How to Sell Without Feeling Salesy with Danny Bobrow

In this episode, I sit down with Danny Bobrow to rethink sales in a way that feels ethical, human, and grounded. We talk about why so many good people tense up around selling and how that usually comes from learning the rules the wrong way. Danny breaks down how leading with care, clarity, and collaboration helps people make confident decisions without pressure or gimmicks.

We also walk through practical moments inside real conversations: how to open without manipulation, translate what you offer into outcomes people actually care about, and recognize when a yes isn’t quite a yes yet. Danny shares how to slow things down at the right time, invite honest hesitation, and co-create next steps that feel safe and clear. If you want selling to feel more natural and less draining, this conversation will change how you approach it.

The Persuasion Blueprint

Modern Marketing Mastery

Transcript

Janice Hostager 0:04

I'm Janice Hostager. After three decades in the marketing business and many years of being an entrepreneur, I've learned a thing or two about marketing. Join me as we talk about marketing, small business, and life in between. Welcome to My Weekly Marketing. Do you like selling things? If you're like most of my clients, the answer to that would be like a fat no. Sales has taken on a bad rap over the years and it leaves us feeling a little icky inside, right? I don't really like that part of business either, but the reality is that if we don't sell, we don't stay in business. If the word sales makes you tense up a little, then this episode is for you because I know you care deeply about your work and you want to help people. But the idea of pressuring, convincing, or manipulating somebody into buying is going to be a hard no for you. We've all had those conversations with somebody at our front door trying to sell us lawn care or the dreaded conversation we have to have with a salesperson when we buy a car. And it's even harder with a service-based business because it kind of feels like we're selling ourselves, right? I've always been in some form of marketing since getting out of grad school. To me, marketing has always been about communication. For a lot of years, I mistakenly thought, or maybe I just wished, that if marketing did its job well enough, you could avoid the whole sales conversation altogether. But actually, I've revised that thought and now I realize it's an important part of the process. We need to make sales in our business, so we need to learn to do it well. So today I'm joined by Danny Bobrow, creator of The Persuasion Blueprint, which breaks persuasion into three simple but powerful ideas: Caring, Connection, and Collaboration. And if that already feels different than anything you've heard about sales before, that's the point. So let's jump into our conversation. Well, welcome, Danny.

Danny Bobrow 2:06

Good to see you.

Janice Hostager 2:07

So a lot of small business owners tell me, and I know this for myself, the words, I hate selling. So what part of that do you think they actually hate? And what are they misunderstanding about persuasion?

Danny Bobrow 2:19

Well, that's a great place to start. I think that in general, most people hate selling because of the pejorative connotations that it conjures in their minds. Because they, like you and I and everyone, have been victims of bad selling, bad sales technique. And I think it's important to be aware of and remind yourself periodically that selling is nothing more than communication with a purpose or the process of empowering people to make informed decisions. Sales, like any tool, is only as ethical as its user. So if you go into this kind any conversation, which is all selling is, it's a conversation, and if you go into it with a recognition that you are an honest person who truly wants to connect with your counterpart and to no more than no more, no less than make them aware of the value of your offering and to communicate that value once you've confirmed what their needs are and that there is, in fact, a potential fit, I think you can actually have fun with it because there's nothing ulterior or underhanded going on. All we want to do is help you structure your communication in a way that maximizes the perception of value that you have to offer.

Janice Hostager 3:43

Hmm. So much good stuff there to unpack. How did you learn to focus on this? What's your story? Did you start out in sales or or what is it that got you into this?

