Welcome to SALES with ASLAN, a weekly podcast hosted by ASLAN Co-founders Tom Stanfill and Tab Norris, geared at helping sales professionals and sales leaders eliminate the hard sell. At the end of the day, we believe that selling is serving. ASLAN helps sellers make the shift from a ‘typical’ sales approach, to one that makes us more influential because we embrace the truth that the customer’s receptivity is more important than your value prop or message.
The goal of these interviews is to spotlight various experts in the world of sales and sales leadership – sharing informational stories, techniques, and expert interviews on the sales topics you care about.
The following are notes from Ep. 144 – The Mistakes That Make Us
In this episode, Tom and Tab discuss the power of making mistakes and the importance of learning from our failures, even more so than our successes. They unpack some of their own mistakes over the past three decades of selling, what they’ve gained from failure, and how those moments of error can be leveraged to elevate our capacity to learn and grow.
Listen to the conversation here:
Or check out the full transcript:
00:13
Tom Stanfill
Welcome to one more episode of SALES with ASLAN. I’m your host, Tom Stanfill. I’m here with the Chuck Norris of training. Mr. Tab Norris, Dr. Tab Norris. How you doing my friend?
00:27
Tab Norris
Thank you. Thank you. Just got to have a gym doing some workouts, live up to the name.
00:35
Tom Stanfill
It’s not, it’s not the Chuck Norris of, of combat. It’s the Chuck Norris of training.
00:41
Tab Norris
I know, but don’t you think he should be kind of buff? I mean the Chuck Norris training,
00:46
Tom Stanfill
Well, you are, you definitely are buffed. If anybody wants to grow a podcast about the rim to rim, to rim, you are also the evil Knievel of sales training. Cause he crossed the evil Knievel.
01:03
Tab Norris
Did you have the little toy that you pulled the string?
01:07
Tom Stanfill
Anybody who doesn’t know that evil Knievel actually jumped over the grand canyon? That was pretty cool. That was pretty cool. Back when evil Knievel would do some amazing things. That was pretty cool.
01:20
Tab Norris
I was a big fan.
01:21
Tom Stanfill
Anyway, so they know if anybody’s listened to our podcast the past, they know you’re a stud in a great physical specimen, but yeah, I don’t know about Chuck Norris. Anyway, we digress tab.
01:36
Tab Norris
Let’s get to it.
01:37
Tom Stanfill
Let’s get into the topic today to time it, we had this idea, were talking, talking in the green room,
01:47
Tab Norris
Sipping our coffee, running around.
01:51
Tom Stanfill
I love your green room requirements that you want puppies, you and Mariah Carey want. I want puppies in my green room. Before we always have puppies for him and green M and M’s. Were talking to the green room about our podcast and we of course were recognized as experts in sales. We’ve been doing it a long time. I mean, I don’t think anybody could argue with that tab if they do, we won’t talk to them,
02:23
Tab Norris
We have sold some stuff we have.
02:25
Tom Stanfill
We’ve been successful in sales. We’ve trained all over the world. We taught people how to sell I’m on author tab. I’m an author, but the book on sales. So, we know have that proves it. We are, we do, we’ve been studying sales for gosh, what 30 years. And, and helping people get better at selling their solution and serving their customers. But we have made mistakes Tab.
02:48
Tab Norris
Yes, we have it. It’s hard to admit, but I will say don’t you. I feel like I have learned much more from my mistakes than my success.
02:56
Tom Stanfill
Well, yeah, I, I, well, I think first of all, I think it’s, here’s a learning from it. We’ll just go and give you one takeaway from the podcast today, stopping after every presentation, every kid, a critical meeting and assessing what you did well and what you, what did work will make you better? We’ll, we’ll, you’ll just continually get better. That’s the time to capture the learning and don’t blame anybody else don’t say, well, if they would’ve done something different, if the customer would have done something, but he’d say, what is it that I could have done better? Or what did I do well, and remember that and learn or learn from that or change what you need to change. That that’s been our philosophy and that’s served me well. Today we’re going to talk about are our biggest mistakes that we’ve made. I’m going to limit it to the last 25 years tab.
03:42
Tom Stanfill
I’m going to make the limit.
03:44
Tab Norris
Going back into the early days. Cause they got really net. That was really ugly.
03:47
Tom Stanfill
Yeah. I had some, my first sales group, first sales job, I had some interesting things happen cause I wasn’t a detailed guy dab and make some mistakes related to details.
03:58
Tab Norris
You’re selling a detailed product. Oh, well that point matters. Oh five points.
04:04
Tom Stanfill
Yeah, I was a loan officer and forgot to, I just forgot this little thing about telling people, Hey, when they get, when this very wealthy couple comes into closing, they don’t have to sell their existing home to buy this new home. They’re already qualified whether they sell their existing home or they don’t. I just happened to not put that little detail in the file. They’re sitting there going well, did you sell your home? Like no. They didn’t close and they were closing on a weekend. They were also a client recommended by the CEO of the bank.
