What Changed B2B Sales Forever with Gail Kasper

Simon: Welcome back to the sales show, everyone. The average buyer today has done more research before your first call than most salespeople do in the in their entire deal. So what's actually in charge of the sale? You or them? My guest, Gail Casper has spent decades studying exactly this shift, and she's got a surprising answer. Welcome, Gail.

Gail Casper: Hi, Simon. I'm excited to be here. This is awesome.

Simon: We are all about sales. We love sales. And whatever is changing, we want to know it now. You just wrote a full book about it, so let's do it. What is the big shift? What's changing?

Gail Casper: And the essence of the structure of the sales process is there. So it's there, but we've shifted back from online to face to face. So more relationship building, more contact that's visual versus doing behind the scenes, versus sending messages through LinkedIn. It really is turning more into a face to face interaction. And the level of our presentation has to be that much higher. We have to be presenting the value, our value proposition, the relationship building. All of the things that are, in essence, the critical pieces of the sales process have been taken up a notch. So we're not just able to just go in and wing it anymore. We really have to have a plan, have gone through that plan, have thought about it, have gone through the process, have scripted out how it could potentially look and move that process forward.

Simon: Everything is transparent now. When people look us up, they see the reviews, they see LinkedIn comments, they see everything. Right. Does that help the salesperson or hurt them?

Gail Casper: Right now, uh, looking somebody up to get the details helps you. It's always going to help you, but we always want to make sure that it stays current. So if you have new reviews, new testimonials, new thoughts, new posts, new information that you want to share online, make sure that you were keeping up with it. There's such a thing as consistency that is key. So, uh, sometimes people will say, well, you know what? I don't get the chance to post that much. What's more critical is that you're doing it consistently. So if it's once a week, you do it once a week. If it's twice a week, you do it twice a week. Make sure it's current, it's there, you're consistently doing it. So the people have that internal clock and they say they can anticipate it, they can see it, and that's where we really build the following. We start to build more credibility and people start to reach out to us.

Simon: Your latest book is Sell Like a Cockatoo. What can we learn from a bird?

Gail Casper: Uh. Oh my gosh. I know, right? All right. So the reason people say, why cockatoo? Why cockatoo? Two main reasons for cockatoo. First of all, they have 60 year lives. So when we stop and think today, okay, what's my goal, my ultimate goal? I want to have a customer that's going to be around for 60 years. And that's obviously the extreme version. But we want to make sure that we have long term customers and cockatoos are around for a very long time. The other piece of that is that cockatoos dance. So when I say dance, the sales process is really a dance. What is your body language saying? Your tone of voice saying? What are your words saying? Because when we are in that sales presentation, the customer is picking up on all of that. And inside that book, there are 50 plus body language and tone of voice techniques that you can put to use immediately to create more rapport, to create the relationship that you're looking for.

Simon: I have seen a, uh, lot of sales recordings where the conversation went wrong and people did not pick up on the body language. What are the most common body language mistakes that you're seeing? Clues people don't see, don't look at?

Gail Casper: Yeah. Um, and at the end of that, I want to give you one that they do look at. That is a good sign. But some of the things that, let's say that you're involved in a conversation with a customer and they all of a sudden back up in their chair, so they lean back. Uh, that is a sign that now they've separated themselves and there's a lack of interest. If they start to cover their mouth or their nose, meaning now they're starting not to trust you, not to believe you. If they're blinking rate increases, it is a sign that they either don't understand what you're saying or they don't believe what you're saying. The same is if somebody takes their glasses and puts them on the tip of their nose, they don't believe what you're saying. You may have seen people that furrow their eyebrows, their eyes get real squinty. Now that they're questioning you, they're wondering what's going on. Um, they might get fidgety. You know, you might see them like clicking a pen. You know, they, they're, they're either anxious about something or they're challenged about something. And for any of these reactions, we want to make sure that we are in a spot to stop, to slow down, because we have a Tendency as sales representatives to just keep talking. Because if we keep talking, maybe we can get them through it. We actually have to do the opposite, slow down the process, say to them, you know what? I feel like you're thinking about something. I feel like there's something going on in your mind. What is that? Uh, Did I say something that threw you off? We are looking for how to slow it down so that we can get them back on board with rapport in the relationship. And the thing that I was going to say to you, that is a sign of interest of wanting to buy is them asking more questions, them thinking. So the hand on the chin. Hand on the chin is they're actually trying to figure out a way to say yes to you, but they don't want to say yes very quickly. So in a situation like that, we want to make sure that we continue to sell the process, the value proposition, and ask them questions to keep them involved in it and eventually go for that close.

