Empathy: The Key to Successful Sales | Ben Hull | Field Sales Unscripted | E162

Speaker A: So Ben, thanks so much for being here today, um, share a little bit about your company and the problems that you guys solve.

Speaker B: Thank you for having me. Uh, I appreciate uh, the chance to talk with you and your listeners today. Um, so the company that I work with right now, uh, it is as you can see it's spelled item. It's actually pronounced item. We are a German uh, company, but we have two uh, locations here in the U.S. we're very heavily involved in the different manufacturing sectors, uh, within the US market and globally as well. But what we do is we're aluminum extrusion. So think of industrial Legos. Uh, it's a system that allows multitudes, um, of different people to custom create different solutions that either they may be using product in something that they're reselling to their customer base in their market or they could be using it to develop uh, in house solutions uh, that fit their needs and improve process, uh, safety, uh, multitudes of different improvements within a facility.

Speaker A: So tell us a bit about how did you start your career and how did you get to where you are today?

Speaker B: So let's see, I've been in the industrial sales market for about 20 years now. Um, um, before that I was actually managing um, the business side of four physical therapy offices in the uh, mid Atlantic region and never um, thought that I'd get in sales. Uh, but it was funny because the number of people that I had connections with that said, hey, why aren't you in sales? You got a great personality, you would be really good at it. And this was in my kind of mid-20s. Of course I, like many people not informed about sales, think of typical stereotype like car sales or all the sales types that we, we see as negative, uh, and what it is there. But uh, lo and behold an opportunity presented itself. I took the chance, got uh, involved with a great company, uh, that led me into industrial sales which completely opened my eyes about the idea of having a product or products that customers actually needed. So it wasn't a I'm trying to sell you based on a you think you want this or it's more of a whim purchase. No, it was actually key products that helped facilities run, uh, helped improvements, helped safety, whatever it was. But it led me to realize no actually uh, selling could actually be more problem solving. You could actually truly help a customer improve their business and what they're looking to achieve. And so that got me what started. And so I was with that company for about 12 years and uh, then saw a great opportunity to make a shift and, uh, jumped on board with Edom. Uh, and uh, that's been basically the last seven, eight years of my career. So.

Speaker A: So you made this, um, shift change very early in your career. It was a mental thing. Right. Because a lot of times I don't think that people really realize the barriers we have up that prevent us from even stepping into sales. So when you think about how you kind of see stumbled into this industry versus the things that you're doing now, talk to us about the changes that you've seen in your particular industry over the past decade.

Speaker B: Oh, uh, well, I mean the, the lucky part for me is in both roles and both companies that I've been in, I've been able to work with a multitude of different company types in, in different industries. Whether it's just general manufacturing, uh, aerospace, medical, uh, you name it, it's been basically an industry that I've been able to walk in the doors of. And it's one of those that opened my eyes tremendously to realize, man, there's so much that's different, but the same. And so it was one that I never realized of. Uh, course, like many people watch the TV show, how it's made and you kind of see the behind the curtain side of it.

Speaker A: Yeah.

Speaker B: And to really see it firsthand. But also, again, you're dealing with people and to realize, you know what, yes, this person has a job to do, but it's still a person. And you still just like how you conversate with other people. A lot of times you can have similar conversations that lead to relationship building. You know, it wasn't some like, oh, ah, I got to be sales pitchy or I got to have, you know, these types of skills. It was like, no, uh, have a conversation, ask good questions, and all of a sudden you learn a lot more and, or you leave that meeting and you realize, oh, I need to look more of this up. Let me, let me get better at this or let me get more familiar with this. That just continues to add to your, to your tool belt of, uh, making the next call or meeting the next customer.

Speaker A: That's so good. It's the similarities and the differences. I know when I was in sales, I would one day be at a food manufacturing plant and the next day, um, um, you know, in a plant where they're making medical devices or something. And the thing is, when you're in sales and you're there to solve a problem, you realize that a lot of the people that you're calling on, they have the same problem. It doesn't really matter what they're producing. And so one thing that I often tell salespeople when I do training is it's not your job to know every customer's industry and everything they're doing. You're the expert in what you do and let them be the expert in what they do.

