80. Three un-skip-able sales essentials

There's an ocean of marketing advice out there. It feels complicated and sometimes contradictory. What applies to you? What are you supposed to prioritize?

Let me simplify it for you. there are only three things you actually have to focus on to sell anything.

I come back to these any time I get unclear, and they steer me back to the right course, every single time. 

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I’m Simone Grace Seol. Let me help you build community care, social responsibility, and spirituality into every part of your business.

📩 My emails — my most intimate writing, sent in real time: simonegraceseol.com/get-emails

📷 Instagram — @simone.grace.seol

Transcript

Hey, this is Simone. You're listening to Liberatory Business. Thank you so much for listening. I'm bringing back some episodes from my archived podcast that doesn't exist anymore — episodes that I think stand the test of time and are just as true and useful now as they were back then.

And just so you know, this episode is a handful of years old, and a lot of it is me talking to life coaches whom I love, of which I am one. But just know that the principles truly apply to any kind of business you have. All right, listen up and enjoy.

Hey, friends. I wanna talk today about what I think of as three essential, unskippable rules — or, actually, I take it back. Not rules. Principles of marketing and sales.

There's so much knowledge out there that it's really easy to get lost in it, really easy to get overwhelmed by it. And I think it's important from time to time to just distill things down to the essentials and root into them, anchor into them, so that you're not floating in a million different directions.

Even when I think about it for myself, I always come back to these three unskippable essential things as a check against myself. I audit myself by looking at these three things and asking myself, "Okay, what am I not doing? Where am I doing one of these three things in a misaligned way?" Whatever. So this is, like, a point that I keep coming back to.

So when I say three essential principles, I always have to give some context to that, because I hate rules. Like, whenever somebody says, "Here are the principles. Here are the rules. Here's what you have to do," I'm always like, "Ugh, get it away from me." My ADHD brain is so rebellious, and whatever you tell me I have to do, I will immediately hate you and rebel against it.

However, it's really important to consider both sides, right? It's so important to pay attention to what feels good to you. It's so important to have fun and prioritize what feels fun to you, and the journey has to be individualized. The journey has to be led by your body, and your sense of curiosity and fun, and I will go to my grave repping that.

And at the same time, as you're thinking about all those things, if you also don't get lost in the mountains of information out there — if you know that there are only three things you have to do, because they are foundational, unchanging, and an objective theory of marketing and selling that applies universally...

I don't care what you sell, whether you sell pipes or tarot readings. It does not matter. There is a foundational, unchanging, objective, universal theory of marketing. If you know it, your life is just going to be so much easier.

The pragmatic and the energetic

I teach marketing and sales as being energetic and pragmatic, right? Pragmatic is literally what you do, and the vast majority of what's on the internet — what you can learn — is like, do this, follow these steps, do these things, think about these things. It's very much oriented, geared toward problem solving. That's the pragmatic stuff.

Energetic, the other part of it, is all about how you're showing up, who you're being, what emotions you're feeling, what energy you're embodying and inhabiting, what energy you're transmitting. It's all of the more intangible things.

And what I'm about to tell you — the three principles — they sound pragmatic, and they are. But the only way you can do them consistently is if they're backed up by an energy that actually supports you doing those things.

So for example — I'm just totally making this up randomly — let's say you decided you're gonna go to the gym three times a week. And the actual pragmatic action of going to the gym just involves you getting in your car, driving to the gym, getting out of your car, walking into the gym, and checking in.

So that pragmatic stuff is easy, right? You don't have to pass through an obstacle course to get to the gym. You just have to drive 10 minutes. That's the pragmatic stuff.

But the energetic stuff — the intangible, all the intangible questions of your thoughts and your feelings and your energy — that's going to determine whether you actually end up going three times a week. Your attitude toward the gym, toward exercise, toward yourself, how you feel about the whole thing — that's going to determine whether you actually end up going on a regular basis.

That's what I mean by: yes, the pragmatics are important, and also, unless you also have energetics that support the pragmatics, business growth is not going to happen.

The gym is not a bad example at all because, like I said, the actual physical action of going to the gym — just like the actual physical action of doing marketing and selling — is not complicated. It's not rocket science. It's not horrendously complex or difficult. You just wanna align your energy. You wanna embody the energy that supports you consistently taking those actions.

Here are the three

So, enough of a prelude. Let's get right into it. Here are the three unskippable, essential, foundational, unchanging, universal principles of marketing and selling.

Number one: you have to tell people who you are and what you do. And not like, "My name is Emily, and I am a mom." I mean, maybe that's relevant, but you have to tell them who you are and what you do in terms of your work, right? So, "Hi, I'm Simone, and I'm a marketing coach." That's it — who you are and what you do in terms of your work. You have to tell people that.

Number two: you have to help people get more of what they want. I'll come back to that more later.

