Unraveling the Mystery of Lead Qualification Through Honest Content
Lead qualification is an essential part of any business, as it helps to differentiate between leads that are likely to convert and those that are not worth pursuing. Improving your lead qualification process can help your business save money, time and resources. Having an effective lead qualification process in place allows you to prioritize leads that are most likely to convert and use your resources efficiently. By improving your lead qualification process, you can ensure that your sales team is focusing on leads that are most likely to turn into customers. This can help your business increase conversions, as well as maximize the return on investment for your sales and marketing efforts. Additionally, better lead qualification can help you identify which leads need more nurturing and attention, so that your sales team can target them more effectively.
Introducing Winnie Anderson
Dr. Nadia Brown
00:00:01
I am so excited for our guest today, Winnie Anderson, and we are going to chat a lot about leads, qualifying leads, and really how that impacts your sales. Because I can tell you from personal experience, I've seen it when the lead part in marketing is off, it impacts the sales. It impacts how the sales conversations go. It impacts conversions and impact and all of that. And one of my pet peeves is only focusing on more leads. More leads, more leads. I want you to focus on more qualified leads. And so that is why Winnie is here. Welcome, Winnie. So excited.
Winnie Anderson
00:00:41
I'm so excited to be here. Thank you so much for inviting me. I know we could go on for days about this, so I'm really excited.
Dr. Nadia Brown
00:00:49
We totally could. This is why Winnie has to be on the show, because we got to talk about this. So, Winnie, first, let's just start with let me back up. I know I just kind of jumped right in there. I'm so excited for today. But let's back up. How did you come to do the work that you do right now?
How Winnie Anderson Got Started
Winnie Anderson
00:01:10
The long story. But the Reader's Digest version it's amazing how at some point, you can look back at your life and you see how these seemingly random pieces are not, in fact, random, but they have all been stacking up to provide you with the insight, the skills and the pieces that you need to put this thing together. So that, in a nutshell, is what's worked. But I started out in sales. That's the whole story. I don't know if I ever told you that I was actually a cold calling, door to door B to B salesperson. Had no clue in the had no clue. Nobody trained me. I had started out in retail sales and then was selling B2B. What a mess I was. I do have that background. I did inside sales for a long time as well. But I also have this very big piece in HR and organizational development. And then when I was in a car accident and was knocked out of the workforce and had to figure out what I was going to do with the rest of my life, I discovered that something I always should have known. I write well and in writing to build my brand and get recognized and seen as an expert in my regional community. People saw my writing and said, hey, you're a really great writer of it. You could write copy. I'm like what is copy? So that's how I actually got into marketing. And I was supposed to help the agency I worked at, but I was also, of course, supposed to help the clients and had to figure this out on my own. And what I figured out was that selling and building a brand is what HR does. To be honest with you, every great brand starts with the people who live that brand and starts with the philosophy of the founder. So it's the same kind of thinking when you educate employees to enroll them into a brand, you have to communicate that message. So figuring out the clients message as well as the agencies and then how to communicate that, all of those pieces. I just started to see the pattern that's the old trainer in me of how to really educate people and that helping them buy is all about giving them the information they need. And I got started. This was the Internet was still in its infancy, so I recognized that this is all about information. And the better information you can give, the easier it is for the person to buy. And the point about lead generation, you can astronomically increase sales with the same number of leads if you just help them say yes and you close them more effectively.
Dr. Nadia Brown
00:04:35
Wow, okay, we got a pause, right? There are so many gems even in this. But one of the things that you shared was helping them buy by giving them the information they need. Right. One of the things that I have seen in the industry, and I'm sure you have too, is actually this withholding of information. It's almost like this. I'll give you this if you give me that. That kind of tit for tat kind of thing. Tell me. Let's talk about that. Why is that probably not the best way to approach sales and marketing?
Approaching Sales and Marketing
Winnie Anderson
00:05:14
It's never and again, I'll use my HR experience as a perfect example. And now you're saying laws, the government has to get involved and say no. You employers, you have to actually tell people how much you're going to pay them in your employment ads. What in the Sam hill? You are so close minded that your dad has to tell you no. You have to tell people what is the biggest thing people want to know?
