“HUBs” and Working Through the Sales Funnels, 3 Sources + Carbs and Games (having fun, being memorable)

A lot of salespeople chase deals, I always wanted to establish “Hubs,” or deals / contacts that can lead to many deals. I have often heard this called “Centers of Influence,” but that strikes me as a bit chasing and hollow. In my mind, these are people you can sell to / service once, but they can facilitate you getting deals again and again. In copied sales it may have been a Controller or COO, in office moving service sales it was a building manager or Project Manager for a major publically traded Commercial Real Estate firm. In Insurance, it’s realtors flipping homes, or fractional accounting firms for startups. These folks can turn one deal into “many.”

I half-joke that you have to survive your first year in most sales roles, years, 2-3 you’re “known,” and my 5 you’re the “man” or “woman” for your need in that circle. People have to see / know you for a bit. In office moves my Dad would say we’re just waiting for someone to drop the ball. Everyone hates copiers and nobody knows anything about them my old copier sales manager would say, and in Insurance, we’re looking for some boilerplate coverage that no thought went into to pick apart. For the Insurance side, meaningful savings, better coverage or a chance to turn insurance into a profit center’s our in.

In startups, the famous question is your startup building an Aspirin or a Vitamin? Are you surprised and delighted? Or are you taking away pain. Startups that take away pain are powerful. Randy Schwantz coined the term “The Wedge” in Insurance sales, as you’re driving a wedge between your client and the competition. It’s all about leverage. Ideally, you keep it above board, I have heard of people using company financial gossip or getting the terms left on a lease to dust up a pain point of fear too.

When you’re selling try and avoid ever feeling like you’re done or the deals wrapped up. Especially early in my career, I’d have my point of contact “sold,” but I wouldn’t realize the real decision maker was up the chain or not who I dealing with. It’d feel like I lost the deal last minute, but I never had the right person sold. Deals aren’t done until they’re done. Be leary of false summits. The money’s not yours until it hits the bank, even then it’s a good idea to leave some cushion / time. Clawed-back deals and commissions can hurt. Try and spend a fraction of money you didn’t see coming on. a big Commision check, and get back to it.

At the height of my moving sales days I have two good sources, Project Managers and Building Managers. Maybe 10 years later a good mentor bud of mine on the Insurance side mentioned having 3 uncorrelated deal sources. That way if the economy tanks one, you still have two legs to stand on, but you’re also not being a jack of all trades, master of none. In insurance this in particularly important because the knowledge is so nuanced. I see the logic in how my moving sales pipeline worked. We were card collecting cold calling savages around 2009/2010, so my copier sales days were a bit of a different beast, but I could see 3 associations or industry groups really working there too.

Last but not least, make it fun and be polite. This sh_t is hard and work is boring. Everyone can use a treat and a little “upbeat” energy around them. Don’t be manic, but solve your personal problems as best you can with friends, family, exercise, maybe even a therapist. You’ve gotta be ready to play the sales game. People love sweet and savory unexpected snacks. My Godfather used to sell packing materials, he’s drop fun trinkets and cards because “everyone’s board.” I think things have shifter with technology a bit, but the principal is the same, surprise and delight your prospects! We can all use a little cheer.


The Wedge - https://shop.thewedge.net/products/the-wedge%C2%AE

Finance lesson learned

Finance lesson learned (finally):


The bank doesn’t want your house. The bank doesn’t want your company.

They want to live off of the difference of the cost of money to them and what they can lend it to you at.

They’ll lend you the money if they think you can pay them back.

If you can get an asset that can do X, you can pay back X over time, and maybe not make extra money in that period. But once paid back the cashflow is yours.

If you can 2x + the sales of the company you’re paying back 1 X on, you’re doing doing awesome. You’re buying infrastructure then trying to level it up.


Side note on my impression of Private Equity:

Private Equity comes in with playbooks and technology to level-up mom and pop companies, but sometimes they get over their skies.

PE raises capital, buys companies, borrows money through the companies they buy to ideally to build towards much bigger company (multiple) exit “platform” than the small companies can do on their own. Higher big company value.


In summation:

Not all debt is bad. If you’ve earned traditional business credit is means smart concervative people trust you. I am sure there are plenty of bad actors aggressive lenders too. Borrower beware.

Try and Keep Them Out of Your Pockets and Stay Cool

I am not saying anything new or revolutionary here.  Management / Ownership may try and f_ck with your comp plan, don’t worry, it’s always for your betterment.  They may try and take deals that they’re excited about that are “above your level” too.  It’s going to be very frustrating.  Try and keep your cool.

Friends have moved from very good companies because of this.  I have lost “startup” relationships because of this.  You can move on, you can quit, but try and do whatever you’re going to do, or make whatever argument you’re going to make from a “locus of control.”  The worst thing you can do with any bully is let them know they’ve got you on tilt.

They may still change the comp plan, you may still have to give up some parts of a deal. Fight for it though! I am not the best at this.  I have been caught sending way too many texts, try and talk to people.  If you can’t get the convo to surface, it’s risky, but you may need to loop in a reasonable 3rd party to get the conversation to happen, but it’s usually best to handle these issues cooly and 1:1.

