Episode 72

How to be a Prospecting Genius with Jason Bay

Published on: 29th June, 2022

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Highlights

  • How he got into sales by accident (01:01)
  • Why you have to have a purpose and WHY behind what you’re doing (04:18)
  • Things he learned from door-to-door sales that he applies to date (10:58)
  • Changing your mindset so you can perform better in your sales career (15:41)
  • Teaching his team to be as good as he is in sales (18:57)
  • Prospecting in B2C and B2B: Digging into Jason’s cold calling genius (22:59)

In this episode of the Transformed Sales Podcast, I interviewed Jason Bay, the Chief Prospecting Officer at Blissful Prospecting, a company he built to help sales teams by providing the systems, coaching, and accountability to grow their outbound sales. A few of his clients have included reps and sales teams from companies like Zoom, CBRE, Medallia, Xfinity, Commvault, and many more. 

Sales is the only "adult job" he’s ever had. And he’s done everything from selling house painting services door to door, running outbound call centers, to helping thousands of reps master cold outreach. Jason and I will discuss a lot related to sales and specifically cold outreach (Including cold calling, sequencing, mindset, and objection handling) With prospecting being something that most salespeople dread for various reasons, this high-energy, YOU-focused episode will help you do a complete turn around of your outbound sales. Stay tuned for more!

Quotes

“If you’re really smart with your money in sales, you can retire in 20 years if you wanted to” - Jason Bay

“Salespeople should always choose conversations over meetings” - Jason Bay

“Your biggest strengths will be your team’s biggest weaknesses” - Jason Bay

“Every sales professional should have 6 to 12 months of emergency savings in cash” - Jason Bay

Learn More About Jason in the Links Below:

Connect with Wesleyne Greer:

  • Wesleyne’s Website - https://transformedsales.com/
  • Wesleyne on LinkedIn - https://www.linkedin.com/in/wesleynegreer/
  • Wesleyne on Facebook - https://web.facebook.com/wesleynegreer
  • Wesleyne on Twitter - https://twitter.com/wesleynegreer
  • Email Her at wesleyne@transformedsales.com
Transcript
Wesleyne Greer:

Hello, and welcome to another episode of

Wesleyne Greer:

the transformed sales podcast today I am so excited to have

Wesleyne Greer:

Jason bay with blissful prospecting here. How are you,

Wesleyne Greer:

Jason?

Jason Bay:

I'm doing good. I think we've had this scheduled

Jason Bay:

for a couple months or something like that. So it's I'm glad that

Jason Bay:

we're getting a chance to finally talk. I know we're

Wesleyne Greer:

both Oh, crazy, crazy busy these days, which is

Wesleyne Greer:

great. Yeah. Oh, no your own business. So Jason Bay is the

Wesleyne Greer:

chief prospecting officer at blissful prospecting. He's on a

Wesleyne Greer:

mission to help reps and sales teams turn complete strangers

Wesleyne Greer:

into paying customers, a few of his clients have included reps

Wesleyne Greer:

and sales teams from company like zoom, medalla, Xfinity calm

Wesleyne Greer:

vault and many, many more sales is the only adult job he's ever

Wesleyne Greer:

had. And he's does everything from selling house paint,

Wesleyne Greer:

running outbound call centers to helping 1000s of reps master

Wesleyne Greer:

cold outreach. So sales when you grew up, you knew you wanted to

Wesleyne Greer:

be in sales. How did you get started? And how did you

Wesleyne Greer:

transition to where you are today?

Jason Bay:

Yeah, I didn't know that. I wanted to be in sales,

Jason Bay:

actually. So I think a lot of people I don't know, you

Jason Bay:

interview a lot of people do, I think I think most people get

Jason Bay:

into sales by accident. So when I was 18, going into college,

Jason Bay:

and I was very shy kid, by the way. So very shy, even in high

Jason Bay:

school didn't talk to a lot of people that I didn't know, I'm

Jason Bay:

still somewhat introverted, like the thought of talking to a

Jason Bay:

person and knocking on their door or giving them a cold call.

Jason Bay:

Like that was never something I ever would want to do you know

Jason Bay:

what I mean? So I studied forensic science as a freshman

Jason Bay:

and someone came into my classroom and talked about this

Jason Bay:

internship to run a house painting business over the

Jason Bay:

summer. And I said yes, because you could make $10,000, right.

Jason Bay:

And I was like, that's way better than working at the mill

Jason Bay:

that my dad works at, you know, stacking wood on a cart for 60

Jason Bay:

hours a week. So what I didn't know joining that company was

Jason Bay:

that I would be going door to door, I just didn't put two and

Jason Bay:

two together, you know, so I would travel two and a half

Jason Bay:

hours back from college to go back home and Brookings, Oregon,

Jason Bay:

5000 person town, and now I'm having to go door to door to

Jason Bay:

find leads for houses that you know, we could paint and it was

Jason Bay:

a really, really great opportunity. Because I got

Jason Bay:

taught marketing, I got taught how to sell I got taught how to

Jason Bay:

hire painters how to build a small business, right? Well, the

Jason Bay:

actual door to door part of it was like, I was literally like

Jason Bay:

sitting in my car for an hour. Like before I did it the first

Jason Bay:

time like sweating. You know what I mean? I was so anxious to

Jason Bay:

do it. But it turned out I was like, pretty natural. And I sold

Jason Bay:

