language, in your own way.

Not scripted, but each one.

I give you a framework and you need to follow it in a one call close.

Yeah I mean, I've been coaching young people for 32 years now.

A lot of what I do is modeled off of my high school basketball coach

because he was the first coach I ever had, and I started playing competitive

sports at seven years old in little league, but he was the first coach

I ever had that actually taught.

What he wanted done instead of telling you what he wanted done.

And I, so when I'm coaching my young ladies, I just I

put, I feel like a teacher.

I, not so much the coach only comes out on game days.

The rest of the time I feel like I'm a teacher.

And.

The most of the kids, the, so I work with a 13, 14 year old, freshman level kids and

most of them coming up through youth ball.

When they get to me, I can tell day one what kind of instruction they've had prior

to reaching me and how much remedial work I might have to do to get 'em to where I

want 'em to be or where they need to be.

So I'm sure you've seen that as well.

And, and, well,

I wanna, I wanna key on something.

Yeah.

I want to key on something you said that's very important.

One of the ways that we humans learn is, and I think the quickest way, not only

through deliberate practice that builds skill, but when you're trying to teach

someone something new, let's say show them, demonstrate it, ha have, either

you demonstrate it or have someone who's very good at it demonstrate it, okay?

Then have them do their own version and they're gonna

stumble and fall and that's okay.

It's safe, stumble and fall, and then, let them correct.

Do it again.

Do it again.

Deliberate practice.

And then the final part of that is let them teach it.

Let them show someone else maybe who's new to that technique.

Let them show those people how to do it.

That's when you really learn something.

Sure.

Absolutely.

So let's let's talk a little bit, you talked about the first seven minutes.

Okay.

Yep.

Let's talk a little bit more about how you might conduct a successful one call close.

Especially building trust.

It's about, the first seven minutes, what

I call the building trust zone.

That's the seven minutes at the beginning.

He don't skip any steps.

You've gotta make instant rapport.

You gotta make a quick connection.

I'm not talking about phony small talk.

I'm talking about, the concept, I am here to help you meet your

needs, to help you solve your problem, not to line my pocketbook.

Okay?

That is the goal of those first seven minutes.

Does that make sense?

It does, and at the same time it's like how do you do that?

Well, no connection, no sale.

Yeah.

We're gonna do a podcast and I don't wanna give away too much 'cause this

is gonna be one that I think people will really enjoy and it's about the

principle of influence called liking.

We like to do business.

We prefer to do business with people we like.

And the people we like are the people that are most like us.

They're similar to us.

So how do we build rapport?

Not through cheesy.

Oh, what well, that's a nice dog you have there.

Or how old's your pussycat or whatever, that's cheesy.

We're gonna do a whole podcast on non-cheesy ways to build rapport,

and it's all based on the principle of influence, reciprocity and unity.

Three principles.

We'll talk about.

All that's, that sounds fair.

'cause I was thinking of some non-cheesy ways to build rapport, or, I, go ahead.

Well, I'm just, I'm just trying to think of what I might respond to if I were,

in, in the role of the customer here.

So my family's really important to me.

If he asked me a que a question about my family, that might be a

sincere question about my family.

That might be a good way to go.

Absolutely.

Maybe he comes in my home for this call and sees I have a set

of golf clubs in the corner.

Maybe he wants a, asking about hobbies or absolutely.

Or maybe he's played a great course and that, that sort of thing.

Or he knows what I do for a living and say, "Hey, I got a friend that does this.

How's the, how's your business going?"

You know, those, so I think the sincerity is important, right.

Of those questions.

And think .. So even if it's, even if it's a question that we might

think on the surface might be cheesy.

If I feel in my gut that the guy's being guy or gal's being sincere

I may not, no look negatively on that, potentially cheesy inquiry.

We're gonna let you teach that session on a non-cheesy report

because you came up with some great ideas.

And we'll do that in the future.

That is a really, that's a question I get all the time.

How the heck do I build rapport?

What do I say?

What do I ask?

How do I do it?

And rather than spend any more time today, let's table that to the next one.

Where does does social media fit into this equation at all?

This is controversial.

Some people think I'm creepy.

I'm a stalker.

I advise using social media to research the call before you if

it's on a business that's easy.

It's all there on the website.

If it's a person that gets a little more touchy, but look at it this way, Dave.

Everything on social media is open source.

It's not confidential.

If you didn't wanna be on social media, you have the choice to take it off.

And so I think it's fair game to use like colleges, sports family activities, things

that are posted publicly on social media.

So I wouldn't go to the person and say, Hey, I, I saw you

were drunk at Bob's bar last night.

That's a good one.

I haven't heard that one before, Dave.

That's,

uh, so, so there is, there

I saw you got arrested for D u I the other day.

Your name was in the paper.

Oh, yeah.

That's a good one too.

Yeah.

So there is, there's definitely a line there.

And I think the, there's a line.

I think those four areas that you covered is probably where I would draw it.

And you just have to be conscious of personal questions, but I agree with you.

What, if it's on their social media pages, if they're in the

news, that's public domain.

Public domain, it's just what best suits your inquiry to this

customer?

Use

good judgment.

Is what I advise my, my sure.

The people use good judgment.

Absolutely.

And some people say, I never do that.

I don't think that's the right answer either.

But do it with discretion.

Yes.

So you already talked a little bit about why flying by the

seat of your pants is not the best way to go about a one closed call.

What about this topic the subject you call premature presentation?

Yes.

Premature presentation.

It's the tendency that a lot of salespeople who are not comfortable

building rapport and asking questions.

They, like we've talked in previous podcasts about, they just start blurting

out their features and benefits.

Well, let me tell you about this, and I got this product and I got that product.

And you have basically then blown a one call close.

You are not gonna close it.

Once you give the customer control of the call, you will..

If you get it, it'll be done on a heavily discounted price.

Okay?

Once the customer gets control of the agenda, the price will be the

single criteria determination, and then you have to drop your drawers.

You've gotta give 'em some ridiculously low price that nobody wants to give them.

So you honestly think it's possible to do a one call close?

No.

I know it is.

I've seen it done.

I've done it, and I've seen it done, but all your ducks have to be in a row.

You cannot make any skips.

You can't skip any steps, and you have to be on your game.

If you're not on your game.

If you get an order, it's what I call a happy accident.

A happy accident.

We're all happy, but it was an accidental sale.

So we wanna avoid that scenario.

Yes.

All right.

At all costs.

Understanding that, part of it is inoculating, anticipating

and inoculating objections.

We'll do a whole podcast on what the heck is inoculating objections all about.

It's a great technique that every salesperson who does

world call close must know.

You don't have a lot of time to deal with objections.

You gotta neutralize them early.

Become highly, highly, highly, highly, highly skilled at

recognizing buying signals.

You would be shocked, Dave, at how many salespeople that are

out there right now selling that don't recognize a buying signal.

It goes right by them.

That sounds like another episode,

So that could be two or three episodes.

Alright, thanks for your wisdom and insight today, folks.

This wraps another edition of Connect & Convert, the podcast that lets you behind

the curtain with some insider information for small business sales success.

This is Dave Salter with Dennis Collins, and we'll see you next time.

Questions, questions, questions, Dave, and