04:33
Tab Norris
Oh gosh.
04:34
Tom Stanfill
I feel I kinda got a little letter on that.
04:36
Tab Norris
Yeah,
04:40
Tom Stanfill
That doesn’t.
04:40
Tab Norris
Count no better. I.
04:42
Tom Stanfill
Was in my twenties.
04:43
Tab Norris
This is when we should know better. I.
04:44
Tom Stanfill
Did, I will say tab. I saved that letter in my desk drawer. I had that letter, which was not a nice letter. It was a very, it was a weird, well thought out long letter.
04:55
Tab Norris
With a lot of details.
04:56
Tom Stanfill
A lot of details telling me what kind of person I was and what I did to her. And, and it was warranted. Okay. I did make mistakes. I kept that letter in my desk. As long as I was in that business to remind me that don’t make those small air smallers or Biggers anyway, but that’s how the f****r, here’s my number one. I’m going to go first. Here’s my number one mistake that I made. This was probably it’s probably about eight years ago, tab. I w were pursuing a relationship with sharp. We were already working with one division and were presuming relationship with another division, which is actually even a bigger division of sharp. We got recommended to meet with the senior vice president of sales. He was interested in our solution. He was already very far down the road with another competitor and had pretty much decided to use that company.
05:49
Tom Stanfill
They were big on using simulations to drive learning. They were different than even though we believe in simulations, but they were different company that were, but we, I talked them into stopping the process and allowing us to share our solution and also meet with some of their team before presenting our solution to the senior vice president of sales. I flew down to Florida and met with the regional vice president and learned about the organization and what was important to them and felt like I understood what their needs were. As I was leaving the meeting, the regional VP said to me, oh, and by the way, the senior VP will just call him Ted I’m calling Ted. I don’t know that we’re going to tell you. He said, Ted, doesn’t like PowerPoint. I’m like, okay, Ted don’t like PowerPoint. You know what? I don’t like PowerPoint either.
06:41
Tom Stanfill
I got it. And I didn’t ask one other question. Here’s the reason is because I had heard that probably 20 times in my career as at Azlan is people don’t like PowerPoint and what they have always meant prior to that, when they say that they’ve always meant, we don’t like a lot of PowerPoint. We don’t like death by PowerPoint. We don’t like, thousands of slides just, make it short and simple. Of course, I’m going to have a couple of slides. That’s the,
07:09
Tab Norris
The presentation.
07:11
Tom Stanfill
I’m going to make a presentation. We’re going to, I’m going to have a intro slide and we’re going to keep it short and sweet. It’s going to be every role, very interactive. I got it. I got it. So I got it. I thought I knew. So we put the team together. I spend hours working on this custom solution. We’re going to show them how we have all simulations developed in our training. And I understood the decision drivers. We all flew to New Jersey, spent the night in a hotel and worked on it, got up early the next morning. Were all sweating and everybody had their roles. We talked about what we’re going to do. I walk into the office and turn all the PowerPoint,
07:47
Tab Norris
But it was short PowerPoint.
07:51
Tom Stanfill
Slide. It was as if I insulted the senior vice-president Ted’s mother, it was literally, like I said, Hey, Ted, I hate your mother. I mean, it was, I mean, it went over like, I mean, literally as soon as I opened up PowerPoint, the meeting was over and the regional vice president looked at me. I told you, we don’t like PowerPoint. And I’m like, what do you mean? You mean you don’t like any PowerPoint, like no power. Like, we don’t want one PowerPoint.
08:20
Tab Norris
Great. Clarifying question earlier. One of my favorite stories, I’ve told that story on you before.
08:31
Tom Stanfill
Okay. Thank you. I love that. I mean, it was just over. I learned to, we always talk about as clear my cache w what I thought he meant is that he doesn’t like, he doesn’t want a lot of PowerPoint what he meant. Because I didn’t clarify and assume that I didn’t understand what he meant. I didn’t clarify and ask the question. What do you mean? Which had been a simple, what do you mean? He doesn’t like PowerPoint. You would have said he doesn’t want any PowerPoint. Zero PowerPoint. Oh. And that would have changed everything. Yeah. That’s probably my most costly and embarrassing mistake maybe.
09:11
Tab Norris
Well, yeah, because it’s always, it’s so bad when you were given insight and you still because you didn’t clear it that’s, what’s so powerful about that story. It like you did the right thing by asking, let me figure out what the VP cares about. Let me learn this. You didn’t quite take it across the line, which by the way, is a great segue into one of my disasters. I think it’s worse. I, anyway, but we’re not going to grade. They’re just bad. They’re just bad. They’re just bad. But, and I don’t remember the name of this company, but it was a large, it was in the mortgage world. Was it was, it was a big, a very big opportunity. It was a national, they were picking one player to go all over the country, tons of reps, what I mean? Every had to fly to DC one hour presentation in front of the 12 critical, the executives,
10:10
Tom Stanfill
Large strategic opportunity, spend a lot of money flying, pressing.