$100,000 worth of paint jobs in my first year and made $30,000

Jason Bay:

over a summer for school. Sounds like I love sales. Yeah. So

Jason Bay:

since then, that was in 2008. I became a sales manager with

Jason Bay:

them, worked with him as a marketing director and a sales

Jason Bay:

director and and then in 2000, what 2013 2014 I sort of left

Jason Bay:

that company full time to consult and help other

Jason Bay:

companies. And since I think 2017, I've been with blissful

Jason Bay:

prospecting in the focus has been more with b2b companies,

Jason Bay:

primarily selling software, some professional services, but

Jason Bay:

really, you know, how do we help them use more than just a script

Jason Bay:

or a cold email template actually have conversations with

Jason Bay:

prospects not talk so much about what they do? And less about

Jason Bay:

pitching and more about digging into problems that prospects

Jason Bay:

have? How do we have really intelligent conversations with

Jason Bay:

people that didn't ask us to reach out to them? And how do we

Jason Bay:

get meetings from that so that we can close deals? So that's

Jason Bay:

kind of my my career in a nutshell, I guess, over the last

Jason Bay:

15 years. So you

Wesleyne Greer:

made $30,000 in one summer as like, a 20 year

Wesleyne Greer:

old, right?

Jason Bay:

Yeah, I was 19. Actually, I had braces at the

Jason Bay:

time. And I'll tell you what I learned about personal finance

Jason Bay:

the hard way though, because I made pretty good money for a

Jason Bay:

college student, you know what I mean? And from there, it was

Jason Bay:

like, oh, anything that I want to do, I'm gonna do oh, I want

Jason Bay:

to go fly down to Los Angeles to go to a John Mayer concert, I'm

Jason Bay:

gonna go do that. I want to get booze for my friends, you know,

Jason Bay:

or go out to eat late at night or whatever. I'm just going to

Jason Bay:

do all of that. So it was a double edged sword for sure. It

Jason Bay:

was good, you know, making that kind of money. But it was also I

Jason Bay:

learned the hard way racking up tons of credit card debt. You

Jason Bay:

know, how to budget and do all that other. That's a topic for

Jason Bay:

another time now.

Wesleyne Greer:

I love it. I love it. One of the things that

Wesleyne Greer:

I love telling salespeople is like you make commission you

Wesleyne Greer:

make a bonus, you have this variable compensation, what are

Wesleyne Greer:

you actually working for? Right? So I love to help them make

Wesleyne Greer:

goals, right? Because you got to make that money, do something.

Wesleyne Greer:

Otherwise we end up like kind of like you said, just spending the

Wesleyne Greer:

money any other

Jason Bay:

way? Yep, no, totally. Hey, you have to have a

Jason Bay:

purpose and a why behind what you're doing. And I think that

Jason Bay:

if you haven't explored this in your listening, I think thinking

Jason Bay:

about what your fire goal is. Are you familiar with fire? Talk

Jason Bay:

to us about it. So fire is an acronym for financially

Jason Bay:

independent, retire early. So it's this movement of peace

Jason Bay:

people that they look at money as a tool to help them retire

Jason Bay:

early. So if you think about, you know, what you would need to

Jason Bay:

make over the course of a year to support your lifestyle, and

Jason Bay:

you kind of do the math backwards, it's about I think,

Jason Bay:

maybe take that number and multiply it by I think 24 is the

Jason Bay:

number whatever it is to where you could earn six 8% off the

Jason Bay:

stock market or whatever. It's like having that number. It's

Jason Bay:

like, hey, if I have investments and things like this, that I can

Jason Bay:

accumulate over 1520 25 years or whatever, if you're really smart

Jason Bay:

with your money in sales, you could retire in 20 years, if you

Jason Bay:

wanted to. You know, and for some people that are doing

Jason Bay:

enterprise, they could retire even quicker, you know, but I

Jason Bay:

think having that number in mind, if that's something that

Jason Bay:

you want to do, but even if you decided not to retire, having

Jason Bay:

the ability to be totally financially free, I think is

Jason Bay:

really big. Another thing because you got me rollin on

Jason Bay:

this is I think every sales professional should have six to

Jason Bay:

12 months of emergency savings in cash. I know that's not great

Jason Bay:

investment, you know, advice, but my life completely changed

Jason Bay:

when we had like a year run, right where like, if I didn't

Jason Bay:

work for a year, we wouldn't be screwed, you know what I mean?

Jason Bay:

And it allows you to say no to stuff. So it allows you to quit

Jason Bay:

a job that's toxic for you. It allows you to not take on bad

Jason Bay:

customers, it allows you to not be super desperate when you're

Jason Bay:

prospecting because you don't need the meeting. You know what

Jason Bay:

I mean? And people always talk about abundance. But you know,

Jason Bay:

what's better than having an abundance mindset is actual real

Jason Bay:

abundance, like actually having abundance that you don't have to

Jason Bay:

fake having an abundance mindset.

