Introduction
[00:00:00] Detective Ev: Well, hello my friends. Welcome back to another episode of the Health Detective Podcast by Functional Diagnostic Nutrition. My name is Evan Transue, aka Detective Ev. I will be your host for today’s show about how to build confidence in your sales process.
We are having a fan favorite guest on today, and I do mean that quite literally. Her name is Hailey Rowe, and her previous episode is currently a top 10 most downloaded episode on our podcast. It is called Anyone Can Be an Entrepreneur. I will put that link in the show notes for you guys, of course, so you can check that out afterwards if you’d like. But we got a ton of cool stuff to talk about today with her. She is coming on to help us focus on the business side, specifically sales today.
Now, I know this is called the Health Detective Podcast, so if by chance you happen to click on this randomly, that might not fully make sense. The reason that we bring on people like this is because we have a lot of practitioners that listen. Some are our own practitioners, Functional Diagnostic Nutrition practitioners. Others are health coaches. We’re a little different than them, but we can still help them on the business side.
We have chiropractors that listen, acupuncturists, a really large amount of people that are in the health space wanting to develop their own business, get their skills down, whatever it might be. That’s why we bring on people like this occasionally.
Build Confidence: Develop Your Business
So, Hailey’s going to be talking to us again about sales today. Last time was entrepreneurship from like a 30,000-foot view. And then as an added bonus, if you are listening to this within about the first week of it coming out, you still have an opportunity to catch her next Live event with FDN, which is going to be where she talks about how to grow your health coaching business or your FDN business on LinkedIn. I think this is pretty interesting because I know that there’s power to LinkedIn.
I actually deleted my account for the longest time and I’m considering getting it back on cause I think there’s probably huge validity there. I just hate how freaking generic it is. I mean, I’m in my twenties so when I go online and I see the posts from some of my friends from college, I love you guys to death, but it is just like, what is going on? It’s all the same stuff. It’s like, I am so proud and happy to announce, yada, yada, yada. I like to thank my friends and family. I just, I’m not cookie cutter like that man. It’s all the same thing, I could plug and play it.
But you know, sometimes you gotta just play the game, right? Hailey knows what she’s doing with that, and if you want to play that game to develop your business, that is the person to go with. So, I’m going to get back on LinkedIn, she convinced me.
FDN Summer Open House
And we’re doing a full training with her for our Summer Open House event. That’ll be my last little announcement here. If you don’t know what our Summer Open House event is yet, it is the entire month of June 2023. We have over 20 Live events scheduled for health practitioners or people that want to become health practitioners, and that is where Hailey will be talking about the LinkedIn stuff.
Just go to fdntraining.com/summer to get registered for that, it is a free event. Scroll down to the bottom of the page to see the location and time for when that event’s going to be occurring. If you’d like the recordings of those events, we do have a paid version; it’s fdntraining.com/vip. That is to get the recordings. But fdntraining.com/summer gets you all of the stuff completely for free. You just have to attend the events Live.
About Hailey Rowe
With all that said, here’s a little bit about Hailey before we get started. She is a Marketing & Sales Coach/Consultant & Linkedin Lead Generation Service Provider. She helps health coaches and functional wellness professionals build their client attraction process, develop their no-brainer offers, and grow their impact locally and online. Also, she shares her F.A.S.T. Framework, that’s an acronym which we’ll talk about today, marketing and business tips on her Health Coach Nation Podcast, and in her FREE Marketing Hub Facebook Group.
She’s been named as one of the top 25 coaches in Chicago and one of the top six business podcasts for health coaches. Since 2010, Hailey has worked in the coaching industry and in business development/marketing for startups. Hailey’s philosophy is this, you can have an amazing service and impact to make, but without a strong mindset and sales and marketing plan, your business will remain a hobby.
Ooh, that stings a little bit. But that’s what entrepreneurship has to be sometime. If you can override the sting, on the other side of that is a really great business waiting for you, and we’re going to talk about that today. Without further ado, let’s get to the episode.
All right. Hello there, Hailey. Welcome back to the Health Detective Podcast. How are you?
[00:04:22] Hailey Rowe: Thank you. I am doing well. How are you doing?
[00:04:25] Detective Ev: I can hardly remember a time I was better. Thanks for asking. I think I hit you with that the other day too, but it’s true. I really am always doing well, so I’m very thankful to be able to say that for right now. I hope everyone else, if you’re doing half as well as me, you’re doing pretty good if you’re listening to this.
Build Confidence: Marketing & Sales Coach/Consultant
We wanted to bring Hailey back on for a couple of reasons. She will be a part of our Summer Open House event and actually, this will be released in time for that. I’ll make sure it is. Let’s just touch on that topic really quick if you don’t mind. So, it’s fdntraining.com/summer. If you miss her event, it’s fdntraining.com/vip so you can catch the recordings.
But what will you be talking about there on our Summer Open House event?
[00:05:08] Hailey Rowe: I will be talking about how to attract profitable partnerships and clients using LinkedIn, the low maintenance platform, I call it.
[00:05:16] Detective Ev: Cool. Very cool. And today we have an entirely different topic. We’re going to be, I think we call it almost like confidence in sales, right? Is that how we would describe it?
[00:05:24] Hailey Rowe: Oh yeah. Sales confidence.
[00:05:26] Detective Ev: Okay. You guys, if you were just someone who actually listens to the intros, you kind of would’ve heard about Hailey a little bit. It is different than our normal person, because we have businesspeople on, but a lot of the people are also health coaches, right? They have these extreme health stories, typically speaking.
So, just in case these are people who skip my intros, and I don’t know why they would do such a thing, can you give us a brief on your background again? Just what do you do and why do you teach this stuff?
[00:05:49] Hailey Rowe: For sure. I am a marketing and sales coach and consultant and a LinkedIn lead gen service provider for wellness professionals. Specifically, I’ve worked with a lot of FDN practitioners.