10:15
Tab Norris
All that. So you’re just setting the stage. So I’m talking to my evaluator. I’m trying, I try, I wanted, let me talk to some of the key, tell me who’s going to be in the room. Can I talk to some of the key players? She goes, no, we’re doing this. There’s, there’s five of you. And we’re doing this on purpose. We just want you to come in cold and just tell us how you can help us. We’re just basing. We just want basic sales. We just want sales training for our people.
10:42
Tom Stanfill
Come on with the sales training.
10:44
Tab Norris
Yeah. So I’m like, yeah. Okay. I really, it would really be impact. I can really customize this. And, I told her, I really want to make it a home run so I can really, if, and if I can talk to a couple of people, I will just have a better understand. I can just, I can just really make it a rifle shot. Right. She goes, sorry. You know, we just can’t do that. Here’s another mistake I made. I go, well, could I just call a couple of reps kind of on my own maybe, and learn a little that I could then share. She goes, no, do not do that. Okay. It gives you an unfair advantage. I’m like, and I just said, okay. Yeah. So as a what an idiot. I didn’t so here, so I just get on a plane. So now I know nothing really.
11:30
Tab Norris
I mean, she gave me a couple of ideas. I created a little, what I thought I guessed based on what this evaluator, who was not very connected to this project told me what she thought these 12 people cared about. I created a little bridge slide and I thought, here’s what I told myself. I’m pretty darn good. I’m a good communicator. And I can flex. I’m going to be okay, I’m going to flash that up. I’m just gonna, I’m gonna, I’m going to tell him, this is what I see as their big gap and what they care about. If they say no, I’m just going to get them talking. Okay.
12:02
Tom Stanfill
When you say let’s help our audience, our best audience, know what you mean by bridge slide? You said, bridge slide. What you mean? When you put together a slide that communicated what they want.
12:11
Tab Norris
That’s what I want, what they want. Yeah. I can put together a slide that says, basically, here’s what I know you guys want. This is what you need to do. Based on my, all my digging and learning before this meeting, which I did very little, but that’s what, that was good clarification. So, I’m thinking, well, I’ll just, I arrive into the meeting. I try to do a little small talk. Nobody’s there. They all come in. They’re drinking. They’re sick, arms crossed. There’s no winter duction zero. I mean, I’m like, I just walk in as you’re on next. I walk in and I mean, I literally, I’m trying to warm people up, Hey guys, thank you so much. I’m so great. I’m just doing the relational thing, thinking I’m pretty good. I can usually get, I mean, crickets, Dom, no movement. And now I’m sweating, flop, sweat.
13:03
Tab Norris
I’m starting to come down . I flash up that slide and I thought, okay, well, here’s where I’ll get on my, I popped that up. I said, well, this is kind of my understanding. And am I on track? The guy, one of the guys goes, not really. I’m like, oh, so what did I miss? He basically, some lady goes, I mean, I guess that’s got, I mean, there’s some merit to that. What did I admit now? I’m flustered, Tom. I don’t know if you’ve ever gotten like this, but when I get nervous, I talk, I’m like, okay, great. Well, I’m just going to dig right in. I literally, I don’t even know what I said for the next 45 minutes. I just talked and I punched slides and I sweat. It seemed like I was in there for an hour. I, somehow I left and needless to say, we didn’t get a call back, but they.
13:55
Tom Stanfill
Don’t.
13:55
Tab Norris
Respond to me. We didn’t get picked. We didn’t get anything. So I learned a very valuable lesson. Number one, I should have Tom. I should not have allowed that to happen. I should have said, I’m not going to get on a plane and fly up to DC and do this because that’s not in your best interest, not my best interest. I need to know more. I should have played hardball on that because I, why I had nothing to lose. If it was going to turn out, like it turned out. Number two, I learned to prepare for the worst case scenario, prepare for people that are not going to be relational. They’re not going to like me. They’re not going to give me the opportunity to get to know them and to warm the room up.
14:36
Tom Stanfill
Yeah.
14:37
Tab Norris
Those were two big takeaways that when I was having my tail between my legs, heading to the airport, feeling like an idiot, those were my big takeaway. So.
14:46
Tom Stanfill
I think that is a, I think that’s a great tip. A strategy is to prepare for worst case. One of the ways that I like to do that, like in that situation, I do think sometimes we are going to be in a situation where they’re saying the client prospect to saying, we don’t want to guide you. We want you to do a capabilities presentation on who you are, right. Rather than you just who you think we are. We want you to tell us who you are, dating. You. Don’t tell me who you think you need to be. Tell me who you actually are. I’m not going to tell you what I’m looking for. I think that’s legitimate for some opportunities. I mean, you obviously need to pre-qualify know that they’re going to spend certain amount of money or there’s a possibility to spend money and who you’re serving is a potential fit.
15:35
Tom Stanfill
I do think you’re going to walk into rooms like that. I’ve done that. I remember doing that with a large automobile company manufacturer, one of the biggest in the world. They wanted to be able to one of 10.
