Dr. Cindy is best known as the First Lady of Sales™. She is an internationally renowned business and motivational speaker and Wall Street Journal's best-selling author.

In today's episode of Smashing the Plateau, you will learn how to get your colleagues to tell your story the way you want to be known.

Cindy and I discuss:

• Why she decided to write “Sell Yourself” [02:10]
• How Dr. Cindy describes her own impact [04:57]
• Where to start creating your framework for your story [07:05]
• Key strategies for turning your story into new business [10:29]
• Mistakes consultants make when packaging their brand [12:21]
• Techniques to help colleagues present the right message about you [14:03]
• Things you can do to stay top of mind with your referral sources [16:12]
• Why you need to ask for referrals [19:14]

Dr. Cindy has inspired thousands by getting them to think differently about sales, selling, and success, both in their professional and personal lives. She helps take the ‘ick’ out of sales by helping people to embrace their inner 5-year-old.

Learn more about Cindy at https://drcindy.com/.

You have to know the steps of a sales process.

You gotta have a good plan.

You gotta look for the right opportunity.

You gotta make sure there's trust with your brand.

Nobody's going to buy anything unless they trust you, that you're

going to be a good steward of them.

You're going to follow through on the referral.

Then you ask for the business, and then you develop the relationships.

Welcome to Smashing the Plateau.

We help consultants, coaches, entrepreneurs, and small business

owners build their businesses after long careers as employees.

We believe you should be able to do what you love and get paid

what you're worth, consistently.

I'm your host, David Shriner-Cahn.

Today on Smashing the Plateau, I'm speaking with the First Lady of Sales, Dr.

Cindy McGovern.

In today's episode, you'll learn how to get your colleagues to tell your

story the way you want to be known.

Stay with us to hear all the details.

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Now let's welcome Dr.

Cindy McGovern.

Dr.

Cindy is best known as the First Lady of Sales.

She is an internationally renowned business and motivational speaker and

Wall Street Journal bestselling author.

Dr.

Cindy has inspired thousands by getting them to think differently about sales,

selling and success, both in their professional and personal lives.

She helps take the ick out of sales by helping people to

embrace their inner five year old.

Cindy, welcome back to the show.

Dr. Cindy McGovern:

Thank you so much, David.

Dr. Cindy McGovern:

It's so great to be back with you in your community.

Thank you.

I'm really glad to have you on.

So the last time you were on Smashing the Plateau, We talked about getting

over the ick of selling, which is a huge issue for our audience of

primarily consultants, coaches, and small business owners selling, you're

in the knowledge, a knowledge based business, that's their own business.

So they're selling, basically selling their ideas.

Now you have a new book out called Sell Yourself: How to Create, Live and

Sell a Powerful Personal Brand, which I think speaks volumes to our audience.

I'm really curious, why did you decide to write, Sell Yourself.

Well, it's funny because it's the one lesson that I wasn't

really taught along with sales, right?

We were taught that you don't brag and you don't do these things, and

there is a way to sell yourself without, selling your soul to a degree.

And I think that it's something that I had to learn the hard way and it

was a bit of a wake up call when I did recognize that what I thought I was

selling wasn't what I meant to be selling.

We all have a personal brand, whether we realize it or not.

Is it the one you mean for there to be out in the marketplace, and

especially as a consultant or a coach, you're selling your knowledge,

but you're actually selling you.

They're buying you first, and so I want to be able to help people to embrace

that, get over the ick of selling like my first book talks about, but really

be able to promote their superpowers so that they can bring in more clients.

So fundamentally, what problem do you think it solves for them?

So we have a hard time talking about what we

bring to the table as consultants, as coaches, as human beings, right?

Because we feel like we're bragging about something.

And so what I want to help people to be able to do is tell their story.

in a way that's impactful for the person listening.

Nobody does this life alone.

We all help each other.

So as you're building your business, or if you've had a successful

business for 20 plus years, you're still building that network.

your network needs to be able to tell your story.

They need to be able to sell you to someone else to sell the idea.

