The age of information parity has triggered an evolution for the sales professional. Reaching out at the right time (before it's needed), trading essential knowledge as equals, and teaching your buyers how to buy are just some tactics that can help you be valued as a trusted advisor rather than a seller.

In this episode Luigi is joined the indomitable Anthony Iannarino, in the first repeat appearance of any guest on the Podcast. Prepare to take notes - this episode is filled to the brim with insights on the responsibilities and opportunities for the latest iteration of the professional salesperson.

🔗 LINKS

Connect with Anthony at on LinkedIn. You'll find his latest book Elite Sales Strategies here, and his daily blog here.

Find out more about Outbound sales conference here.

Connect with Luigi on LinkedIn.

Welcome to another episode of the Sales IQ Podcast. Thank you for joining us this week for what is a milestone moment in our podcasts history we have for the first time a guest that is appearing on the show for this second time, and this is massive. And because this particular guest in my eyes is probably one of the smartest minds when it comes to B2B sales.

And we're going to dive into what is the most important part of the whole sales process, which is a sales conversation. It is the only thing that matters. And why does it matter? Because we are living in a world. We are living in such a crowded marketplace. And when you think about it from your buyer's perspective, And they're talking to a provider, product provider or a service provider.

It's actually really hard for them to differentiate between different providers, features of the products look, identical websites look very similar. They actually do very similar things. So, how do you buyers navigate through the buying journey and arrive at a point of decision where they are confident in the decision they're about to make?

And this is a really important conversation because. When we look at the diary, Gartner have recently put out over 60% of B2B engagements lead to a no decision. They don't go anywhere. They maintain the status quo it's because something's broken down in the person. They either. Haven't seen the value that haven't got consensus.

They haven't got alignment on problem. There could be a variety of different challenges that are stopped them from taking action. And that is what this episode is what we're going to be talking about today, because the way in which we differentiate from a sales perspective is that sales conversation.

You probably go, well, what the hell are you talking about? Luigi? The reality is we don't want to be going. To talk to prospects, into talk to potential clients and say, Hey, look at all the awards we've won. Look at all the companies we serve, look at all the great things that we do because the reality is most people sell like that.

And if you're selling like that, then that you're walking out of that office or you're walking off that zoom call or their team's call or whichever way you're engaging with your customers and your prospects. And the client's like, Hey, I've just had three different salespeople come in and they're all talking exactly the same.

And then they share with me a product that looked exactly the same. The only thing that differentiates is. And this is where we need to be thinking differently. This is where we need to be thinking about the insight that we bring into these conversations, the education, because at the end of the day, our client L potential clients are trusting us to make the decision they don't trust themselves to make.

That is an incredible statement when you hear it. Right. When I first heard that, I'm like, yeah, like, let's think about this. I'm the expert at what I do. My clients are not the expert at what I do, this seeking advice they seeking. To fix something that's impacting their ability to achieve a certain outcome. So hence why they're looking for somebody to fix that problem.

"So, my name's Ellis, I work at DocuSign as an ABR. And the reason I started Sales IQ was because I really needed that guidance and that training to make sure that the outreach that I was doing was hitting the nail on the head. So I was lucky enough to start the program early on in this role and since then I've been pretty successful and last quarter I finished on a 185%. So I've seen some huge results by adopting the principles."

Our next cohort is starting soon. So to learn more, go to www.salesiqglobal.com, or if you have a team of sellers, talk to us about our in-house offering. Control your pipeline, control your destiny, with Sales IQ.

Then. Then he wrote another book called Ilitch Sal strategies. And this is what pretty cool because, and look, I haven't got a buy-ins because Anthony is incredible. And if you haven't subscribed to his blog, we're going to put into the show notes. We can get access to his content, but he's content is awesome.

I've had the privilege of seeing Anthony live in the U S. At outbound a number of years ago, I flew halfway across the world to get the opportunity to listen to him and listen to his preachings and his content. And, and it is, it is gold and Anthony is going to drop some incredible strategies in this episode today.

So please, if you're listening to this on the road, make sure when you get home. He listened to it again. And you take your note, pad out, you get your pen and you take some notes because Anthony is going to drop some pearls of wisdom. That's going to help you, not just differentiate in a crowded marketplace, but it's going to help you become the best sales professional you can be.

