The Three Keys That Unlock Every Door in Sales | SOS EP. 375

The know, like, and trust framework is the essential foundation for both landing a sales job and closing deals with prospects. Mike O'Kelly breaks down the specific mechanics behind each component and provides actionable strategies for implementing them effectively.

• Your resume is a passive introduction that forms the first impression when you're not present
• Hiring managers filter candidates based on whether they know, like, and then trust them
• Follow-up demonstrates trustworthiness and consistency in both job hunting and sales
• Buyers care more about what happens when things go wrong than when they go right
• The rule of three applies universally across sales processes: planning, building, and launching
• Being responsive shows employers you can handle the responsibilities of the role
• The same three-phase framework applies whether you're getting into sales, dominating, or moving on

If you want to chat about your situation or get a territory audit with a free strategy session, click the link in the show notes. I do two to three sessions per week with listeners, helping sales professionals meet their goals and survive outside sales.

Chapters

• 0:00 Intro to Know, Like, Trust Framework
• 1:49 Getting Noticed in the Job Search
• 5:12 Building Trust with Employers
• 8:04 Applying KLT to Customer Relationships
• 10:22 The Three-Phase Sales Process
• 13:00 Follow-Up: The Trust Accelerator

Transcript

Speaker 1: 0:00

The Surviving Outside Sales Podcast, hosted by Mike O'Kelley, presented by Sales Builder Academy, the goal is to survive and thrive all phases of outside sales, whether you're getting in, dominating or getting out. Surviving Outside Sales I'm your host, mike O'Kelley, thank you so much for joining. Either you are trying to get a sales job or you are trying to close a deal. There are three things that you must do, for either you need to be known, you have to be liked and you have to be trusted. I know you've heard this before. Do they know, like and trust you? But how it's the? I know I know what to do, but how do I do it? That's where that's what I'm gonna talk about right now. Okay, so those three things know, like and trust. So think about it when you're getting into the sales world, and this is one of the things that I talk about in the sales entry plan with my students who are looking to get into the sales world. If you are struggling with that, or you are watching this video or you are listening to the podcast and you want to get into the sales industry, reach out to me. I help individuals like yourself who are trying to get into the sales world and utilizing the sales entry plan, how you can learn how to be known, liked and trusted by companies and hiring managers to get that job. But then also there's the sales builder accelerator that I can help people with to get known, to be liked and trusted by their buyers in order for them to say yes. But those are the three keys, so I'll talk about the how to do that. Okay, so the first one, to be known, all right, the to known. If you're, if you're looking for and I'll break this down between getting a job and also if you are trying to close a deal, if you're trying to get a job, being known, the first thing obviously you got to do is you have to have a great resume, and the resume is going to be the passive way that you're introduced to somebody. It's actually not the active way that you're introduced to it, because it is on a piece of paper. You're not there.

Speaker 1: 2:17

A hiring manager, somebody at the company, hr, or a hiring manager or an actual manager or a boss they're looking at your resume. You have no idea when they're doing that. They could be doing it at home. They're scrolling over their phone. I have interviewed and hired hundreds of people and I have seen thousands of resumes and I look at a lot of resumes, probably more resumes than I should. However, I kind of am a sucker for the underdog, so sometimes that's gotten me in the trouble in the past.

Speaker 1: 2:46

But the point is you have no idea when they are looking at those, and so that is a digital representation of who you are. It's the first impression and unfortunately it is. You're not there, so you can't interpret what they're looking at. You can't give them okay. Hey, here's my resume, and, by the way, when it says X, y and Z, I want you to take this into account. You can't do that, okay. So what you have to do is you have to establish the first thing is they're going to know you, and then do they like you? Okay, so when they read over this resume, do the things that you have listed here, do they start to like you? Did they start to get excited about what they see?

Speaker 1: 3:27

If the answer is no, you're not getting interviewed. They're not going to waste their time. If the answer is yes, you're going to be put into a bucket, where it's. It's a yes Doesn't necessarily mean you are going to be interviewed. It just means okay, yep, putting them into a bucket.