Speaker B: Yeah, exactly. For sure. And, you know, you meet a lot of people in different, in different parts of their career path as well. You know, you may work with individuals that have been with a company for 20 years. You might be talking to somebody that's been there for a week. And so also understanding those challenges of different people, what they might be going through or what they're being tasked to do, uh, you start to have a better understanding. I think empathy is something to, from a sales standpoint, I've always had a, uh, portion of and I've always tried to preach to our teams about understanding what's that customer's scenario. You know, again, if somebody is just starting, they got a lot that they're being thrown at and they might not know everything. And if you can be a, uh, true value to them, more than likely that person's going to carry you on with them through the rest of their career. You know, whether they stay at that company, they go to a new one on the vers side, you know, somebody that has been doing the same for 20 years, but all of a sudden you can help them with this problem that they've had for many years and have always been a pain for them. And now all of a sudden you can truly bring a valued solution to solve that problem. And now all of a sudden you've opened their eyes to, oh, wow, I've kind of always just pushed this away, but there really was an answer for this out there. So I think it's, it's the empathy side of it is truly important.

Speaker A: Yeah, really, you know, stepping into that customized world and realizing that you're there to essentially sell something. But that may not be the problem that is the most pressing. So really asking yourself and uncovering what can I do to help get this person from where they are to where they want to be. And that little magical piece in the middle, that is the place that you build those lifelong customers, those people who come back to you over and over again. You leave a company and they're going with you to the company. You release a new product and they're like, it doesn't matter what it is. If you're selling it, I know it's good. Like, that is how you develop those deep types of relationships and industrial sales. And I think that what I've seen recently is people are making this so transactional, right? It's like, oh, I gotta hit my numbers and so I gotta sell so many widgets and because I had to sell so many widgets I'm just gonna boom, boom, boom, boom, boom. I call it the spray and pray approach. And they don't slow down to really develop that trusted advisor status.

Speaker B: Yeah, I think that. And you've been in this long enough to know the change that E Commerce has put into the market. And a lot of times sales, true field sales reps may feel that pressure. Oh well, this customer, it's only a click away from them on Amazon or some other website. And yes, that has its place and it will always and it will continue to develop. But you're never going to replace a person, a person to person interaction, a person to person relationship because that person, as much as they can get all the information they can on the Internet. Of course now that with AI and what that can bring to it, giving the end user more information, there's still unanswered questions and again you still don't have that. And the other key part to this is are uh, you setting, you know, can you set the expectations? Some of the best relationships I've ever had with customers, you know, especially in field rep work, was being able to set the right expectations that customer already has. Even if they bought from a competitor or they were buying from a different company, they knew how it worked with that company. They've never worked with our company. And so being able to set the expectations, even though sometimes they might not be what they want to hear, but I've clearly set out the right expectations so that way they know how it will work with us. Some of it might be different, some of it different for the better, some of it different, maybe not so much, but at the end of the day they understand that and that again helps to build that relationship. And again it's different than the website. You know, many of us have clicked on something and when it arrived it wasn't quite the way we wanted it or wasn't, uh, shipped in the timely manner as we wished it would have. Uh, but if you have somebody that you can talk with those types during the relationship building, that helps for a great experience. And that's where field reps should understand. I have an advantage. I'm a person, I'm not an E Commerce platform. So what advantages do I have versus an E Commerce that I Don't have to feel like I'm competition with that. I'm bringing a different value to a customer.

Speaker A: And I really think, and I tell a lot of salespeople and people who are really focused on, well, you're telling me that I have to deliver value, give a lot of value, but what if I do all of this and then they go with a cheaper option or they go and they buy it online. I'm like, those aren't your customers like the customer, the people who see get take what you have given them. And they're like, you gave me all this for free. I wonder what would happen if I was a paying customer. That's the person that you really want to focus on because that is who your ideal target is.