Well, I'm really excited, Anthony of we'll be heating the 200 box from from our episodes. For our show this year, and you are the very first guest that is making their second appearance. So welcome to the sales IQ podcast again, Anthony.

But I also recognize that there was a whole bunch of attributes, like character traits that you need, like discipline, optimism, caring, competitiveness, resourcefulness, all those things. And no one had ever written a book. That was really a competency model, even though I made mine more entertaining than a competency model with a, with a lot of good stories.

And it's, it's sort of dressed up as a success book. Right. And, and I did that book first because I thought, you know, everybody's so far behind on this conversation. You know, people like you and I are paying attention to what's going on in the world of sales, but they're not paying attention to it the same way that we are.

Like, we're looking at it through this lens of like, how do people get better? And so I did that one first. And you're always kind enough to say nice things about the law of start of closing. But the last started closing is in that first book, I just have the list of the commitment with no explanation, cause you only get 60,000 words.

So there was no words available for me to say any more about it, but I wanted to show people the structure when I handed off my first. I wrote 4,000 words on the next book, on my flight home. I mean, so I, I knew what we were writing and I knew what I was going to do after that. Well, without giving people control of the conversation in a way to look at what's now a non-linear process, you know, you're not going to have a straight line anymore.

People are going to come in and out of meetings and that'll start install, and then start again. What I wanted to give him as a way to have control over that conversation and not worry so much that they jumped over to the investment before we're ready to have a conversation about that and knowing how to get them back to collaboration and consensus and all the other things.

So I thought that one had to come next. Otherwise either lunch was going to be very. Thing to do. Yeah. Yeah. So when we got to that point, when we started talking about level four, value creation, building consensus, advanced discovery, like really taking a deeper look at what's going on with, with what the company is struggling with.

I felt like that one had to come third. I had a fourth book already outlined that book is now the fifth book and and it's almost done. I have 7,000 more words to write. Of the 65,000 words that I've been given. So I'm, I've been upgraded from 60,000 to 65, so that's good. I got 5,000 extra words.

And what happened is I wanted to do new content. I mean, every year I go to outbound, I want new content. So I'm going to release something new. And I had this idea about. What salespeople need to understand about the relationship that they have with a client. And I found this article. That sort of gave me the concept of one up in a one up is largely based on the idea of one-upmanship.

And so one of them is ship is something like a Luigi. Do I remember meeting you at Harvard? When I was getting my MBA? I mean, were you there at that same time? And Luigi's like, no, I didn't go to Harvard. You know, and, and that's just me trying to put you down in front of other people that is not the concept at all.

Even though people are concerned and I was concerned, so I had this speech that I had not rehearsed that I had not practiced, but I knew how the content very well, because I've been writing it for some period of time. And I've been paying attention to the relationship that we have with clients. And how many of those relationships.

Where the sales person believes that the client should be leading the conversation. And the client is the one that has the authority to make a decision. And the client is the one that's running this program that we have and they're leading. And when I see that, it makes me think like, why do you think they're going to buy from.

Like, why would they buy from you when you don't believe that you know, more than they know? And so the concept of one up to me was very, very clear. The person who's one-up has greater experience, greater knowledge, and a better ability to make a decision than the person who's one down because they make the decision once every seven to 10 years.

They don't have any good experience to let them know how to make that decision. And what's happened in the intervening time and I walked out on stage and then before I did this you've been outbound. So, you know, it's a, it's a big show and it's a big production. And I told everybody. I'm going out with a piece of content I've never rehearsed.

It will be the first time I ever give this speech. I'm going to have to actually look at the slides to know where I am. And and this concept that I'm going to be talking about might cause half of the audience to run screaming out of the room. You know, thinking that what I'm saying is manipulative in some way, or that it's one upmanship or something.

And I started by telling a story about being on Mount Everett. And you may have read that in the book or you may not have yet. So in the book I was on Mount Everest and I had a situation where I had altitude sickness or I thought I did. And I had a Sherpa that explained to me that I was allergic to altitude sickness medicine.