I have friends and my brothers that are much better at me at this.  This is not some Alpha bro telling you to punch people in the mouth.  Just know in the game of sales, people are going to try and take your cookies.  They may win, but make sure they at least think about it before coming through to take what’s yours again.

On the flip side of the coin, don’t be too sensitive, and sometimes there are bigger things and needs for the company or egos at play.  Try and “read” the situation and react accordingly, don’t bottle it up too long and “pop” unproductively.  Try and stay in control.

The Internal Game of Sales - Staying at The Table

There’s a lot of talk of sales tactics and strategy, cadences, AI, CRMs, and tracking, but besides “smile while you dial,” I haven’t heard too much talk of the internal game of sales since Dale Carnegie. The classics would talk about mindset, Napolean Hill, OG Mandango, but I feel like the more recent sales books would talk more about the internet, tools, etc. Maybe it’s a fad chase? Anyways, take care of yourself.

I am not sure if it was my Dad who I sold with for 6 years or Dale Carnegie, but “people like working with happy successful people” has always bounced around in my head. I am not saying you can have problems, but sort them out with friends and loved ones and get back in the game. Know which “sales” friends you can have fun and gab with about your personal life too.

Sales is innately hard and polar, you are going to be high and low, plus you may have to present a “false” personality at times, and that can be taxing emotionally. As best you can, try and stay as true to your character as you can for the long game. I do think salespeople are at their best when they approach it more like a blue-collar trade. Punch in move everything forward, even if it’s an inch, punch out, do the same. Next thing you know you’ve built the Hoover Damn. Nothing amazing happens overnight.

Also, figure out how to stay at the table. I saw this from a place of humility with a lot to learn about Finances. Still, try to live behind your means. A sales manager may be happy when you have a new car payment to cover, but you may be pushing deals that won’t play well in the long run, or you may under-bid a project. A few of those are fine, but the world’s often much smaller than we think, and industries are ran by a handful of people. Play the long game.

Sales Mindset - Lobbying and The Nature of The Beast

Sales is wild. I could write and talk about sales for days. I even help facilitate a sales “group therapy” community called Broker Brews.

I heard one-time middle children have no natural authority. They’re not the youngest, cutest, or the oldest strongest. This may be why I love making deals. I won’t bore you with the child lobbying or “jobs” my parents helped us get to earn cash. I will say helping run the Troy High School snack bar while my brother played and Dad ran the booster club was a lot of great money handling and people interacting at a young age.

I digress. Sales is also funny because oftentimes you have to keep us away from the rest of the staff. Sales “outposts” are common for a few reasons. If your Accounting people or department acted like your sales department you’d be concerned.

In sales you have to open doors, bring people along, get internal buy-in, external buy-in, and either lobby your cause or wait for it to be the right move for the company. The salesperson’s gotta keep an eye on compensation and lobby for what is fair too, it’s a wild world. And ownership wants to help the salesperson, but they also don’t want them to run off with the lifeblood of their kingdom, accounts and deal flow.

In sales, we’re often under-educated, potentially under-connected, underslept, and we’re on a bit of an island compared to most regular jobs, and that’s ok. We’re rewarded handsomely and probably wouldn’t fit with the rank and file. Please be nice to the salespeople in your life, they’re supporting their company, family, and hopefully a nice car lease because they’re a badass.

PS: Try and make SDR to Account Manager convo handoffs less weird. And is your LinkedIn bot working if you have to SPAM 1,000 people to get one convo? Know who you’re talking to and why, please.

Just Get Started

One call. One page. One post. You should do all of them before thinking too much, you’ll freeze yourself up. Just get in the game and iterate later. You’ll be far ahead of the crowd just for trying something. If you keep moving and thinking when there’s friction you’ll be on your own in a good way.

Don’t forget a lot of the world is bored too, we need fresh voices, faces, and influences on the greater conversation. Don’t worry about being “the” voice, start by being a voice, and try and be helpful.

EATING MY WORDS AROUND AI:

I need to eat my words a little. I was a little walled out / walls up on the AI talk.

I am now seeing that "AI" can solve a ton of uses in a variety of places. I would have this rule of thumb when engaging with startups, I didn't want "horses" too close that I am involved with. I put "AI" in one bucket. (I'll stop using quotes on"AI" for the rest of this post.)

Vibhanshu Abhishek and I connected two weekends on Twitter or LinkedIn? I forget. We ended up having lunch with my good buddy Trevor Hayes, CIC and talking about Alltius and AI for outbound sales that following Wednesday. It was an awesome lunch and conversation.

I hopped on a quick call with Lance J. Dowdell to talk about ReFocus AI, they have some awesome tooling around client retention monitoring. Last but certainly not least, I spoke with Zach Cole and Adam Rubenstein at Traq.ai, and their sales coaching and summaries were very impressive.

Lance was the one to break it down to me that these companies are complementary and solving different parts of the agency flow equation. You may get your walls up when you hear AI, I did, try and see what the AI is being used to solve and if there's need / value there.

If you're selling an AI-related tool, as Lance would nudge you to, talk about the outcome and uplift. Not the tech necessarily.

This proudly Boomer-trained elder millennial salesman is having fun checking out the steam-powered axes out there! Now I gotta get back to having some conversations and trying to sell. It's a brave new world!