Handling No, Yes, And Commitment

Danny Bobrow 3:53

I started a business when I was in high school washing windows and cleaning gutters. And I found that I was, well, I was as a kid, I was outgoing. So knocking on a stranger's door and asking them if they were interested in having me wash their windows or clean their gutters was not a difficult thing for me. It was fun because every window I perceived as an opportunity. And the other thing I learned early, which I think also held me in good stead, was that every no is one more step toward a yes. I also learned later in life that no is not really no, it's just uh a yes hidden in a maybe, that people say no because they want to maintain control, which we all do. And so if you can view no as a conditional yes and embrace it and understand why people say no, it's often just to put on the brakes and to feel in control. In fact, if I could just jump ahead, when I was in uh shortly out of grad school, I took a job. Uh I worked in a couple of health club chains, some large health club uh groups you may have heard of, your listeners would probably be familiar with. And I was selling health club memberships. And I learned fairly early on that some of the easiest sales, what we would call laydowns, were people that walked in telling you words to the effect that I'm not buying today. I just want you to know that. So don't pull any of your shtick on me. And I would say, that's great. I appreciate your honesty. We can both relax now. Now let's take a tour. And I meant it. And at the end of the tour, they would oftentimes end up signing the contract. And so that taught me an important lesson, which is that no is nothing to fear. In fact, it's important also to recognize that there are different kinds of yeses. People often say yes just to tell you what you want to hear or to get you to leave them alone. There are confirmation yeses and counterfeit yeses. The real true yes that salespeople crave and are looking for are commitment yeses. And you need to know how to distinguish between the three to know if you're really in the ball game or not when it comes to a sale.

Janice Hostager 6:05

Really interesting. So I think that selling feels so personal for service-based businesses, especially for solopreneurs, because they're really selling themselves. And you know, a no feels personal. What recommendation do you have for moving past that that barrier, that feeling of like you've been almost personally been offended by a no?

Danny Bobrow 6:32

It's important to, you know, get granular with your own feelings. You know, I talk about in The Persuasion Blueprint that persuasion is not just about persuading others, it's about persuading yourself. You need to believe in the worth and value of your offering. And many people have the opposite challenge, which is that they're very persistent and very resilient. And what I learned in the mountains as a mountaineer was that if you really want it to go far, you need to go together. And that meant being patiently persistent or respectfully resilient. But I do want to get back to your question, which is how to not personalize it. It's really a matter of getting granular with your own emotions. When you feel something, and you can role-play this in advance so you can be prepared for it. But if somebody says no, what specifically does that make you feel? What does that conjure? And if it's feelings of inadequacy or imposter syndrome or lack of self-worth, it's very important to recognize that and to verbalize it. Because the very act of verbalizing that moves the emotion from your limbic system to your free frontal cortex. It's an actual brain science, it's a neurological process. So when you say I'm feeling insecure or I'm feeling inadequate, or this makes me feel that I'm somehow not measuring up, you just note it and it sort of on its own will move itself away from your core identity and into just something that you're observing and can indeed work on. But if you do that consistently, I think the power that those negative emotions have over you will dissipate over time.

Janice Hostager 8:20

Interesting. Interesting. But just stating what they did just made me feel like an imposter or uneducated or something like that is all you need to?

Danny Bobrow 8:31

Well, you label you it's it's I'd say it is, it's but it's simple, not easy. It's a process. It needs to be exercised like a muscle. It's the same thing you do in negotiating or connecting with prospective customers, clients, or patients. As resistance rears its head, you want to label the emotion through statements and then get the other person to state for themselves that this is what I'm feeling. Because when they do it in like fashion to you doing it, the power is dissipated. They begin to move and they it shows that you're listening. This is a difficult thing because it seems invasive for people initially to tell people it sounds like you're uncomfortable with what I just shared, or it sounds like this is conjuring fears of past failures. And the fact is that you can't just initiate a conversation with somebody at that level because you don't yet have explicit or implicit permission to do that. And that's why The Persuasion Blueprint is a sequence of what I call mastery of the three C's of effective persuasion. And those three C's are establishing, signaling, caring, and then making a connection through establishing uh credibility and earning trust, and then moving on to collaboration where you develop a co-path with your prospective customer, client, or patient. And the ability to get to the point where you can ask such questions or make such such statements requires that you've signaled caring and established a connection with your prospect first.

