Oct. 4, 2022

Are these Sales Mistakes Tanking Your Income? with Jeremy Miner

Are these Sales Mistakes Tanking Your Income? with Jeremy Miner

Most online entrepreneurs make surprising sales mistakes that tank their ability to grow a business. That’s why today, I have a special guest here to show you what these mistakes are and how to avoid them, so you can hit your income goals and attract more clients.

How many major sales mistakes have you made as you’ve tried to grow a business?

You may not think it’s very many, but in today’s episode, we’re uncovering surprising missteps that could be tanking your ability to earn more money and causing you to repel potential clients.

Internationally recognized sales trainer Jeremy Miner is here to give you the insider secrets that today’s top online entrepreneurs use to close more sales.

BY THE TIME YOU FINISH LISTENING, YOU’LL LEARN: 

  • What it means to be a problem finder — and why this is so essential to the sales process
  • The key difference between selling and making an offer
  • The biggest sales mistakes online entrepreneurs make that keep them from generating the income they want as they grow a business

Then, if you’re ready for more from Jeremy, Join his Facebook Group (and get some free resources while you’re there!). 

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Transcript

Courtney Elmer 0:00  

You are listening to the AntiFragile Entrepreneurship™ Podcast. This is episode 142. 

[INTRO]

Courtney Elmer

You're with me on the show today is the internationally recognized sales trainer Jeremy Miner, who has taught 1000s of people how to go from getting average results in selling to becoming high six figure and even seven figure earners. Now over the years, Jeremy has been asked by 1000s of salespeople to train them on how to eliminate rejection, how to connect with their prospects in an authentic way, how to overcome objections, and how to close more sales without being pushy, or sleazy. 

Courtney Elmer

And what I love most about Jeremy and what you will soon find out is that his unique brand of sales training draws from behavioral science and human psychology, not from outdated sales tactics, or can to sales scripts, or any of those slimy methods out there that we all resist when we think of sales. Inside this episode, Jeremy is going to reveal what it means to be a problem finder. And why so many people miss this step and how critical it is to the sales process. He's also going to reveal to you the major mistakes that most overlooked entrepreneurs make that keep them from generating the income that they want. Welcome to the show.

 

Jeremy Miner 4:24  

Well hey, thanks for having me Courtney Elmer. And you know what I think you say that every guest that you're so excited I appreciate it though I love it. So I'm going to take all that as a compliment because my kids always tell me I'm really boring. 

 

Courtney Elmer 5:01  

Absolutely. Well, you're right. I do say that to every guest who comes on, but it's because I am excited about every guest that comes along. So listen, you shared a reel the other day on your Instagram, Jeremy, where you were talking about something that is so important to the selling process, but it's something that most overlooked entrepreneurs out there, they completely miss the people out there who are struggling to make sales miss this. And it's something I harp on all the time with our clients, I'd love for you to unpack it for us this idea. Unpack it? That's good. A building a gap? Yeah. What does it mean to build a gap? And tell us why is this so important in the sales process?

 

Jeremy Miner 5:45  

Yeah Courtney Elmer. I mean, there is no sale, without a gap in the prospects mind from where they are. Okay, we call that their current state or current situation, compared to where they want to be, we call that their objective state, What is their future going to look like? Once all these newfound problems are actually solved. So let me repeat that there is no sale without that gap. Now, the reason why some of you aren't here, get sales here. And there is because your prospect is coming to you. And they already recognize how big of a gap they have. 

Jeremy Miner

So gap building is taking any type of prospect because one thing that I think a lot of us don't understand is that most prospects, when we first initially talk to them, and it doesn't matter, the industry don't really know what their real problems are. Or maybe they have an idea of what their problem is, when they come to that call, let's say if it's an inbound call, or even an outbound lead, or whatever, but they don't really understand how bad the problem is, okay Courtney Elmer? Or they don't understand the consequences of what happens if they don't do anything about solving the problems.

Jeremy Miner

That gap can only be built in the prospects mind, not by telling them, because if you tell them what their problems are, and if you tell them what they should do, guess what happens Courtney Elmer? It goes in one ear out the other, because, hey, you're biased. You're the salesperson, of course, you're going to say all that, You're trying to make a sale, they know that. So the gap can only be built by your skilled ability, as far as what questions you ask at the right time. And how you bridge from question to question that make it natural, that make it where it doesn't sound like an interrogation or scripted, which triggers their brain, okay Courtney Elmer? 