Build Confidence: A Sales System
They are amazing at what they do, but sometimes when it comes to the sales piece, they get a little nervous about how do I put myself out there? How do I not sound pushy? What about everybody’s going to think my pricing is too expensive? These are things that you have to navigate as a new business owner.
And sales is definitely a new skill that a lot of times new business owners don’t have quite yet. Sometimes even established business owners don’t have a sales system or have gaps in their sales process. So, I got into working with these wellness professionals because I used to do marketing and be on a business development team for wellness startups. I loved it but I love even more working individually with these wellness-based business owners and how to attract clients, get visibility opportunities, establish their business foundations and messaging, all that kind of stuff as they want to make their impact.
[00:06:57] Detective Ev: Very cool. This is something, my gosh, if you guys even listen to every other episode, I talk about this all the time. So, I’m so happy to have you back today. I more talk about it conceptually, you’re going to give some tangible things that we can use today.
I see this coming up so much and it kind of breaks my heart. So, I see a lot of people that get into this space because they had health issues and because their heart took them into the health side. But then they realize, oh, wait. To do this in the most effective way possible, most people are going to have to do this in a business format. That’s probably your quickest route to success.
Build Confidence: Intimidating Sales
But in their head, they’re saying, wait a second. I wanted to be a health person; I don’t know anything about business. And then, yeah, I gotta do sales and marketing. I can’t even define those things. So how am I supposed to do this? The truth of the matter is, I have seen so many people take that leap, learn those skills, and actually dedicate themselves to it in the same way they dedicated themselves to figuring out health.
Guys, yeah, it’s scary in the beginning. It’s intimidating. There’s no doubt about that. And it never really gets a hundred percent comfortable. At least I’m not there yet and I’ve been doing sales for nine years in some way or another. But it’s a muscle, you get stronger with it. It gets a little easier to activate it over time, and it is something that can be learned. There’s a real skill to it.
I think what I’m excited for today, as well, is at the middle-end we’ll talk about the sales system’s potential. So, I was always someone that they considered a “salesperson”, quote/unquote. What do people really mean by that? They just mean that you maybe are extroverted and have some level of charisma. That’s not a sales system. That’s a person who is extroverted and has charisma that might be more prone to selling. But that doesn’t mean that you have a consistent system that you can duplicate for someone else.
This stuff matters. Yes, you can be an introvert; yes, you can be shy. This can all be done. So, let’s break it down simply for people just in case they are new to this stuff, and they’re intimidated.
Build Confidence: Sales Versus Marketing
First, we don’t have to do Websters here, but how would you define the difference between marketing and sales? Because I think that’s confusing for people.
[00:08:45] Hailey Rowe: Yeah, that’s a great question. So, I define sales actually by Dan Sullivan’s definition. I love his definition. And that is, sales is getting somebody emotionally and intellectually encouraged to take an action that they define as good for them.
When we talk about coaching, which is what you guys do with your students, I really see sales as a partnership conversation with you and the potential client. You are seeing what they want and need, seeing if you can deliver that, seeing if you guys are a good fit, and helping them come to a decision.
I think a lot of people automatically freak themselves out about sales because they think it means you are asking somebody for money, you’re pushing somebody to make a decision, you’re begging somebody, you’re trying to quote/unquote “convince people”, which it is none of that. It is a conversation with open-ended questions, hearing your potential client or prospect, and seeing what makes sense to solve their problem, helping them come to some kind of decision, whether it’s a yes, no, or a referral to someone else who would do a better job.
The point is you’re like a detective and you’re trying to figure out what is the best next move for this person and what do they feel is the best next move for this person. That’s what sales is. But marketing is everything that leads up to that conversation. That’s the part where you’re going to be connecting with new people.
Build Confidence: Offering the Solution
That’s the part where you’re going to be nurturing people and telling them your story or helping them understand what you do and why you do it. It’s the part where you are inviting them to get quick wins from you upfront, either through a lead magnet, like a freebie or your free webinar or whatever, or inviting them to that sales phase if they’ve indicated an interest to go to that next phase.
Marketing is really more so the stuff that has to happen before the sales conversation to help somebody understand what’s possible for them, get an interest, get them to raise their hand that they are interested in the kind of solutions you provide. And then the sales part is helping them come to some kind of decision.
[00:10:56] Detective Ev: I think this is perfect, especially if someone has never heard about this. It’s like, okay, so sales is this, marketing is everything that leads up to that. That’s actually a great way to put it. I’ve never heard marketing put that way, but now I’m going to start explaining it to people like that.
Just to be clear then, when we’re talking about these definitions, what I didn’t hear in sales definition is lying, cheating, stealing, manipulating, or anything like that. So, sales is actually an ethical thing where you solve someone’s problem, assuming that you’re qualified to do so. Is that what I’m hearing?
[00:11:23] Hailey Rowe: Yeah. Actually, the way I like to think about it is if somebody has a problem or a challenge they’ve been dealing with and they’ve been spending time, money, exhaustion, emotional expense on this issue, searching for an issue, it’s your duty to offer them some kind of solution.
Build Confidence: Dealing with Objections
So again, if your solution really isn’t the right solution for them, of course don’t manipulate them and tell them that it is. But at the same time, a lot of times what they need is support, accountability, finding the root cause of their challenge, et cetera. You guys, as wellness professionals, can do that. So yeah, no manipulation needed.
However, I will say that a lot of times I see people think that somebody has a limiting belief or objection. For example, if somebody says, oh, I want to do this, but I need to wait until my child’s soccer team ends this summer. You know? That is not necessarily them saying they don’t want to do it and that you should just say, oh, okay, well let’s catch up at the end of the summer. We do want to explore objections with people.
In other words, you’re not forcing them. You’re not saying, well, that’s a wrong assumption. We could get started right now because blah, blah, blah. You’re not dictating something, but you do want to help somebody.