Now the hard part of, of that situation is he didn't go to high school. He didn't go to college. He doesn't have a medical degree. The, the prescription that I got was from a doctor who does have a medical degree and in my Sherpa had yak dung under his fingernails because that's what they used to insulate their houses on the inside and the outside of some of the walls.

And I was struck with this idea. That Zimmerman. My doctor has never been to the Himalayas. Like he doesn't know the Himalayas. What could he know? He, he lives where I live right now. 800 feet above sea level. It's not, it's not 17,200 feet. And at some point I realized. This guy knows more about what I need to do, because he's seen this before.

And he knew by looking at me that I was allergic to altitude sickness medicine. And so I throw it away and I told this story and people, I was watching them just take in what I was saying to them. And I explained that this person has one up because he has experience that I couldn't possibly have, and that he had seen a pattern.

He had this pattern, pattern recognition that all of you in sales have, like you walk in and the client starts talking and. You you race ahead. The reason some of the times we race ahead of the client is because you've seen this pattern so many times. You're like, I got the answer for this one. I already know the answer.

Like you don't even have to say any more words, I can solve it for you. And so we sometimes jump ahead of them because the pattern recognition is so strong that you can't avoid knowing what the right answer is, because you've see it. And he did that with me and I realized. He wasn't trying to prove that he was better than me, that he was smarter than me.

He wasn't trying to put me down or put me in my place or anything like that. He was trying to help me be able to survive in the Himalayas. And that's what his, his intention was. And he told me you walked to school. You got to walk a lot faster. Like you got to walk a lot faster. So you start getting a lot of air into your lungs or you're going to feel bad.

Like he's not going to be in the same category with me, but there's a couple of things that he knows that are super valuable. And when I, when I first came to this idea I, I expected people not to go and I, I have a LinkedIn note the other day saying like, this is one upmanship and it's not one of them, a chip.

And I like when people say that, because I at least get to say you're one. As it pertains to what you know, that your client needs to know. And they're one up knowing what they need you to know so that you can help them. And what we do is we have this transfer of each other's information. So I'm no longer one down.

And the client's no longer one down because I'm giving them my advice, my counsel, my recommendation. And it's the same as if they're now possessing what I already know. Cause I'm giving them the advice that they need. They're also giving me the advice that I need at the same time. And I think when you see this, it makes sense to you. If you've been in B2B sales for any period of time.

Why us? Right. And I think what I'm loving about this conversation is before I can even talk about why us, I've got to help them on their journey of why they should change. Because even if I do have all the answers for them, and like you said, if I race to go, I'm seeing this pattern. This is a solution.

This is, this is what you need. And look at all the people that we've been able to help. They haven't arrived at that point of a ha. Right? So therefore they're not, they're not going to make any form of decision and they're not going to change because you and I love the way you put it in the book.

They're not trusting themselves to make this certain. Right. If they haven't, they're not doing this, it's not like it's a transactional sale. I think this is the difference. We're talking about transformation. We're talking about change and to personalize a buying change. It's and it's, it's, it's not something that they're doing all the time, right?

So there is going to be that level of, and I, and I saw some interesting stats that over 60% of enterprise decisions or DMS are lost to no decision that's status quo. Right. So, and again, in your book, you talk about sort of some of those one up more of the, I suppose, the mastering, the craft and the behavioral elements that, you know, elite sellers need to execute.

I'd love to hear sort of, you talk about some of those things and how it helps sellers. You know, move a buyer to that point of why they should change.

So that's what we're going to get from managers at the next outbound. But at this particular time, the legacy approach is when you think about this. And I'm going to speak very, very frankly and candidly, I see people that are going through Sandler training. It's it's 54 years old. That makes it the same age that I am.

I have a white beard. This, this is an indication that I've been alive for some period of time that my beard actually turns to some sort of a whitish blue or something. I don't know what it is, but that's what happens over time in, I you think about. The things that they would teach would be something like don't drop your candy on the lobby floor, which is a way of saying don't do free consulting.

And of course, you'd have to introduce your product because how are they going to know anything like that? There's not a internet that they can go to. You don't put a catalog out all the time. Like somebody had to walk in and talk to people about what they did. It makes perfect sense. And they had to lean on their company.