Speaker B: Yeah, I think that, I mean, and it sounds like from your background as well as for mine in the industry, yes, it leads to a lot of people could be potential customers. But we all know that not all customers are created equal. And you do could find yourself in a lot of time eaters that really don't bring the value back to you as a salesperson. And this is always a mentality of most salespeople. Oh, well, uh, I don't see myself as the equal value as the customer. And once you do that, then you're going to lose a lot of time. You're going to miss out on a lot of opportunity because they're just going to see you as just something that they can push to the side or that they don't value you and your time. And that's a bad situation to be in. And it's really, it's not to have an ego. It's not to think yourself better than your customer. Of course not. But at the same time, you have a job to do just as they do. And your job is tasked to evaluate to find those right customers for what your company is doing. Okay, maybe your company is based on price point selling. It's possible. Um, but there's other ones that when you know what your customer or what your company is basing what you're selling and what your customer base is, you have to, you have to hone in on that. And that's part of where you should be evaluating that. Early in those first discussions with that new contact, that prospect or that customer, or to even reevaluate existing customers. All of us have had those existing customers that have been the legacy customers and they've done that. And either they all of a sudden just completely disappear from us or we never maximize the potential because we never go in and also maybe do some of this reevaluation.

Speaker A: Yes. Really stepping into like it's not just a one time thing. Right. It's like the win loss reports. You need to do the understanding why they didn't buy from you. What did you do? Well, like it's a repeatable process and once you have your repeatable process, that's when you're off to the races. So tell us about what some of the hardest challenges that you've had to overcome in your career have been.

Speaker B: Well, I mean some have been just uh, different factors. Of course I was selling during the uh, bubble pop and the uh, housing crisis which made a very big impact on the types of customers that we were dealing with. Of course more recently dealing with COVID and even the more recently now with tariffs, uh, which we are actually impacted by a pretty big one that's not been as populated in the news in regards to the aluminum and steel tariffs. So there's always going to be external factors that you're going to have to deal with and be challenges. And usually it's one of those where you either find the people that are really good at what they do and to their core of a sales process and sales focus approach. They'll always find a way to navigate those challenging times. The ones that have been just skating by or just riding the wave of um, the good times, uh, usually those are the ones that struggle. And because it's a more challenging time, you don't have something to fall back with. That is just the grind it out process of. I'm still going to make calls, I'm still going to attack new customers, I'm still going to try to find value, uh, with the customers that I do have and be able to find a way to still be successful in that time. I mean I'm sure you've had it either yourself or colleagues that even in some of the most trying times they still were hitting quota, they were still hitting numbers, they were still exceeding numbers. And there's a way to do it. But the ones that are riding the wave, you'll quickly see those also exit uh, when times aren't tough. So that's been some of the bigger ones, um, just from external factors, uh, from company side of it. Again, sometimes it could be internal. You know, the company that you work with, there might be uh, some situations. You know my, my one main, the first one that I worked with, it uh, was a publicly traded company, very big company, um, well known and, but it was also driven a lot of times by shareholders. And you know, I was a shareholder as working as an employee for the company. But it was one where there was decisions that were made to be able to show a better bottom line number to the shareholders that also became just a big broad, hey, this is what we're doing. Oh, we're going to take maybe hours from your part time staff or we're going to do this and not really looking at the individualized and saying, no, this location is doing really well. We should actually be adding more to them, not taking away. Um, so there's going to be internal challenges as well. The current company with, as I mentioned, it's a joint company, so that's a cultural difference from what they're used to and how they sell and the focus in the EU market versus how we have to attack it in the US market or even Mexico or in the rest of the Americas. So you can have the external and you can also have the internal. And so those are both the ones where no matter what, I've always had core values and the way I've always approached it to be able to fall back on. And guess what? Usually, uh, we've always been able to ride through those waves and still come out very successful on the other side.