15:48
Tab Norris
And they just say, go, they.
15:50
Tom Stanfill
Say, we’re going to have 10, come in and just say, here’s your capability to tell us what you do. Now they did tell me certain things like the role of the, of the, the people were training. They told me enough for me to know what solution I could match my solution to the problem. I knew that I could potentially serve them, but I didn’t really understand decision drivers or who’s whose. They said, after we do the 10, then we’re going to have the finalists come back. I’m like, okay, I’m up for that?
16:19
Tab Norris
Yeah. I agree with that. Here’s the problem. I didn’t even try. I didn’t ask. I mean, I should’ve pushed and then it would have led to this and I think it would’ve changed the whole meeting it. I got so I can say to the group, I tried to learn more, but up from my understanding and talking to my evaluator is this is you just want me to go first and say what our capabilities are.
16:40
Tom Stanfill
Right. I.
16:41
Tab Norris
Tried to, I tried to do what I wanted to do without having the information by creating this quote bridge slide. That’s that was the problem.
16:50
Tom Stanfill
That was that you weren’t prepared for. Okay. This is going to be, I’m going to talk about this and make a decision. It’s kind of like golf. You got to make a decision. What are you going to do? I’m going to get this shot. I’m going to come in. I’m going to tell him who absolutely I’m going to boldly conflict. Tell them who we are. I have no idea who you are. Although I do know you do have a problem. I’m assuming, you know, they have a.
17:13
Tab Norris
Big problem.
17:15
Tom Stanfill
So it was qualified.
17:15
Tab Norris
A lot of mistakes on this one, but you’re right. That’s a really good thing, Tom. I, and I’ve done that multiple times. You got to pick a lane, pick your shot, grab the club that you think and go, if you miss it. Be all in, do not try to play both sides. And that.
17:31
Tom Stanfill
Always you were trying to, you are trying.
17:33
Tab Norris
To,
17:34
Tom Stanfill
You’re like, I’m going to try to dance. 12 people looking at it going, well, what music would you like me to dance music tab. I think another really important thing when you’re preparing for worst-case and you’re going to walk into a cold room like that, which does happen from time to time. Yeah. I think one, you’re saying, just pick who you are and go with it and know that you’re going to have to talk for 45 minutes and say, this is who we are, the close again, like a dating thing. Don’t try to adjust to the person you’re wanting to date. Just say, this is who I am and be bold about that because we all have no shots. Secondly, I think we can prepare by asking the simple question. Tell me the personality of the people. I’m about.
18:20
Tab Norris
To say, I.
18:22
Tom Stanfill
Love to ask that question. Am I walking into a room? They’ll tell you that, am I walking into a room? They’re going to basically be very quiet and they’re not going to share much, are they more task oriented, right. Driver task oriented, or they’re more relational. What’s it going to be? It going to be kind of just quiet and it’s going to be all in there. I, she would have, she probably would have answered that.
18:42
Tab Norris
I would have given you that, because I did ask who the key player was that I needed to make sure I went over,
18:49
Tom Stanfill
Which.
18:49
Tab Norris
Was a really good question, but everything else was so bad who cares? I mean, I wouldn’t have won anybody over with that presentation.
18:57
Tom Stanfill
Well, I’m going to piggyback on that and tell you this. This is probably my number two. I think biggest debacle in sales, and these are all we’re focused on very large opportunities. So I was meeting with farmers insurance. We were working with one of their divisions. Because of the work that we had done, we got referred to the parent company and the learning, the head of learning had learned about our solution and was excited. And I, I flew into California. We met twice with her and our entire team and they went through our solution and we met and talked about what the need was. And it was very specific need. It was about helping their field sales organization learn to prospect more effectively. Because of some changes and transformation in the organization, this is exactly what they need. We all were excited about what? From that, I built my bridge slide, which again, the bridge slide is saying, Hey, this is where you’re going.
19:55
Tom Stanfill
This is where you are. This is where you’re going. This is your plan to get there. I’m going to feed that back to them to make sure that I understand what’s important to them. Well, I didn’t need to do that because I was already very aware. I didn’t develop a bridge slide. I just said, I know what you need then all this time with your team. We’re just going to dive in and I’m gonna show you what we have related to the, helping your reps, learn how to get more meetings and prospect and find new. I went through my, and I felt very comfortable.
20:28
Tab Norris
And you picked your lane. You didn’t do like.
20:31
Tom Stanfill
Super couple. All the people that we work together on this presentation together, we all were like,
20:36
Tab Norris
Smiling,
20:37
Tom Stanfill
Smiling. He’s he’s doing it. He’s saying all the things he said to us and he’s done. He’s telling them what we told them to tell them. At the end of the presentation, who is high-level executive looks at me. He goes, I have no idea how you can help me.