The, the kind of relevance or credibility that we think we need. And that made perfect sense. But now all this time's gone by and all the things that you're talking about in the wild. Is on your website. Like, I don't need you to tell me any of that. I already went out and looked at you on LinkedIn and I looked at your company and I know what you do, and it doesn't make sense to have that conversation.

So the reason that people are rejecting those conversations is because it doesn't create any value for them. And because there's no value for them, they're ready to move on to somebody else. Who's going to have a better conversation. So some of the strategies and the first one that I would point to as information.

And what happened when the internet took hold is that people started to say, well, now there's going to be information parody. And the client's going to know everything that, you know, well, how could that be? I sell what I sell every single day. And I've done that for 30 years. You make this decision once every 10 years.

You have no ability to have the same information, the same experience that I have. So I've been teasingly telling people like when you go to web MD and type your symptoms in, you're not a doctor, like you actually want to go to a doctor, you can go look at your symptoms if you want to, but you really actually need somebody who does this as a profession.

And that's why we're always going to have the position of one-up. And I'll say one last word about. The the modern sales approach versus traditional sales approaches and the sales approach, even solution selling. It starts with, let me tell you about our company. Let me tell you about our legendary CEO that everybody loves this guy's story, or at least that's what marketing wants you to believe.

Nobody cares, but they they'll continue to make you do that anyway. And then they'll tell you, like, show them the, the, our trophy case, you know, all the logos on one slide, all of big companies that people can't relate to in a lot of ways. And then let me learn a little bit about you, which. What kind of problems do you have?

So I can explain how my solution already solves that. And when you think about this. Say Luigi's making a buying decision and salesperson a comes in on Tuesday. And does that same thing that I just said, just walk through and on Thursday. Yep. Salesperson B does the same thing. And I ask you the Weegee.

What was the difference between the two of them? And you're like, well, the first guy was taller and had lighter hair and a, and the second one had a red logo. And I know that for sure. They can't tell any difference between this conversation. Because it's been structured in such a way that everybody's, they've commoditized the conversation that it's just a commodity now.

So if you don't want to have a commoditized conversation the third chapter in the book is about the sales conversation being the only vehicle that we have. So here's what I would tell you. Your, your product's great. Your service is great. Your solution's outstanding. I get it. I understand all that. So don't, don't take this the wrong way if you're listening to this.

So as everybody else. Everybody else's too. So you have the value that your solution creates for the client, which they cannot feel or experience until they get. They can't, they get none of that until they buy. So the only thing that you have is a conversation that creates enough value for them, that they go, these are the right people to work with.

I'm going to buy from them. Now you can talk about your product all you want to, but that's really not what's going on in a consultative sale. Yep. And I've been very grouchy about the consultative sale for a while because people continue to say, well, I asked really good questions. Congratulations, you ask good questions.

That's a good thing to do. There's nothing wrong with that. And I don't use any high pressure techniques. Neither does anyone else, like for the most part, nobody uses those kinds of techniques anymore. So then w what does consultative mean? It means I'm going to tell you how to run your business. I'm going to make the decision for you and listen, if you're within the sound of my voice and Luigi's voice, then know this is true.

When you give them your advice. Your counsel and your recommendations and they take it. You made the decision for them. You made the decision for them. And they wanted somebody that they trusted more than they trusted themselves to make that decision for and with them it's for and with them. And, and people don't understand, most people don't understand that, that sales conversation, the greater, the value you create, the greater you give them the decision-making factors in how to weight these things and why you do this. Instead of that, the more you're going to win those deals.

Right. But you referenced this in the book around you moving outside of that, I'm selling to you and you're moving above onto that kind of broad level where you're helping them essentially guide them to a point of saying, this is the recommendation we need to. Because he's the recommendation for you and, you know, Ashley Love the fact that the way that you talk about asking great questions, it's fantastic, but any good seller should be asking great questions.

So that's not a differentiation for hype. And again, I know that you've been really focused on that value creation piece, and I continue to talk to sellers across that. You're not just creating value. You're creating value Gris, and even it's more important when you get to that point of that pointy at the bottom of the funnel, you've got to continue to create value because at some point.