Simon: What's the role of emotions in sales?

Gail Casper: It's terrible. It's good and bad because, uh, emotions, if you see your customers super excited and that, wow, you feel like, oh, my God, they want to buy. They're in. They're in. We have a tendency as sales representatives to think, uh, that, okay, I got this closed. I'm going to skip over steps of the sales process when we shouldn't be doing that. So a lot of times we see that positive emotion from a customer. We skip over steps of the sales process. We get to the point of the close, and the customer puts up their. The wall and says, I have to think about it. So emotion can be a negative thing. Emotion can also be a negative thing in terms of, okay, I'm out there cold calling, or I'm trying to reach customers, they're not getting back to me. I'm exhausted. I feel like I keep getting punched in the face over and over and over again. And, uh, you know, I feel like I'm not getting anywhere. Uh, I just. I don't feel like doing it today. That's emotion Logic is you have the plan in place? I have something called the Systematic attitude development Technique. It's another one of my books, um, Unstoppable six easy steps to find and achieve your fire. That entire book is about the systematic attitude development technique. Because the key to success is really having that plan and following that plan. Regardless of how you feel, you make that plan. You prioritize it in terms of what are the things that, if you did them, would produce the greatest Positive results in your life and you tackle it. I mean, think about emergency personnel. They don't run from a gunshot wound. They are trained to manage it. Our military personnel, they have been trained at the highest level to deal with stress. They just go through a very logical approach. And we need to do the same thing in sales.

Simon: Same thing. And you are very athletic. I think for people who do a lot of sports, it's normal. Like, we don't wait until we feel to go to the gym. We go to the gym because we know we will feel better afterwards. And then it became. It becomes easier, right?

Gail Casper: Yeah. And, you know, I don't know that it's ever easy. I can't say, like, I, I. You get into a good habit of going, um, but there are days that I would just be like, you know what? I can get so much more done in my morning if I don't go today. But yet, you know, the health element, you know, the fitness portion of it is so important, and it is a part of my job. So it becomes discipline, instilling discipline to do it. But you're absolutely right. You say to yourself, okay, I don't feel like going to the gym. But then you go, you're glad you did. You feel good that you did. You feel good about yourself. You feel good if you just have a regular meal versus, oh, my God, you know, did I eat too much today? So it's so important that we stick to those plans and exercise discipline from

Simon: the body to something completely without the body. AI, Is this actually helping business owners with sales or. Or is it a hype?

Gail Casper: Um, I would say it's absolutely helping, but it's how you utilize it. Meaning I wouldn't want to use AI to put my letters together. I want the letters in, like, a letter to come from me. I want it to have that personal feel that I'm connected to whoever it is that I'm talking to. So if I get little messages online that people are selling me something, it just turns me off. There's no connection to me with that. So letters, I would say, is certainly use it for grammatical issues, grammatical changes, but we want to keep things simple. AI sometimes can make things very complicated. The other part of AI, though, that I love is the research piece. So you want to do a competitive analysis. You want to come up with different alliances that perhaps you can pursue, different opportunities that you can pursue. Like, that's a great resource. AI is like, like papa bear, man. It's got everything there for you, and it brings that summary together. So that you can then move forward and build more business for yourself. So, and it's also a great resource just to give you that pat on the back. You could go in there and say, okay, I've done this, this, and this. And it's going to give you other ideas. So stimulate the ideas, refine those ideas through your thoughts, through what you bring, so that you can go out there with AI Completely equipped and armored up.

Simon: What's the one question that most salespeople never think to ask, but they should?

Gail Casper: That's a good question. One question that, uh, salespeople don't ask, that they should. M. It's so different for so many different sales representatives because we all have a tendency to want to go to the value prop. And this is something I see over and over again. Meaning, uh, you know, a customer might say, you know, this is my challenge. This is what I'm going through. And I'm like, oh, my God, this is great. You know, I have the product that can fix this. So instead of staying in, questions like, tell me more about that. You know, so what's going on? So what's the problem that occurred? So instead of digging deep, which I talk about a lot in Cockatoo, digging deep to get to that return on investment so that that customer feels the problem, feels the challenge, feels the cost of that challenge, and then you come in later with that solution. So the biggest challenge I see with sales reps is that we, we're ready to go for the sale. We hear the problem, Boom, I got the solution. Let's talk about it. Slow it down. Get back to more questionings, Find out what happened. If you can get that customer. This is one of my secret tools, but I'm going to give it to you, Simon.

Simon: Guys, guys, it's the secret tool. Take your notepad.