But three: you have to tell them exactly how and why to pay you.

So. One, tell people who you are and what you do. Number two, help them get more of what they want. Number three, tell them exactly how and why to pay you for more.

One: tell people who you are and what you do

Okay, let me elaborate on each of these. Number one, telling people who you are and what you do.

You will not believe the number of folks I coach who wanna make more money and are frustrated that they aren't making more money — frustrated they aren't getting more engagement, all the things people want. And when I talk to them, it turns out they have, like, a secret, separate account for their coaching stuff, and a separate personal account. Which, by the way, you totally can do. But the reason they have that is because they don't want half the people in their lives to find out that they're a coach.

They're keeping it a secret from, like, half their family and half the people they know that they are open for business as a coach, right? Or they are showing up, but you can't really tell from what they're doing. They kinda hint at what they do, but it's not very direct.

So it's amazing how that happens. And listen — if you are hiding your coach identity, there is no way you're gonna get close to selling to your full potential.

This usually happens because people are afraid of being judged, misunderstood, criticized. Or they just don't wanna deal with the unpleasantness of people in their lives who know them as who they used to be and are gonna be confused or critical about who they are now. And so they're out there minding everyone else's minds and managing everyone else's opinions of them, preventing their judgment and criticism and confusion, and so they're spending all their time essentially muffling their businesses because they're afraid of what other people think.

And listen, I've been there. Not only have I been there — I think I moved in there and lived there for many years. So I get it. Believe me, I profoundly get it.

I was so afraid of — actually, no other than my best friend. Like, my best friend circle, right? I had my little bestie circle, and we were really tight, and it was their judgment that I was afraid of the most. I had a very respectable job before, and they knew me as that, and I totally thought that me being a coach, they would think it was totally hokey and stupid and embarrassing.

And so, to prevent my besties from having unpleasant, negative thoughts about me, I just completely hid that part of me. That part of my passion, my ambition. And I remember how that was a real thing for many, many years — until I decided one day that, you know what? I would rather be made fun of and criticized for who I really am than accepted and loved for who I'm really not. And I can't keep this inside anymore. I have to be who I am.

It was, like, a decision I made that I wasn't gonna do that anymore. But it took me years. So I get it.

And until you resolve whatever the unconscious reluctance is that you have inside — the thing that keeps you from proudly declaring to everyone you know, everyone in the whole world, from every rooftop, from every mountaintop, exactly who you are as a coach and exactly what you do, over and over and over again — until you're able to do that joyfully, naturally...

Okay, you know what? I take that back. Maybe not naturally. Sometimes that takes intentionality and effort. But until you're willing to do that, you're gonna be subconsciously blocking your own potential for sales.

The universe delivers exactly what you want. If half of your unconscious desires include not being known or seen as a coach, the universe will deliver exactly that. Hey, you don't wanna be seen as a coach? We'll give you exactly that. People won't see you as a coach. Ipso facto, they will not hire you as a coach, right?

And I learned this from other coaches I admire in the field, too. There are some people I'm like, "Yeah, these people are really conscientious. They're really good at marketing." And they do this. Every so often, they will do a post stating the most obvious things. "Hey, my name is so-and-so, and I help people with this. Nice to meet you if you're new to my world. If you're new to my world, you can take advantage of this and this and that resource."

Just giving people, like, "Hey, nice to meet you. I am so-and-so, and this is what I do. Hey, nice to meet you. I'm so-and-so. This is what I do." This very, very basic action of telling people who you are and what you do over and over and over again, to the point where it feels ridiculously repetitive to you — that is essential.

How often you say things has to build up to a critical mass in order for people to remember.

And I always highly recommend marketing as if everyone who's gonna encounter that marketing is meeting you for the first time today. Imagine how people would be primed to respond to you differently. When you're being kinda jaded — like, "Yeah, well, everyone already knows me, everyone already knows what I do, okay, what do I talk about today?" — versus, "Hey, I'm Simone. I'm a marketing coach for coaches, and I do this work."

If I'm assuming that everyone I'm meeting is new, I'm gonna be energized in a way that makes people lean in. And I'm going to be reminding people of things that they either have never heard about or need to be reminded of. The more I remind people, "Hey, I'm Simone, I help coaches with their marketing," the more you hear me say that — the next time you see anyone who needs help with their marketing, you're gonna be like, "Oh yeah, there's Simone. Simone helps people with their marketing. How do I know? Because she told me, like, five million times." You know what I mean?

Okay. So I hope I've driven home the point enough. Never slack on what seems like a very basic step of telling people who you are and what you do. Any kind of squidginess around that, you wanna explore, right? Where are you not proud to say it? Where are you not enthused to say it? With whom are you not proud to say this? Until you're really happy to tell everyone loudly, proudly, joyfully what you do — over and over — you are not going to be living out your full potential for selling.