Dr. Nadia Brown
00:05:42
How much money are you going to make?
Winnie Anderson
00:05:43
How much you’re going to pay and you're not going to tell them that? What's the matter with you? I advocated that when I was a recruiter and I used to tell my applicants, look, don't tell anybody I told you this, but this is a salary range. So if you're not comfortable with it, say so now so you can self select out of the process. Why would I torment you and get you all the way to the hiring interview and then tell you one of the most important things you'd want to know to make a good decision? So this now put me in marketing and sales. It's the exact same thing. Why would you withhold critical information, a normal intelligent human needs in order to make a decision? Yes, it's ridiculous. Honor the treat people with dignity and respect and give them all of the information they need because you're then only going to get people who go, yes, let's get on a call and talk about it. Right? Wouldn't you want to have conversations, maybe fewer conversations, but more high value with intelligent people who respect whatever it is that you charge and see you as the high value person you are. And if you have a sales team, and I've been inside sales on a sales team, why would you want to put them in a situation where they've got to try and trick people? Come on. It's just so adversarial. And this is why, as buyers, because we're all buyers. As buyers, we get conditioned to actually hate sales and to not want to talk to people.
Dr. Nadia Brown
00:07:34
Yes, because we're annoyed. First of all, there are so many directions. I think we're going to need a part two to this because you touched on the HR part. And we work with sales teams in that whole hiring process. That's a whole but like you said, even in that process, though, as the buyer, I'm coming into this like you said, I'm trying to make a reasonable decision and I'm missing key pieces of information. I loved when you talked about how it then makes having the sales conversation adversarial.
Winnie Anderson
00:08:10
Totally.
Dr. Nadia Brown
0:08:10
And I dare say it also then creates what we often hear in the industry when it comes to sales, why we have to overcome objections. Right. And I have a whole video about why I'm so annoyed with that. But the whole idea of how sales have been and even the terminology overcome objections is adversarial in and of itself. Now you're creating this entire sales process that is creating this tension. Exactly. This tension going into this working relationship. It's a whole lot of mess.
Winnie Anderson
00:08:47
Totally ridiculous. Amen, girlfriend. Because really, this is why you get to this conversation. And I just had conversations with people like this this week, where one of the biggest objections what are reasons? Because they're not objections. They're reasons. Because if you're talking to people who have genuine objections, honey, you're talking to the wrong people. Yes, I talk to people who have questions. They have concerns. They have some fears, even. Right. And you know what? That's because they're normal humans.
Dr. Nadia Brown
00:09:21
Imagine that, normal humans.
Winnie Anderson
00:09:24
So if you're talking to people with objections, you're talking to the wrong folks. You need to respect the fact that people are trying to make a decision. Now, you know, in the business world, I work with some great employers. To be honest with you, we're making a mistake. Not that there weren't people who were punished for making mistakes, but I grew up as a professional where making a mistake was, I just made an investment in you. You just learned some valuable lesson, which you better apply. Right. It was not like I'm at risk of losing my job. But today we know one mistake and you are out.
Dr. Nadia Brown
00:10:09
Yes.
Winnie Anderson
00:10:09
Right. So there is a lot at risk for people. So if that person I don't care if they are talking to their partner, their business partner, their life partner, they're talking to an educated friend. They want to have the kind of information that helps them talk through and think through the actual purchase. So, yeah, you need to give them the information they need.
Dr. Nadia Brown
00:10:35
And this is so true because some of our listeners are B2C. But then, especially when you start talking about B2B and you're going into companies, and now you have teams. And now, like you said, you have that added layer of if I make a wrong purchasing decision or bringing someone on the team or bringing someone in the company to consult or train and it doesn't go well, not only is it going to be a bad experience per se, but it could be the end of my employment. And I know it right. There is a lot, I agree, a lot of pressure on people to make these decisions. So we need, as you look at your philosophy, which I adore, you already know this in terms of really leveraging your content, because a lot of us create content we want to do inbound marketing to have those folks raise your hands to our businesses. Tell me more about your philosophy around this presale strategy. Like, break it down for us because this is so juicy.