They might have told you earlier in your discovery call, which we call that call you use to see if somebody’s a fit for your services, they might have said earlier, I need to do this. I’ve been waiting for eight years to solve this problem, blah, blah, blah. And then later they have some comment about, I gotta wait till my kid’s soccer team is over.
Well, okay. In that case, you as their coach, you understand that they’ve been dealing with this pain, and they fall into this pattern of delay. So, it is your job to ask a question and inquire about that. You’re not forcing; you’re not pushing.
Build Confidence: Inquiring with Certain Objections
If somebody has an objection, a lot of times people close down like, okay, bye. I’ll talk to you later. What we actually want to do is lean in and inquire.
Be like, interesting. Do you think that the plan we’re going to put together is going to be super time consuming? Because we can adapt it to make sure it fits with your lifestyle and your kid’s soccer games and whatever. That’s more of what I mean. We do want to inquire about certain objections they may have if they’ve already shared that this is what they’re looking for.
[00:13:52] Detective Ev: I appreciate that perspective of the limiting belief because this is something everyone can relate to. We all walk around with these in many categories and areas of our life.
Hopefully, if you’re watching something like this, you have engaged in some conscious personal development. By conscious, I mean intentional, you weren’t forced into it. And through that personal development, you probably identified some of those things for yourself.
I was just having a conversation with my girlfriend and best friend, separate conversation. But I love personality theory and my best friend and girlfriend actually have the same personality type. So, it makes sense why I was friends with him since we were young. And then I found a partner in her. But they have very similar ways of thinking about things.
One of their things, Hailey, with like money and working that we’ve all been working through together, even as friends, cause we’re all connected, is they are under the impression that to make good money means you have to work 70, 80 hours a week, you have to be bringing the laptop to the beach with the family and all these things.
Build Confidence: Adding Value Not Hours
And what you’re talking about here is something that I just do with a friend. I’m like, so what does 70 hours do that 40 hours doesn’t? And then we start working through this and just ask very logical questions. Like, if someone’s making $15 an hour, you can work all the hours in the day that you want. You can work all 24, that’s not going to get you rich. Right? So, then you have to acknowledge, I need to be providing more value in the hours.
Cause it’s not just about 70 hours, but 70 hours at $15 does nothing. I mean, it does something. I’m sorry, I’m not trying to be ignorant, but obviously it’s not getting people rich and financially stable, I don’t think. At some point then we gotta say, oh wait, what else is there?
So, where did I get that limiting belief from? And it turns out with one of those people I mentioned, their dad was actually someone who literally worked 70, 80 hours a week, still does. Would bring the laptop to the beach and was hyper successful. So, they assumed and got this, rightfully so, as a kid. Oh, they do that? That must be what everyone that has success does.
I’m like, we have FDNs that refuse to work more than 40 hours a week simply because they care so much about their health, and they got sick working extensive hours before. So, they say, how can I provide more value in the 40 hours versus just adding hours. Because you get a very limited amount of hours. We can add almost unlimited value to our services and ourselves as we move on through life. I think this would help with the confidence thing in sales.
Build Confidence: Clients Must Take Responsibility
Is there a time or a way that the limiting belief is too much and it’s just not your job as the business owner in this case to work them through that? Because some you can work through easily and others it’s like, oh my gosh, you need a therapist with all due respect.
[00:16:15] Hailey Rowe: Yeah. If you hear from somebody, like, nothing ever works for me, they ripped me off and I have to get a refund, and blah, blah, and a lot of they, they, they, and not a lot of personal responsibility, you, as a coach, can’t always teach that, or it’s not always worth teaching that.
So, if somebody’s very blame oriented and you’re hearing a lot of “they” or “the world” or X, Y, Z is against me, sometimes that person may not be the right fit. Cause coaching is all about you partnering with someone and them taking responsibility and you helping them get the results. But I think that’s important.
I think the other thing that’s important is if somebody has a trauma or something really serious or certain medications you’re not familiar with that you would need to coordinate with their doctor, but it’s way down a rabbit hole of something you’ve never done, like totally disqualified, you need to be the judge on can you really help this person. Yeah, I definitely think there’s things that you need to look out for.
About sales, if you’re really excited about what you sell, really convicted, really thinking that your offer is an amazing steal and you over-deliver, naturally a lot of the techniques that we teach in sales and sales psychology, your tone, and all of that, just naturally is going to be really good.
Build Confidence: It Just Comes Naturally
I teach my clients sales, marketing, all that, and a lot of times I listen to their discovery calls and give them feedback.
I have a client who just, I could tell from the moment she gets on the phone, she is so excited and so interested in the person on the other side. She’s not thinking about herself at all, she’s more so like, I have the solve, I have the framework, I know that this is what you’re saying, we can solve this. And she doesn’t even have to memorize anything or dictate anything because it just is coming so naturally. So just a side note there.
The other thing is use your emotional intelligence. If you get a gut feeling that somebody’s just literally every excuse out of the gates and they’re sounding like they really don’t want it, you could even say, wow, it sounds like maybe this is something you don’t want. And you can even clarify that. Because sometimes you’ll find that when you do that, people are like, wait, no, no, no. Then they’ll say what they’re really thinking.
But yeah. Just a side note there.
[00:18:44] Detective Ev: That’s perfect.
I think one of the things we can do as not only FDNs, probably just coaches and practitioners in general that you work with, is it’s really important to have, in my opinion, a few things that we can offer people. So, I don’t even just mean lower ticket programs. Like I have a personal role.
This is one of the ways that I feel ethical selling is. I will never, ever get someone on a free discovery call that I said was free and not give them something. Now my something oftentimes is as simple, Hailey, as a book recommendation.