All right. That's number one.

Two: help them get more of what they want

Number two: help them get more of what they want. Now, this is the most misunderstood step in this entire sequence.

Here's what I mean. I said, "Help them get more of what they want." I did not say, "Tell them you can help them." I said actually help them. Actually helping them is far superior to merely telling them you can help them. It's also the fastest and most efficient way to get them to see and understand and believe you when you say, "Hey, I can help you."

I say this is the most misunderstood thing, and I also want to say this is the thing people skip the most. It frustrates me so much it makes me wanna reach my hand through the screen and grab people by the shoulders and shake them and say, "Hey, stop doing that."

Because 99% of what I see in the way people market is kinda like dangling the promise of help in front of people instead of actually giving people help. It's like, "Hey, I'm really good at what I do. These are all the wonderful things that could happen if you work with me. I can totally help you. This is how I'm qualified. This is how wonderful my methodology is. These are all the results other people have gotten working with me."

That's all great, don't get me wrong. You definitely wanna say all those things. But what's missing in all of that is where you are actually helping people to get the results they want.

There's a huge difference — a world of difference — between telling people about all the ways you're gonna be amazing in helping them, and actually helping them. It's the difference between telling people how delicious something is going to be — describing everything about the food and why it's so delicious and why it's amazing and why it's made from locally grown organic blah blah blah and cooked by the world's greatest Michelin-starred chef, and, you know, blah blah blah, greatest food ever — you can talk about that all day long. Or you can give them a bite of the food so they can actually taste it.

That's the difference. Hearing about how great something's supposed to be versus actually getting to taste it — having that actually nourish your body and create sensations inside your mouth, with your taste buds. One is an intellectual exercise, and another is felt with your body.

When you tell them you can help them, that remains intellectual for them. When you actually help them, they receive it with their bodies. And you know what's gonna happen? They automatically become powerful believers in your ability to help.

I think most people stay on the surface of telling people they can help them, because actually helping people is a lot more challenging. Actually being useful to people is a lot more challenging. Because first, in order to do that, you have to get out of your own head, and you have to step into their shoes.

The kind of people you wanna help, the kind of people you wanna work with, the kind of people who you want paying you for more help — you can't go at them with what you think is important. In order for your marketing to work, you have to help them with what they want, what they value, what they think is important, what they're already prioritizing. It's not you just going off on your soapbox about what you're passionate about. You have to get out of your head and think, where is their itch that they want scratched?

This means you have to — again — get out of your own head, and you have to be humble and put your assumptions aside, put your own personal perspectives aside, and you actually have to pay attention to people. You have to listen to them and pay attention to what their hungers are, what their desires are, what their fears are, what their dreams are. What are they thinking about on a day-to-day basis that is the itch they wanna scratch? This requires a kind of curiosity and a willingness to observe and pay attention instead of just being in your own head.

So the first step to being able to actually help people get more of what they want is to pay attention to people and try to notice, like, what do people actually respond to?

So the second reason this can be hard is because — when I tell people, "Don't just tell your audience you can help them, actually help them" — the most frequent question I get is, "Okay, but how? How do I help them?"

And based on what you help people with, I can brainstorm ideas for you. But ultimately, that's not a question I can answer. That's a place where you have to use your own brain to brainstorm answers, and to try them, and learn from all of it.

I've thought of countless ideas for how to actually be helpful to my people. Back in the day — I say back in the day, but it was probably only like three years ago — I had this free Facebook group where it was, like, a constant experimentation lab for trying out different ideas for helping people, so I could see in real time: oh, this really helps them, this really scratches their itch. Whereas that thing I thought would be really great, they're actually not as interested, or it's harder for them to jump on it, right? I just tried so many things.

And because I've been on such a long practice of testing out my ideas for what would actually help people, and then learning from it — and I've been doing it repeatedly for years — I'm a lot sharper about it now. I'm so much better at diagnosing what people want, what their itches are, and how to be more precise about delivering exactly what they want in a way that makes them think, "Oh my God, that was so useful."

No mentor of mine dictated to me, "Hey, Simone, do this because your people want this." The best ideas are gonna come from you using your own creativity and conducting these experiments on your own time.

This is such a huge value of mine. I live by it. If you're listening to this podcast, you know what I mean. So many people tell me that listening to my podcast is better than super expensive programs they paid for — that they get more value from this. And that's because I pack in the kind of things that I know really scratch people's itches, that's going to be immediately and massively helpful for them.

And so when I sell a program, when I say, "Hey, you guys, buy this," you guys believe me. You trust me because you're like, "Simone's already helped me, so I know Simone's gonna deliver." That's not, like, an if. You associate me with delivering. You associate me with massive helpfulness, because I already have provided that for you before you have even paid me.