Wesleyne Greer:

I love that. And you know, many, many years ago,

Wesleyne Greer:

when I got into sales, I was very adamant about what I the

Wesleyne Greer:

goals I wanted to achieve, right? And I was like, Okay, I

Wesleyne Greer:

want to pay off all my debt, paid off all the debt,

Wesleyne Greer:

everything but the house, right. And then once you have that

Wesleyne Greer:

freedom, and you have money saved in the bank, you can take

Wesleyne Greer:

vacations, you can put your kids in private school, if you want

Wesleyne Greer:

to put them in private school and you don't worry about it,

Wesleyne Greer:

right. And so even as a salesperson, a business owner

Wesleyne Greer:

having that runway of six to 12 months, it allows you to know

Wesleyne Greer:

that, okay, yes, I need to close the sale, but my mortgage

Wesleyne Greer:

payment doesn't depend on the next sale, I close, right? So

Wesleyne Greer:

really having that being grounded, because sale the

Wesleyne Greer:

career in sales can change the trajectory of your life, it can

Wesleyne Greer:

absolutely change what you do and how you do it. But you have

Wesleyne Greer:

to make sure that the money that you make the abundance that you

Wesleyne Greer:

have, you're putting it in the right place at the right time.

Wesleyne Greer:

And maybe at this point in your life, do you need to pay off a

Wesleyne Greer:

student loan, that's what you got to do? Maybe you want to

Wesleyne Greer:

save for a house. That's what you do. But I met with a lady

Wesleyne Greer:

yesterday. And she was like, you know, I pay myself pretty good

Wesleyne Greer:

salary. She's a business owner, I have what I need. But so I

Wesleyne Greer:

don't really know what I want to do with this money. I'm like,

Wesleyne Greer:

did you say you want to buy a building? How about we buy that

Wesleyne Greer:

building cash? Right? So again, like thinking through, what do I

Wesleyne Greer:

want to do with this money I'm making?

Jason Bay:

Yeah, what do you want to do? And I do this

Jason Bay:

exercise all the time with my wife, Sarah, it's, what does the

Jason Bay:

ideal day look like for you? What does it look like? What

Jason Bay:

does that ideal day look like? You know, for me, it's doing

Jason Bay:

something fairly similar to what I'm doing right now. It would be

Jason Bay:

less being less busy than I am right now, which I'm working

Jason Bay:

towards. But like really think about, like, what is that thing

Jason Bay:

that you want to do? And money is just a great tool to be able

Jason Bay:

to help you to do that. Because your ideal day might involve

Jason Bay:

working a job that maybe pays less money than you make right

Jason Bay:

now. Or maybe you're running your own business or not working

Jason Bay:

at all, I don't know what it is for you if you're listening, but

Jason Bay:

like really think about, like, what time would I want to wake

Jason Bay:

up? What would I eat for breakfast? What kind of freedom

Jason Bay:

when you know what I want? And that's what I think that if you

Jason Bay:

can be smart with your goals and think about how you would use

Jason Bay:

it, I find that because I'm not really super money motivated.

Jason Bay:

I'm more motivated by lifestyle. So what kind of lifestyle do I

Jason Bay:

want? And how can I use money as a way to sort of achieve that.

Jason Bay:

And there are some people that are the opposite. Some people

Jason Bay:

are very coin operated. So I think knowing what motivates you

Jason Bay:

another exercise that I did with my wife to that was really

Jason Bay:

helpful as thinking about our core values. And this is from I

Jason Bay:

think, rich Bach, I can't remember his full name, but he's

Jason Bay:

a personal finance kind of guy. But one of the first exercises

Jason Bay:

he recommends for people that are married, especially that

Jason Bay:

share money, which I do is, you know, what do you value? And

Jason Bay:

it's a really simple kind of question. But when you really

Jason Bay:

think about it, we're like, well, one of the biggest things

Jason Bay:

that we value is relationships, and having really good

Jason Bay:

friendships and being very close with family. So is how we spend

Jason Bay:

money in alignment with that, is that how we are using our money?

Jason Bay:

Are we using it to better our relationships, because a lot of

Jason Bay:

people like oh, don't go out to eat, don't do all this other

Jason Bay:

stuff. But we're like, but if we spend that money going out to

Jason Bay:

eat with friends, and then it helps us have closer

Jason Bay:

relationships that's actually in alignment with our values. Yeah,

Jason Bay:

personal health is another big value for us. So people are

Jason Bay:

like, Oh, they don't spend money on expensive gym membership or

Jason Bay:

whatever. Well, if that's in alignment with what you value,

Jason Bay:

that's really what you're looking for. And not that this

Jason Bay:

is meant to be like a personal finance thing because I'm not a

Jason Bay:

personal like finance guru or a financial advisor. So don't take

Jason Bay:

any money advice from me. This is just kind of things that I'm

Jason Bay:

sharing my journey just Roger, I think the other thing is like,

Jason Bay:

you'll find that we do a lot of things on a daily basis and

Jason Bay:

spend money on things that are not in alignment with what we

Jason Bay:

value. So I think sales is really interesting because like

Jason Bay:

thinking about how you can do this in a way that helps you do

Jason Bay:

more of what you value both where you spend your time, and

Jason Bay:

what you spend your money on, is how I like to think about it.

Wesleyne Greer:

I love it. And I think that the key is, as a

Wesleyne Greer:

leader, we know that everyone on our team has a different value

Wesleyne Greer:

system. So as we're coaching them, or as we're talking to

Wesleyne Greer:

them, we want to align what they're doing with their values,

Wesleyne Greer:

right? Like, I know, one thing that I value is having somebody

Wesleyne Greer:

to come clean my house. And so I would always tell people skip

Wesleyne Greer:

lunch today, because I want to make sure that I have money for

Wesleyne Greer:

somebody to clean my house, right. And so knowing what

Wesleyne Greer:

motivates and what drives the people on your team, helps them

Wesleyne Greer:

work harder and helps them achieve each and every goal. So

Wesleyne Greer:

talk to me about So you started as a door to door salesperson

Wesleyne Greer:

and you moved up the ranks. So you mentioned that first day

Wesleyne Greer:

sitting in the car being nervous. What are some of the

Wesleyne Greer:

key things that you learned by being a door to door salesman

Wesleyne Greer:

that you still use today?