Philosophy Around the Presale Strategy
Winnie Anderson
00:11:35
Thank you. Thank you.
Dr. Nadia Brown
00:11:37
Yeah.
Winnie Anderson
00:11:38
If your intention is to close sales easier and faster.
Dr. Nadia Brown
00:11:46
Right?
Winnie Anderson
00:11:48
Exactly. And your intention is to only work with great people, have great clients who have fabulous, wild success with whatever it is that you offer, right? Then you have got to share useful content with them. And we all know that with the advent of the Internet, the Internet is based on content. It's based on information. That's all it is, is a sea of information. And people have been conditioned to turn to the Internet when they have any problem. Any problem.
Dr. Nadia Brown
00:12:30
You know that any question is like, Google it.
Winnie Anderson
00:12:33
That's exactly right. Exactly right. It's our first inclination. We either pull out our phone to do it, we grab our tablet, we're sitting in our desk, we are going to ask Dr. Google even, we're going to put in our problem and expect to get the answer. And with the advent of voice technology and voice search, it's just become second nature. So you have to be able to provide this great information, otherwise you're going to kill yourself anyway, because how else are you going to get leads and clients? You're going to do it the old fashioned way, which we know we don't always have available to us, right? Because we're still dealing with repercussions from the pandemic. And now people have gotten in their minds, right, they've changed their behavior. We know that's the hardest thing for people to do. So they've changed their behavior. Now you're saying, oh, you can go back to your old behavior. They're like, you know what? I like this new behavior. I've gotten used to referring back to.
Dr. Nadia Brown
00:13:40
The office, they’re wanting people to go back to the office.
Winnie Anderson
00:13:42
People are like, I don't want cooties. People recognize that you're disease carriers. I don't want to be near you if I don't have to be. Right. There was actually a study, I think it was McKinsey, if I'm not mistaken. I'll get you the link and you can share that with your folks, but I believe it's McKinsey. They did a study that showed technology adoption left five years in the first few months of the pandemic.
Dr. Nadia Brown
00:14:13
Wow.
Winnie Anderson
00:14:14
So those laggards were like, all right, I got kicked out of the boat. I got to start using this. People who were maybe using the net for consumer purchases now are using it more and more for B2B. So you're talking about 95 plus percent of people turn to the web first. Right. So if you're not using it effectively, you're just not getting found, and you're working too hard for every lead and sale that you're getting. So that's number one. Stop working so hard. So then people need and want to navigate their own buying journey on their own because they've dealt with this adversarial stuff for so long. It is deeply programmed into our psyche that you're just going to try and trick me, manipulate me, pressure me, et cetera. These people still act like they're starring in Glenn Gary, Glenn Ross, and they're using these high pressure, always be closing tactics. It's ridiculous. So sharing this kind of content freely, answering the really hard questions that your buyers have in their head that they will often not actually ask you because maybe they're embarrassed. They don't want you to think they're cheap. They don't want you to think they're unsophisticated or that they're stupid. So by creating content that is built around how they're searching, how do I how much is what should I pay for? Right? That's how you connect with them, how they suddenly see you as truly a trusted solution provider, a guide, helpful, not some menacing, always be closing kind of salesy weirdo.
Dr. Nadia Brown
00:16:13
No, we don't want to do salesy weirdo around. No, pause right here for a second, Winnie, because you're dropping these gems as we're going through this process. And I think, like you said, technology can be our friend, but I also feel like technology can also be our foe if not used correctly. Right? So how do we create content that can be found? Like, how do we get found to stand out in the sea of all these people screaming, look at me, look.