Janice Hostager 10:11

Very interesting. So let's break down your blueprint model a little bit. Let's go step by step here. So the first one you said is caring, and it's and as you define it as it's not what you say, it's what they feel. So when you say caring, what does it actually look like in a sales conversation? How do you include that emotion or that intention without being inauthentic?

The Three C’s Framework Overview

Caring In Action: The TAFI Script

Danny Bobrow 10:33

Right. Well, uh it it is about uh authenticity, but you have to be able to convey that. I I I think people experience what I often term the care gap, which is the gulf between intention and perception. I think a lot of people are less successful connecting with other people because they know and believe in their heart that they're a caring individual, but they also make the implicit assumption, I think, that their caring is self-evident when in fact it's not. People don't think the way we think. Um, our reality is not their reality. I actually have a a blueprint um within a blueprint for the the initial conversation with someone, and it was really initially created for telephone skills mastery because that was where the need was most acute with my clients. I found that my marketing firm would generate leads for people, for our clients, but that they wouldn't effectively or successfully convert those leads into solid and kept appointments. So I created a telephone mastery curriculum called the Art of First Impressions, or TAFI for short, T-A-F-I. And all of this is predicated on the principle that people make decisions based on emotion and then justify them with logic, especially with a first-time prospect. And so the TAFI introduction is intended to show you how to gain control of the call, which is not manipulative. It's incumbent. People are looking to you as the expert to guide them. So the key is to learn how to connect and to control the call while establishing rapport and conveying empathy so that people don't feel like they're being manipulated. They're willingly granting you control of the call. So the TAFI introduction is five statements that do just that. The there are five statements that are actually closed-ended questions, because whoever is asking questions is the one who controls the call. The art, the alchemy of it is to do it in such a way that people feel like they're being respected and appreciated. And so, if I may, the TAFI introduction consists of the first statement being, and let me just use the medical analogy, although this is easily modified and tailored for really any profession or any vertical. But I would say something like: if I were a front desk person at a dental office, thank you for calling Hometown Dental, where the most important smile to us is yours. This is Danny, how may I help you? And it's not only what I've said, but it's how I've said it. I've tried to use tone, inflection, and resonance in my voice, what's called the vocal component of effective communication. I've also chosen my words carefully so that I avoid any negatively charged words. You'll want to do this throughout the conversation. It's obviously easiest at the first statement. But even in that first statement, what I've done was I've shown confidence, I've exuded enthusiasm through the way I've answered the call. I've given my name and I've asked how I can be of assistance. Now, the next statement will be from the caller who will say, I'd like to know if you're in my dental plan, I'd like to know if you can do 401ks for my company, you know, whatever question that you might get. I'd like to know if you can do a portrait for my upcoming wedding. The answer should be the same regardless, even if they're asking why the sky is blue, for goodness sake. The answer should be, I can help you with that. My name is Danny. And may I ask who I'm speaking with? So what you'll often get in a medical setting and in other companies is you ask, you call, they say, Hi, thanks for calling our office. How may I help you? And I say, Yeah, I'd like to know if I could get a second opinion. And the answer is, your name? And it's not done in a particularly friendly manner either. And the reason that the person's doing that is yes, it is important to get the caller's name. It's also important to get date of birth and insurance you'll be using. But these are details that really can and really ought to wait until much later in the conversation. Because if we're going to do business together, the details can wait. If we're not going to do business together, the details don't matter, do they? So the first thing you want to do is establish rapport and convey empathy. So I enthusiastically answer the phone, and then the person asks the question. The second thing I'll say is, I can help you with that. My name is Danny. May I ask who I'm speaking with? So I'm saying in a very positive tone that we're a yes we can mindset here. And I'm giving you my name again. You may have noticed that in the first statement I gave my name, well, why do you think I'm giving it a second time? They probably didn't hear it the first time. Because they're thinking about what they want to say.

Janice Hostager 15:39

Right.

