Sales Training

Communication skills are invaluable yet often overlooked. In this episode, Susan sits down with Matt Heinz, President of Heinz Marketing Inc. He's an established podcaster and marketing leader. They discuss practical ways we can become better communicators by creating and sharing our stories. They explore how opening up builds connection and trust—when we lead with vulnerability, we grant others permission to do the same. The resulting environment fosters mutual understanding between all personality types, whether analytic experts or creative collaborators. Matt and Susan examine how to reframe experiences from our past into bite-sized stories that offer wisdom. Gathering these over time not only boosts our own confidence but allows us to celebrate shared experiences with others. The ability to craft compelling stories makes communicating easier and more effective. This speaks volumes to HR facilitating healthier office cultures. Ultimately, honing our storytelling skills allows us to bridge divides and bond teams together. Tune into this insightful episode to gain tangible tools for improving how you communicate through personal stories.
A quote from Matt that speaks volumes about him:
“The definition of good work isn’t more work. It isn’t defined by doing the most work. The definition of work is about impactful work – for the work itself as well as what it enables for you and those you care about, as well as the broader communities in which we live and engage.”
Matt Heinz
President
Heinz Marketing
 

Susan Finch and Rob Brodo from Adventexe delve into the crucial role of coaching in driving organizational success. Recent studies have revealed that companies with a strong coaching culture are classified as high-performing organizations, and you won't want to miss out on that kind of achievement. Rob shares invaluable insights on coaching dialogue, coaching effectiveness, and the overall approach. They debunk the misconception that each company's coaching needs are vastly unique, emphasizing the core principles that apply to leadership coaching across the board. However, they also stress the significance of aligning coaching strategies with your company's specific goals and objectives. Join them for this episode, "Skills Needed to Drive Performance Through  Effective Coaching."
Rob also invites you to read his latest post on Five Business Acument Tips to Making Yourself Indispensible.
 
Links from this episode:
Adventexe.com
https://www.advantexe.com/new-manager-business-leadership-simulation
Rob Brodo on LinkedIn and Twitter
Susan Finch on LinkedIn and Twitter
 
About Advantexe:
Advantexe Learning Solution's mission is to provide world-class Business simulation-centric Business Acumen, Business Leadership, and Strategic Business Selling talent development solutions to organizations around the world to help them execute their business strategies and achieve their goals and objectives. 
Their vision is to be the premier talent development resource partnering with their clients to close the talent gaps preventing them from flawlessly executing their strategic initiatives and achieving their short- and long-term business objectives.

Steve Richard, SVP, Value Realization at Mediafly sits down with Susan to talk about sales and sales training in a recession. He says, "Really good demand gen marketers that are super targeted with what they do and have very little scrap rate have never been higher demand. That's one thing I'm definitely seeing that's critically important right now. And everyone's going outbound."
Key points in this episode:
SDRs, SBRs, are you in the top third, mid-range third, or bottom third?
Time to start self-sourcing opportunities
How many times do you need to repeat training materials, three, seven, 50, or 100 times? 
The sins that steady renewals can cover.
Is this current market downturn isolated to tech to tech, or is it across the board?
Steve's advice to take from this episode:
"If you're good at generating opportunities, you're always going to be fine.  That's it. It's simple. So learn how to generate opportunities no matter what customer-facing role you're in."

Sales Managers and Leaders - you need to get your sales teams up 3x. Susan Finch's guest is Todd Duncan. A great place to start is with his golden nugget of a tip. At the end of each hour at the 55-minute rule. In the last 5 minutes of every hour, review what you did in the last hour. What was productive? What worked? What didn't work? If you simply start with this ONE tip, you'll be on your way to working much smarter in the following hours. Waiting until the week's end, or the month's end is too late for this review to make adjustments and improve.
He'll also give his opinion as to why sales pros slip back into bad habits after having great coaching and training. One word - discipline. 
And TRUST - the most important thing to earn and the easiest to lose. How do you get back on track?
What is your WHY? What is your deep motivation? How does an action allow you to achieve something that is really emotionally important to you? You will want to listen to this more than once to fully absorb these huge tips you can start today.
And when you're done listening, go over to ToddDuncan.com and sign up for everything he offers. Follow him on all social channels. As Corey Frank from the Market Dominance Guys says, "Invest ONE hour per day on LEARNING and IMPROVING yourself." This is a great place to start. Everything can improve - you need to accept that and be willing to do the work to improve - every day.
Get his book - High Trust Selling on Amazon
About Todd Duncan:
Todd Duncan built a successful real estate and mortgage business before committing his life to help others do the same. At a young age, he learned the importance of building relationships, and that transactions will make you a living, but relationships will make you a fortune. That life lesson has carried him through his career and helped him become the #1 salesperson nationally at just 23 years old, write 17 books, start his own podcast, and make a transformational impact on the hearts and souls of business professionals. 