Speaker 1: 3:43

So most hiring managers, most people that are looking to get employees, they are going to start filtering okay, the filtering process, and this is what a lot of people don't tell you. You know, if you're applying online especially LinkedIn or Indeed or one of these job boards you think, ooh, I applied, I can't wait to hear back from them, chances are you're probably not going to hear back from them, unless you are an absolute layup for the role. You've got the great experience, it's exactly what they're looking for and the timing is right. You happen to hit that job posting in the first 24 hours and it's not the avalanche of resumes have come in yet. So there still is timing with everything.

Speaker 1: 4:22

If you've listened to the surviving outside sales podcast or you're you've been one of my students in sales builder Academy, you know I always talk about dating and sales go hand in hand, just like if you're trying to meet that right person. Sometimes timing isn't right. You don't meet them. You meet them at the wrong time. You might meet them when they, when they're dating somebody. You might meet them when you're dating somebody. So the same thing is with jobs and opportunities, but the timing is everything when you apply for jobs, how you can be on the radar faster, things like that. All of that matters All right. So the knowing and liking part that sometimes can happen simultaneously just by them looking at the resume, so great. You get yourself the phone screen, you get yourself the Zoom meeting, you get yourself the zoom meeting, you get yourself that first interview. That's your opportunity for them to start to trust you.

Speaker 1: 5:09

But every interaction you are having, from the time that they know who you are, you're on their radar, to the time that you actually sit down with them or you actually meet with them in person, you are going to there's going to be a mental kind of a mental kind of dashboard from that manager of how responsive have they been. You know, things like if there's grammatical errors in the application process itself or if there are grammatical errors in the resume, they're going to remember that Okay. It doesn't necessarily mean it's a deal breaker. It's just if you continue to not elevate past that they're never going to trust you. And that's what they want Most jobs, especially in the sales world. They're not super drawn out. We're not talking about three four-month interview processes where you really get a chance to know somebody. Sometimes they can hire you in less than a week not not all the times, but sometimes that happens. You need a quick hire. They got to get somebody out there and they're willing to give somebody a shot. So what what they're going to do is however they feel. The better they feel towards a candidate, the better they feel towards you and they can trust you. That's going to make it so much easier for them to say yes in the future and that's what you want to do Getting them to know, like and trust you.

Speaker 1: 6:26

And then, on the trust side of the interview process, it also happens with the follow-up. Follow-up is crucial. I can't tell you how many times that I have really liked a candidate and I reach back out to set up a time to discuss the role, which basically I'm letting you know hey, I want to talk about the role and make sure you're still interested and make sure you still have that excitement level. That is. My last filter of trust is if you come out there and you knock it out of the park on the zoom meeting and you knock it out of the park with the two face to face interviews and then I reach out to you and you're super low energy. You don't sound excited. You've lost my trust. But if you're, if you're really excited for the role you, you share a story, you're ready to go chomping at the bit? I will, then that's the trust and then it's like, okay, great, that's the final hurdle.

Speaker 1: 7:14

I have actually had candidates where I was excited about probably more than maybe they were for getting the job, and I reached out to them and it took them two, three, four days to reach back out to me and say, oh, sorry, I just got busy. The answer is no. I have lost trust in you because everyone is busy. Okay, I'm busy, you're busy, everyone is busy. We have things going on in our lives. Not many people are just sitting around twiddling their thumbs. Okay. So if you can't handle this right now, before you have the job, you're never going to be able to handle what is going to be asked of you once you have the job. Okay.

Speaker 1: 7:49

So if you're trying to get the job, you need to be known, liked and trusted. Those are the three keys in order to get hired. So if you can do that, that is going to be the recipe for success Once you get the role and you're actually trying to sell. It's the exact same thing no, like and trust. If you are known by your prospect, if they like you, then what they're doing is can I trust them? And the trust with them is can they deliver what they promised? Can I trust them that they're going to be here if something goes wrong? Buyers care more about what happens if it goes wrong than what happens if it goes great, because they know what's going to happen. You've already made the claim hey, buy this product or service and this is what's going to happen. So they already know that they're not trying to trust that. What they're trying to trust is if things go sideways, are you going to be there to help me through this process? If the answer is no, guess what. They're not going to buy the product. This process. If the answer is no, guess what. They're not going to buy the product. So, whether you are selling yourself to a company to get that role or you're selling yourself in order to get the prospect to say yes, no, like and trust, it's the exact same process. It's one of the things that I talk about when I built out the sales entry plan and the sales builder accelerator. The sales builder accelerator is how you can take your territory and scale your territory, basically starting from the foundation all the way up to building advocates. It's A to Z for how to build your sales territory as a business. The sales builder accelerator and the sales entry plan have virtually the exact same process.