You've gotta be able to sell yourself first.

And if you can't tell your story, I can't send you referrals.

So for example, What's your story?

So my story is helping companies to grow their business.

That's what I do.

My focus is helping people get over that ick factor of selling and

turning every single person within an organization into a salesperson.

But so often what ends up happening is if I'm not careful about

controlling the narrative, they say, Oh, that's a training company.

Or, Oh, she's a coach.

Yeah.

But I don't want 'em to tell them that I'm a coach.

I want to tell 'em what the impact is that I make.

And so I think that's the narrative we have to work on when we're selling

ourselves is thinking about what's the treat for the person listening?

What's the impact for them?

So that then they want to go tell the story to somebody else.

Yeah.

How do you describe your impact?

I literally get results for our clients

by growing their business.

That's exactly the impact is we leave you with a better sales process than

you started with, and it's something that you can execute on your own.

And when it's knowledge based, like my knowledge is obviously sales business

development, so I could easily talk about sales processes and prospecting

and target lists and more people to tears, , or I can tell the story around

the impact we had on an organization, the consultant that we helped, to

double their business in six months.

That's the impactful piece.

And that's my brand.

My brand is what we actually create for others.

So for all of your listeners, what I would ask them to think about is

how are you telling your story today?

Are you telling it as, this is the list of products or services that I offer,

or this is the impact that they have?

That's where you want to start.

Right, so as an example, one of the things that I talk

to, potential podcast guests about, is sharing stories versus sharing principles.

And I say, if for every principal you should have at least one story

that will illustrate the principle.

And if you have a choice between sharing the story and sharing

the principle, share the story.

People remember stories they forget principles.

It's funny because especially if you're in a

knowledge based role or capacity, or you came from corporate and that

was the thing we love lists, right?

, it's a list of everything.

These are the 10 tenants, these are the five core values, these

are the this, but how do they live?

And that's why, the new book.

It's Create, Live and Sell.

The powerful personal brand, you've gotta live it.

You've gotta bring it to life.

Because we do, We live by storytelling and we live in a peer

review society, quite frankly.

And we don't buy anything without having some aspect of peer review.

So especially if you're selling yourself and looking to get new clients and

looking for referrals, they could tell them the 10 offerings you have

or the five principles you teach, or they can tell a story around it.

And that's a whole lot more fun to share with somebody.

Yeah.

So for somebody who really, is not well versed in storytelling or hasn't

developed a framework for capturing these stories and sharing them.

Where should they start?

Start with yourself.

So the first thing is, and I talk about this in the new book especially, but I

do this work with my clients as well.

What are the things you want somebody to say about you when you're not in the room?

Have you ever sat back and thought about that?

And then what's their go to?

What's the go to, Do they say, Oh, you're a father, you're a

parent, You're this, you're that.

These are the labels that go on sort of business cards and email signatures.

. I'm not talking about those labels.

I'm talking about the words you want them to use to describe you.

Helpful, kind, compassionate, ethical, What are those pieces?

And then start crafting your own narrative about how you

want people to tell that story.

Because we, we fall into that trap as well as human beings.

It's Oh, I do this and it's whatever the line is on your business card

versus saying how you do that.

What it is that you bring to the table.

So I think it's really starting within and being clear on

who you want to be known as.

And let's face it, if you're running your own company and you're running

your own business, you're creating what I call your leader legacy.

That story is already being written . Are we using the words you want them

to be using to create that legacy?

Because you absolutely can control the narrative.

Yeah.

Okay, so first, think about what it is.

You want others to say when you're not in the room, particularly when it

comes to the kind of impact you have on the kinds of people you want to serve.

Absolutely.

And it makes it easier for them to brag on you because if you, let's

just take like attorneys, how many thousands of attorneys are there, right?

And then you have a specialty.

You're an attorney that does this kind of law.

Okay.

But again, that's not differentiating you.

How are you truly standing out from the rest of the pack?

That's that narrative that you want others to be able to say, and

that's really your personal brand.

That's the brand that you're selling them on.