Speaker A: Yeah. And you know, you really broke that down very well. And I think that we oftentimes forget about the external. I mean, I think we often forget about the threats. So when I do like a, a grassroots sales training, I teach salespeople how to do a swot and how to do competitive analysis and it's not something that a lot of people even talk about or still do. But those threats are important because you can't do anything about a threat. Like you can't do anything about the economy, you can't do anything about tariffs. Right. You can't do anything about those things, but you need to be aware of them. Why? Because those are the things on the top of the mind of your customers. And you have to figure out, how am I going to strategize around this? How am I? Okay, so I understand that, um, tariffs may be impacting our costs to purchase. So I need to proactively have those conversations with my customers because once our inventory is gone, prices are going to increase. So do I have a good enough handle on my territory, on my customer base, on the places that I know that I can position us to actually go out there and continue to sell? Or have I just been selling on price? Because as you said, this is where we separate the haps from that the ones who know what they're doing and the ones who have no clue.

Speaker B: And that goes to kind of what you mentioned earlier about the transaction. Are you just trying to do transactional sales? Well, guess what? You're going to be the first person not wanting to have hard conversations with your customers. But those sales reps that are willing to guess what, they're going to be the more successful because they're willing to have the hard conversations about an incoming price increase or a situation that's out of their control, but they got to be able to work with their customer to do it. And again, there's been plenty of times where I've had the hard conversations with customers that we weren't the fit. In that moment, in that opportunity, we were not the fit. But being open and honest about that and helping with the expectations also then came back full circle to the right fit. That was a right opportunity, in many cases was even a bigger sale, dollar amount, you know, so there's a lot to it. Uh, but being able to also go in and have the hard conversations and having that confidence to do it is a attribute that sales need to have.

Speaker A: Yes, I completely agree. I think that it's the more, you know, the, the more you position yourself, the more you build off your previous experience. And really, just like, it's all about stepping into the customer's world. I love to say nobody cares about you or your company and why you're great. I care about me and so does everybody else. Right. Like, we all care about ourselves. And so I think really helping salespeople understand that is key. Key. So in industrial sales, there are many different ways that teams can be structured. How is your team currently structured so

Speaker B: very similar to many groups? Um, we're a smaller, uh, outfit here in that we have about 90 employees within the U.S. out of that, 20 are within sales roles. Um, we break it down where we have a group that is key account focused. So of course, like many groups of what's a key account, it's a, a very large company that you're doing substantial business with and typically need a, uh, primary focus. So we have members that are in key account. We also then have our regional sales managers who are based in geographic territories. They're focused on many different customers within that region. And then something that came out of COVID which, uh, as we know there again about being able to adjust was the ability not to walk in the door. You know, we weren't able to just go walk in any customer. And so all of a sudden Here comes the zooms, here comes the teams, here comes all these online meetings, which typically may have been a phone call in the past, uh, or was just a drive around your bread route to kind of just stop in and see people that really weren't valuable meetings. You probably lost a lot of time doing those drives. And now all of a sudden we're doing these online meetings and now realizing, wait, you can conduct the full sale process online without actually even setting foot in the door. Was it the answer to all? No. And that's why you still need the field reps, you still need key account management. But what it did create, which is a position we call digital sales, and these are team members that really kind of think of as a regional sales manager without the call, you know, so they're not losing windshield time to go drive to different customers. But they're able to conduct a lot of online meetings at a very high level. Um, these I try to explain as these need to be the digital experts. They need to be able to share screens, do, uh, online sharing, being able to conduct a very professional online meeting. So lighting has to be very good, the audio has to work. They need to be the experts. So you feel like, hey, these team members, not only do they know the product, they know how to ask great questions, but man, this feels like a real professional online meeting. And that's where we saw a key for that position to come. And then we also have what would be our typical inside sales as well, who's also helping to do a lot of order processing, back office type of administration work, uh, for our, for our sales process. So that's how we're broken down.

Speaker A: So tell me more about. Because I've never heard the digital sales, um, expert. So how do you go about determining whether this person, this uh, prospect, let's say it's the inbound lead, how do they, you know, if they're going to a regional key account manager that's in the field versus a digital salesperson.