Danny Bobrow 15:39

And that's another distinction that we coach people on, which is stop filling your mind with what you're going to be saying and fully listen to what the caller is saying. You won't forget what you want to say. But it's really important to find out what they want to say. So I say, yes, I can help you with that. My name is Danny. May I ask who I'm speaking with? Now I didn't say your name or even it's Danny, can I get your name? I say, My name is Danny, may I ask who I'm speaking with? Because it's a quid pro quo. It's one of Cialdini's principles of influence, which is called reciprocity. Even at this early stage in the communication, in the relationship, I'm not asking you for anything that I'm not offering you something first. So, you know, and it's another question, isn't it? So at this stage in the conversation, who's in control of the call? That would be me.

Janice Hostager 16:28

Mm-hmm.

Danny Bobrow 16:29

Other calls I listen to, which will led to us to develop this curriculum, is somebody would call and say, I'd like to know how much a crown costs. The person at the other end of the call, being an honest person, thinks, well, it's dishonest to do anything other than directly answer the question immediately. So they'll say, Well, that depends. And then the caller will say, Well, what does it depend on? It depends on the kinds of materials. Well, what kinds of materials are there? Who's in control of that call? So even at this initial stage in the communication, you've already lost control. And I what I learned that within the first five, sometimes five seconds, and certainly twenty seconds, I could tell if this call was going to end well or badly. Just because of how it was going in terms of tone and control. So then the next statement I would state after they told me why they were calling is to say, Well, thank you for calling, Mary. Are you in any discomfort presently? And in your industry, that may not be wholly appropriate. You may want to say, is this an urgent matter that needs my requires my immediate attention? And the reason I'm asking that question is not to get information, it's to impart information. Specifically, I'm trying to use this as an opportunity to show you that I care about you, even though I haven't even met you. And so the little subtle instances of where I'm establishing caring and rapport and empathy, and anybody can do this, I think you'd agree. But again, it's not easy, but it is simple. It's not easy because people are wired to do things their way. And even a simple change like I've just presented to you takes a lot of practice.

Janice Hostager 18:13

Yeah, I was just I was just thinking that there are probably ways that people accidentally signal that that this is about me rather than this is about you pretty easily because it is sort of, especially in our busy world, we just want to get to the facts, right? Right.

Danny Bobrow 18:27

And in our minds, we've we think, well, you're calling me for information, so I want to I want to give you all the information. But we're putting the cart before the horse when we do that because people they do need information, but again, these are details. And what they really want to know is do you hear me? Do you see me? Do you care about me? Am I are you understanding me? And once you break through to that, then you're you're off to the races. But a lot of well-meaning people who are very competent, sometimes competence works against you. Your expertise can get in the way of effective communication because you feel you've heard it all before. And sometimes I think we think, well, if I complete this person's sentence or answer their question before they even ask it, boy, are they going to be impressed with my expertise. But in fact, it's missing an opportunity to connect on that emotional level with the person, to open their prefrontal cortex to dealing with logical questions of logic and and rationality rather than this little emotional voice that's like saying, Don't trust her, don't trust her, don't trust her.

Janice Hostager 19:34

Very good. Okay, the next one is connection. And you define that as when they feel you're the one who gets it and the only one who can fix it. So a lot of people, I think, are a lot of people, but there are people out there who feel a little awkward in selling themselves as the one that comes across as being able to solve your problem. Now, not that you shouldn't be able to solve your problem as a business owner, but how do you create connection without crossing over into ego?