So I would even encourage all of your listeners to be thinking about how are

you even introducing yourself to people?

How are creating your own network and working that network and making sure

that they know those words that you want them using when they describe you?

Or are they just saying, Yep, Cindy does this or David does that?

So if you're a real estate attorney and it impact

you're able to have is, I mean there's some real estate attorneys that will

just process transactions and there are others that will, essentially

save a deal from falling apart.

There you go.

They'll know when to push in a negotiation and when to hold back.

. Cause ultimately, if you're representing either the buyer or the seller, both

parties want the deal to go through.

They don't want the deal to be to fall apart, even though as a, as the attorney,

your job is to protect them against risk.

That's exactly right.

But it's, you can either say, I'm a real estate attorney and

I work with buyers and seller.

Or you can say, My job is to make sure this deal goes through regardless and

to make your life easy in the process.

Yeah, totally different story.

. David Shriner-Cahn: Very,

Yeah.

Are there other, besides learning what stories you want other people to

share about you, are there other sort of key strategies that you recommend?

Yeah, I do, and I talk about some of these in the book, but the,

one of the things that I would encourage, especially for consultants, coaches,

this audience is recognizing what kinds of clients you're looking for to begin

with . And you fish where the fish are and to use sales language, but if you're

looking for certain type of clients, looking at the needs that they have, and

then being able to hold up the facets of your brand that fill those needs.

So for example, if you want to get into, you're that real estate attorney and you

want to get into the luxury home space, that's a different need than if you're

selling, homes and in subdivisions.

And it's very transactional, very quick, multi, multi deals in a month.

So recognizing how you truly shift the brand, and it's almost like

if you look at product branding.

They changed their packaging over the years.

we changed with the times back in the seventies it was browns and yellows

and maroons, and then it went to pastels in the eighties and then in the

nineties it went to, more crazy neons and then it started to mellow out and

now we're back into primary colors.

How is your brand evolving as.

and evolving based on the needs of the clients and the potential clients.

And I think that's one thing, especially for those who maybe

came from a corporate background.

You were branded as part of that corporation.

You were branded, you were selling that brand, whatever it was.

Now you're selling yourself.

So have you worked on the packaging?

Have you made it very clear how you want to be seen?

And if you haven't, That's the other thing you've gotta do is look at how

that is being presented to the world.

Yeah.

What kinds of mistakes have you seen consultants make when it

comes to, packaging their brand.

Oh, okay.

How much time do we have?

, I've made some of 'em, right?

So I'm a consultant too.

So the biggest one that they make is assuming your network knows how

to tell your story at hands down.

That is the biggest mistake because just because you've told everybody,

Oh, I started a company, or I started a consultancy and this is what I'm doing.

they're going to go tell people about it.

It doesn't mean they're going to help you get the word out, and it

certainly doesn't mean that they're going to refer business to you.

So that's the first thing, is just assuming that's going to happen.

Another mistake in terms of packaging the brand is leaning too much on your

past successes, because those are associated with wherever you were before.

And that's great, you know that.

But again, that was that company or that entity that you were part of.

Now you're you.

And it's really hard and it's a little bit lonely.

If anybody that you know is starting their consultancy or they've been in it

for a period of time, you guys know this.

All of a sudden you don't have colleagues to, walk past at the coffee pot and

you're trying to figure out what this is.

And so the mistake is that brand follows you.

It doesn't.

That is your past.

You're talking about your future.

And so it's truly crafting it and getting a good plan together.

And that's why step one is the creation of the brand, because it is

a creative process to figure out who you want to be known as in this world.

Now, I could be Cindy, that used to work at Brand X, I

don't want to be known as that.

I want to be Cindy that does this now.

So being careful about that as well, it's a big challenge for a lot of folks

because we do lean on that past success.

But you want to focus on the future.

Yeah.

And I actually want to go a little deeper with what you, the first point

you made about getting colleagues to tell your story the right way.

What techniques are there to help colleagues who want to help

you, but to help them present the right message about you.