Speaker B: So the nice thing is because it's so digital and we want to be so quick with leads, our digital sales is actually conducting most all of our leads, uh, qualification day one. So m, they're already kind of starting that, uh, that process. If it's an existing, if it's a lead where it's an existing company that's already assigned, we automatically put them, uh, in front of the managers that uh, own those accounts. But for the digital sales, we've also created checklists. We've created kind of a qualifying when you make that first meeting, we need you to do the, you know, where your investigation hat you got to ask a lot of these questions so we can figure out what is the best need for this customer. And it's not a need of product, it's a need of person, like, who is the best from our team to support that. And so we have a lot of qualifying questions that will help to give us a breakdown of, you know, what kind of opportunities are they looking for, what are their pain points, um, where are they located, what level of decision, or where do they fit in their company? And so once we go through these, we have then the ability to kind of say, yes, this needs to be put to the key account team. This needs to go to our, uh, regional sales managers. This needs to go. Or this could just be supported by digital sales. And one of the things I will say is pretty key is, is the speed of what the customer needs. If they are in a very tight timeline, we can't lose on, hey, okay, well, the regional sales manager can drive four hours to go, see you, uh, two days from now. That's not fast enough. And so to be able to work with that speed where you can still have a person that's conducting it, that's why this digital sales role is key. And so a lot of those opportunities they'll take. We also have a lot of regions where we don't have a regional sales manager, so they can support and kind of help that organic growth, uh, for now. And then maybe eventually, then we can see, yes, we'll put a regional sales manager, uh, in that market.

Speaker A: Okay. So I want to make sure I understand what this, this process looks like, because it's actually different than I've, um, heard before. So it seems like your digital sales, um, team, they're the first person to touch that inbound lead. Right. So they qualify them, they figure out which, uh, avenue they need to be cordoned off to. Then either they hold on to them or they are assigned to a regional sales manager. And then when it's the proposal phase, getting the quotes out phase, then it sends off to an inside salesperson. Is that right?

Speaker B: Yes. Yep. So we do have some groups, some in the group that have full capability. So like the digital sales team, they can do their own quotes, they can do their own, uh, processing key, uh, account. They actually have a person from digital sales who just works solely within the key account, is supportive of that, helping with quoting or proposals. And then the regional sales managers, they're reliant on the inside sales, and the Reason being is because they lose so much time in being, traveling and going through there that they can always work on that and then hand it off. That can be work and being done while they're on the travel to the next customer or to the next sales meeting. So that's why we've kind of put some things in place that don't seem uh, as, as normal as a lot of companies may do. But uh, we found good success with it. But it has its challenges. You have to have a very clean process. You have to be well organized for it to work. Uh, it does create some gaps, it can create some frustrations here and there. But once you get it smoothed out, uh, it can be very efficient and very functional.

Speaker A: I like that. That's pretty cool. So you mentioned that there can be some gaps and challenges. What are some of those gaps and challenges that you guys are still working through um, with that structure?

Speaker B: Well, one part of it is just covering the U.S. you know, again it's, we're, we're a company that's been around for, well next year will be 50 years. So it's not like we're new, but we actually are fairly young to the US market and you know, we're privately owned company so we're not backed by a lot of shareholder investment and being able to just go ahead and add a lot of headcount. So we're trying to do it as strategically as we can, as efficiently as we can. So some of the challenges are just we don't really have somebody that can work there. The other side of it is that we have a very, as simple as it is. And as I mentioned, kind of like basically think of industrial Legos, you know, at the premise it's very simple, but there is a lot of technical that go into this, especially if you're working with a client on an actual design, custom design solution that's uh, really going to support uh, a multitude of uh, application needs. And so you need people to be very good at their product knowledge, very good at our processes, having problem solving skills, great communication skills. So what we typically see is when we bring on a new salesperson, there is about a 6 to 12 month uh, you know, startup onboarding really to get them to a point where they can be about an equal level as many of their peers. So we know that that takes time. So that's a challenge. And that's a challenge. No matter, you know, we're looking at better ways of how do we improve the onboarding process, how do we improve continuous Education, how do we improve, uh, what they're seeing, uh, every day. And so we are looking at things like how does AI play into that, how does some new technology help us to increase the speed of the expert level of our sales team that we want them to have. So as you said, you can't be, uh, uh, an expert at everything. You know, I don't need you to have engineering skills, but I need you to kind of have a basic knowledge. I don't need you to be the most technical product expert, but you gotta kind of know kind of what could fit to what a customer might be needing. So it's challenges like that.