Build Confidence: Sowing Slowly into Potential Clients
Thankfully, I’ve done this for nine years and I’m listening to what they’re saying. If it was someone that man, I’m like, they got every excuse in the book, and I feel bad. I say, hey, you know what? I got a book I think you would honestly love, and it might help this current situation. I don’t even explain it cause I don’t want to offend them. They need to come to this conclusion on their own.
I’ll send them The Compound Effect by Darren Hardy. It’s really simple. It was the first personal development book I ever read. And I was like, oh wait. A lot of the problems in my life aren’t my fault, but they’re my responsibility to fix. What a concept. You’d be surprised how many people walk around, no one’s ever told them that, and they’ve never actually thought about it.
You could change someone’s life in a very positive way if you send them this stuff. Or maybe it’s someone who can’t afford your services, legitimately, which you gotta work through that stuff. That might not be true, but sometimes they just can’t. Then you can say, all right, here’s a book for this, or maybe you have a minicourse or whatever.
I think having these different offers helps. Because then, depending on how bad the limiting beliefs are, you have something in your back pocket possibly to even help solve their limiting beliefs. I’ve sent that Compound Effect to a handful of people over time. It’s been amazing to see some people a year later. They come back and they’re like, yeah, things have been going a lot better and now I’m really interested in your services.
Build Confidence: Building Trust
And these are the best people to talk to on the call now. They’re locked in, they’re focused, they’ve done that work on themselves, they’re ready to go, and they appreciate you for helping them out and not selling them on something that they weren’t ready for beforehand.
You’ll thank yourself too cause you don’t want a nightmare client and you don’t want them to be forced to do something they don’t want to do.
[00:20:33] Hailey Rowe: Yeah. Sometimes there’s kind of like a prerequisite or pre homework or something like that that you can experiment with.
In other words, like, I’ve had people who they really want to work together, but it is what you said before, like maybe they truly can’t afford it right now. So, I will give them an exercise they can go do to start making progress towards that if it’s something that they want to do, or coach them on where are the gaps that you can fill in your business to start. It’s not that you’re going to coach them and give them your program for free forever and whatever, but it is really a good point of what you’re saying. Goodwill and just sharing, giving results ahead of time that actually builds trust.
And I’ve had people come back to me later and be like, oh wow, I solved this problem and now I’m ready to go. Yeah, I think that’s a great tool if somebody’s not ready, give a recommendation or give a next step. That all comes back to the same rule of helping them come to their next move or their next decision that’s going to help them.
Build Confidence: Having a Structured Call
[00:21:29] Detective Ev: Sure. Then going a little bit more specifically on the topic of today with confidence in sales. Hailey and I have gotten to interact quite a few times now doing Instagram Lives. Whenever we do these things, you come across as a Go-getter, totally confident, totally secure in yourself. That’s hard enough for people to do. Then we’re adding the selling component on top of it.
I know how nervous some people get doing the podcast with me even, believe it or not. And yet, now we’re talking about sales, which is even tougher. It’s up there with public speaking for a lot of people. So, how do we develop that confidence then specifically for the sales side? I know we’ve already given some tips, but I’m sure you have some things that are concise.
[00:22:05] Hailey Rowe: Yeah. Couple things. Number one, I think the first thing that is the most obvious, sometimes you don’t feel confident in sales cause you literally have no idea or structure of how does a discovery call work? Or what are the kinds of things you want to cover with someone to see if they’re a good fit for your offer? So, the first very easy thing to address is having a structure for your calls with potential clients.
Now, I know not everybody does calls, and I know other people have different offers like courses and maybe they do a webinar and whatever, but for most individuals who offer high-ticket health wellness packages, it makes sense to maybe get on a call, especially if you’re new.
So, I would say the first thing that I see that derails people’s confidence is they come on the call and they kind of like, don’t have any structure.
Build Confidence: How to Structure a Call
The first thing is you have to set the stage for the call. You don’t jump on the call and just start shooting the breeze. It’s, hey, today we’re going to talk about your goals, what you’re struggling with, what you’ve tried so far, and if it makes sense, we’re going to talk about how we could work together to address those. Does that work for you?
Then from there, leading the call in finding out their dream outcomes and goals. What are their obstacles; what have they tried so far that hasn’t worked? Where are the gaps? Why did they come to you? Like, what are they looking to solve? What would make it a no-brainer and a home run versus what are their hesitations when it comes to working with you?
Recapping all of that, then seeing if you guys are on the same page, seeing if they want to hear more about how you work with clients. Going into the benefits of your work with you, not just the features. That’s the other thing I think that kills confidence is when you just focus on, I do sessions and you’re not really feel confident about what you’re promoting. You’re just saying, I’ll do a couple hour sessions with you in a package of 12 sessions. And then the value is not really communicated to that other person.
Make sure you’re connecting the dots of what does this program give them in their life and the features just happen to be a side product, meaning however many sessions you do, resources, et cetera. Hearing them out on what are their questions, what is really on their mind, what would hold them back from getting started, things like that, coaching on those things.
Build Confidence: Listening & Asking Open-Ended Questions
Then having at the end, either we’re going to schedule a follow call after you think about it, if you’ve already addressed what they need to think about and they still just want to sleep on it, or they are going to sign up and you guys are going to send the onboarding and set up the first session. Or it’s a “no” for right now, and you guys have come to that decision, that’s totally okay. But then you can have the peace of knowing it’s a no and move on, right?
That’s just the first thing is you need to have a general structure for your calls to feel confident. When you have that, you’re going to feel a lot more comfortable.
The second thing is being comfortable in really listening and asking open-ended questions. A lot of times I think people get intimidated by sales cause they think they need to read it directly from the script. They need to dictate a response to every single objection that has a prepared memorized response. The truth is what you need to know is there’s going to be a couple things that you guys are going to have to align with for them to move forward.
Product fit. Do they believe that your offer is the best thing that can help them get to the results? A you fit, so, a trust fit. Do they believe you are the best person to help them get there? A price and value match. Meaning they see the value of this as equal to the price. And then do they have any limitations that they think they are not going to follow through, or little things in their mind about themselves that’s causing them to not move forward.