Creating Content That Stands Out
Winnie Anderson
00:16:45
At me, look at me? Yeah, let me tell you what justice. Earlier in the week, I had a big all day intensive, which you know how those work for me. I had this person send me information before then so I can start. Noodling. And one of them is, do you have a buyer persona? And if so, can I see it? So this person sends me this buyer persona that is a sea of bullets that must have been two thirds of an eight and a half by eleven page. And while, yes, we know demographics are important, psychographics are more important, what associations are they in? All of those things give you important details, insight, if you can interpret them. No one has ever been able to tell me here's how my buyer thinks here's the values that they have here are their priorities, here's the trends in their industry. And what they need to stay on top of here is the way their organization is likely organized. Is it traditionally hierarchical? Has it become flatter over time? Those are the things that are most important, along with the language that they use to discuss the problem, the impact of that problem, and their aspiration. When you really understand those elements, the content becomes obvious. But you genuinely start with what used to be referred to as the reporter questions. Who, what, where, when, why? So think of how do people genuinely ask a question? How do I, what is right? So when you can think about those questions, and yes, I hate to break this to you, how much does it cost? Is one of them. I know if you're brave enough to address how you price and yes, I'm sure that with some of you the answer is, it depends. Right? Because tell people what it depends on. Yeah, because you probably have I deal with a lot of creatives you probably have a minimum, right? I used to love the old and I'm old Linda Evangelista supermodel line from, what was it the 80s? They don't get out of bed for less than $10,000. Love that, first of all, because she's got a floor, right? Honey, if you're not going to pay me this minimum, I'm not even going to think about it.
Dr. Nadia Brown
00:19:24
You don't need even to talk.
Winnie Anderson
00:19:25
You've got one too, and if you don't, you better figure it out.
Dr. Nadia Brown
00:19:29
Yes, and then hold right here for a second, Winnie, because you and I both know this is a thing and people do this whole thing and it's like this cloak and dagger. It's just a very interesting process when it comes to sales. And just yesterday, honestly, I was talking with my husband. He's looking at some investment vehicle stuff that he wants to get into in his spare time. He was talking about this process. He's looking at investing in some type of trucking, something, and he was looking at, you know he's doing his research. My husband's an engineer. He needs his data, his facts, his spreadsheet, all that. And he shared with me that there were a couple of different companies that could help you get started, but there was only one that shared that key piece of information, which was how much does it cost to get started? And he was so excited, this person broke down how much it would cost to purchase the truck, how much it would cost to do all the ancillary, like the hidden costs and things you don't even know that you need to think about. And so he then gave him a range like, it's going to cost you about from this to this, and took it a step further and was like, you probably won't see an ROI for about twelve to 18 months, right? So he is like, okay, I can work with this. And I was like, babe, I love that. I love that sales process, because now you know, and if you choose to have a conversation with him, you're starting at a completely different point.
Winnie Anderson
00:20:59
Totally.
Dr. Nadia Brown
00:20:59
Versus, I'm still trying to get the information. Like all this information that you forgot to tell me. Everyone else was like, schedule a call, schedule a call, schedule a call. Where this guy was like, here it is, here you go.
Winnie Anderson
00:21:10
Exactly. Because he got treated with respect.
Dr. Nadia Brown
00:21:14
Yes.
Winnie Anderson
00:21:14
And this is what people want to know. I hear so often that, oh, I get these price driven prospects. Well, that's because you're keeping it a big secret. So you've got them in a call, which is amazing, right? They're already pretty close to saying yes, and now you're pulling the rug out from under them. They don't want to look cheap. They don't want to look stupid. You're basically telling them, man, I underestimated what I was going to have to pay for this. Because really, the dirty truth is most buyers don't know how to buy anything. That's why we do research, so we can educate ourselves. Because the seller always has the most information. They're the experts. Even if it's you're buying a house, unless you are a professional real estate investor. And we all know even they make mistakes, right? You buy a house and you know, man, I didn't think to look under the floor or whatever. So giving people the information that, hey, you didn't think about this, right? My husband and I, he suggested that we renovate our kitchen. Nearly reduced me to tears. I've done a kitchen renovation. It's horrible. And I said, please don't, let's replace the countertop. I never thought about that. That's fabulous. So, okay, we're going to replace the countertop. So we get a referral because we went online and said, who should we talk to? Because we don't want to waste time. We still don't know a lot of people where we live. So we go to this person, he does a great job and says, have you thought about the sink? And we're like, no, you're going to have to replace the sink when you get a countertop. So now a project that went from X amount of money went to X plus a little bit more, but totally made sense, because nothing would have pissed us off more. And who would we have blamed? Him.