Speaker A: And so as you're thinking about, you know, the dichotomy of your sales team, like you mentioned some AI, you mentioned some onboarding, um, investments. What do you think the, or what are the, the levers that you're pulling today to help you get your team to where they need to be?

Speaker B: So obviously, you know, all of us know CRMs. Um, anybody that's in sales has probably heard, you know, if you haven't heard the term CRM, just wait, somebody's going to tell you about it soon. Yeah, um, but I think that some of the things that, you know, I've been dealing with CRMs for a long time and it was a very cumbersome, very like your late nights as you're entering all the information in, you know, partly just so upper management can kind of see that you're doing what you need to, but also really for your own notes to that way you could be organized and the next time you talk to that customer, you know, but it was still very manual. You still had to put out a calendar reminder or put something to remind you of checking back in with that customer or what have you. Now with technology, what it's actually helping to do is to give a better tool for, for a salesperson, you know, now so much of it is almost just a click away that you can set a reminder that basically will tell you, hey, you're sending an email to your contact and if they don't email you back in two days, it's going to automatically remind you, oh, hey, they never emailed you back. Well, guess what, Follow up is key. So I'm going to call this contact because they didn't email me back. Okay. There could be reasons why, but the biggest thing I don't want to have happen is just it go away from my mind. And now I look back six months from now, go, oh crap, I never reached back out to that person. And now all of a sudden you found out that the competition swooped in, they got this nice proposal or they got this nice project that had you been able to keep it front of mind and in a nice scheduled sequence, you would have been probably the one to win that opportunity. And so the way technology is helping to make a tool like a CRM, um, more end user friendly to the salesperson is just becoming so great. And there's other programs, I mean there's multitudes of CRM programs out there. A lot of them are keeping it simple, which is great. You know, simplicity helps us on the sales side for sure, but it's, there's a lot of data behind the simple. And so it's making sales, uh, professionals more adept to their job, keeping things in front of mind, but also helping them with time management as well. Again, we do a lot in sales and many people don't realize how long the days can be and how much you're trying to cram in into a day. And a lot of times, you know, you're putting things that are not as valuable in some key hours in your day and this is helping to keep that more within that time schedule.

Speaker A: Yeah, I, um, I was, I feel like I was an anomaly as a salesperson because I love the CRM. Like I really did like it because I, at any given moment I would have like 100, 250 open opportunities. I couldn't remember all that stuff in my brain, right? And so I'm putting all the things in there so I can remember who just had a baby or who is a Knicks fan. Like all those little small details and. Oh, okay. They mentioned in passing they're opening a new plan in two years. Okay, let me get the new contact for that. Like it was this web that I couldn't keep in my brain. And so I try to explain that to salespeople when we work together because I think it's important them to understand that this helps you make more money. Like a, uh, CRM is not a tool for management to babysit you. They could care less really what you're doing or how often you're talking to someone. But it helps you make more money because like you said, if you ignore this hot opportunity and the competitor sweeps in after you spent two or three months, then you let it go cold. You lost stuff. Right. So I do think that, and I know with all the tools and technology out there helping salespeople, being able to update in the field, being able to really do things quickly, not having to pull their laptop up. Because after you've been in the field all day, I don't want you up until 10 o' clock updating stuff. Right. Like that, that balance. So I think that as we continue to lean into technology, we're going to find ways that we're going to, um, really enable the salespeople to do more, more with what they, the tools that they already have.