Build Confidence: Doing Reps
You have to check. If you want to feel confident in sales, you have to make sure that you’re hitting those, you understand the person, where they’re at in each of those four areas. Do they think the product is a fit, you are a fit, that they’re going to follow through, and the price equals the value or more – the value exceeds the price?
Then the other thing with confidence is just reps. Here’s the deal, none of us are good at things that are brand new. And most of us are not willing to stink a hundred times before we get good at something. But my encouragement to you, because I used to do actually high-ticket sales calls for another coach and also for businesses I worked for when I worked in the startup world. I had to put in so many reps and have so many stumbles and so many times where I was like, why didn’t I ask them this? Or I totally felt just tired by the end of that call cause I could have been better about listening.
You just have to put in the reps and know you’re going to be bad at something in the beginning. But the only way you get better is by doing these calls. Then after, evaluating, what did I do well, what did I maybe not do well, et cetera.
The last thing I want to say about confidence with sales is you have to be confident about your offer. It is going to be hard to sell something that you feel really unclear about and/or you feel is overpriced and/or you’re not sold on yourself, or you can’t back it up with that you also understand the importance of investing in yourself, things like that.
Build Confidence: Taking it Too Personal
Working on the offer is pretty important cause we’ve all been really good salespeople at some point in our life with something we really believe in. To your spouse, you might have been like, honey, we have to go to this restaurant. It is so good. The service is amazing, the food is amazing, da, da, da. You had no problem selling that to your spouse.
But when it comes to your own business, your own program, and your own product, we get all caught up in our heads, we get all caught up on us, how we’re sounding, and what other people think of us. That is what makes people really nervous because they have so much skin in the game about, this is me. If they say no to this program, they’re saying no to me, and I take it very personally. But the truth is you are offering a transformational program that’s separate from you and you gotta keep it separate from you.
And yes, you might love your work; yes, you might be a big part of the package and the program, but someone saying no does not mean you are unworthy, or you did something wrong. It’s just that there is going to be a certain percentage of people who say no and are not a fit, and that is okay. Just keep in mind, you gotta be so sold on your offer so that doesn’t cause you to lose enthusiasm.
[00:28:42] Detective Ev: There’s so much there. I’m going to pick from a few different parts. Hailey and I actually had a conversation the other day on her Instagram. Definitely check her out there, it’s in the show notes.
Build Confidence: The Other Side of Predictability
One of the topics that came up was the entrepreneurial personality and the confidence that comes with that. I think one of the things here that we’re overlapping with is the same type of personality that is willing to engage in entrepreneurship, typically is a little more friendly to the sales side. Because guess what? Entrepreneurs are constantly putting themselves in uncomfortable situations.
What I have found, especially if we don’t work on ourselves, if we don’t engage in personal development, a lot of us do kind of try to live in our little comfortable bubbles that keep us safe all of our life. Now, safety’s an illusion anyway, but we try to do this. We want to do the routine things, we want to see the same people, we want to go to the same job, we want that predictability. And you can do that, that’s fine.
But on the other side of that predictability, man, that’s an amazing life waiting for you. There’s something so much more out there waiting for you. It is something that should bleed over into other areas of your life. It’s not just, oh, trying the sales and I’m nervous cause it’s new for the first time. Like, you need to do this with everything, and it helps out.
I just started Brazilian jiu-jitsu last year. Guess what? That is uncomfortable, man. I’ve never grappled with another person in my life. And I got like man parts in my face now as they’re trying to like choke you, right? It’s not the most comfortable setting.
Build Confidence: Fear Exposure Therapy
But guess what? You go one time, it is awful. You’re awkward, you’re red in the face, you’re nervous. Then you show up the second time, and then you show up the third and the fourth. Now, guess what? I’m not saying rolling is my favorite part of the week. Rolling’s like when you do the sparring with these people. It’s not my favorite part of the week, but I know, worst thing that happens is this. And I’m okay. I’ve lived.
[00:30:24] Hailey Rowe: Can I say something about that? Two things. One, they did some research and they found, like with fear exposure therapy, it takes about 25 times of repeated exposure until the person can be exposed to that thing without completely being terrorized. Okay? So, I think everybody here should set the goal of 25. Let’s even make it inevitable that you’re going to rock your sales. Twenty-five to a hundred times, I would say a hundred times being willing to do it scared to really get good.
And the other thing you just said is what’s the worst-case scenario? The worst-case scenario is you just feel a little awkward. You feel an uncomfortable emotion, which we’re already feeling anyways in your business when you don’t have sales, you’re feeling that lack feeling. You’re going to feel a feeling anyways, so you might as well be moving forward in your business and growing.
[00:31:17] Detective Ev: I love that. Because listen, that awkwardness is going to come. Either you get it on the sales calls, but you’re going to win some. The flip side of what Hailey said is some people will say no, no matter what. Guess what? Some people say yes, no matter what. There is a percentage of those too.
Build Confidence: Picking Your Awkward & Embarrassing
And it’s the wackiest thing in the world. You could have said whatever, it could be your worst sales call you’ve ever had, and they will pay in full. You don’t know why it happened, but they are just those types of people.
Ironically, I’m not a person who negotiates. People always think that because I’m in the sales. And I do that, I’m the easiest buyer in the world. You tell me what it is, I’ll pay full price. I’m like, oh, whatever. Like, let’s just go do it. Because I’ve done some research normally beforehand too, but that’s just how I am. I’m just going to buy it. I already knew I was interested. I’m not here to try to pick you off $300. You said this is the price, I’m going to buy it.
So, I mean, I might be screwing myself from people that I buy from in the future. Here they’re like, we’re going to raise this guy a few hundred dollars. But that’s the point. You’re going to get some no’s, some yes’s, so you might as well do the calls.