It's getting harder and harder, more decision makers are getting involved in the process. Right? So that value creation piece, I'd love to hear, you know, talking a little bit, bit about what sellers can do to create more value in the process. That's not just about asking questions.

We ask more questions. They give us more information. But what's changed is that that's not very valuable for them because everybody's asked the same question. What's keeping you up at night, some version of that so that they can get to the problem so they can get to the solution. Now, if you come in and you start asking questions that cause them to have what I would call the aha moment.

And if you're a salesperson you've done this before. You didn't know you did it. You didn't know it was the aha moment. And you also didn't probably. I should write that down. But when you ask this question and you say something like, what updates did you make to your strategy going into this peak season over the last six weeks?

And what do you think you're going to need to change going into the future? And they go, that's a great question. Does that mean. I had no idea. I should've been thinking about that. And now I realize how important this is. And so you just taught me something about me and now I like you because you just helped me understand that.

I don't understand what I need to do to be successful here. And now I like you. And I think you're going to be valuable to me. And it's those kinds of scenarios. You've done that. And as soon as the person says, that's a great question. You know, they just learned something. About them and that's what you need.

They need to understand why change. And when you do this, We make a lot of mistakes about insight. So when challenger sale came out, everybody decided they were going to be an insight based seller. And so what they did is they found some insight and then they went out and said, here's an insight. Here's another insight.

It's like a Oprah Winfrey thing. Like you get an insight and you get an insight. Everybody can send insight, you know, and that's not, that's not really what you're trying to do with insight. It's not the showing them insights.

What you're trying to do is take the lens that they have. With all their false assumptions or outdated assumptions and the way that they've done thing for, let's say 10 years, and you're trying to give them the paradigm shift that says something has changed while you've been doing this.

That now requires you to do something different to get the results that you need now. So what we're trying to do is give them a paradigm shift. Something like you can get in a taxi cab, you can wait in the rain for the taxi and try to wave people down. Or you can have an app on your phone that all you have to do is tell the person what time to be there and you can walk out and get it in a nice clean car with a bottle of water and all that kind of thing.

That's a paradigm shift, it's an evolution. So if you can show them the way that we used to do this was the right way. And and I will say this about sales, like solution selling. It was very good. Very good. We've done it for a long time and it starting to wear out. Because it doesn't serve people the way that it did when it was invented.

Like when, when the, the, when salespeople started to adapt that it was because that was what was necessary. Now there's something else necessary because we have greater complexity in our environment. We have greater uncertainty. And because of those two things are true. I got to find somebody who knows more than I do to help me with this.

So when you come in. And you sit down across from somebody and you start going through the slide deck and you start talking about your solution. You're not having the conversation that they. To be able to decide that they need to change how they might change. And there's a whole bunch of things you can do inside the sales conversation to make that happen.

Yeah. And the book largely argues that you have only the sales conversation and you need to figure out all the things that you can do to push those buttons that say, this is very valuable conversation for me. I'm going to be better prepared to make this decision.

They're not how allowing thereby. To have that aha moment. Right. Or if they don't actually identify or capture that right. And go, okay, there's something here. There's an unrecognized need. We've helped them identify. And then we don't build that. They're not building off that. And I actually love it because you're absolutely right.

That that conversation they're having is what's going to differentiate us to the competition because I, the products I think today more than ever. CLA, you know, buyers have more choice. There is more, a huge vertical, right? Yeah. It's so needed with, okay, now I've got too much choice. So now I'm getting to that point of of kind of being paralyzed in a world of, well, where do I go?

There's all these features, they're all the same. Everybody's making those outlandish claims the best in market best in the world. So you're absolutely right. That sounds comfort conversation. Here's what's going to differentiate. And

And until it's, time-based like, I can't do that. Well, that means you can't be a, you can never be a trusted advisor. You can never be a trusted advisor because a trusted advisor doesn't come behind you and go like, Luigi. You really botched that up, brother. I mean, you shouldn't have done that. And you're like, well, why didn't you tell me I shouldn't have done that before I did it that doesn't, you're not an, a trusted advisor.