So that is a fantastic million dollar question,

and it literally is a million dollar question because it can cost you a

million bucks if you don't do it right.

So part of it is people can only repeat stories that mean something

to them, otherwise they're going to tell it and it's going to fall flat.

So what ends up happening is we think our next door neighbor who has

never worked in the space that you're working in, who has never, has no,

connection to it whatsoever, is going to go tell all of their friends.

They're not.

There's gotta be something that they can relate to.

There's gotta be something that they experience either in the conversation

with you or in a story you've shared with them that makes them excited,

that makes them feel something and create an emotion in them.

So then they want to go tell somebody else.

we all have this in terms of being consumers, right?

We've had a great experience.

It was great, but unless it was over the top, wow, we don't have

anybody to tell anything about.

But the minute that you say, Oh, I'm going to go to this restaurant,

then I go, David, oh my gosh, we had the best meal there.

If I just had a meal, I don't have anything to say.

But the flip side is if I had a bad experience, I'm going

to tell you that one too.

So making sure our network can tell that wow story that they

feel a connection to, even if they didn't experience it themselves.

So my job using the restaurant connection is, even if you haven't eaten there,

David, I turn you into a raving fan.

I give you such a story to tell that the minute that opportunity

comes up, you go, Oh my gosh, my friend Cindy ate at this restaurant

and I gotta tell you what happened.

That's how you create that buzz, and it is the million dollar question because

if your network isn't working for you, then you are a solo entrepreneur,

but you can turn yourself into an entrepreneur by creating raving fans.

Right now, if you're, particularly in today's world, where so

much of our communication is digital and it's asynchronous, are there things that

you can do and people are bombarded with so much information that comes at them

all the time in lots of different ways.

Are there ways that you can prime the pump, and keep the right

information going to people that truly would like to help you if you

were able to enable them to do it.

Are there ways you can do this when for some people it

means sending them an email?

For some people it means sharing a link to a video you may have made.

Or, it could be sharing a link to a podcast episode, or it

could be sending them a text.

For some people it's the old fashioned way of randomly picking

up the phone and calling them.

And then there are the few people that we actually see in person.

Yeah, that happens too.

But a lot of times it's not in person.

So what can you do to kind of keep the embers going on the fire so that they'll

have the fuel to be able to help you when the opportunity presents itself.

Well, it's funny because this is another

one of the mistakes that people make is they're not top of mind.

And the thing that I would encourage everybody to remember is it's

not their job to remember you.

It's your job that they remember you.

And so exactly what you just asked is what are ways that we can do that?

And the first thing is, it's not just about throwing information out there.

I get a lot of clients who are like, Oh, I need to post on social media.

And my first question is your audience that you're trying to

reach on that platform, and what do they need to hear from you?

Don't post just a post.

It's everybody's highlight real.

We know that, right?

So what are you actually doing to impact that audience?

What do you want them to feel by reading or seeing that post and that and then you

think about how that methodology goes.

But there is a cadence that is needed to make sure that you're

staying in front of these folks.

You know, we've all got kind of this core group, right?

Those are the people we can pick up the phone, we can call it any

time they will, come get you if you got a flat tire kind of thing.

And then we've got that secondary network and it's like a target if you look at it.

So we've got the center and then the second ring and the third ring, and

then the fourth ring, that outer ring, needs to know what's going on, but

more importantly, needs to know how they can help you when the opportunity

arises, because they're not the people you're going to see on a regular basis.

They're not the people that you're going to have regular interaction

with, but you need to stay relevant.

And so what I encourage folks to do is, share something that

is helpful for that audience.

Don't share just your accolades.

And that's a big mistake people make in personal branding is they post all

this stuff like, Oh, you're a speaker, you're an author, you're this, no.

Share the message of what that does.

I wrote a book, not to just write a book, I wrote a book to help

people, and I want to talk about that and why it helps people.

So thinking about that, even in your own organization, your own consultancy, what

is it that you're impacting on people.

Tell that story.

Don't be a consultant, be a helper, and get that message out there.