Gail Casper: Evidence stories. Evidence stories. If you can get that customer to tell the story about the problem, and then later on, you're the one that fixed that problem, you're going to then take that information to your next sales call. So now you have a story of how you fix the same problem for someone else and the details that go behind that. You want to build as many evidence stories as you possibly can so that because the evidence stories are selling for you, you don't have to do it. So there's my secret tool that sales reps haven't been doing.

Simon: Guys, evidence stories. And.

Gail Casper: And I think you're the first podcast I shared that on. So, Simon, you're special.

Simon: You heard it here first, guys, when you Hear it's too expensive. What's actually happening?

Gail Casper: Well, sometimes to them, it may be that it feels too expensive, but what they're really telling you is, I don't see the value. That's what they're saying. They're saying, you know, what is the cost, whatever, but I don't see the value. So, I mean, that's an objection. It's a common objection. But my rule for objections is that you have to have three comebacks before you ever decide that you're going to negotiate price. Three comebacks. And those three. Two of those three are really revolved around your value proposition. How do you turn it? You know? Okay, you're saying it's too expensive in which way, Mr. Customer, which part of it? Because one of the things that we talked about is I bring X, Y and Z to the table, and my competitors don't do that. Well, it's still too expensive. Well, I totally get that. I understand that. But you also had mentioned to me that you're experiencing this challenge and it's costing you time in the process. What's the cost of that time? Because when we come in and we save you that time, in the long run, it's going to save you money. So we've got to make sure that we have those comebacks so that the customer can feel that, wait a minute. There's value here. Because if you relinquish and you go to price right away and you all of a sudden start negotiating, what you said is, there's no value to my product. There's no value to my company. All this is is numbers. So sell. You get back to value.

Simon: What's. Which chapter of your new book is most alive for you?

Gail Casper: Um, I would say, uh, the chapter on questioning is most alive for me. Just because we have a tendency to talk more than listen and to stay in the listening mode, regardless of what they. They say to you. But to stay in listening until you have gotten all the information, all the needs and the wants, that deep dig, deep questions in terms of return on investment. Until you have gotten all that information, you can't possibly talk about your product. And there is one more. When I talk about value proposition, because, um, one of the things that's different today is that you've got to know your value proposition, that you could recite it in the middle of a marching band. You've got to know it so well. I go into companies. One of my specialties is customization. So I customize it at a super high level, meaning I'm going to go in. I know your value proposition, I know your products, I know how to ask the question questions based around your products. I know the objections you're going to face. I can give you the tools on handling those objections, but I don't want to know your value proposition better than you. It should never be that I go into a company and I know it better than you do. So to sit down and say, take the time, you know, what's the history behind this organization? What's the history behind the products? How are they made? What makes them different? What do I bring to the table as a sales representative to refine all those tools, write it down, memorize it. And you know what, Simon? You're going to get people that say, I don't want to sound scripted, I don't want to sound scripted. I get that you're going to sound scripted until you know it. But when you know it, you start to add yourself into it, then you're not thinking about words anymore. Then the script is gone. It's a part of you. So if it's a part of you, you start to add more of yourself into it. And that takes time. So one of the biggest challenges I see with sales reps, they don't want to give it that time. You got to give it the time. You got to give it the time. In the prep.

Simon: How do you work with your clients? Is it more coaching or training? Is there a specific cadence or duration?

Gail Casper: It could be because I customize. It is everything from a keynote speech to a multi day program, depending on what the needs are and what they're looking for. So one of the first things that we do is we sit down and we just say, okay, let's take a look at your team. What are some of the challenges that going on and uh, what are some of your goals and objectives with that team? And from there I design a program, whether that is a half day, full day, uh, multi day program. And you know, I will then go and not only interview managers, but I'll talk to the team themselves to find out what's working, what's not, how things are going. And then from there the program is developed, it is written, it is customized specifically for them, which means that I do not have two programs that are alike. There are no two companies, two challenges that are the same. So I look at every single company on an individual basis to be able to customize specifically for them and address those issues and then give the tools to the sales reps so that they're in a spot, that they feel empowered and that they also feel like somebody gets them. So it's a lot of time, Simon. It's a. It's a lot of time to prepare for presentations, but it is specifically designed, whether it's the length of the time frame and what the contents are for the client. And I will incorporate, by the way, coaching into that. Um, I am also an executive coach, so there is an opportunity where, you know, a manager will say to me, have a specific sales rep. They're challenged in terms of building business. Can you help them build more confidence with that? Give them the tools to be able to build.