You're a guy that's doing an autopsy. The body's dead. Now we can't bring it back to life. You should have told me before this. And my argument is, and there's a, there's a chapter about compelling change. Your obligated. To tell them to change before they recognize that they need to change, because if they recognized it, you're late.

Number one and number two, they're probably already being harmed. So why would you wait when you could prevent that from happening in the first place and give everybody back the time and the money and the pain that they have to go through. Before they get to that point where they can get the better results.

I think, I think challenger was a lot of people, misinterpreted challenger. I think if you really think about, but anyway, I think that's another conversation, but, but if, if you're sitting here going, you know what I am that the change conversation, I'm not having enough, I'm not helping them identify and I recognize needs.

What's the best place for them to start making that paradigm shift to them themselves. Right. Because that's where it's going.

It doesn't really care. It just does reality. And so that's it. And I had clients I couldn't get to change. And once I started briefing them with. Like real data. I mean, as soon as we started to be able to capture really good data, I started putting data in front of people and showing them, you think that this is true and now let me show you this.

And they would look at this and go, if that's true, then now I understand why I'm having this problem. Now we get that change conversation started. So you know what information they need to see to help them understand that. The their assumptions are outdated or they've, they're just not useful anymore.

They were when they had them though, believe me, that was a good thing when they did it. And like, it's going to be a good thing when you come in and you give them a new paradigm shift and they take on some new assumptions 10 years from now, those assumptions are probably not worth talking about like, it's the world's evolving so fast that you're going to have to do something sooner than that.

And you'll find out that this, this is the great, I'm just going to say, it's like the arc of sales goes like this and it bends directly into value creation. So as a consultative salesperson, You it's now a fundamental that you're con con consultative. Like it's not a choice if you're transactional, no one needs you.

Like, you're not giving me enough value that I need to spend time with you and you have to move very quickly to becoming more what I'm just calling truly consultative. And I'm saying that because the, the words consultative means good questions to most people. And I'm saying it has nothing to do with your question.

Except for the ones that caused the client to recognize something. And it has everything to do with your counsel, your advice and your recommendations, including your vantage point. Like I take people up the Mount Everest every day. You've never been to Mount Everest. I'll lead you because if we let you lead, we're all going to die on this mountain.

Like you, you, you can't get there. You don't have the experience to get there, but I can tell you how to get there in the safest possible way in the fastest possible. Based on where you are. Some people have to go all the way around the mountain like this, cause they're not strong enough to go straight up.

Other people can walk right up the side of the mountain. And it's just two different, two different ways of thinking of it. But if you're not teaching them how to buy and you believe they know how to buy you're wrong, like they don't know how to buy. They're struggling with making decisions. You're you're I think the number I've seen is 54% of B2B initiatives just.

Yeah. There's no decision made. They stop. They don't even look at it again for years, which means if we fail them at this, not only do we fail, but they fail and they may fail for a very long time because we didn't do the job we needed to do.

Was important for them. Right. And if we're not successful in helping them, it could impact their organization in the long-term. It could impact their people. We could impact a whole range of things. So yeah, if he wants again, you've you've, you've, you've, you've come to the Sales IQ podcast and you've delivered incredible insight.

You know, it's very few will make me get a pen and a paper just to start writing, writing down. So I just want to say again, thank you for coming on the podcast. We're gonna. Links for everybody where they can buy your book, where they can buy outbound tickets because the outbound is coming up. I did make the Trek as all my listeners.

Not only if you're new to this show. I, you know, took me two days to get to out bound physically two days in Glidewell. And it was the best conference I've been to in my life. I learned so much about what was the biggest outcome for me was the fact that there's a community of people just like me trying to be the best we can be.

And we don't all have the answers. Right. And even the best of the best are out there looking. To find that additional 1%. So that's what our bounds going to help people achieve. But I just want to say again, Anthony your content, your books the leadership you show our community to help elevate. I'm very appreciative of, and I'm very grateful for what you do for us.

It's a good marker. It's probably the biggest selling book since spin selling me, my guests in, in sales. You've got to start recognizing that that book is now 11 years old, and most people have still not picked up where we are and what we need to do about it. You know, they're just sticking with the status quo.

This episode was digitally transcribed.