925. Are You Selling or Just Presenting?

Most salespeople aren’t actually selling—they’re presenting. And there’s a big difference.

In this episode, I break down a powerful conversation between Mike Weinberg and Ahsan Wardak about why salespeople default to pitching features and benefits instead of solving real problems.

We talk about:

• Why presenting is just marketing, not sales
• How to stop selling the product and start understanding the problem
• Why every customer’s situation is a thumbprint, not a template
• The mindset shift from “pitchman” to “architect”

If your numbers are inconsistent, it might be time to check your approach. Are you connecting the dots—or hoping they do it for you?

Hear their conversation on Mike's podcast https://mikeweinberg.com/podcast/episode93/

Let’s get it. 

Transcript

0:01

All 3, 2, 1. Let's get it. Welcome to another episode of What's Your Problem, the podcast. This is episode 9 25. And a title. Today's episode, are you presenting or are you selling? Another way to look at it that I kind of struggle with and I may at the last minute switch it out. Are you marketing or are you selling? So before we roll out what? Today's episode, thank you so much for being a part of. What's your problem? The podcast. I got a couple of buddies with me today. I got Saint. He's over here in the corner. And then I have, uh, Dior, which I call her Bean. Uh, she's my, uh, my miniature weenie, long-haired weenie dog. She, she loves to get in the small of my back, so when I'm messing with the podcast or creating the podcast, she likes to get behind me. So she's actually. Uh, those of you who are watching on video, she's actually right behind me in this black chair, but she smooshed between the, the small of my back and the cushion ever since she was a, well, she's still a puppy, but she's, uh, I don't know, 11, 12 months old. Uh, we found her at a washateria man, just like abandoned, um, skinny, malnourished, terrified of everybody. And, and, uh, it was like the best Christmas present I ever got. So we had to. I don't know, probably a month, we went out there every single day trying to, uh, trying to get her and, uh, we actually with, with my buddy Saint over here, who is a. He's a mixed breed weenie dog, and he's colored like a, a rottweiler. I, I I, I'd like to see that image, how that all came, came to be. If he is actually mixed with, he's, he's my gumbo dog. He's, he's my mix. But what we did is, or what my wife did, I say we, but what my wife did is, 'cause we just could not capture, I call her bean, uh, 'cause she jumps around like a bean. But we couldn't capture so. And I was like giving up. I'm like, she just doesn't wanna be saved. She wants to live on the streets. It was, uh, it, like I said, this is November, December, um, so it was starting to get super, super cold and she was just out there living on her own. And dude, she was like six months old. Imagine this. She's six months old having to fend for herself. She, I don't know how she learned to maneuver around traffic, 'cause that's a busy area over there by that wash area. She never got hit. She stayed away from people, but somehow she learned how to eat and dodge traffic and dodge people. And, uh, so my wife came up with the idea of bringing Saint. Out there, and they're the same color, same markings, except Saint is not a full-blown weenie. But she saw him and she came up to him, thought he wanted to play. And when she did, uh, when, when she did come up to Saint. Uh, my wife reached out, grabbed her, and, uh, she's been with us ever since. Man, like I said, this is right around Christmas time, so, uh, she's, she's been with us and, and, uh, so I say all that to say if you do happen to hear some growling or some moving around, stuff like that. It's because occasionally like weenie dog do, weenie dogs do, they like to have these spontaneous wrestling matches. And so sometimes, so maybe Beam will co cooperate and stay in the small of my back. Those of you who are looking at the camera you'll see right now Saint is at the door first. He wants to come in the office. He loves to sit in the office with me while I read. Uh, but now he is, uh, ready. To, uh, to roll out. So, um, alright, so onto today's episode, the, uh, inspiration for this episode came from Mike Weinberg's podcast. Mike has, um, uh, been on the podcast many, many years back. It was great to have 'em on there. And so I'm just a, I'm a huge fan and appreciative of the work that he actually does. And so I was listening to, uh, a recent episode that he had, uh, between him and Ahsan Wardak and Dude, like one of the main takeaways just, it really, really hit me hard. Most salespeople. Aren't really selling at all. Most salespeople are presenting, they're marketing and they're talking about the product, the technology, the features, the benefits, and they're just hoping that the customer connects the dots on their own, so it's no wonder that their results are mixed. See, presentation is a crutch. And sadly that's the way most of us were taught in sales. Talk about the features, talk about the benefits, basically just shove it down the customer's throat. And that's, that's what we were,, you know, I started 27 years ago. I was given this big, huge ass binder, put in the empty meeting room, and all it did is showed the product, the features, the benefits. And you just, you just push the pitch. But presentation isn't selling, it's marketing. And to Ahsan's point, he really brought this to light. Presentation isn't selling, it's marketing. Sales is something completely different. See, sales is personal. It's