Jeremy Miner

To become open and very curious on you and looking at you as more of the trusted authority or the expert who's going to get them where they want to go. So that gap can only be built by your skilled questioning and your tonality, it's really key that a lot of people hear about it, but they don't understand what tonality is. So the bigger that gap means that the more reasons they have in their mind to want to change. And the bigger that gap, the easier it is for them to want to make that change now and want to make that change with you. Now, if your question ability is off, if you don't understand the right tonality in the delivery and how to clarify and probe based off their answers and how to shift. 

Jeremy Miner

Well guess what happens to the gap, it starts to go way down, and the gaps not very big. And all of a sudden, when you throw out your price points. That problem doesn't really look that bad compared to the price. And that's why so many of us get I want to think it over I need to keep looking around, I need to do more research. I'm going to try to figure it out myself, which would be for a lot of your audience right in the in the high tickets was odd. They're going to try to watch some free YouTube videos and figure it out. That's why you're getting the objections because you haven't learned yet because it's a learnable skill, how to be effective at Gap building.

 

Courtney Elmer 8:46  

Well said, you know, it made me think of how when I first got started in my own business, I knew how to coach and I did not know how to sell. What I didn't know was that taking those coaching skills to my sales calls helped me to close more sales. And it's exactly what you're talking about asking these questions and doing it in a well thought out well structured way you know what you're doing as the salesperson but doing it in a way that's not salesy, right. No one wants to feel salesy.

 

Jeremy Miner 9:10  

That's what I always say Courtney Elmer, if you want to be a great sales professional, if you're an entrepreneur and you want to scale your business where eventually you're not on the phone doing the calls, you want to hire sales team. First of all, you have to be really good at closing yourself because that brings you more business where you can pay a sales team to do it for you. But you have to really get your sales people and yourself if you're small entrepreneur to think that selling is like acting. Okay, so Well let me ask you, Courtney Elmer, who's your favorite actor actress in Hollywood? I'm gonna put you on the spot Courtney Elmer.

 

Courtney Elmer 9:42  

Oh, good question. The guy that plays Harvey Specter in suits. 

 

Jeremy Miner 9:59  

Okay, so everything he says in suits, guess what, folks? Almost 100% scripted. When he talks his lines scripted. Now, does it sound scripted when you're watching him Courtney Elmer? No. Be In fact, it sounds so natural that when you watch him in that suits you don't. You don't think of him as the actor. You think of him as the character he's portraying, like my favorite actors, George Clooney, when you watch George Clooney and like Ocean's what is it? 11, or whatever it's called as a random show. You don't view him as George Clooney, you view him as the character he's portrayed. And why because he sounds very natural, yet everything he says in that movie is pretty much 100% scripted Courtney Elmer.

Jeremy Miner

So as a salesperson or business owner, we have to memorize our lines, we have to memorize the questions we're asking. You know Courtney Elmer, I see a lot of people especially in like the height, because we train 158 industries high ticket is one of those. But we see a lot of people in high ticket, it's like they get lazy, because they're working from home, or they're working for an office. So they either call their leads, or they're on Zoom, and they plaster some script bullet right up on their computer. And it's like they're sitting there reading it or kind of referencing, like reading it all the time. And it sounds like they're an FBI interrogator. 

Jeremy Miner

And it typically, especially with an A type personality turns them off very quickly, and they emotionally start to shut down. So even if you're selling from home or selling from an office, and they can't see you, okay, you've got to memorize your lines. Because if you don't, it doesn't sound natural. Okay Courtney Elmer. That's why I love a lot of salespeople that are like, you know, going door to door or they're having to meet in front of a boardroom or they're meeting at a customer's home like they did legitly have to memorize everything, because they can't like have it written on their, you know, their inside of their arm, like copying their lines. So you want to become like a Hollywood actor or actress. That's why they get paid the big bucks. So if you want to get paid the big bucks as a business owner sales professional, you're going to memorize your lines.

 

Courtney Elmer 12:03  

Yeah, great point. You know, actually, another actress who I love is Viola Davis. Viola is an incredible actress. I'm reading her book right now. And she is talking about what you're getting at, where as an actress, and she talks, talks about the art of acting, and how you're bringing yourself into that role into that character. You're not trying to be somebody else, necessarily. You're still being you. Yeah, you're doing it in a very crafted way. It is a craft. And she unpacked it so beautifully in her book and talks exactly about what you're getting at, which is where I'd like to talk next with you. What are the consequences of not building a gap in your ideal clients mine, for those listening, who are trying to sell who are failing to do that right now and don't even realize that they're making that mistake? How is that impacting their business?