Dr. Nadia Brown
00:23:39
Yes, totally would have blamed him, because.
Winnie Anderson
00:23:40
He's got the knowledge. So you've got to think about exactly as you said, what do they know and what do they not know that are the hidden problems? And when you can let them know those things, you instantly skyrocket to the top of the few handful of people that they're trying to sift through. Your stock rises because you're so much more honest is the way you come across. You told me things nobody else would. It just raises your stock in their eyes. So yes, absolutely.
Dr. Nadia Brown
00:24:15
So one of the things that you talk about in your work is something you call billboard content, right? I love this. First of all, I love how in preselling people and really letting your marketing and your messaging and things that you're doing really helps support you in the sales process and not just bring in a lot of people, like you said, that aren't qualified, that aren't a good fit, that for whatever reason, really leverage it to the best of your ability. And now we have this billboard content. When you got to break this down for us, how do we leverage this billboard content? What is it going to do for us? And how is it going to definitely help us build more trust and really position us what I like to call your strategic ally? Like, I'm your friend, trust me as you go through this process. So what is this billboard content?
What is Billboard Content and How To Leverage It
Winnie Anderson
00:25:08
So, first of all, we know that old school sales and you still see it around today. And old school marketing, it talks about the funnel, right? So it's a really big top. If you think of this like a vacuum, I'm going to suck in everybody and I'm going to spit out these people at the bottom. So I'm going to have to sift through these people. I've got tire kickers. If you think about the customer mountain, the top of the funnel people, these are people who are really they're on the wrong side of the mountain. They're people who may not even know they have a problem, but they saw something that sounded sexy and got their attention, so they opted in for it. Oh, please stop that. Because you then have to sift through them. You've got people on your list that really aren't paying any attention. Probably didn't even open up that download that you gave them and then maybe you get a trickle through this little subby thing. Totally wrong analogy. Because this is a process, it's a journey. And that's why I like the analogy of a highway. People have something happens in their life that makes them say this problem has now gotten to the front burner. It's now the most important thing. I'm going to mix my metaphors today. It's now the most important issue. Whether it's my boss has handed me something I have to solve or I've discovered I have a problem or there's something going on in my home, I've got a problem. That's what's called a triggering event or a tipping a point. And that happens. The person is ready to enter the highway again. They go to the Internet and they enter in a question. What is this rash I have? What is this? I've got the scaly stuff on my arm. What is it? So they're searching either problem focus with symptoms or they self diagnose. I have eczema, I have contact dermatitis, which do I have? So they either search by problem or they search by guess solution. So when you create content, that's in response to all the variations of how they would be searching. That's how you get people early on on the highway. As you start to educate them about the symptoms, the problem, and the potential solution options, they then start to navigate further down the highway. So billboard content is the really big content that educates them deeply. It might be a buyer's guide. It might be we've got evergreen videos that are maybe a little mini webinar or something there that they really provide great content that educates them in a deep way about the problem, the impact, the general solution, why those things don't work. And then here's what you really need and here's how to make that decision. You're helping the person understand their own values, their own priorities, balance those choices, understand how things get priced. Do I want to find the money? Because we'll spend anything we can rationalize, right? But you've got to help them do that, help them understand the pay off when they can expect it, how much, et cetera. And then they're ready to say yes. So they want to get about 95% through the journey on their own before they talk to you because they don't want to look stupid. So that's the billboard content. It's the really big stuff. And then you're going to have maybe what I call signpost content, the smaller pieces that guide them over to a piece of signpost content that maybe they missed, depending on where on the highway they enter. So your content then feeds into itself and it ends up being a loop. And you might have a few different call to actions, calls to action that get people to go back to this billboard content. And eventually they just realize, I can't get any farther, I'm ready for a conversation. The content itself has built in qualifying mechanisms that help the person, okay, I stepped forward, I know this, I understand this, I'm ready to now consume this, or I'm ready I need a conversation, or I need to go into your FAQs, or I need to do a live chat just for a quick thing, right? So that's how billboard content works. It helps the person genuinely navigate through the key decision points. And that's another important thing to understand about buyers. What are those key things that they're trying to check off in their head that's probably more important than their age?