Because otherwise you’re going to have to get your awkward feelings and embarrassment from the next family party when they say, how’s that business going? And then for the second or third year in a row, you gotta say, oh yeah, I’m still working on it. Right?
So, you pick your awkward and embarrassing cause they both suck. One you actually grow with, and the other, you can keep that going indefinitely, right? We gotta get in the mindset. That’s why the personal development side is so big to all of this anyway.
Build Confidence: Putting Failures into Perspective
You have to be a person that when they want to do something, is willing to try new things. I want to learn to fight, I want to learn to be able to defend myself. Not to fight for fighting’s sake, but I want to be able to do that. Okay. You’re going to have to go through the uncomfortable process of being bad at something.
I’m always a walking self-help book. There’s a quote that says, the master has failed more times than the amateurs even tried. And how true is that? You know, these people that you look up to, they have failed often more than we have tried. So, I love that.
Then, I guess my next thing is, you talked about kind of having some structure to the sales calls and this, I guess, indirectly relates to the confidence side. But another reason that we can do that, that I think, again, would build confidence long-term indirectly, is that if you don’t have a structure to each sales call, how do you know if you’re getting better? Right?
[00:33:18] Hailey Rowe: Right. You don’t have time to evaluate cause every call is so different.
[00:33:21] Detective Ev: Yeah. And so of course each person’s going to come up uniquely. But when you say a structure, do you mean, like FDN, for example, gives people a base script of like eight questions that we’re supposed to use every single time. So, would it be something like that? Is that what you work with your clients with?
Build Confidence: A Roadmap
[00:33:33] Hailey Rowe: Basically, yeah. I give my clients kind of a roadmap. Obviously, I give them ways to customize it to their own style. But I do think it’s important to have a roadmap to hit on the main parts you need to know about somebody and what’s important to them to be able to make an offer if it makes sense. It’s usually having to hit on the goals, the gaps, what they’re struggling with, et cetera.
But yeah, you do want to have parts that you could review. Cause maybe you’re really not so good at talking about your program when it comes time to, because you noticed that you don’t even know what your program includes, and you keep messing up on what’s actually included or whatever.
When you have certain parts you hit, you can look at each one and say, okay, did I hit these points or not? But when you go on the call and there’s no structure, you’re going to keep getting brain picking calls. You’re just going to have people come on the calls and just be like, so what do you think about this? It’s not going to go anywhere.
[00:34:29] Detective Ev: Yeah, you definitely want structure.
I’d like to transition a little bit to what you offer, but two, maybe even before that I’d love to hear client testimonials from this.
To the degree that you’re able to share, do you have any obvious examples of someone that came to you and maybe they were struggling with the business side, or the sales side as is the topic today, and you worked with them and helped them get a great result. What’s something that comes to the top of your head with that?
Build Confidence: Client Success Stories
[00:34:51] Hailey Rowe: Definitely. One that comes to mind is she didn’t even know what she wanted to really coach. She had a lot of talents and a lot of different certifications and a background. Together, we became clear on what she truly wanted to do, the impact she wanted to make, what her package looked like, et cetera.
But she was super afraid of sales because, originally, she said, I have to be asking people for money, I don’t want to do that. And when you think of sales that way, of course you don’t want to do that. Who wants to ask somebody for money and feel like you’re taking?
I actually have a screenshot testimonial from her about how she realized that sales is more so coaching and serving. And she was able to have her first $3K high-ticket coaching package sale, her first $5K month. Then she had an $8K month, and then she was making more than what she was making in her corporate job.
I had another client who also felt like she didn’t know what she was selling at all. We got clear on her package of course, but then we were able to do some recordings of her discovery calls that I was able to listen to and give her feedback. She was able to totally change her conversion rate.
Before, she had people who would ghost her all the time. People would say they were going to do it, but then when she sent the onboarding email, they wouldn’t do it. Versus now she is booking clients in her private coaching practice and has had high-ticket months and all of that kind of stuff.
[00:36:17] Detective Ev: Awesome. That’s so cool.
Build Confidence: The Conversion Rate
These are life changing numbers; you know what I mean? Because it’s so easy to talk about millions. That’s not what most people are going for. They’re looking to replace those jobs that they don’t like and have a little extra left over. And that’s stories of that. So, that’s pretty sweet.
This all ties in before we talk about where people can find you and what it is specifically that you offer. I think people get a little caught up in not knowing what to expect in sales. What I mean by that is you have already identified, no matter how many sales or how good you get at this, some people are going to say no. The thing is, people always want to know the expectation, and then if they don’t have one, they’re thinking that any no is bad.
So, realistically speaking, I don’t know if you have these numbers offhand or can estimate it. Let’s say a hundred people call one of your students or even you, how many people actually end up buying? Because I think the numbers are much lower than people think when they first get into sales.
[00:37:12] Hailey Rowe: That’s a great question. I will say about 20% maybe is what you should expect. However, I’ve had clients who their problem will be they’re not getting the calls. But when they do have the calls, it’s such a high conversion rate. So, it depends. And I would say mine’s higher. I would say a lot of my clients’ are higher.
Also, I think if you have what we call a business model that has like an upsell and a down sell and stuff, you can increase your own conversion rate just by having options. So, it can definitely be higher.
Build Confidence: Beginners Need Reps
But in the high-ticket sales world, if we’re talking about general stats, and when I was doing sales calls for these coaches and things like that, the standard and what we always had talked about is 20% is kind of around what to expect.
Now if you’re pre-qualifying your calls, meaning you are only taking people who fill out your form and say they can afford it, look like they’re a good fit from their form, have to apply and stuff, your conversion rate actually could be really, really high because you’re doing a lot of pre-qualifying upfront.