Jason Bay:

Oh so much. It's really funny because I've you

Jason Bay:

sold b2c, as well as b2b.

Wesleyne Greer:

Mostly I'll b2b. I'm b2b. Okay.

Jason Bay:

So I've spent, I think, what the first I guess

Jason Bay:

six or seven years of my career in b2c, and a lot of people like

Jason Bay:

to pretend that b2c is so much different than b2b. And it's

Jason Bay:

really more similar than it is different. And it's b2b, there's

Jason Bay:

just more people that you need to sell to, right. And it's

Jason Bay:

they're not spending their money. They're spending a

Jason Bay:

company's money. And I know, those are kind of big

Jason Bay:

differences. But a lot of the principles still apply a lot of

Jason Bay:

the work that I do with sales teams on cold calling, I mean, I

Jason Bay:

just go back to what I've learned, literally going door to

Jason Bay:

door for the first time, there's a couple of really big things,

Jason Bay:

you know, a lot of the advices for rejection, it's not that big

Jason Bay:

of a deal. Get over it. Well, yeah, like if it was that easy,

Jason Bay:

everyone would just get over it. You know what I mean? And one of

Jason Bay:

the things that I learned is how to not only desensitize myself

Jason Bay:

to rejection, but I think to actually understand why you're

Jason Bay:

afraid of getting rejected. You know, like, think about like,

Jason Bay:

why a salesperson, if you're, as a sales leader, working with

Jason Bay:

someone that doesn't want to pick up the phone and call or is

Jason Bay:

too afraid to ask for what they want, telling them to just get

Jason Bay:

over it, it's not very good advice, that doesn't work,

Jason Bay:

right, or forcing people to do something, they're scared of

Jason Bay:

just it doesn't work. You know, the thing that to do is to

Jason Bay:

really help a person understand that they feel this way, and

Jason Bay:

that it's normal to feel this way. So one of the first things

Jason Bay:

I was taught is just how can you make it less about what you want

Jason Bay:

from this person, a meeting and more about starting a

Jason Bay:

conversation. So I always say, choose conversations over

Jason Bay:

meetings. So reframe the purpose of this to I just need to start

Jason Bay:

a conversation with this person that makes it a win. From there,

Jason Bay:

I will figure out if it makes sense for us to in house

Jason Bay:

painting, schedule an estimate, or if I'm calling now schedule

Jason Bay:

an appointment with this person. I think reframing what you're

Jason Bay:

doing, as I start conversations with people, and it's up to them

Jason Bay:

whether or not they say yes, all I can do is really kind of

Jason Bay:

influence that. Right. So going in and resetting your

Jason Bay:

expectations was a really big thing that I took away. I think

Jason Bay:

the other thing too, and this is when I talk about call

Jason Bay:

reluctance, the kind of thing that we have going on, there's a

Jason Bay:

habit loop, right? It's very simple. A habit loop is there

Jason Bay:

some sort of cue or trigger that's number one, two is that

Jason Bay:

cue or trigger causes some sort of behavior or routine, and

Jason Bay:

three is there's a reward for that. So a really simple example

Jason Bay:

would be cue trigger, I get hungry. And so at the end of the

Jason Bay:

day behavior routine, I go into the pantry to grab something

Jason Bay:

that's like really quick and easy to eat reward. I'm no

Jason Bay:

longer hungry. Right? Now we go through these same habit loops,

Jason Bay:

whether we want to acknowledge it or not, a lot of it happens

Jason Bay:

subconsciously, one habit loop that people have around going

Jason Bay:

door to door or doing any kind of cold calling or anything like

Jason Bay:

that is you know, I open up this person's LinkedIn profile, I see

Jason Bay:

their level of seniority. And I start to tell myself this story

Jason Bay:

rate, this activity queues this behavior, this narrative where I

Jason Bay:

don't want to bug this person. They seem really busy. They've

Jason Bay:

been doing it for 20 years, you know, what value can I offer and

Jason Bay:

the reward for that is procrastination. Procrastination

Jason Bay:

is a mental reward, because you're not going to do the thing

Jason Bay:

that makes you anxious. That's a really dangerous habit loops,

Jason Bay:

you know, to be in. So what I sort of recommend, and this is

Jason Bay:

sort of the next thing I want to share is that, like, if you can

Jason Bay:

wrap your head around the worst case scenario, like I've seen

Jason Bay:

everything, dude, that going door to door, I've seen people

Jason Bay:

answer the door in their underwear. I've been cut off of

Jason Bay:

someone's like, lawn, you know what I mean? But that didn't

Jason Bay:

really happen that often. That's maybe one out of 100 people that

Jason Bay:

I talked to, and you know what happened after that I just went

Jason Bay:

to the next door and talk to the next person. It really wasn't

Jason Bay:

like nothing happened to me. You know what I mean? I think this

Jason Bay:

like acceptance. Yeah, this like resilience and like, just

Jason Bay:

accepting and being okay with the worst case scenario. Right.