Dr. Nadia Brown
00:30:24
You really have to know your buyer, but you really need to know them because like you said, what are those key decision points? What are those things that they don't even know that. They don't know that. They need to know. Right?
Winnie Anderson
00:30:38
Exactly. It comes from not being so tied up with, I've got to sell. How can I serve? How can I give before I get and how can I serve? And then I'll sell to people who are ready and right for this. But especially service providers. We're so tied up in the magic of our thing, right? And what we do, and we think everybody needs it and wants it, and of course, maybe they do, but we're just out there with this firehose telling everybody, I'm not ready yet, and I don't even understand it. So that's why this content and it takes pressure off of you when you focus on creating pieces for various elements of the highway, then I'm going to make a sale.
Dr. Nadia Brown
00:31:35
Right?
Winnie Anderson
00:31:36
They'll sell themselves.
Dr. Nadia Brown
00:31:37
They will.
Winnie Anderson
00:31:38
They genuinely will sell themselves. That's why I call it preselling, because they'll really come to you ready to buy.
Dr. Nadia Brown
00:31:45
So with the presell, we have preselling. We have the billboard content. Another piece of this philosophy, because how does this all tie together? This is where I'm going with this question. How do we pull all this together? And basically, like you said, we're pre qualifying our leads to make our sales conversation so much smoother. But what is that tool that we're leveraging in order to do this? What are some of the tools that you recommend?
Key Tools to Getting to Know Your Buyer
Winnie Anderson
00:32:10
Oh, jeez. First of all, it's your website, right? Stop posting social media. Twenty four seven. I know, I'm sorry, right? Because my coach is a big social media person. It's actually how I found her. But what happens when you only post on social media is you're counting on Serendipity. And sometimes it works, often it doesn't, because it's become a pay to play kind of platform now. Right? So you really want to yes, you're going to share content. Of course you are. But you're going to build your own house. You're going to build your own vault of content. So that is going to help you grow your own web presence. So, I know initially it's like you're the voice in the wilderness. But when you focus on how your buyer is searching, what they really want to know, and that's it. Start with the questions that they want to know, and you put that information on your website, you can't help but grow in those terms because you're structuring your content around whole phrases that people are actively looking for. So you're building what Google refers to as your authority, right? They look for expertise, authority, and trust. It's called EAT. So that's how you put all of this content together to boost yourself in the rankings, because Google wants to serve up the best quality content they can. So that's where this really comes into play. And then the other piece of this is your site doesn't have to have these fabulous bells and whistles and make people OOH and AH.
Winnie Anderson
00:34:01
Because they'll be out of here in New York. Second, you really want clear and simple. They want to know at a glance. I call it the goldfish test. They want to know at a glance that you have the solution to the problem that they've got. You want to keep your navigation nice and simple. Don't overwhelm people. I looked at a site just the other day, yesterday, I think person had four different things she wanted the visitor to do. Like, I'm reading one paragraph and I didn't know what to do. And then you have these buttons that are all different, and I don't know what to do. And you know what they do know to do is leave. That's what they're going to do. They're not going to call you. They're not going to send you a message. They're not going to ask you, what the hell are you talking about here? I don't get it. They're just going to go because life is too hard and don't make it harder for them than it has to be.