Avoiding Info Dumps And Control Loss

Danny Bobrow 20:03

Very good point. Good question, Janice, because that's another problem where very competent people can get into their own in their own way by what I call expert override. Conversely, if you're you know, you think, well, there's lots of competent people out there, why why should I be the one that they work with? Well, that's their choice. But some specific ways to demonstrate the the connection, establish credibility, and earn their trust is by asking questions about what's important to them. Again, once you've earned their trust through the TAFI introduction or other means, then you're able to probe, to ask open-ended questions about what's important to them. Well, why are you calling now? What will our work together look like in a year for you to be glad that you chose to work with me? Or why would you be disappointed? You know, get at what's underneath the surface in terms of what might be their fears or concerns. You can ask negative questions too, which is, you know, why might you be disappointed if you worked with us? But more specifically, to establish that credibility, I'm big on the interplay between and the difference between attributes and benefits. And that is an attribute is just an inherent characteristic of your offering. A benefit is the helpful outcome that the person will experience if they choose you to provide them that service or product. And so I'm big on the structure of translating attributes into benefits. And an example of that might be to say, well, we're open on evenings and weekends. That's an attribute. And a lot of people will just leave it at that. But what I recommend that you do is that you translate that attribute into a benefit through what I call a word bridge. And a word bridge would be a word or phrase like because, or that means, or that's why we. So we're open evenings and weekends. That means that that we're here for you at a time that's convenient for you to see us. And I and I suggest that you take time to add what I call arrows in your communications quiver. So you practice these different scenarios. Well, what is it about your practice or your business that's beneficial and unique and special? And why would people and then so list out those attributes and then work at translating them into benefits? Why would this resonate with somebody? And once you've successfully done that, then it's time to just pause because a lot of people are afraid of silence. But silence in sales is your friend. In fact, the more you can let your prospect talk, the more likely the positive outcome, because all they're doing is telling you who they are and what they want. And so after you've translated an attributed to a benefit, it's time to be quiet, breathe, let them process what you just shared and wait for their response. And if after what may seem initially like an eternity to you, but it's probably three seconds, the person says, Oh wow, that's really cool. Well, you know you just ticked off a positive benefit, something that's a buying signal potentially. They've established you've established a need that you can fill for them. If they don't say anything, they go, uh-huh. Well, then maybe that's not so important. But it's good for you to know because you're slowly over time, you're, you're, it's like a block of marble that you're sculpting an image from. You're you're you're chipping away at what's important and what isn't, and you're letting the true image of this prospective customer emerge. The other way to establish credibility, it's been said that if you want to be interesting, be interested. So that means sincerely ask a lot of questions. I was on an Alaskan fishing boat on a tour several years ago, and I noticed that every client loved this one guide. And I thought, why does everybody have such wonderful things to say about this guide? And I observed him for a day and figured out that the thing that he did that connected with people, which is pretty amazing, and it's it's it's brilliant in its simplicity, is that whatever anybody would say to him, whenever they would share anything with him, his answer was almost always the same. It was, really. And that's all he did. And then, of course, the conversation would ensue from there, and there would be an opportunity for the person to elaborate on what they love, what's of interest to them. And everyone had wonderful things to say about him. I don't know exactly why, but he's he's a great guy. And they probably knew nothing about him.

Janice Hostager 24:49

And that's really the difference between just relating to somebody and then actually connecting with them.

Danny Bobrow 24:54

It is. Relation is relating is is uh skin deep. It's scratching the surface. But you what you want to do is is get down deep because people really do like to talk about themselves and they do like to once they trust you, once you've earned the trust, then they'll open up. And I just learned in the last year that the word listen and silent are actual anagrams. They're uh they're the same word, they're just spelled with a different combination of letters.

Janice Hostager 25:26

So interesting.

Danny Bobrow 25:27

Think about silence as your friend and be silent and listen.

Janice Hostager 25:33

Okay, so C number three is collaboration. And you define that as the moment they go from maybe to I'm in. I love that you call this collaboration and not close. So, what shifts when we stop trying to convince somebody and start inviting someone in?