20:52
Tab Norris
Like listen to all the greatness. I just,
20:55
Tom Stanfill
I mean, it was almost like I looked at them on my internal team and they looked at me like, we don’t know what just happened. It was, they were almost embarrassed. They felt bad, honestly, in a tone, like he was a little agitated.
21:11
Tab Norris
Like somebody missed the boat here. Like you guys, this guy.
21:14
Tom Stanfill
You’re telling me this because he basically, and it was so funny because one of our, our regional vice presidents was with me, Johnson, Guerra. He got mad at the guy,
21:26
Tab Norris
Oh God,
21:28
Tom Stanfill
Don’t talk to my friend that way.
21:31
Tab Norris
He’s.
21:31
Tom Stanfill
Like, wait a minute. And so it was a John’s account. I felt awful. What turned out is they weren’t representing. What was on his whiteboard. They were representing what they thought and not, I don’t know why they were wrong about that, but I learned several things. One do the best. You said, do the best that you can to get a meeting with the person you’re about to meet with this is a strategic opportunity I needed to meet with him specifically and say, I’m about to take an hour of your time. I’d like to learn. What’s important to you to make sure it aligns because, I know you’ve delegated this to learning organization, but I want to make sure that what we’re about to recommend aligns with what’s important to you because only you’re setting the strategy. I want to make sure that’s important. Do you have 15 minutes for me to confirm this?
22:22
Tom Stanfill
I have a feeling he would have given me that meeting, give the fact that he’s going to give me an hour later. I think he would appreciate that. The other option to do, which I want to reiterate the whole thing about the bridge slide and I’ve since then done this before, when I, when the, when I couldn’t get a meeting with the executive or the ultimate decision maker is I do create a bridge slide where again, it’s like, here’s what you want. Here are the critical things you need to get there. So it’s like, literally, it’s one statement. It’s like, here’s what I understand you really want. This is your overarching objective. I try to say that in a way that really gets them connected. Like this guy really gets me. You really want this, and I’m going to say it, I’m going to work really hard to nail that Senate.
23:05
Tom Stanfill
I just have four or five bullets that say for you to do that. This is what, I’ve been doing this for a long time. And I’ve met with Oregon. These are the three or four things that have to happen for you to reach that. Are we in agreement with that? If we’re not, that gives me my opportunity to flex.
23:20
Tab Norris
To see. You were, see, that’s the difference between my mess up and your mess up is, I mean, mess ups is not the right word, but it’s it’s then you don’t move. You. You’re all committed to that. You’re not, you’re going to look at those people and you’re going to keep D you’re not going to move forward until you get that all clarified, which is,
23:39
Tom Stanfill
Yeah. I’ve had that happen before where I did that because of after learning from that situation. I’ve, I remember flying to London, meeting with an organization and I’ve been same exact thing. I’m now in the room with all of the leaders of sales and I started with my bridge line and we ended up having a great conversation because I was off and I was off because the learning person, muddy evaluator didn’t quite represent them. That gave me an opportunity to redirect, but I was, but we gotta be ready to read it.
24:08
Tab Norris
Yeah. You’ve had to be ready. I mean, I think that we’re picking up on a theme here. You have to pick a lane and you gotta be ready for the worst case scenario. Those are two, I’m seeing those themes kind of running through kind of our stories here.
24:22
Tom Stanfill
Definitely. All right. So what you got,
24:25
Tab Norris
Yeah, one more quick one that it’s real. This is hard to do because I had a CA I have a common problem. As I tell my stories, I realized this is where I really have to work. My tendency is I want to tell everything to everybody. I, I have a hard time making a stand. I wanna, I wanna make everybody love me. I want to adjust and adapt. It’s hard for me sometimes to just go, here’s what we do. Well, here’s what you need to do. This is it. Pick a lane and go for it. I learned this, I’ll never, this is, this was worth it because I have never done this again. This was, this was many years ago, but it was the same kind of thing where, like we talked about before three vice-presidents technology company you’re on. It was, it was like, we’re not, we just want to see, I want you to hit the highlights of your program, tell you how, and we’re going to pick three that are going to come back and get in the next round.
25:34
Tab Norris
It was the exact same thing, but I knew it this time. And I was competent. I knew what I was going into. It was a good environment. It was all those things. If you’re, if it was an hour meeting, which now, is going to be 45 minutes, people are going to be late. They’re going to, you know, whatever. If you were going to have 45 minutes to show big picture what we do well as a company, Tom, how many slides would you traditionally have ready for that? Well, how many would you prepare and present if you’ve got 45 and it was really 30 minutes because you’ve got a questions and answers. So you got 30 minutes. What would you,
26:08
Tom Stanfill
I have a real simple rule. I, I think of, I have the core slide. If I’m going to show a core slide, a key slide, five minutes a slide.
26:17
Tab Norris
Okay. So.
26:19
Tom Stanfill
You think about five minutes a slide. That’s the minimum I could do, right? That’s the minimum. You take five minutes. If I’m looking at that’s how I do it by five that’s, six slides.