Yeah, I like actually would love to react to that,

which is I see way too many people just being overly self promotional, right?

And just pushing, This is what I do, this is how I can help.

And they're trying too hard to sell before they even know if there's a need.

On the flip side, and this is the, by, by far, the vast minority.

But I also see people that are really great at putting value-based

content out that does solve problems for people in their audience.

And the stuff they put out is really helpful.

And I'm like waiting for the sales pitch, and I never see it.

Dr. Cindy McGovern:

You have to ask for it.

Dr. Cindy McGovern:

. Yeah.

So can you talk a little bit about that?

It's funny because we could do like a whole

podcast on just the mistakes, right?

So that's another one of the mistakes, is that they don't ask for the business.

You don't ask, you don't ask your network to introduce you.

You don't ask for somebody to say, hey, keep me in mind as you,

go to that conference next week if you run into somebody that

could benefit from what I do.

So that's a big piece of it.

But there's a fear in asking, and we have to admit this as

friends here on this podcast,

we're afraid of them saying no.

And, that's a perfectly acceptable response because if the answer's no,

either we didn't do a good job of telling our own story to them, so they want to

carry the flag or they don't get it, which is also our fault, or it's not a fit for

their audience, and we need that feedback.

We actually want that feedback.

It's funny, I was recording a video earlier this morning for something

and I was talking about getting feedback, and that's important for us.

No is feedback.

So learn from that and then it helps you to shift your

message a little bit as well.

But you have to actually ask for the business, yes.

Yeah.

And no could also be not yet.

Yeah, absolutely.

I firmly believe no is a temporary response, but I want to understand why.

, is it that I asked at the wrong time?

Did I not uncover enough needs?

Did I not explain what you were going to get in return?

Like I need to know because that feedback is going to make you stronger.

Yeah, absolutely.

Cindy, is there anything else that I haven't asked you that you want

to share that is really tied to what is the core of your new book?

Yeah, I really want people to be able to take this

and get over that self-promotion fear.

And we talked a little bit about this already, but there is this, The terms

sell yourself will sell yourself.

The operative word is sell in that, and we forget that.

We forget that there is an active component to this and that's

why, the subtitle of the book is Create Live and then Sell.

Because so often we think, I'm living the brand.

Obviously they know that.

There is absolutely a promotional aspect in this, but you have to

know the steps of a sales process.

You gotta have a good plan.

You gotta look for the right opportunity.

You gotta make sure there's trust with your brand.

Nobody's going to buy anything unless they trust you, that you're

going to be a good steward of them.

You're going to follow through on the referral.

Then you ask for the business, and then you develop the relationships.

And that's a very quick, sales process, but it's really important that's the

piece that people take away as well, because you can have the best brand ever.

You could be posting about it online and showing how wonderful you are

in all the accolades, but if you're not actively looking for a need to

fill within that audience, you're not going to be able to grow that business

Well said.

Cindy, we've covered a lot of territory.

If somebody wants to go deeper with anything that we've discussed today,

get a copy of your book or any of the other resources that you have, where

would be the best place for them to go?

drcindy.com.

D R C I N D Y .com is the best spot, and I'm on all the platforms, of

course, of social media, and I love to hear from listeners and I answer my

emails and I answer my social media.

So if people post questions, I'm happy to offer that coaching and advice,

because I really want people to be able to take this, grow their business,

and have more fun in the process.

And yes, I will attest to the fact that

you do answer your emails.

Cindy, I want to thank you so much for taking the time to join

us again on Smashing the Plateau.

Congratulations on your new book, and I encourage people to get in

touch with you and learn more.

My guest today has been the First lady of Sales, Dr.

Cindy McGovern.

Thank you, Cindy, for joining us.

Thank you so much for having me.

When you visit this Smashing the Plateau website at

smashingtheplateau.com, you'll find a summary of each episode along with

the links we mentioned on the show.

On today's episode with Dr.

Cindy McGovern, we learned how to get your colleagues to tell your

story the way you want to be known.

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