Collaboration Beats Closing

Danny Bobrow 25:49

What shifts is that you take your time. This is the time to slow down. And I think you're right that people think about a race and that they've they've established rapport, they've they've they've shown caring, they've made the connection. Now it's time to collaborate. Let's get her done, let's close the deal. This is the time when you really want to hold your horses, and now I'm done with the race analogy, and and focus on them. Slow down because I think a big mistake I've seen a lot of salespeople make is that they they go through the presentation, they say, okay, great, I understand your needs. Let me formulate a proposal for you and I'll send that over to you. How's that sound? Great. Okay, thanks. Boom. Then you send the proposal and then you do the dance. They don't exactly say no, but they don't say yes. When you get a buying signal, to me, it's time to stop and ask more questions and say, well, let's let's make sure that this is working ideally for both of us. When you say that this sounds good to you, can you elaborate on exactly what you're looking for? What will our work together? I mentioned this earlier, what will our work together have to look like in a year for you to be glad that we made this decision to work together? Or that that sounds great, but let me know if you could. If you don't wouldn't mind just opening up, let me know exactly what you're looking for, because I don't want to rush into this and I know you don't want to either. Let's really map out what our work together is going to look like. So instead of just saying, okay, I've got a buying signal, I'm going to send the proposal, walk through the proposal with them at that time. Let them know, well, stage one would be on our onboarding process. And at that time, we're going to be asking you a few questions. And to make that time as productive as possible, maybe we could go over a couple of them now. Would that be all right? So now you're getting, you're assumptively and getting them to feel, okay, this feels good. Let's kind of dive in. Let's see what this looks like together. And then this will help you identify any resistance or lack of flex points instead of the proposal saying, this is what we're going to do for you, step A, step B, step C. And you're not there to actually inter interact with the prospect. This is an opportunity to interact, to keep the person together, and they'll say, Well, you know, I don't know if I could do that in a week's time. And you'd say, Well, that's fine if I'm correctly hearing you. You're saying you'd like a little more time at stage two in the process. Is that correct? And they'll say, Yes, that's it, which is a great thing for a prospect to say, because they just confirm this is what they want. So now you know if you can deliver that, that's great. And you might ask, are there any other stakeholders, anybody else whose opinion you respect who we should probably involve in this process? So you're because that's another thing that happens is the person gets off the phone, they talk to their spouse, they talk to their business partner, and the business partner says, Well, did you ask them this? Or are you crazy? That's a lot of money. So, you know, that's inevitable. And that's why establishing caring, connecting, and then collaborating is a process, it's a sequence. But we have to be as professionals ready to recalibrate and go back to square one. Within the last year, I had a similar experience where I thought I had a done deal with someone, and then the deal all but fell through because they were bringing in new stakeholders. In fact, they'd brought in new stakeholders, but I thought they were just rubber stamps. I thought they were assistants who worked with the key decision maker. And then in talking to the person who referred me to this group, I learned that they were more than just rubber stamps. They were people that had their own fears and interests. And in fact, they had referred someone to this person before, and that didn't work out. So they were very risk averse. And they were, and their goal in their mind was to do nothing but to punch holes into my proposal because their upside of saying yes to something that didn't work out versus saying no and never knowing if it would work out or not, they were much more in favor of saying no to protect them from being in any way implicated in a bad decision. So these are things that you need to be aware of.

Janice Hostager 29:52

Mm-hmm. Mm-hmm. Can you tell when a maybe is maybe a no, or is it somebody that needs more time or more collaboration? Are there any like-

Danny Bobrow 30:02

100% of the time? Probably not. I think I've gotten better at it over the years. Specifically, what to listen for is tone of voice, the pause. You know, if somebody goes, Okay, that sounds good. And they didn't say, Oh, wow, that sounds great. Let's do it. Obviously, there's a difference. We want to hear the commitment, yes. It might merely be a confirmation or a counterfeit, yes, which is defined as a yes to something that people don't really have not committed to yet. They're simply saying yes because they want to get you off the phone, or they want to defer a decision. So when someone would ask a qu make a statement like that saying, yeah, that sounds good, once you've made the connection with these people and they and they trust you and they know that you care about them, you can go out on a limb and say, Well, you know, I'm that doesn't sound very committal to me. Or uh, you know, I'm I'm wondering, uh is there something more going on? Because I'm hearing hesitation in your voice.