Dr. Nadia Brown
00:35:03
Please don't. Oh, my gosh, this is so good. So we're pre selling. We're leveraging billboard content because our buyers are on the highway versus going through a funnel. I love it. I call it the customer journey. And we're leveraging our website to be a resource and the actual tool to support us and not just relying on whatever we post or don't post on social media. That's so good. And it really just to help, because like I said, I've been doing sales, and I've done sales for my company, my company. I've done sales on behalf of other companies. And one of the ways I can definitely tell there is a breakdown, and I always don't know where it happened. Right. But I know that there's a breakdown because I'm the one having those conversations. And I'm like, okay, where do these leads come from? What are we putting out there? What are we saying to attract them? Because I'm having a conversation and they're having a conversation, and they are not the same conversations, right. We want all of that to align. And like you said, one of the things that I see in my work all the time, Winnie, is people get so discouraged with having sales conversations, which is why they don't want to have them. But like you said, because you're talking to the wrong people or you're not providing them enough information.
Winnie Anderson
00:36:13
I have a theory.
Dr. Nadia Brown
00:36:15
Right. So then they're coming to the sales conversation. What? You want to be a sales conversation and a closing conversation, but they're still in information gathering phase, right?
Winnie Anderson
00:36:25
That's exactly right.
Dr. Nadia Brown
00:36:28
It leads to your frustration. Right. Because now you're frustrated because you're ready to close and they're still gathering info. Doesn't mean you won't close, but, like, leveraging some of the things that you shared with us, Winnie, and really going back, I'm in the process. I've already worked with Winnie to help. You know, even I just noticed gaps in my own process. So I'm not like, sitting here like, I got it all figured out, which is why we have Winnie here today. But it's just like, okay, I can see the gaps, and it's like, okay, Nadia, what can you and the team now do to go back and look at your own process as your clients are on this journey to buying and working with your company in order to really close those gaps? So when they do come to the table and now we're having a sales conversation, we are closer to on the same page, there still may be information they need. There's still maybe some things they need to think about, but it's not such a big gap. It's like a tiny gap. Right. Totally shortens those sales cycles, no matter who you're working with, whether it's B2C or B2B, right?
Winnie Anderson
00:37:24
That's exactly right. They totally apply. Yeah. So you have really talked about you're having a marketing conversation when you think you're having a sales conversation.
Dr. Nadia Brown
00:37:36
Right.
Winnie Anderson
00:37:37
And so here's another little piece of HR that applies in sales and selling. When I was a recruiter, I worked for several industries and several companies as a recruiter. But my favorite job as a recruiter was when I worked in a casino hotel industry. And it was just so much fun. It was really outstanding. And I loved being a recruiter. I really did. And when I worked at the casino, because we employed like, 3200 people and had about 700 different job categories, I had the luxury of being able to screen in.
Dr. Nadia Brown
00:38:20
Wow.
Creating Your Screening Process
Winnie Anderson
00:38:21
Screening in means I'll interview you for anything and I'll figure out what to do with you later. Right. So maybe you are, maybe you're just trying to figure out you're not happy in your current career and maybe this hospitality thing might work for you. I'll talk to you absolutely because I understand the knowledge, skills, and abilities and qualities that great applicants and employees need to have. I can figure out the job that's right for you. I'll get you in here, and we'll grow you into a fabulous employee. Right. I used to love that. So too often, we do allow ourselves to get discouraged in this process, even when we're trying. Okay, I'm going to commit to this, and I'm going to make the shift. It doesn't happen overnight. Right. So what you want to really think about is I am screening in. I want to listen to all of the questions and all of what I might feel at the time is resistant, the concerns they have. And you know what I'm going to do? Going to write them down, and I'm going to create content around every single one of them, and I'm going to put that content on my site.
Dr. Nadia Brown
00:39:44
I love it.
Winnie Anderson
00:39:46
Then as you create your screening process, you have some kind of maybe a brief questionnaire they complete to schedule an appointment with you or whatever is your qualifying system. But you can then say, hey, read this content prior to our meeting. It will help us use our time more efficiently. And in applying for a job, the advertisement part of it is a test to see how well you follow directions.
Dr. Nadia Brown
00:40:21
Imagine that.