26:29
Tab Norris
Okay. So do you think 42 slides was.
26:32
Tom Stanfill
Too many?
26:36
Tab Norris
I had 42 slides. I thought, well, they got to see all of it and they want to see the program. So I thought, you know, I’m good. Well, I mean, it’s like really? I’m like flying through and I’m going, oh, that’s really important. We’re not, we don’t have time to go through that. So let me show you this. All I did is confused the mess out of these three people. I’m passionate. I was excited, but it was I I’m sure they felt exactly like the farmers, people, what did we just taught you now? I have no idea what you did.
27:06
Tom Stanfill
Yeah.
27:08
Tab Norris
It’s just,
27:10
Tom Stanfill
Yeah. That’s, that’s the, yeah, that’s tough. I mean, that’s where your prep comes in, where, again, you’ve got to figure out who you are now, and you can do that. Like, I’ve done that before where I say in our world, and if you’re demoing a product or we’re like, okay, there could be a hundred things to say about this product. I’ve done that before, where I’ll bring up our content. I know how to think through this because I can show them, I’m going to show them six things, but they’re going to see that there’s 42, but I’m not going to talk about the 42. They’re just going to, I’m going to show him six because they want to see the book or they want to see all the content, but you you’ve got to. Yeah. There’s you got to think through that and know, but I think the key takeaway for, for me when, or the key learning for me, when I learned how to adjust my content for my audience is five minutes a slide.
28:05
Tab Norris
No. And it was the best. It was worth every bit of that misery because I will never, I’ve never done it again. And I won’t ever do it again. And it’s powerful. You want them to go, Ooh, there’s gotta be, what’s all behind that. It’s got, we used to talk about what the plot flat factor. And it’s like, Ooh, that’s good. I think this is another takeaway I had from that to highlight what you do, that’s proprietary, or that you do that you need and make sure you make, put a big highlight on that.
28:34
Tom Stanfill
Yeah, totally agree. If you start off with what their problem is, right. They’re going to nod. If they, if you’re wrong, then they need to tell you the problem. You communicate what proprietary benefit that you offer, what you need to use to solve that problem. You would get your list of what really is unique to you. It’s probably not going to be that many things and that’s where, and your time, and then it, and then if there’s more time for them to dive into other things that aren’t proprietary or unique to you, then you can then move into that conversation and have that. Yeah, I think it’s hard too, because we’re so close to it. It makes it sense to us is to say, here’s all that we offer because we’re afraid they’re going to miss something, but let them double click. Right. Let them keep it high level.
29:18
Tom Stanfill
Here’s six. Here’s the six things you need to know about us in 30 minutes. Yeah. If you want to double click, we can double click, but we’re going to start from, I want to know more about that and, start at that level and let them choose their level of it. Cause a lot of times you can spend, once you start going down that rabbit hole. Oh,
29:36
Tab Norris
I see. I see people do that demo products and then people do it on the demos. Yeah. They just, I’m going to demo all of it. They, and they everybody’s delays the person’s glazed on the other end. It’s the same thing. It’s the exact same problem. So,
29:51
Tom Stanfill
All right, well this, that reminds me of my, the last of the last one we’ll share is.
29:56
Tab Norris
Finale. The.
29:58
Tom Stanfill
Finale, the finale is because it, it falls under this whole prep thing of meeting with an executive for a large, a large strategic opportunity. And it’s another, another lesson I learned. This is a little different than what we’ve been talking about, but kind of the same situation. It was again working with the evaluator and the team of evaluators and key stakeholders, and even had spent time in the organization and doing an assessment. This was for a company called Scottrade and their huge discount brokerage company. Scott trades position in the market, their go to market strategy is if you want to pay very little money there, the price leader, the, the smallest amount of money you can pay to buy stocks where the cheapest option, you have our go to market strategies. Like we’re the Southwest airlines of the brokerage community. Like if you want financial services where our job, what you want, you come to us and we’ll buy it for you as cheaply as possible.
31:01
Tom Stanfill
So we’re the discount. I don’t even think. I think somebody, I think I said this after the meeting, I think here’s a meeting with the CEO of Scottrade. I think he would paint his own garage. I mean, all the furniture was cheap. Everything was cheap. I mean, everything.
31:22
Tab Norris
You’re looking around and you’re driving with a rolls Royce.
31:26
Tom Stanfill
Okay. Yeah, if it was in the, the car world or the airlines world, I’m British airlines.
31:35
Tab Norris
We have the best first glass.
31:37
Tom Stanfill
I’m all about. Value, right? Our go to market strategies is innovation and value and right. So, so we’re not aligned. Right. Do you think I’m going to be able to change the CEO in a 45 minute meeting? Hey, you need to change your strategy. That’s helping build this billion dollar business. I’m going to help you change your strategy. What I should’ve done is one thing I learned from that is, is, do focus on their, go to market strategy, who is this company? Every organization has a personality, which drives how they make decisions. The personality is driven by the leader of the company. And so they have a personality. That, and you look at how they go to market. You look at how they make decisions that all filters down and I’m meeting with the person who’s driving that strategy. Their go to market strategy is price leader.