Janice Hostager 31:05

Mm-hmm. And and that brings up like countering objections too, because that hesitation sometimes feel like we need to bring that out or there's something that we're not aware of that's happening. And what in marketing, what I like to do, and I tell my clients and my students is that I want to counter objections along the way, along the what I call the Trail to the Sale. But often they really come to a head right before they lay down their credit card. So how does countering objections fit into that? And how do you dig deep enough to find out what those objections really are? And sometimes it's not what they're saying.

Danny Bobrow 31:40

Well, that's countering objections is a matter of, again, listening. If they've explicitly objected, the first thing to do is to recognize if this is a legitimate drawback in your offering, in other words, an objection that you cannot satisfactorily address, or if it's a drawback, can the drawback be minimized by other benefits that you stand to offer the prospective client? And so, you know, if somebody one thing you know, what would be a good example of an objection that uh that, well, I I think you're I think this is too expensive. That's a classic one. This is a lot of money.

Janice Hostager 32:15

Yeah.

Danny Bobrow 32:15

So it sounds to me like affordability is a is an issue for you, and I certainly respect that. I just want to make sure I'm hearing you correctly that if we could find a way to make this affordable for you, that you would be open to considering it. Is that right? And then it would say, yeah, I just need to find a way to make it affordable. Okay, well, that's important. And that's why we offer financing options. Or, you know, we can be flexible in the pricing. And I I I've come across this a lot with dental prospects. Dentists are pretty notoriously frugal. And, you know, the the thing that I say to them is that well, my understanding was that you wanted to achieve results within a reasonably quick time frame. And because I don't want to diminish and start caving on my value proposition either. But what I can be flexible is if you're willing to be flexible with the implementation of the steps of the service, we can spread this out and make it affordable for you. I'll also do zero interest financing for a reasonable period of time. In other words, I'm very flexible in execution. If I know this person wants to work with me, then I'm happy to find a way to make it happen. It's being consistent in policy, but flexible in execution. But it involves that question, you know, is so this is important to you. Is that right? To get them to say, yeah, that's what I need to know. So then you can then you can have a conversation about it.

Janice Hostager 33:40

Because it could be just that your product or your service just doesn't fit them right now. It's not a good fit.

Danny Bobrow 33:44

That's right. But the other possibility is that they haven't really felt sufficiently comfortable with you yet. And so they're looking for reasons to keep you at arm's length. Right. And that's why the caring and the connection are so important. And if somebody objects, you know, worst case scenario, you lose the sale. You know, your life isn't over. And then there's always more opportunity. So it's nice to keep things in perspective too, I find.

Janice Hostager 34:12

Right, right. So I kind of want to see where this being a marketing strategist, I like to see where things fit into the big picture. So I use a model called the Trail to the Sale where it starts out with awareness and then goes to consider, compare, evaluate, sell, supersize, serve, and send. And of course, today we're talking about the sell stage. But an ideal situation, and maybe this is just the marketer in me that likes to do the heavy lifting in the marketing, can some of these be covered in the process of marketing to them before they even get to the sales conversation?

Danny Bobrow 34:45

Absolutely. And as a marketer who's all about processes and consistent application of processes, you can make the the job of the sale a lot lighter. And I know you're probably familiar with Robert Cialdini's principles of influence, the Seven Principles of Influence. And your marketing needs to do that, needs to recognize the and I think what did you say, supersizes is one of your later stages?

Janice Hostager 35:10

Mm-hmm.

Danny Bobrow 35:11

Right. So, you know, you want to figure out what your minimally viable offer is or your minimally acceptable offer to you and to your prospect so that you get them making consistent decisions. Consistency is a one of the principles of influence. And when people you get people to say yes to simple things, they're more likely to say yes to more formidable challenges or questions.

Janice Hostager 35:33

Right. Right.