If you remember nothing else from this podcast — if you remember nothing else from anything sales-related — please remember this. Actually being useful to people, actually giving people what they want, actually helping people in advance without attachment, is the best sales strategy.

Three: tell them exactly how and why to pay you

Okay. So let's do a little review. There are three principles. Number one, tell people who you are and what you do. Number two, help them, help them, and help them get more of what they want. The third thing is: you gotta tell them exactly how to pay you more, and exactly why to pay you more.

You gotta tell them, "Hey, pay me," without apology, without ambiguity, without doing a weird little dance of, "I have buried that information somewhere on my website or social media, and you have to go on an Easter egg hunt to find exactly how you can hire me." Don't do that.

You'll be amazed how many amazing people do a brilliant job of helping their people, right? They're great at step two, providing all the help — and then make it pretty much impossible for their people to figure out how to pay them and why they should pay, right? "Yeah, I love hanging out with so-and-so. I love being in so-and-so's sphere. They give so much usefulness. They're so inspiring." And then if none of those people are paying you, it's because you're not telling them exactly how to pay you, exactly why they should pay you for more.

Don't be afraid to use very direct, plain words. Being polite about this shit, dancing around this shit, is not a service. Plain, direct language is of the highest service. Selling is a good thing when what you have actually helps people.

So when you say, "Hey, give me money," I want you to be able to say, "Give me this much of your money, because here's what you're getting in return." I want you to be able to say that sentence without a hitch. This is how you can pay me. This is how much. This is why you should pay me today, and not tomorrow.

I sometimes do this because I want to normalize doing this. Sometimes in my selling pitches, in my emails, I will say something like, "Hey, everyone, I know some of you might be procrastinating. Listen — get out your wallet, get your credit card out right now, go to the sales page, click on the thing that says buy, enter your credit card information, and give me money."

I literally say it word for word sometimes, because I want to de-stigmatize saying the plain reality of: we're doing this whole thing because I want you to pay me. Not because you care about making me rich — although maybe you do, I don't know — but because of what's on the other side when you pay me. When you enter that credit card information and fork over that chunk of cash to me, here's what you get that's going to change the rest of your life and give you shit that is worth many, many more times than the money you're giving me now. This is a transaction that's going to create so much multiplicative goodness in your life. Let's get that started. It starts with you paying me. Pay me. Give me money.

So in talking about this, it's also important to tell people why they should pay you today. Because isn't that what you want? You don't want people to pay you at some distant future point — because guess what? They don't want their transformation to start at a distant, mysterious point in the future. They want it to start today. They want to start feeling better today. They want to reap the benefits of getting coached starting today.

So you gotta be clear in your mind — this comes from clarity in your own mind to begin with — why exactly someone should pay you today and not tomorrow. Not some mysterious date in the future where they randomly have a whole bunch of disposable income and all the time, and the stars are magically aligned, and they can just make that leap, and it's totally easy and there's no resistance. That day does not exist.

You have to know for yourself: here's how you can pay me, here's why you should pay me, and here's why it should be today. If you can say all of this in a really aligned way — meaning, if you say all these things and you feel really great about it because you actually believe everything you're saying — that is so powerful.

And if you're like, "I'm not really sure why they should pay me today" — that, you have to go work on. You have to be curious, right? You have to be curious about: oh, what actually is the significance of somebody getting started with this work today? What does it matter to them? What's the value?

When I was suffering, when I needed help with this thing and I didn't know what was available to me, and I just thought I had to keep suffering with this thing forever — what were all the implications? What were all the consequences in my life? And what are the consequences of getting started today? What are the consequences of believing that something can be different starting today? How does that ripple out into the future?

You have to think about all of these things so that you are genuinely congruent — so that you are aligned mind, body, and soul when you say, "You want to pay me today, because here's what's gonna happen," right? You gotta put that thought into it. You gotta put that aligned intention in, and you have to be willing to have that dialogue with yourself to land on what that aligned intention is.

Keep coming back to these three

So, my friends — I feel like I went on many, many tangents, but it's worth it, because these are simple, pragmatic steps, and when you do that work, it is going to reward you more than anything else in the world.

Remember, just keep coming back to these three things. Three unskippable things. One, you tell people who you are and what you do, again and again. Two, you help them — you actually help them, instead of just telling people you can help them — you actually help them get more of what they want, and you do that over and over again. And number three, you tell them exactly how to pay you and why to pay you today, and you do that over and over and over again.

That is all you need to do in marketing. And if you can do all three of those things consistently, from a place of alignment, from a place where you feel really good and you believe all the words you're saying — you are going to be a sales megastar. I guarantee it.

So I hope that simplifies your work in sales and marketing, and keeps you focused and not getting sidetracked. That's gonna help you make lots of progress. All right, my friends — I'll talk to you next week.