If you are in sales, you'd better know if you are transactional-focused or lifetime-focused when it comes to how you approach prospects and customers. There is no wrong version, but you need to know which you are. Your sales manager needs to know which you are too. That deep honesty will allow you to play to your strengths. The theme of this episode is two-fold - being in awe of the fantastic things people you encounter do and who they are, and knowing yourself to the core. If you don't like it, change it. There is also homework at the end from both of us.
A favorite quote from The Big Kahuna is, "It doesn't matter whether you're selling Jesus or Buddha or civil rights or 'How to Make Money in Real Estate With No Money Down'. That doesn't make you a human being; it makes you a marketing rep. If you want to talk to somebody honestly, as a human being, ask him about his kids. Find out what his dreams are - just to find out, for no other...”
Jason Beck, this list of movies for sales professionals is for you.  You can listen to our commentary in this episode. Check them out - some are not available on Amazon or Netflix at this time - but check back. The more extensive commentary is on Salesman.org - sign up for their newsletter, too. 
Used Cars with Kurt RussellJerry MaguireThe Wolf of Wall Street (duh)Death of a Salesman 1985 - or see it on stage - so powerfulMoneyballSeize the Day - Robin WilliamsIn Pursuit of HappynessTin MenGlengarry Glen RossTommy BoyDiamond MenLord of WarLove and Other drugsThe Big Kahuna - a sleeper and feel-good movie about salesThe Goods: Live Hard, Sell Hard
 
Jason Beck is Vice President of Sales at Enerex, retail energy's trusted data platform, providing secure connectivity to the entire value chain — brokers, suppliers, agents, customers, and utilities — to drive efficient transactions. Their flagship service, Sparkplug, is the #1 retail energy sales platform in the world, powering over 10% of US commercial and industrial (C&I) transactions. He's also been a wonderful guest on Market Dominance Guys. Connect with Jason on LinkedIn.

Christopher Lochhead wrote a book called Play Bigger. He was the CMO of Mercury Interactive and a couple of other real high-flying Silicon Valley startups and just an awesome guy. But he has a saying. He likes to say, "Thinking about thinking is the most important thinking you do. A lot of what we're talking about is stepping back because it's so easy to default to, Hey, I just raised my Series A; I'm in MarTech, let's go get somebody out of drift or let's go get a sale.
Let's go find someone in Salesforce marketing. Let's go get a director from Salesforce to run our marketing. Oh, they'll crush it for us. And it's a natural default, right? And then a person comes in and because they weren't clear... And usually that person, they don't know how to vet. So, they're told this and they're super excited. Oh, wow. This is my chance. Put a stamp on it, but they forget that I'm not going to be in Salesforce anymore. Meaning, I'm not going to have, first of all, the Salesforce brand and just all the power of that. I'm not going to have all the resources.

 
Susan welcomes back author and impact training expert, Amy Franko, as a follow up to the book launch episode for The Modern Seller. Update on her book, wildly successful launch propelled her into the number one position for Kindle downloads in the category of Sales Techniques. We've continued to follow her tips, posts, appearances and the topic of The Why and the How came up. Her blog post titled, "What Distinguishes a Standout Seller?" led to this interview. There is not one answer, but Amy helps you determine the questions to have ready in order to guide the meeting, the presentation and ultimately - THE SALE.
Be sure to sign up for her newsletters, guides and more. Definitely worth adding to your weekly research list for those AHA moments.
AmyFranko.com - you will find her book, The Modern Seller there as well.

 
Take a breath. Really, take a deep breath before you pick up the phone. While you're at it raise your arms, lower your shoulders, sit up straight, smile then make that call, walk into the meeting, take the stage. Speech patterns and bad habits can tune your audience out, even an audience of one, before you get further than your introduction. This will cost you revenue and waste everyone's time.
Take tips from voice and dialect coach, Susan E. Finch. This show should have been a video - it was so much fun and packed with applicable tips to keep you from being annoying. The biggest culprits?  Women! Women 17 - 35 and this voice fry issue where they sound like they are swallowing their words. Next, the gutteral hiccup - that punch that only belongs in the Cockney community in London.

Hey CMOs, CEOs how do you have your SDRs embrace an external group of SDRs to train your existing team on how to secure that first meeting and take it to conversion? 
Our guest is Whitney Marshall, Co-Founder of Qualified Meetings. Their goal is to operate as an extension of your sales team – our only goal is to convert highly qualified opportunities that meet both of our standards. 
Why wouldn't you invest in a proven process and full-service program that will predictably grow your pipeline, while simultaneously providing data intelligence, resulting in an improved go-to-market strategy based on real data and conversations? Or do you think hand your reps a call list, sitting them in the corner telling them to dial their little hearts out and close deals is enough training?