 

Jeremy Miner 13:04  

Well, it's impacting it, because what happens is, when you don't build a gap, the gap is very small. Okay Courtney Elmer? So they look at the problem is like not being that big of a deal, because they don't recognize there's that much of a gap between where they are and where they want to be. So they figure that they'll put it off, because it's not that big of a deal in their mind. Or maybe they'll try to do it themselves. Like, especially with the industry that that you know, the high ticket industry that so many of your listeners are in. So they view it as like not that big of a deal. So when you throw out a price point of let's say, 10, grand, or 15, or 25, or whatever, you guys sell your products or services or your programs for, you know, that 25 grand, and they don't see the problem has been that important because you couldn't help them see it in their mind. 

Jeremy Miner

Well, are they going to spend that Courtney Elmer? No. So they're going to say, Well, this sounds really good, but I need some time. I need to really think this through it's a big decision financially, we need to pray about it. We kind of need to keep looking around doing more research, you know, I need to see if I can do some of this like, Does everybody on here get those objections? It's because you're not building a gap. Okay, most of those objections, 70% of those should not happen if you effectively build the gap. And if they end up due happening 20 to 30% of the time, because they already see how big of a gap they have. It's so much easier helping them overcome those basic concerns about not having the money because they recognize how big the gap is. So they'll move heaven and earth like they'll go remortgage their house, they'll sell a car, they'll do whatever they can to move away from that pain, okay Courtney Elmer? 

Jeremy Miner

The more pain they feel, now, they can't feel the pain. And thus you're able to ask them certain questions that allow them to relive the pain of not having what they want, So if you're in the high ticket industry, and let's say you're selling a program that teaches people how to scale their businesses, for example, we talked to about that, but right now, they're not able to scale their business. So what is that causing? Like? What is that preventing them from being able to do? It goes much deeper than like, oh, it, it prevents us from being able to grow the business. That's like surface level stuff. That also if you get deeper with them and clarify and probe, we probably find out it's preventing them from being able to pay for their daughter's wedding that they really want to pay for. It's preventing them from being able to retire their parents, that they really that are already working two jobs, it's preventing them from being able to give back to charities that really need their help that they want to donate to or their church. Like once you get deep with them, and not build off their why Courtney Elmer? 

Jeremy Miner

Because most sales, an average salesperson can find out the why of a prospect. But the very greatest of salespeople who make the most amount of money by far business owners are able to help the prospect see what's behind the why. Like what's driving the why not the y itself the why is surface level That's old school selling that's consultative selling, logical based questions, logical base answers in return from the prospect, you have to find out what's driving the why, like, what's behind the why. And that gets the prospect like Tony Robbins does a really good job about this, if you walk him out, if you'd see him on stage and stuff, is he gets his prospects or people in the audience to discover not what their Why is, but what's behind the why. 

Jeremy Miner

And he's doing that because it gets them into their emotional state. And once they get into any emotional state, people make buying decisions off emotion, not logic, there is a reason why he asked certain questions to his audience. And he pauses at certain moments. And he lets it think in and then you see the audience for it. See, he's doing that for a reason. Because he knows as like a psychologist, because my background is behavioral science in human psychology in school. As a psychologist, you know that in order for the prospect to change? Okay, so all selling is this change, for them to change, you have to get them into their emotional state, because people don't change off logic, they change off emotion. So if you can't get them to their emotional state, there's no change. And when there's no change, there's no say,

 

Courtney Elmer 17:09  

I have a background in psychology too. And this is why I love the field of coaching, because we're inspiring change, Not inspiring it. But if we were the facilitator of that for someone, and it's the same in sales, and this is the thing with sales that you know, I hear from so many people, Jeremy is like they think sales is a sales call, or a sales presentation. And I'm like, no, no, no, no, you're selling with every piece of content you put out there. And there's a difference between selling and making an offer. Within all of your content, you should be speaking to this gap between where your prospect is and where they want to be.

 

Jeremy Miner 17:47  

Yeah, you're seeing it Courtney Elmer. So that's why you start to see me on reels, we do 160 reels a month, like it's like a content for you, I feel like one week a month, that's all I'm doing is shooting rounds, We'll take some of this interview that we're having. And we'll wrap this up in some type of reel and post, you know, probably six reels will come from this. But all we're doing when we're doing our Rails is we're seeding without making an offer in the prospects mind. So our prospects are primarily business people, entrepreneur, sales, people, sales, executive, sales leader, management, coaches, consultants, anybody that sells any product or service, we're starting to see it in their mind that maybe they even if they're doing good, maybe they think they're doing good. 