But sometimes I recommend if you’re new to taking these calls, you want to get your reps in first. So, I am actually not a fan, if you’re new, I wouldn’t have an extensive form that someone has to apply for and all that. I think you need to get some practice in and sell some stuff. So, I am more so about it doesn’t matter. You could have a higher conversion rate for sure if you pre-qualified better, but in the beginning, I think you should just take the calls and get reps in.
[00:38:43] Detective Ev: I have done jobs where the thing was 40% convers rate. I have done some that were 10%. Either way, I want you guys to think about this, 40% or 10%, both of those are less than 50%.
I think people, they’re used to just a normal job setting or whatever where in your normal job you probably have to be successful more than 80% of the time. Right?
Build Confidence: Accepting the Averages
And I’m not saying that you’re failing if you’re not getting these closed people. Some of them you might have referred out to something else, right? That could be considered a form of close, you just didn’t close them on your thing cause you were doing the right thing and giving them somewhere else.
My point is though, I think that 20% was a really fair number to list off. Guys, that means four out of five people that you get on a call to talk to will not buy the program. You need to accept that and realize that when you get into sales. I think that actually will build their confidence if they know, oh wait, Evan even only does 1 out of 10 sometimes. Hailey was at a point, one point, when she was only doing 1 out of 5. And they’re maybe looking at us as more confident with the sales side. Yeah, that’s normal. Not everyone’s just going to like flock and do this, otherwise everyone would do it.
So, you need to know those numbers. And when you start tracking them better, one, you can see if you’re improving over time. But two, you can also just kind of get a feel like, all right, this is just normal. So, if I’ve done a hundred calls and I know 20 people bought it, cool. If I do a hundred more calls, probably 20 are going to buy.
What’s so funny is, and you’ve probably experienced this a million times, isn’t it hilarious that if you do enough, it always averages out? Sometimes you get 10 dry and then 10 are on, and you’re like, yeah baby, it’s a great week.
Build Confidence: Entrepreneurship is a Mental Sport
[00:40:06] Hailey Rowe: It’s very cyclical. And it can be very easy to base your confidence on if people are saying yes or no to you. But the truth is that’s what kicks you in the booty as far as you showing up confidently, consistently in your business and on your calls.
Cause I’ve seen people like get a couple no’s and then be like, ugh. They feel this low in their business and then they’re not confident on their calls. Or they have bad energy and then they’re not trying as hard. Then they take a break for three weeks to recover from the rejection. You can’t let that stuff get to you. It’s a mental sport, learning how to be an entrepreneur.
But I will say, you can have a definitely higher conversion rate than that. I think what you said, you should go in with a low expectation so that you’re like, woohoo, when you close because that keeps your spirits like aligned. And when you’re feeling that way, you naturally are more captivating to people.
There was one other thing I wanted to say about what you just said. Tracking the numbers, you’re going to find, you’re going to have a certain number of no-shows. You’re going to have certain amount of time from when somebody meets you to when they actually sign up on average. We call that like what’s the sales cycle? So, tracking that kind of stuff can be really awesome.
And it also gets you out of, as you said, taking things personally and being emotional about it. You’re more so focused on the stats and just say, how can I improve my conversion rate and prevent my ghosting rate, and all that kind of stuff.
Build Confidence: Getting on a Roll
[00:41:26] Detective Ev: Right. It’s this ability and skill actually to remove yourself emotionally from the outcomes and stuff. At the very least, involve yourself positively, emotionally. Don’t go onto the call all negative, that’s the worst thing that you could do.
There was this phenomenon they actually taught me about when I did car sales at 18. The sales managers would say, every time, what’s the best time to sell a car? And it would be after you just sold one.
Saturday was always a busy day. If I had a bad week, I didn’t sell anything. The people that sold one usually sold three or four. It was like back-to-back to back. And it was different people every week. It wasn’t just like one or two people were dominating that. You’re like, how does this happen? Well, their energy’s different. Their confidence is different. So, don’t allow a few bad calls to screw you up.
And also, have faith in those numbers cause there’s laws of averages. Again, if you know that (making up the number), one out of five purchase and you’re 10 calls in for the week and maybe four haven’t purchased, you say, okay, cool. That’s just the four that don’t purchase. No worries. You can actually rejoice and say, my two are coming. They’re coming up really soon. They’re going to be here.
[00:42:27] Hailey Rowe: And not putting so much weight on every individual you book a call with. I see a lot of people thinking like, this one has to be the one, cause maybe they’re not booking a lot of calls. So, then they’re freaking out. They’re like, this one has to be the one.
Build Confidence: Pricing Arbitrarily
But then you’re not doing your job with sales cause you’re so focused on this heavy weight of, I need this client to say yes. So, you want to get out of that place. You want to be having a lot of opportunities, a lot of things going on in your business. Be creating those opportunities so that you’re not just putting so much weight on one or two people.
[00:43:00] Detective Ev: Yeah. The last thing I’ll say about what you said, cause you talked about pricing and stuff too.
I still do this to myself to this day, just so I always am staying in the right place mentality wise. Like at our business, we sell packages right now, at the time I’m recording this, between like $3300, $4500, sometimes even a little higher.
When someone buys that package, it’s one call and they just close out and say they bought it. I’m like, well, would they have paid $4,600? What if I said $4700, maybe $4800? Like, would that really have been the difference? Because this person said yes right away.
I mean, I’m not the expert like Hailey is, but this is the way that I build confidence with it. I’m saying, okay, they instantly just said yes to $4,500. You’re telling me $4600 would’ve been the make or break. And then you kind of wonder, well, how much of a difference there would there have been?
Now I’m not suggesting we just charge needlessly, but I’m also suggesting how arbitrarily sometimes we come up with our pricing and we allow our limiting beliefs to be our price. It’s like, no, they’re happy to pay that man. They want to work with you. You’re the one under charging for what you’re doing.
Build Confidence: Finding the Sweet Spot
You know, maybe just start a hundred dollars at a time, go up a hundred dollars each sale until you really start getting no’s. And then you’ve kind of hit your cap of what it’s worth. But I have found that helps.