Speaker B: Yeah, I would, I would say if anybody, especially a younger field rep, but even once it still have, you know, a good 10, you know, 10 years of career path still in front of them. If you don't understand AI, start learning about it. Because the faster you understand that it's not to replace you, it's to actually help support you and make you better. You're going to see a multitude of ways then how it can help you either maybe be more efficient with your time, maybe be able to bring better, uh, expertise to your customers. There's going to be a lot of advantages for it and you can't just bypass it because it's also going to start to be embedded in so many things. Uh, for anybody that's Microsoft users, you know, Copilot is quite big now with that. Of course everybody knows ChatGPT, but everybody's kind of using it as glorified browsers and okay, everything's got to play around with it. Uh, you and I have been around long enough to remember when the Internet started into what it was like at first and now what it's become, of course. But these are things that you got to learn to start to use it because it's an advantage for you. If you want to have something that helps put money in your pocket, guess what? It's going to allow you to make more calls, more value calls, be more efficient with your time, which leads to, uh, dollars. That's, there's no other way around it.

Speaker A: Yeah. And I think that the sooner people adopted and stop putting their head in the sand, the faster that they'll be on the verge of using and understanding it. And even I think about something like LinkedIn, um, a lot, especially in field sales. A lot of field sales reps still don't use it and they don't realize like how that you don't have to be there for 10 hours a week, like can you do 30 minutes twice a week and staying in front of your customers. And it's the same thing with AI because it's so rapidly changing. And what I find is people who use it, right, they see so much success. But when People first start using it, they use it so wrong and then they get frustrated with it and they're like, this sounds like a robot. You got to trade it like, just like anything else, it's not out of the box ready for you to use well.

Speaker B: And that actually brings up a good thing. And I think this is a good one for the field reps out there that are trying to start using it. You know, don't let it be replacing you in the fact of, uh, don't have it. Write all of your emails. Can it help you with some of the things to be more efficient? Absolutely. But guess what's going to happen is it's going to sound very, very professional, almost robotic. And now you're going to go do that on site meeting, that in person meeting and now that person's going to say, you sound nothing like your email. And all of a sudden it's going to be, you're going to lose that personal side, which again I think as we know, the relationship, the relationship portion is so critical and so key. You made a great comment about putting in your CRM about, you know, somebody just had a baby or something like that. I would almost be challenged people to say, how many times have you reached out to a customer or contact and it was nothing sales related, it was just that you had heard something before and you just want to say, hey, congratulations on the new grandchild or hey, you know, I bet you today, that's right, today, big day. You got that graduate that's graduating high school today. You know, wishing you the best of luck. Those go a long way in building relationships with people that they understand. You listen to what I say, you know, you heard me, you listened to me and you just were kind enough to reach back out and again that back to that empathy side to reach back out and just say, hey, I'm not here to sell to you today. I'm here just to say congratulations or hey, I heard about that. Unfortunate. Very sorry, condolences. You know, whatever it is, you bring that personal side to it and all of a sudden you're starting to build relationships.

Speaker A: Yeah. And I. It's. And that is how you blend the human and the technology. And that is the perfect thing, that is the perfect way to do it because I think that. And so here's a great way that you use AI for that example. Building on it, I met with my customer last week and they mentioned that their son is graduating on this day. What's a good gift that I could give them? What's a good like what would be outside of the box, right? Like, if you can't think about, like, use it to give you good ideas. And they could say, oh, maybe you can do this, this and that and then you do it. But you don't have to take an email that says, hi, I am so excited. And so it's the human element. Using the human element with technology, I think is the most important thing that we as field salespeople need to lean into. Because what I find in the work that I do is manufacturing, distribution. Anybody who's in the field, like, it's just not a thing. Like it doesn't matter what it is, it's just not a thing. And most times people are scared of it and most times they don't know how to use it well. And so I think it's our responsibilities as leaders to break it down, to help them understand how this helps you and not say, we're going to do this full day CRM training and tomorrow you're going to be a CRM, um, expert, because that never works. But give them some small building blocks so they figure out how to use things well.