Jason Bay:

That was another thing that I had to learn doing that is that

Jason Bay:

the worst case scenario is that someone's gonna be super pissed

Jason Bay:

that you're at their doorstep. You And you know what that might

Jason Bay:

make you feel really weird about what you're doing for a couple

Jason Bay:

minutes, just sit in that emotion and be like, yeah,

Jason Bay:

that's sucks, dude, that person was in a hole, you know, or

Jason Bay:

whatever. And you just go to the next person. You don't I mean,

Jason Bay:

that was a really important lesson I learned there. Again,

Jason Bay:

that applies. Same across b2b prospecting, you're gonna get

Jason Bay:

people that are rude to you, sometimes, most of the times,

Jason Bay:

that doesn't happen, though. And we could talk about how to make

Jason Bay:

the cold call if you want to have because that's a really big

Jason Bay:

piece. Because if you just call people and just try to pitch

Jason Bay:

your solution, Jen, there's going to be a lot of rejection

Jason Bay:

when you do that, you know, but those are two really big things

Jason Bay:

that I took with me is the accepting the worst case

Jason Bay:

scenario, and really kind of reframing what the actual goal

Jason Bay:

is, during this interaction. And so

Wesleyne Greer:

I always love this when I talk to sales

Wesleyne Greer:

experts, and I really don't realize it before we get on the

Wesleyne Greer:

podcast. But our ways of thinking are so similar, because

Wesleyne Greer:

I talk about eliminating what I like to call self limiting

Wesleyne Greer:

beliefs. And so I'm not a prospector like you I'm more in

Wesleyne Greer:

the middle of the process, right? The discovery the demo

Wesleyne Greer:

after we actually have them in the funnel, but that rejection,

Wesleyne Greer:

or I'm not good enough, we're Oh, that's a lot of money. I

Wesleyne Greer:

don't think I can ask for that much amount of money. Like all

Wesleyne Greer:

of that what's happening in your head is what prevents us from

Wesleyne Greer:

doing the action. And so really realizing, acknowledging like,

Wesleyne Greer:

yes, this may happen. But if this does happen, this is how

Wesleyne Greer:

I'm going to deal with it. Or yeah, my feelings just got hurt.

Wesleyne Greer:

I spent, I had this call this person 20 times they finally

Wesleyne Greer:

answer the phone. And then they said, No, I don't want to talk

Wesleyne Greer:

to you ever again, stop calling me. And that hurts, right?

Wesleyne Greer:

Because I invested so much into that. And it's okay, because

Wesleyne Greer:

we're humans, but it's okay to take a lick. But we got to get

Wesleyne Greer:

right back moving, right, we have to keep the momentum going.

Wesleyne Greer:

And really changing the behaviors. And changing the

Wesleyne Greer:

mindset is really what helps us perform better in sales.

Jason Bay:

Yeah, that's the part you have control over is your

Jason Bay:

mindset. Right? You control that part. And framing how you

Jason Bay:

respond to things I think is super important. And I think you

Jason Bay:

mentioned something we haven't really directly talks about it.

Jason Bay:

But the goal is not to like like being rejected, that's never

Jason Bay:

going to happen, that just you're not going to ever like

Jason Bay:

being rejected, it's actually good to just sit in there

Jason Bay:

feeling it, give yourself a mentor to like, do that socked.

Jason Bay:

Like, and to recognize how you're feeling which I've sort

Jason Bay:

of learned the hard way through like therapy, you know, it's

Jason Bay:

just like, dude, that doesn't feel good. Because we have 10s

Jason Bay:

of 1000s of years of evolution, that rejection and getting

Jason Bay:

rejected from other people. That means that you're not a part of

Jason Bay:

the tribe anymore, and you're not going to survive, that

Jason Bay:

doesn't feel good on purpose. It's not supposed to feel good.

Jason Bay:

But we don't live in tribes anymore. Exactly. Exactly. Life

Jason Bay:

is not at stake, if someone that you don't know says no to you,

Jason Bay:

and if you can really kind of think about, you know, how can I

Jason Bay:

be more intrinsically motivated and not need the approval of

Jason Bay:

people that I don't know that, frankly, they don't care about

Jason Bay:

me, and I don't care about them, because I don't even know them.

Jason Bay:

So be more intrinsically motivated to, you know, feel

Jason Bay:

good because you're doing the right thing. And having the

Jason Bay:

conversation and being courageous and picking up the

Jason Bay:

phone and calling versus doing it for the validation from other

Jason Bay:

people.

Wesleyne Greer:

Yeah. And one of the hardest things that

Wesleyne Greer:

salespeople have to do is this, this cold piece, right? So

Wesleyne Greer:

whether if they're a full cycle salesperson, so they have to

Wesleyne Greer:

prospect and demo and close, or they just focus only on the cold

Wesleyne Greer:

calling, getting over that, like that fear of rejection is hard,

Wesleyne Greer:

or the fear of am I going to make the number of appointments

Wesleyne Greer:

I need to make, and I really liked what you said, it's like,

Wesleyne Greer:

stay in the moment, like stay in the place that you are, and just

Wesleyne Greer:

enjoy it. Learn from what went wrong, learn from what went

Wesleyne Greer:

right and keep building and building and building because

Wesleyne Greer:

these things don't happen overnight. Like your first day

Wesleyne Greer:

going door to door was definitely not like your 500th

Wesleyne Greer:

day going door to door. So as you transitioned from being that

Wesleyne Greer:

individual contributor to being a leader, what are some of the

Wesleyne Greer:

behaviors or the actions or the tactics that you really try to

Wesleyne Greer:

implement in your team to help them become as excellent as you

Wesleyne Greer:

are?