Jeremy Miner

But maybe once they learn more advanced skills, they could do be doing much better. So we're getting them to think about where they're at in their current situation compared to where they could be Courtney Elmer. And when we do that is by dropping little 62nd nibbles, or a little hors d'oeuvres, like little stuff that gets them thinking and questioning their way of thinking of how they're selling now compared to how they could sell and what type of result they could get. So but the time they broke in with us, they're kind of already mentally prepared, that, Hey, maybe I should make a change. You know, maybe I could sell more, once I learn more advanced skills that work with human behavior. So we're doing the same thing Courtney Elmer.

 

Courtney Elmer 19:06  

Yeah. And it's powerful whenever you can help someone become aware of the mistakes that they're making that are causing the problem. So for someone listening today, who thinks they know what their ideal clients problem is? How can they know for sure? And how can they start helping their ideal client their prospect become more aware of the problem, the true problem that they're experiencing and to really prime that pump for that sales call where you can make the offer?

 

Jeremy Miner 19:56  

Excellent question Courtney Elmer because we see so many people and they think Oh, I'm a problem solver. Well hate to tell you this, you're not a problem solver until after the prospect purchases from you, because they don't purchase from you, how are you solving the problem? You can't. So you have to be much better problem finding, Because if you can't help them find problems that they didn't know they had, they're never going to purchase from you. So you can solve the damn problem.

Jeremy Miner

So that's called problem finding. Okay Courtney Elmer? Because like I said, most of your prospects don't know what their real problems are, when you first start talking now, how do you help them find that they have more than one problem? It's easy. It's by building the gap Courtney Elmer. It's your question ability, and your tonality that allows them to build that gap in their mind. Because if they don't build the gap, like we mentioned earlier, it's impossible for them to ever feel the need or urgency to want to change their situation with you. Now what are most salespeople Courtney Elmer? Hate to say this, most salespeople are what we call product pushers. You talked about that and saying go. So what they do is they ask a few logical base questions. John told me two challenges you're having or, you know, what are you looking for in a solution? Or what type of budget do you have set aside for this? These are all surface level questions, which they're going to give you what type of answers surface level answers you return. So that's what I mean by problem finding Courtney Elmer.

 

Jeremy Miner 26:04  

So many salespeople, and entrepreneurs think that they have the most product knowledge, and they can dump that on the prospect that somehow the prospect is going to think they're an expert, the exact opposite is true Courtney Elmer. All it does is it creates uncertainty in the prospects mind when you dump on them. As an expert for them to view you as the expert who's going to give them the result they want. Your expertise comes from your expert questioning that you're asking and how you're asking that takes them through different stages from connecting to their situation. And what's really going on to, what we call problem awareness, like you made a good hint of it is, what are the real problems? What are the not the problems, but the root cause of the problem is what's causing the problem? Okay, most salespeople don't even find out what's causing the problem. They find out a problem and then pitch, What's causing the problem? And most importantly, how are the problems affecting them even? Personally?

 

Courtney Elmer 30:00  

Lets bring up tonality again, because I wanted to circle back to this. Share with us more about that. Why is it so important? And how can we start working on our tonality?

 

Jeremy Miner 32:11  

Yeah Courtney Elmer, it's all the perception that they have of you, I can take a script from a company that is the worst script on planet Earth. And by changing my tonality, compared to how they do it, sell three times more even on horrible questions, and like a horrible telemarketing script. But if I changed my tone was certain, you know, what we call verbal cues, like when they're talking like, Uh huh. Okay. Oh, I see. That's a verbal cue. Now, most of the time, when you ask a question, and people talk, what are most salespeople and entrepreneurs do Courtney Elmer?

 

Jeremy Miner 32:52  

Sit there and listen. Like, it's like you're talking to your grandma on the phone and use talk talking for three minutes, And they don't say anything. Like, are you their Grandma, are you there? Well, they're not. They're not they're not letting you know, they're there. They're not letting you know you're listening. I also want to ask verbal, I also want to have verbal posits, let me give you an example of people who do exceptionally well, with verbal pausing when they're speaking. Tony Robbins is one of them. He'll ask something and halfway through that question, he'll pause and let it sink in and people to go Oh, my gosh, like it it's powerful.