32:25
Tom Stanfill
My go to market strategies value, right. And product. And yeah, so we didn’t match. So it was never a qualified opportunity. I don’t think I would have ever changed it. We could have said, well, we’re going to come up with an inexpensive solution, but honestly,
32:42
Tab Norris
That’s not what.
32:44
Tom Stanfill
I’m about return on investment. He’s about how can I get it done cheap.
32:48
Tab Norris
Yeah.
32:49
Tom Stanfill
By the way, since he’s the cheapest, he doesn’t need to probably train a sales reps. She’s like, we’re the cheapest.
32:56
Tab Norris
Hey guys, teach your people to say that really well. They were cheap.
33:01
Tom Stanfill
Yeah. I mean, they even had an introduction that was recorded so that when they would call a car client and to leave a voicemail, half of it was already recorded, just like, it just had everything automated. It was all about driving costs out of the pranks. What I’m saying is all of that learning, if I would’ve learned to qualify that I would have realized that this was not a match. I spent a lot of time working with that organization for that meaning. It was a waste of time because it wasn’t, we weren’t aligned.
33:32
Tab Norris
Yeah. That’s, that’s a hard one for salespeople and it’s like we want to serve everybody. It’s got to pick your pick where you win, spend your time, where you win. You’re going to get your that’s where you’re going to get your best return as a salesperson. All right. Well, let’s, we have a lot of stuff came out to our.
33:50
Tom Stanfill
Package. So.
33:52
Tab Norris
Let’s kind of sum this thing up. What are, what are kind of the big takeaways that we’ve got? Yeah.
33:58
Tom Stanfill
Well, here’s, here’s what I, I, in listening to your stories and thinking about my stories, I think first of all, prepare for worst case scenario. If you, if you do everything you can to get prepared and to try to meet with the decision makers and you can’t, because sometimes you’re not going to, I’ve sometimes said I’m not coming. Like I’ve sometimes said I’m not flying to XYZ city and meeting and doing all this work because were further down in the process and they needed, I needed to be allowed if they were serious about letting me out of my solution. Sometimes we have to say, yes, were going to do a capabilities presentation. We’re not really, they’re not going to give us a lot of information. They just want to know what do we need to prepare for worst case scenario and start off with a bridge lie to see if you understand and then be ready to flex.
34:50
Tom Stanfill
That’s what I heard in the meeting before the meeting, I think is great. If we do have the meeting before the meeting. Yeah. Right. Try to the best we can. If we, if it’s possible, have the meetings that we need to have before the ultimate meeting. And when you do listen.
35:11
Tab Norris
And actually listen and clarify,
35:13
Tom Stanfill
Make no assumptions,
35:15
Tab Norris
No, make.
35:16
Tom Stanfill
No assumptions. Find out what their go to market strategy is. What’s the, what’s the personality of the organization. What,
35:22
Tab Norris
What.
35:24
Tom Stanfill
Who’s, who’s going to be in that room? What is the philosophy? What’s the personality. They’ll tell you that type of information to help you get better prepared. What else tab, what am I missing? Number of slides.
35:40
Tab Norris
More.
35:40
Tom Stanfill
Yeah.
35:41
Tab Norris
Less is more. I mean, that’s, that’s really it. I mean, make sure you’ve got that they, they leave wanting more like set it up to where they need to want to double click to get more because by the way, they may not want that, but you’re prepared if they need that. I think that less is more, I think that’s a good, deep way to kind of sum that one up.
36:05
Tom Stanfill
Rule of thumb is, think about if you look at not navigational slides or your title slightly, but if you look at your key slides, if you look at, okay, I’ve got, this is a slide that I need to unpack five minutes, a slide, which allows you to say what you need to save them to have Q and a around at five minutes, a slide. Look at the time, take 15 minutes off the front end because they’re going to be late. You’re gonna have introduction to take 15 minutes off the back end for Q and a potentially, or just, if you define a narrow it, I usually use a rule of thumb of 45 minutes for an hour meeting. Yep. I got 45 minutes for an hour meeting. So I got five minutes of slide. That’s the max. You probably are going to get to those.
36:45
Tom Stanfill
That’s, that will help you meet that challenge of less is more.
36:52
Tab Norris
I wish I had listened to this podcast many years ago. It would have been, but it really is amazing.
37:01
Tom Stanfill
Okay. Close with your Hilton story.
37:05
Tab Norris
There’s not really a big takeaway on this.
37:09
Tom Stanfill
I think this is funny,
37:11
Tab Norris
Big Hilton properties. They were looking for a partner. We were in the mix. I had worked hard to get this meeting with the two or three VPs and it was early, but it was an important meeting, but it was a meeting. It wasn’t a presentation. It was just, let’s get to know each other. I’m going to do a discovery meeting. I’m going to jump on a plane and come up and spend an hour learning more. So excited prep. I mean my nicest suit, I fly up there, fly to Memphis. I’m in Atlanta. I’m going to Memphis. I show up the meeting. Was it two? Okay. Two central time. I show up 15 minutes early. Cause that’s the way it works. You always want to be there early. So I’m there at 1 45. I’m there. I get there. I was at the receptionist. I’m here.