active. It's a thumbprint because every customer's problem is unique, and so it makes you wonder like, why do we default to presenting A, because we were taught that way, and B, because we were taught. It's what we know and what we know makes it comfortable. See when all you're doing is talking about the features and benefits when all you're doing is presenting. You don't have to think as hard. You don't have to ask tough questions. You don't have to listen for the answer, and based on the answer, tailor your next question. You don't have to risk any sort of tension in the conversation. But real selling, if you think about it, it's a dance because you have to read personalities, you gotta solve problems, and it's about understanding the person, not just pushing the product. And Weinberg asked, why don't more salespeople sell versus market? Because it's easier not to one Ahsan's favorite lines is the technology is great, but you've gotta figure out how to stop selling the technology. And when I heard this, I thought about. And I was telling a young salesperson this, the, the other day, I said, look, because I sell vehicles. I said, look, the $90,000 truck is super easy to sell. There's so many gadgets, there's so many features, so many computers to point out the hardest thing to sell. Is the base model truck. I sell RAM trucks. I said that's the hardest thing to sell because there ain't a lot to talk about. Which brings me to right back to the point of what Ahsan said, which is so true. How can you sell and not talk about the technology? That's when you have to ask questions. That's when it requires active listening. That's when you have to dance. With the tension and push a little harder, like Weinberg calls, pick the scab. You gotta pick at things a little bit. It makes it a little bit uncomfortable, you've got to be able to manipulate the tensions. Sometimes you gotta put tension in and sometimes you gotta let it out. See, when you're pitching tech man, you're not selling at all. You're just creating an awareness and you're hoping that your customers eventually will connect the dots between what you said and what they need, and that's a huge problem. See, awareness doesn't equal action, and the dots will not connect themselves. So you gotta be the architect, not the pitch man. See, selling is not about the offering, it's about the understanding. Ahsan said, speak less in terms of what the offering is and more in terms of what you understand the client's problems to be. Amen. Close the book. High five, hallelujah. You gotta lead with. Here's what I understand about your challenge. And once you lay that out, am I getting that right? And you, and you and you be quiet. The next episode that I'm gonna do is about hold holding the pause from Catherine Brown's book. See all this stuff started linking together. I'm like, I started just leapfrog across. So it's saying, here's what I understand about your challenges. Am I getting that right? Can you help me? Can you help me validate that? You gotta start with the problem, not the pitch. So what is sales? Sales is active listening, asking meaningful, tailored questions, gaining a deeper understanding of their unique problem, identifying a desired outcome, and then offering a specific. Customized solution. I mean, your whole mindset with your customers should be like, how can I help you achieve your goal more efficiently? That's all technology is. Technology's efficiency, but the salesperson is there to help build a solution together, step by step, dot by dot. But here's the trap. Presenting is so much easier. It is, bro. It takes way less energy, especially in this fast paced ADD world that we live in. But if you're not slowing down, if you're not matching the customer's pace. Then you're just adding to their overwhelm and an overwhelm customer doesn't buy. They always revert back to, no, or, let me think about it. They hesitate, they freeze because number one, they don't know how to make decisions. Most people don't know how to make decisions. Number two, they're afraid of making the wrong decision. And number three, they've been burned by people in the same profession as you and me. So obviously their antenna is up because so many salespeople have presented in a transactional way and left the customer to figure it out from there, and they're left holding the bag. So my final check in with you, question I want you to ask and recalibrate like, bro, I heard, I heard this and wrote this out and was like, man, I kind of gotten lazy. I haven't been selling, I've been marketing. And that's the question I want you to ask yourself. Have I been presenting lately or am I selling? Am I helping them build their outcome? Am I connecting the dots or just hoping? Somehow with some low price and fancy features, the dots will connect on their own. If your numbers are inconsistent, you gotta check yourself because you process is probably inconsistent too. You're marketing, you're presenting, you're not selling. All right, please share this episode with others or at least one person who needs to hear this episode. Much love to Mike Weinberg and Ahsan Wardak for this great conversation. It was the inspiration for this episode, man. I will put the link to their conversation. In my episode in the notes so that way you can check it out for yourself. And you may listen to this, you may listen to their conversation and draw something else. And draw something more. So if you have something to add to this man, I'd love to hear from you as well. Alright, with that, keep it simple, keep it moving. Never settle. Stay tough peace.