Jeremy Miner

Courtney Elmer, I don't I don't really get into politics. I like to watch, different presidents how they communicate, but like, one really good communicator was President Obama. And when he would say things he would a lot of times say a statement and pause, or like a question he would pause before he said anything else? And the whole audience was like, Oh, my gosh, you know, and it triggered that emotional state. Now, that's not something he was born with. Those are acquired skills, I can assure you that nobody's born with advanced tonality and verbal pausing skills. 

 

Courtney Elmer 38:20  

Yeah, it makes so much sense that rapport is so important. And knowing how to build that rapport is often a challenge for people, you know, especially if you're not coming from a coaching space, If you're a coach already, you probably have some degree of rapport building skills and strategies up your sleeve. 

 

Jeremy Miner 38:36  

Can I share something on one way not to build rapport Courtney Elmer? Yes, because a lot of a lot of people, a lot of salespeople in any industry, but even the high ticket space, they believe that rapport building is getting on there like Hey, how're you doing today? How's it going? Oh, yeah. Do you live in Dallas? Oh, man, it's so hot here in Arizona, and they think that's rapport building. But the problem is, is that every other salesperson that's ever tried that to sell that prospect, anything, also is doing what? saying the exact same things. And so when you act and ask the same exact questions as everybody else is trying to sell them vacuum cleaners, to maintenance, to toilet bowl cleaner, to whites, to a home to a car to coaching, they all put you in the same category is another salesperson trying to they all know that you're not really wanting to know how their day is going. 

Jeremy Miner

We all know that when a salesperson, how are you how's your day going? We all know that they don't really want to sit there for 20 minutes while you talk about how your damn days going. So it's it comes across to most people is like yeah, they're trying to build rapport. Okay, so we don't want to do that Courtney Elmer. So never ask how's your day go now? Let's say the prospect ask you how your day is going. I see a lot of salespeople like Oh man, I'm doing really good working hard drinking the coffee doing the work and doesn't do anything. I want to downplay myself.

Jeremy Miner

I kind of want to poke fun myself, so they do what they can come to my rescue because that's what we do psychologically as a human being. Okay Courtney Elmer? So like, oh, how're you doing today? Jeremy? Oh, you know, hanging out trying to stay out of trouble. What about you, man? Or you know, hanging out being the boring guy? Oh, I'm sure you're not boring Jeremy. See little techniques like that trigger them to loosen up a little bit because you're human. Oh, hanging out trying to, you know, be handsome over here, like everybody else in the office. You know Courtney Elmer, little things like that little things that you can say there, trigger them to open up and laugh a little bit. And when you're able to do that it instantly builds more openness.

 

Courtney Elmer 40:42  

Exactly what you did at the start in this conversation.

 

Jeremy Miner 40:45  

Exactly Courtney Elmer. We're a training company we do what we train will be disingenuous for us not to do that.

 

Courtney Elmer 40:54  

100% I love it. Jeremy, you've shared a lot with us today. Because we covered so much today, I'm going to give you the final word, I want you to share anything else, given what we've talked about, that you think would be impactful for our listeners to take with him as they walk away from this episode?

 

Jeremy Miner 41:29  

Well Courtney Elmer, realize that, if you describe selling in one word, all selling as change, that's really what selling is, is change. It's about how good you are at getting your prospect to view in their mind that by them changing their situation. And that means purchasing your solution them doing that is far less risky for them than then doing nothing at all. staining the status quo, like I mentioned before, their problems stay the same. And nothing ever changes.

 

Courtney Elmer 44:37  

I'd love to have you back because I look we didn't even talk about objections.

 

Jeremy Miner 44:48  

We didn't even we didn't even scratch the surface Courtney Elmer.

 

Courtney Elmer 46:17  

Now coming up on the show next week, we are going to start dropping a special series here on the podcast for you to help you solve your lead generation problems once and for all. Because in order to truly solve this sales problems in your business, you've got to solve the lead generation problem first. I will see you back here next Tuesday. Until then, go live your EffortLESS Life®.

Jeremy Miner

Founder & Chairman

Jeremy is a good fit for this audience because of his unique understanding of the sales process from his Behavioral science background and being ranked internationally as one of the Top 50 highest paid salespeople in the world selling anything during his 17 yr sales career before strarting 7th Level.
That experience and getting thousands of clients results has caused 7th level to be the fastest growing sales training company in the United states last yr according to the INC 5000 list rankings..