You have anything like that? Or do you agree with this?
[00:44:06] Hailey Rowe: Yeah. I think with pricing, first of all, we don’t even call it pricing. It’s an investment in coaching. Because they’re investing. Right?
So, the other thing though with pricing is you want to pick a price that allows you to feel like you are overdelivering, but not like you’re going to resent this because you’re so undercharging and you’re just going to be exhausting yourself for this client and whatever. You also want it to feel a little bit out of your comfort zone so that you will be rising to the occasion. You will feel like, Ooh, I really gotta show up for this.
So, you want to pick that price kind of in that sweet spot. And for everybody starting out, that’s a different number for them.
And you’re so right that it is totally arbitrary. There are coaches who charge hourly session rates, which I’m not a huge fan of. Or there’s coaches who charge $25,000 for six months coaching, maybe. Right? It’s kind of crazy.
But the key is you gotta think about your market, about the value of the outcomes of what you offer, about your experience and what you feel confident saying out loud. Cause if you feel super awkward saying it out loud, the person on the other end is going to feel that for sure.
Build Confidence: Laddering
So, I kind of like your idea to ladder, meaning pick something, just line up with it and then as you get more confident with that and you know you’re undercharging, increase it.
I definitely didn’t start at the rates I am at today in my program. Originally, I did a test group that was pretty, it still costed money cause I wanted people to really pay attention in the test group and not just like, not show up and all of that. But it was significantly lower than what I charge today.
It gave me the confidence to realize, oh wow, I can actually do this. I can close a sale. And my program started to evolve and get more valuable. So, naturally you’ll just raise your price when you feel you’re ready for that.
[00:45:57] Detective Ev: I like that wording attached to it, laddering. It’s like, okay, cool. Start with the thing that you’re obviously comfortable with that isn’t so undercharging that you’re not delivering a good service now. Cause that’s kind of stupid too.
And then again, what’s a hundred bucks on a $2,000 package? It’s like, okay, well that probably wouldn’t have been the no. You keep doing that and all of a sudden, it builds the confidence slowly and steadily. That can happen.
Okay. As we’re getting to the end of our time here, we’ll finally work this in. I want to know if one of our practitioners is listening, I mean, you’ve already worked with FDNs. I’m not asking you to give away your secret sauce, but what would be the structure of what it would look like to come and work with you?
Build Confidence: F.A.S.T.
And Hailey, I also know that we’re just talking about sales today, but again, you do marketing and sales and some other things, so, I just want to make sure everyone’s clear about what you do and what it would look like to work with you.
[00:46:39] Hailey Rowe: Yeah. So, I customize, but I have a general kind of framework I share that kind of communicates some of the things I help clients with. It is grow your business the F.A.S.T. way. It’s an acronym and it stands for followers, action, sales, time management, and transformation.
With followers, it’s, who are you looking to attract, where do they hang out, and planning how are you going to reach those people every week and be nurturing them and leading to more discovery calls or whatever you’re trying to lead to with your sales process.
The action piece is how do you create content, messaging, and an offer that is compelling enough that people want to take action, they want to reach out to you? So, helping you with your content, helping you with your local marketing, pitches if you’re trying to do speaking, things like that.
Sales is, how do you lead your discovery calls, what we talked about a lot today and your sales process. What’s your upsell and your down sell? How do you price anchor and all that kind of stuff?
Time management is obviously where do you spend your time? Cause a lot of people feel overwhelmed about what should they be doing as a business owner to be generating clients.
Where to Find Hailey Rowe
And then transformation is, two things. The personal transformation required to get to your business goals. I’m the certified behavioral change specialist and a human potential coach. So, some of that life coaching might come into play if you have a huge mindset block. But some of my clients don’t even have that. They’re just like, gimme the strategy and we can do that.
And the other part of transformation is making sure the point A to point B of your program is very clear. You have something that differentiates yourself, you have testimonials with social proof you can use in your marketing to make it easier. Those are the kinds of things that I work on with clients.
And if anybody’s curious about that, they can go to haileyrowe.com/client-attraction and/or haileyrowe.com/sales-journal cause both of those are free gifts. The first one is going to teach you my four basics of client attraction and kind of help you go do the marketing part before you get the sales calls. And then the sales journal is more prompts to help you generate your next sale.
So, that’s where I’m at. I have the Health Coach Nation podcast as well, and the Marketing Hub Facebook group, facebook.com/groups/themarketinghubgroup. And thank you for asking that question.
[00:48:49] Detective Ev: Yeah, of course. We’ll have that all in the show notes for you guys. I can’t recommend Hailey enough. And thank you so much for coming on today.
Normally, I finish with our signature question, which is, what would the guest get everyone in this world to do for their health? I will change it up today and say, if you can get every business owning FDN out there to do one thing for their business, what’s the one thing you’d get them to do?
Conclusion/Signature Podcast Question
[00:49:09] Hailey Rowe: Woo. I love that.
I would say, more willingness to fail and more willingness to dare yourself. So, give yourself a dare of posting about your business if you haven’t already, or pitching yourself to that podcast opportunity even though you think that’s a stretch or whatever. But I think we need to be more willing to just go put ourselves out there rather than just consuming, consuming, consuming information and not doing anything with it. So, that’d be my answer.
And if it was for your health, I just want to say this, nature walks. You know, I love solving all my problems on my walks.
[00:49:47] Detective Ev: That’s very cool. All right. Thank you so much again for joining us.
Hailey Rowe: Thank you.
You can always visit us at functionaldiagnosticnutrition.com. Our Instagram handle is @fdntraining.
For more informational and functional health-oriented podcasts like this one, go to functionaldiagnosticnutrition.com/health-detective-podcast/.
To learn more about us, go to functionaldiagnosticnutrition.com/about-fdn-functional-testing/.