Speaker 1: 9:30

Okay, the first phase is going to be the planning phase, the second phase is going to be the building phase and the third phase is going to be the launching phase. And the reason why is no matter what you do in this world, if you have to convince somebody to do something, you are in sales. If you're trying to date somebody, guess what's going to happen. You're going through the exact same three process. Okay, you're going through the planning stage, you're going through the building stage and then you're going through the launching stage. Now, in a relationship, the launching stage is you're probably close at closing for a commitment, maybe to be boyfriend, girlfriend, maybe to get engaged, maybe to get married, whatever it is. That's kind of the launching phase. But the building phase is you're building the relationship you're building, you're continuing to build on that trust, you're building that bond. But in the beginning it's the planning phase. You know, and that's kind of the exciting part, you know when you're dating, but the the planning phase. But it's still the exact same steps, the exact same process. No matter what area you are in sales, it's the exact same thing.

Speaker 1: 10:31

On the tail end, you know the surviving outside sales is getting in, dominating and getting out. The getting in part is the sales entry plan. The dominating is the sales builder accelerator there are also. There's also a process of getting out, getting into management, getting into a new role, becoming an entrepreneur. It is the exact same. You have to plan, you have to build and then you have to execute. So you still have the planning, the building and the launching. It is the exact same three-phase process, no matter what you do in the sales world.

Speaker 1: 11:03

And I know if you've been listening to Surviving Outside Sales podcast or if you've been one of my students, you know I talk all the time about the rule of three. The rule of three is undefe everything in this world. It's so easy to remember, it's so easy to structure things in the rule of three. That's how I build all my systems, processes and frameworks. It's the rule of three. In fact, every one of my programs has 27 steps, three phases, three stages, three steps per stage, nine steps per phase. I know I used a lot of words. It's a lot easier if you see it in person. But 27 steps my original, my original program, the sales builder blueprint was 86 steps. At one point it was way too long. I took feedback from some of my clients. It was way too long, it was way too much and I kind of backed it down because I wasn't applying the rule of threes. I literally was just creating content and creating courses just based on everything, and that's just not sustainable.

Speaker 1: 11:59

So the big takeaway from this episode is the no, like and trust. These are the three things that you have to master and there's a lot of nuances within those, but those are the three things in order to hear a yes. And what? Follow up? And again, the key is to follow up, follow up in sales and then follow up with the job opportunity. The follow-up is showing everything that you talked about and being authentic and um, that you can be trusted, that it's going to happen again and again and again. And basically, what it comes down to is your follow-up is showing, hey, everything that I said yesterday, everything that I promised either in the job interview or in the pitch meeting excuse me, everything that I just said is real. Everything that I just said is authentic. You are getting an authentic me. You can trust me. You already know me, you already like me. You can now trust me. That is how you can close for the job and that is how you close for clients. Thank you so much. Really do appreciate it. Hope everybody has a fantastic, fantastic rest of their week. Please reach out to me.

Speaker 1: 13:09

Mike is surviving outside salescom. I have some big, big, big stuff coming in the next month. I'm very excited. I'm going to be sharing. I am doing a lot behind the scenes, a lot of resources and a lot of great stuff that I'm going to be offering to all the listeners and the people that reach out. Thank you so much for people that reach out. I do appreciate it.

Speaker 1: 13:29

I love getting messages on LinkedIn. I love getting emails saying hey, I absolutely love the podcast. I'm doing X, y, z, um. You know I I do free strategy sessions for anybody that wants to listen. Um, the link is in the bio or the show notes, so click on that If you want to chat about your situation, if you want a territory audit, if you want a strategy session. I do about two to three of those per week, uh, from people's, just from the show. I don't run any ads and just meet, meet sales professionals where they are and try to give them the best guidance they can so that they can survive outside sales. Thank you so much. Really do appreciate it. Please share this with a friend or tag somebody you know. Chat about this how you can get better at being known, liked and trusted in your sales role with your colleagues and we'll see you next time Surviving Outside Sales. Cheers.