Speaker B: At the same time, I think that any, any field rep, because I did this, and I'm sure you did this as well, you also need to do self investment. You know, it's going to be, if this is your career and this is the path, you can't be afraid or expect your company that you work for to just basically always hand you, uh, the next tools or the next things to help make you better. You got to be willing to educate yourself, be open to looking at, you know, there's so many great, uh, sales trainings that are out in the market right now. There's a lot of great information. Now just on the flip side, there's a lot of junk that's out there too, don't get me wrong. But there are some really great, uh, groups out there that you, as an individual salesperson, you could invest in yourself. Whether it's time just reading a book or it's spending some more doing some online courses or, you know, again, looking at the technology, I know a ton of people that, you know, a lot of people have the basic membership program for our plan for ChatGPT, you know, and they, but they did it themselves because you use it for personal use as well. But at the same time it's like, hey, my company may not pay, let me make that investment. Because if that little investment helps me make 10 more sales a month or puts X amount of dollars more for me per year, guess what, it's worth the investment. So don't be afraid to invest in yourself.

Speaker A: Absolutely. When I started in sales, I was a chemist, came straight out of the lab. I was like, I don't know what I'm doing. And back in those days I had CDs that I would buy and I would listen to as I'm going between call. I would attend seminars, I was reading books because there was nothing like my company didn't do anything. They gave me product knowledge, but they didn't give me any sales skills. And I was like, I want to be good. How can I be good? How can I become good? How can I become better? Like I remember one of the courses that I took, it was this advanced negotiation skills. And that helped me still today to become, I'm a good negotiator. And so I think that when you invest in yourself especially, especially in anything that's going to make you better as a salesperson, as a leader, like any of those things, the return on Your investment is 10, 20, 100x. Like you really can't put value on what an investment into your development will be.

Speaker B: And I would say that especially for, you know, again, a lot of your listeners that are in a more of a field rep position now but has aspirations to becoming a, a sales leader or moving up. Start investing in yourself, start to understand, start reading management books, start to read technology, take leadership books. You know, look at individuals that are extremely successful and read about them because you're going to get insight that either one is going to actually open your eyes to being like, oh yeah, I really don't want to be a sales leader. I just want to be the number one salesperson that we have on this team. That's what I want. Because now, you know, kind of what you'd be going into. And so some people might say, yep, that's exactly what it was what I wanted to do. I wanted to be more of a sales leader than uh, anything else. And uh, but there's other people that say, you know what? Now I'd just rather be number one in sales every year. And I'll keep building on that. So if you, if you do have those aspirations, get out there, get some knowledge, start reading into this to better understand. Because not all companies provide that. That's, that is a very big gap still in many companies, especially on the sales side about like not lacking mentor programs or really giving kind of somebody that could be a potential sales leader, uh, the right opportunity, the right knowledge.

Speaker A: That's Good. I feel like that, that is the note that we should end on investing in yourself, and especially if you have aspirations to go into leadership. Because it really isn't all this cracked up to be. If you're not wired for it, right, you get paid less money, you have more stress and more responsibility. But if you really thrive on helping and seeing other people and, uh, develop, if you really say, I don't want to spend as much time in the field like, then you, it may be a good fit for you, but you don't know unless you learn about it before you step into the position. Because one of the worst things you can do is stick step into a management position. And you haven't done any of your own research. You haven't. You just have this idea of what management is. It goes well for no one. No one ever.

Speaker B: And usually the company actually ends up in a bad spot because you lose kind of twice. You lose, who was your probably number one sales rep, and now you've lost the sales management. So now you got to replace two people. Whereas if it was kind of right person, right seat, it could have went very well. But yeah, again, for any of the field reps out there that have that aspiration, start getting knowledge about it, start to better understand. Go to your boss or go to your management, uh, group and ask, you know, what's your day like? What does your day look like? What kind of things do you have to do in your role? And start to see, does that fit to really what you want? And, uh, help you make the right decision?

Speaker A: That's so good. Open your mouth and start that conversation and let them know. Because I think a lot of times, uh, in leadership, when somebody comes to you and tells you they want to be a manager, like, we don't have a position. Well, thanks so much for joining us and providing us your time, talent and expertise today. This was a fantastic episode.