Jason Bay:

We're Yeah, great question. So like, candidly, I

Jason Bay:

was like sales I learned how to do pretty came pretty naturally

Jason Bay:

to me, leading people did not I had huge learning curve, like

Jason Bay:

learning how to teach people to do things was really tough. I

Jason Bay:

didn't I'd never had really done that at that point in my life

Jason Bay:

when I was 20 years old at this time now, you know, so there's a

Jason Bay:

couple things that I can tell you that I messed up on that I

Jason Bay:

think were really good learning lessons. So one, and this is the

Jason Bay:

advice that I was given because we had a really great training

Jason Bay:

at the company I worked with. They said, Your biggest

Jason Bay:

strengths will be your team's biggest weaknesses. And I didn't

Jason Bay:

really understand what that meant. Until I started and I saw

Jason Bay:

Hey, all the things that came pretty naturally to me like

Jason Bay:

building rapport with someone that seems like a no brainer, no

Jason Bay:

duh, like kind of thing that you would do not pitching a lot and

Jason Bay:

talking about your thing but asking questions. Once in

Jason Bay:

figuring out what's important, and that seemed pretty obvious

Jason Bay:

to me, but you know what my team didn't do? They didn't ask

Jason Bay:

questions they weren't as curious as I was, and they just

Jason Bay:

went straight into, here's what we do and why you should buy

Jason Bay:

from me, you know? So I think reframing and assuming that the

Jason Bay:

people in training, assume that they don't know anything about

Jason Bay:

the thing, you're training them about half of that conversation,

Jason Bay:

hey, I'm gonna come in and just assume that you know, nothing,

Jason Bay:

okay? It's not because I think you're an idiot. All right. It's

Jason Bay:

just like, you don't know what you don't know, you've never

Jason Bay:

done this job before, you know. And then I think making sure to

Jason Bay:

really focus on what are the things that come really

Jason Bay:

naturally to me that I didn't have to be taught. And to double

Jason Bay:

down, you know, on those things, the other thing that I really

Jason Bay:

made a mistake of is, as a manager, especially first time

Jason Bay:

managers, your instinct is to fix fix, fix, it's to be a

Jason Bay:

firefighter and put out fires, right? Oh, someone needs

Jason Bay:

something, let me just do it for them. Let me pick up the phone

Jason Bay:

and call that prospect that they're having a hard time to

Jason Bay:

get to close, let me tell them what they should say in the

Jason Bay:

email. And what you do is you completely rob someone of their

Jason Bay:

own resourcefulness, when you do that, and your team actually

Jason Bay:

doesn't get better, because they're doing things, the way

Jason Bay:

that you want them to do in are taking advantage of all the

Jason Bay:

smart, intelligent people that you have in your team that could

Jason Bay:

come up with different clever, and frankly, more like effective

Jason Bay:

ways of doing things. So you have this instinct, and it's, I

Jason Bay:

think, good just to be aware of these biases that we have, and

Jason Bay:

these things that we're going to do so that, you know, you're

Jason Bay:

conscious of it, and you can maybe avoid doing those things,

Jason Bay:

right. But you're gonna have these natural urges. And I'm not

Jason Bay:

a parent, but I imagine that if I had kids, it would be a very

Jason Bay:

similar kind of thing, I would have this, like, if I see them

Jason Bay:

suffering, I want to step in and do something for them. But your

Jason Bay:

reps like they need to fall on their face, they need to mess up

Jason Bay:

a call, they need to lose a deal, they have to go through

Jason Bay:

that stuff in order for them to learn. So I think those are some

Jason Bay:

of the really big things. The other thing that I made a big

Jason Bay:

mistake of and I talked to sales managers all the time about this

Jason Bay:

is you gotta have frequent boundaries, dude. Like, you have

Jason Bay:

to have boundaries with your reps. That means if they need

Jason Bay:

something at nine o'clock at night, you don't pick up the

Jason Bay:

phone, dude, you know, have some boundaries with these people,

Jason Bay:

like establish what your working hours are, and you don't respond

Jason Bay:

to emails on the weekend, you don't do stuff and respond to

Jason Bay:

phone calls. In the evening, when you're having dinner with

Jason Bay:

your family or significant other, like you have to have

Jason Bay:

these personal boundaries. It's a good thing that this happened.

Jason Bay:

But you know, my first sales manager job like customer

Jason Bay:

relationship, and again, I'm married to someone else now. So

Jason Bay:

it was really good that that happened, you know what I mean?

Jason Bay:

But it did, it cost me a relationship. And I had no

Jason Bay:

balance, I had no boundaries. It was just like work, work, work.