Winnie Anderson
00:40:23
Because if you can't follow directions, what do I want you for? Right, exactly. Well, I'm sure an element of that is in your own screening process, depending on the nature of your industry, obviously. But if you work closely with your clients, do you want people who can't follow directions who are a pain in the neck? I don't. So when somebody refuses to follow the path that I have with no good reason right. If you need an accommodation, I totally understand that, but if you just will not do what I asked you, we're not going to work together.
Dr. Nadia Brown
00:41:01
No, it's not going to end well.
Winnie Anderson
00:41:03
So embrace the whole screening in concept and use this. Tell yourself, this is all insight into what I need to do to help have better conversations. You should never wonder what content to create because people are telegraphing, please create this.
Dr. Nadia Brown
00:41:25
So true. That's one reason why I love sales conversations. And I get that at some point you have a time like, right, but especially in the beginning, are you creating something new or you have a new offer? Talk to the people because they're going to tell you exactly what it is they need, what's missing, what's not landing. It's just so rich, so talk. And I know we love hiding behind our computers, but we have Zoom. You can still talk to the people and hide behind your computer.
Winnie Anderson
00:41:53
Yeah, you know, what I know is, the joy of technology. I don't have to actually leave. If you find yourself, and we've all been there, where you make any excuse to do anything else, right? There's a fabulous book called Finish by John Acuff and it talks about noble obstacles. And a noble obstacle is when you say to yourself, oh, but first I have to do this. Right, but first so that's a noble obstacle, it might genuinely sound to your favored brain like this really is more important for you. You got to focus on this. But if you're trying to do anything other than have a conversation, I want you to get curious about that because there is something you're projecting on to that conversation and you're probably too attached to the outcome emotionally. You'll always be a good person whether that person buys from you or not. And if your team, if you're having problems with your sales team other than hire Nadia and have her help you, you really want to ask yourself as an organization, are we giving these folks what they need? There's the whole sales enablement and buyer enablement. That's what I think pre selling, I think it fits on that fence and aids both; sales enablement gives the seller the information and resources they need to be comfortable in a conversation. And buyer enablement gives the buyer the resources they need to process the information to be ready for a sales conversation.
Dr. Nadia Brown
00:43:36
That's so juicy. So good. All right, so, Winnie, you have completely broken our brains today. I know what I want to talk about, and I still end up taking notes. So that's just how it goes. And we've already worked together. Like, it's insane, but every time we talk, it's like, I don't know, you probably said that and I missed it, but I got it this time, right? So where can people connect with you? What additional? Like, if you have some resources? Because this is one of those things that you probably need to listen to this again to really process all the information that you're sharing with me. But also you're shifting the paradigm in our brains of how we've kind of been conditioned slow, and you're like, not so much. So why don't you try it this way? Is there a resource that we could get to help us?
How To Connect with Winnie
Winnie Anderson
00:44:26
Yes, actually there is. As we record this, I'm compulsively tweaking it even as we speak. But you can go to my website, www.winnieanderson.com/Manifesto, and I will have some little thingy, workbook kind of thing, with some of my visuals, my models, and then you can work through, gee, do I have this? Do I not have that? Where is my thinking on this? And that will really help you process this, especially if you're a visual learner. And of course, we can connect through the site. I'm also on social media, obviously. I'm on Facebook and LinkedIn Twitter until it explodes? I don't know. But you can pretty much find me on LinkedIn and Facebook, as well as www.winnieanderson.com.
Dr. Nadia Brown
00:45:14
And we will have all of Winnie's contact information and the link to the manifesto in the show notes. So make sure you go there. Winnie, this has been delightful. I'm excited for the work you've do is so needed. And thank you so much for sharing your wisdom with us today.
Winnie Anderson
00:45:29
Thank you. Thank you for being you. And thank you for inviting me to share these thoughts with your audience. I'm super excited about the potential, helping people feel easier and reap the benefits and make the big impact they want to make.
Dr. Nadia Brown
00:45:43
Love it. Thank you all for joining us for another episode of Straight Talk About Sales. We'll see you again soon. Bye.