37:59
Tab Norris
I’m here early, but just, I’m going to sit right here. Just want to let them know I’m here. I can’t wait. You know, but whatever. I sit down while I I’m waiting and I’m waiting now. It’s past two now it’s two 15. Now I’m getting a little agitated. I was early now and I went up to the reception. I said, if you let them know I’m here she goes. I’ve let them know you’re here. And it’s a great, thank you. Sit back down. Car and driver. I’m getting really deep into car and driver now. Another hotel now, it’s a, now am I half an hour now I’m starting to get Ang. I’m starting to get real.
38:40
Tom Stanfill
Frustrated. And I’m like,
38:42
Tab Norris
I’m sorry. I’ve been sitting here now for 45 minutes. Is there some, is there a problem? I’m starting to pick up the tone, I’m getting the, I’m a little tired, my travels, and then she’s like, I’ll let them know again that you’re here. So she went back.
39:00
Tom Stanfill
One more time. I’m.
39:01
Tab Norris
Sure.
39:01
Tom Stanfill
I’m sure it’s.
39:02
Tab Norris
Wrong. What is wrong with this person? So she comes back. She said, there’ll be with you in about 30 minutes. And I’m like 30 more minutes. I mean, what did I, and now I’m just like frustrated beyond belief. I’m like, well, I’ve flown all the way up here. I guess I’ll wait 30 more minutes. I’m just getting it. So how dare.
39:18
Tom Stanfill
They?
39:18
Tab Norris
The guy walks in and he walks up and I know he could tell. I’m just like, Hey John, nice to see you. I’m a little, I’ve been here a while. I’ve been here for now an hour and 15 minutes. I know things come up. I’m still trying to be nice. I know things come up, but you’re.
39:36
Tom Stanfill
Addressing it.
39:37
Tab Norris
Yeah, I’m addressing it. Yeah, but I’m just making a statement. That’s just, that’s just not very nice. I mean, that’s just, it’s just, I wish you would’ve let me know. I didn’t say that, but that’s what I was communicating. He goes, oh, I’m sorry. He goes, actually, I’m showing that we’re right on time. Wasn’t our meeting it too. I said, yes, it was two. He goes, are you still on Eastern time? I didn’t have an apple. There’s your takeaway? You have an apple watch.
40:13
Tom Stanfill
Takeaway is the customer is never wrong.
40:15
Tab Norris
He’s never wrong. Once again, I’ve said this a few times done what an idiot. I mean like really? That was one of the most embarrassing moments as a salesperson.
40:27
Tom Stanfill
I think that’s hilarious. There is a relevant point of that story too, beyond just it’s funny. The customer is always wrong because sometimes the customer is wrong. Like they are like, if they are an hour late or, and they got like, I’ve been in situations where like, no, the meeting’s at three. You’re like, I have an email right here that you’re like, like I was with one of our, with an agile night and were meeting with Johnson and the guy walked out. The first thing he said to us was, I’m kind of surprised that you guys haven’t responded to my emails.
41:05
Tab Norris
Oh my gosh,
41:07
Tom Stanfill
It was something about the email or something. I thought about this when you were telling that story. If we had, I mean, I could, I mean, I’m, I’ll. Yeah, let’s go to court a lot. I will prove to you that you are wrong about that. And, and, and it was related to mark and he was, and I know, I mean, mark, he revealed to me, but we both said I’m so, we both apologized and said, I’m sorry if he missed something, we didn’t you’re wrong. Oh yeah. He handled mark handled the great, and we’ll certainly check it out. I apologize. I thought we had, but he handled it, but like the customer, we can’t, we don’t win anything by making the customer feel bad about something. That’s not related to what we’re talking about now. Obviously, sometimes the customer is wrong about what’s the right solution and what’s the best path forward.
41:53
Tom Stanfill
We need to lead them in a different direction. But yeah,
41:57
Tab Norris
It was just immature. I mean, I was just being immature. That’s really what it was. So anyway,
42:02
Tom Stanfill
And you couldn’t tell time and.
42:03
Tab Norris
I couldn’t tell up and I’ve never had a real normal standard. Watch it ever since.
42:08
Tom Stanfill
Yeah. There you go. All right. Well, good lessons from our failures, we’ve shared a couple, so we didn’t share about the hundreds of successes, but we’ve been thinking we’ve learned, we learned more from our failures than our successes sometimes. So, all right, my friend, thanks for joining me again. If you guys love the podcast, let us know, give us feedback. If you, if you’ve got ideas on how we can do it better, love your comments, tell us how we can improve. Again, thanks for joining us for another episode of SALES with ASLAN.