Jason Bay:

And I prioritized putting out all these fires, it really

Jason Bay:

affected my personal life. And when your personal life is

Jason Bay:

affected, it affects your professional life, because

Jason Bay:

you're not showing up. So those are some of the things I think

Jason Bay:

off the top of my head and you know, having boundaries, making

Jason Bay:

sure that you teach people how to fish instead of catching the

Jason Bay:

fish for them. And making sure that you come in aware that your

Jason Bay:

biggest strengths are going to be your team's biggest

Jason Bay:

weaknesses, you're going to have to double down on things that

Jason Bay:

come naturally to you,

Wesleyne Greer:

man, I've had some really phenomenal guests on

Wesleyne Greer:

this podcast. But I don't think I've had anybody who at 20 years

Wesleyne Greer:

old, was able to pick those things out right, or even being

Wesleyne Greer:

introspective enough to say these are the biggest lessons

Wesleyne Greer:

learned. And I was literally just coaching a client and we

Wesleyne Greer:

talked about the exact same thing like six o'clock your day

Wesleyne Greer:

needs to be done. I don't care what is happening. She was like,

Wesleyne Greer:

Well, what do I do? What do I do if if this happens or that

Wesleyne Greer:

happen. So just leave it until the next day, stop fixing all

Wesleyne Greer:

their problems, because they'll never learn, right? Like if you

Wesleyne Greer:

are always the Savior than the salespeople never learn how to

Wesleyne Greer:

fix things. They never learn how to triage, they don't learn how

Wesleyne Greer:

to do. And so really, all those tips you gave are so amazing. I

Wesleyne Greer:

just love them. I love them. So I want to tap into a little bit

Wesleyne Greer:

of what you do now, in terms of you talked about the mechanics

Wesleyne Greer:

of the cold call. And so I'm guessing that a lot of what you

Wesleyne Greer:

learned in the b2c world going door to door really informs the

Wesleyne Greer:

way that you're teaching companies, leaders, people to

Wesleyne Greer:

cold call, tell us what your how your method is different than

Wesleyne Greer:

all other people out there.

Jason Bay:

I think there's a couple of really big things that

Jason Bay:

people mess up, whether it's phone, email, whatever their

Jason Bay:

John. So one is there tends to be a one size fits all approach,

Jason Bay:

you know, for everyone they reach out to. So the very first

Jason Bay:

thing that you need to do is figure out a way to go from this

Jason Bay:

mass blast to what I call a quality first approach. So

Jason Bay:

before you ever pick up the phone or email someone, so I'll

Jason Bay:

give you an example. So I work with a company right now that

Jason Bay:

has like project management software, one of their personas

Jason Bay:

is marketing people and one is like PMO like Project style

Jason Bay:

people. If I send the same message or say the same thing to

Jason Bay:

both of those people who do very different things at these

Jason Bay:

companies, it's going to fall flat, it's going to look

Jason Bay:

generic. So if I treat my entire target market and the people I

Jason Bay:

reach out to as one it's going to be very ineffective, you're

Jason Bay:

gonna get rejected a ton. You're gonna build a send out a lot of

Jason Bay:

volume and make a lot of calls but the rejection is going to be

Jason Bay:

very high, because I'm using generic stuff that doesn't

Jason Bay:

really resonate with these folks. So on the other side of

Jason Bay:

that is what I call quality first. So basically, if you

Jason Bay:

imagine a circle for those of you listening, and that's your,

Jason Bay:

your target market, all the people you could reach out to, I

Jason Bay:

want to find little pockets in there of people that have

Jason Bay:

similarities and patterns. So one way to do that is filtering

Jason Bay:

by persona. Another way is to talk to specific in this case,

Jason Bay:

marketers, maybe that work at software companies that are

Jason Bay:

enterprise above 1000, employees, these people are all

Jason Bay:

going to have something kind of similar going on. And maybe I

Jason Bay:

even go down even further. And it's companies in marketing that

Jason Bay:

are hiring, right. And they're dealing with like the types of

Jason Bay:

growth that they would need a new tool to help with. And I can

Jason Bay:

talk to all of those people in a very similar way, with very

Jason Bay:

slight customization. So that's the very first thing that people

Jason Bay:

make a mistake of is they just do like they want a one size

Jason Bay:

fits all approach. The second thing is you need to move from a

Jason Bay:

me centric way of talking to a US centric way. So instead of

Jason Bay:

this is called using your customer voice. So instead of

Jason Bay:

saying, we at this company, help set up dashboards and analytics

Jason Bay:

for you to manage projects faster, and we can take that off

Jason Bay:

your belt, that's that's talking about what we do, I'm not

Jason Bay:

talking through the lens of the customer. So talking through the

Jason Bay:

lens of the customer would be ideal, we help marketing teams,

Jason Bay:

who oftentimes feel like an internal marketing department at

Jason Bay:

their company, or an internal marketing agency, excuse me, and

Jason Bay:

they're being pulled in 20 3040 different directions with all

Jason Bay:

these projects, we help them bring some sanity to that chaos

Jason Bay:

and help them organize their projects better, so they can

Jason Bay:

meet their deadlines. Right? It's like people come to us to

Jason Bay:

fix this problem. And here's how we help them versus our solution

Jason Bay:

does this? It's two very different ways of talking. So to

Jason Bay:

answer your question, when cold calling, you have to come in and

Jason Bay:

say, Hey, I'm going to filter the people that I talked to, and

Jason Bay:

I'm gonna have different ways of talking to people that have

Jason Bay:

different jobs, because they're going to engage with our

Jason Bay:

solution differently. And they're going to be US centric

Jason Bay:

and how I approach this. So the mistake that people make is when

Jason Bay:

they call people, it's Hey, this is Jason Noblesville

Jason Bay:

prospecting? Did I catch so and so yeah, hey, I was calling

Jason Bay:

because at XYZ company, we do this. So they give the pitch at

Jason Bay:

the very beginning, what I want to do instead is completely do

Jason Bay:

the opposite of that, I'm going to talk to what people like you

Jason Bay:

are working on. Okay. And I'll give you another example with a

Jason Bay:

client. So this is a client that sells an automated welding

Jason Bay:

solution. So they reach out to like VPS, of operations and

Jason Bay:

manufacturing. So it's a hey, this is Jason with XYZ company.