Surfacing And Handling Objections

Danny Bobrow 35:34

So, you know, providing social proof testimonials, opportunities to communicate with other happy customers. I'm always a little disappointed to learn that most companies are not comfortable doing that. And if I'm gonna make certainly a major decision, I will not make it without speaking to somebody who's had a similar experience with you and who's willing to talk about it. I realize you're probably gonna cherry pick, then not everybody is satisfied. And I'm not expecting 100% satisfaction because Lord knows when things don't work out, it it's often a two-way street. And sometimes it's a one-way street. Sometimes the customer didn't follow through. And frankly, I'll jump ahead when we talk about my Persuasion Blueprint. I offer a 100% money-back guarantee, but I do ask and expect that you will go through the modules and give it a good faith effort and will commit to working the material because we're all wired to resist change. And the only people that I can help are people who are open, who recognize that and are open to considering a different way of doing things. And sometimes people need to be reminded that some of the most successful people around us, the most the highest performance athletes and actors, you know what they have in common, other than a commitment to excellence? They all have a coach. They're never satisfied with what they've got. They also recognize that when they try something new, they're probably going to get worse initially. If you're a golfer and you retain a golf pro and she tells you how to change your swing, your game's going to get worse initially.

Janice Hostager 37:15

So what's one small shift that somebody could make this week or next week to really sell a little more authentically and implement some of these tips that you've given us today?

Danny Bobrow 37:25

I would say that a really good thing to do is to when you feel you've completed your presentation, pause and listen for the buying signal, and then really listen closely for the tone of the answer and ask another question. Whatever, wherever you're at, as close as you think you are to a done deal, think about another question you could ask to gain clarification and to demonstrate to your prospect that this is something that you're not rushing into, that you don't think they should rush into either. This is an important decision, and I want to make sure that it works for you. So if you don't mind my asking, based on everything that we shared and everything that I've offered, what would you say gives you the most pause? Or in under what circumstance would you see yourself regretting having made this decision? In other words, don't be afraid that you're gonna talk yourself out of a sale. Because what you're gonna do is you're gonna cement it. Because the person is gonna say, well, because if there's something there, you want to know what it is, right? And if there isn't, they're gonna say, well, you know, you're located conveniently, you're a good listener, the price is right, your timing for implementation is great. Sounds like I can talk to people who I know and are already happy with your service. Uh you know, I can't think of a single thing. So they've basically just cemented the sale for you.

Janice Hostager 38:59

Love it. Love it. Where can people learn more about you and The Persuasion Blueprint if they're interested?

Danny Bobrow 39:05

Well, that's easy. They can go to my website, which is dannybobrow.com. I think you'll have that in the show notes.

Janice Hostager 39:11

I will indeed.

Danny Bobrow 39:12

It's an easy one to spell, but only after you see it. And what I suggest you do is it's nice to establish a baseline. And to that end, we offer a persuasion scorecard that you can complete. It's complimentary. It's just a series of questions for you and us to gauge where you are in terms of the circle of persuasion, the three C's being caring, connection, and collaboration. And then we can follow up and have a conversation about the various ways you can get involved with us and go from there. But it's a simple process and it's a fun process. And as I said earlier, if after going through the seven modules, the longest one of which is I think 16 minutes, if you don't feel that there's value there for your investment, you let me know and I'll refund your money.

Janice Hostager 40:01

Awesome. All good stuff. Thank you so much, Danny. I sure appreciate you being on the show today. And um yeah, thanks so much.

Danny Bobrow 40:09

Pleasure was mine, Janice. Good to see you.

Janice Hostager 40:12

If this episode sparked something for you or just made you realize, oh, this is the piece I've been missing, then I've got you. We cover sales along with the entire Trail to the Sale in my new Modern Marketing Mastery course. You can join the wait list when we open it up. I'll put the link in the show notes. Thank you so much for spending a little part of your week with me. I truly appreciate you. To learn more about Bob or anything we talked about today, visit myweeklymarketing.com forward slash one forty five. I'll see you next time. Bye for now.