Jason Bay:

I know I'm probably catching the middle of something. But you got

Jason Bay:

a minute, you know, for me to tell you why I'm calling you can

Jason Bay:

let me know, if you want to keep chatting, permission based

Jason Bay:

opener, right? Get the prospect to opt in prospect, nine times

Jason Bay:

out of 10 will say yes, hey, great. Well, I talked to a lot

Jason Bay:

of VPs of operations. And they typically tell me that they're

Jason Bay:

working on one of two things right now. One is they have

Jason Bay:

these parts that they're manufacturing that are really

Jason Bay:

low volume, and highly customized. And they're

Jason Bay:

struggling to automate certain parts of that process, or to

Jason Bay:

they're short on welders right now. And they're having a heck

Jason Bay:

of a time with the labor shortage of finding qualified

Jason Bay:

labor to come in so that they can keep ahead of their

Jason Bay:

production targets. Does any of that resonate with you are my

Jason Bay:

way off here? And the prospect would really like, actually,

Jason Bay:

yeah, we're focused on that first thing that you said. And

Jason Bay:

now I've started the conversation by talking about

Jason Bay:

you and what you're focused on. And now I'm going to ask

Jason Bay:

questions around those things. And then I can just say, we help

Jason Bay:

with that, versus making the entire call about me and what I

Jason Bay:

help with. I call this priority drops, I want to open the call

Jason Bay:

and talk about things that they are likely working on. Because

Jason Bay:

I've talked to so many people like them, I'm going to filter

Jason Bay:

the conversation around those things versus spray and pray,

Jason Bay:

how can I just pitch and see who bites? You know, that's not how

Jason Bay:

this works, I want to suggest things that people like them are

Jason Bay:

working on and see if any of that resonates. That's kind of

Jason Bay:

the short version, I guess, of the cold calling approach.

Wesleyne Greer:

I love it. And you hit on two things that I am

Wesleyne Greer:

so adamant about that I think teams as well as leaders need to

Wesleyne Greer:

really focus on one of the things that I like to say is you

Wesleyne Greer:

got to niche down until it hurts, right? So there are

Wesleyne Greer:

riches in the niches so as what is that smallest addressable

Wesleyne Greer:

market that you can find the similarities, because you get

Wesleyne Greer:

really, really good, like you should know more than the

Wesleyne Greer:

customer. So you should really understand the challenges that

Wesleyne Greer:

they're having the pains, the problems. And that being said,

Wesleyne Greer:

when I understand that my VP of operations in a company that has

Wesleyne Greer:

500 employees, or whatever that is, they're going to have

Wesleyne Greer:

similar challenges, right. And when I think about those

Wesleyne Greer:

problems that they're having, and the impact that it has on

Wesleyne Greer:

the organization, that's how I craft those Customized

Wesleyne Greer:

Statement. And I think what a lot of people are doing wrong is

Wesleyne Greer:

they're going way too far on the personalization side. And so

Wesleyne Greer:

because there's so far down the personalization line, their

Wesleyne Greer:

volume is so low, and then they get frustrated because they're

Wesleyne Greer:

not getting as much return on their investment. But if you

Wesleyne Greer:

just focus, get that nice little focus niche and say, Okay,

Wesleyne Greer:

you're focused on this, okay, you're focused on that. That's

Wesleyne Greer:

really what helps those things flow. Yeah. Awesome. Awesome.

Wesleyne Greer:

Well, thank you. so much, Jason, you have given us so much

Wesleyne Greer:

insight into really applying the b2c world into the b2b world

Wesleyne Greer:

because as you said, a lot of people like oh, it's two

Wesleyne Greer:

different things, but we're still selling to people, right?

Wesleyne Greer:

So there's always a person at the end of it, and then these

Wesleyne Greer:

amazing tips you've given us about cold calling, as well as

Wesleyne Greer:

being a strong leader. So I thank you so much for your time,

Wesleyne Greer:

your talent and your expertise today. And that was another

Wesleyne Greer:

episode of the transform sales podcast. Remember in everything

Wesleyne Greer:

that you do in every way that you can find a way to transform

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About the Podcast

Transformed Sales
Transforming Sales Managers to Lead Using Behavior-Based Skills Development
As a sales manager, you are judged by the performance of your team. And you're praised when they do well. But one thing that you've not been able to figure out is how to get everyone on your team consistently hitting quota every single month. Sales leadership is difficult.

The Transformed Sales podcast equips sales leaders with the skills to develop high-performance teams. We provide coaching strategies for improving sales team performance, mentoring developing sellers, and providing ongoing support for best practices. As a result sales leaders can guide, create, and nurture long-term relationships with their teams.

You will learn how to enhance your ability to engage in productive conversations with internal team members, resulting in a collaborative, dynamic environment where sellers feel supported.

Transformed Sales assists businesses in developing and building the culture necessary to build high-performing sales teams. In this leadership coaching program, coaching strategies are offered that can be used to improve the performance of sales teams. These strategies provide ongoing support and reinforcement of best practices