Unlocking Your Sales with Trevor Gosar

[TRANSCRIPT]

0:00:03 - (Jared Erni): This is the For Impact podcast, the destination for impact driven entrepreneurs striving to live life on their terms and create a ripple effect of positive impact in the communities they serve. Where we put your success stories center stage, dissecting the lessons learned, and sharing insights and ideas that will help you amplify your impact. And now, here's your host, Jared Ernie.

0:00:38 - (Jared Erni): Let me go ahead and introduce Trevor. Trevor Gosser has served as the director of Sales for Odin, a home service company where he actually scaled the company from a million dollars a year to over $10 million a year in just two years with their sales. Today he operates Surge Sales Consulting, where he helps primarily home service companies and contractors with the tools they need to stop giving quotes and leaving it to the client to sign on, but actually getting customers while they're in their homes.

0:01:08 - (Jared Erni): And Trevor's expertise is going to be valuable to our group, not just those who are in the home service space, but because sales is really a principle based approach, we can find those principles used in every industry. So those of you who are joining, who may not be in the home service space, I want you to still pay great attention to the principles that Trevor will share with us today that has allowed him to have incredible results with his cells.

0:01:36 - (Jared Erni): So how's that for an introduction, Trevor?

0:01:39 - (Trevor Gosar): You made me blush. That's not very hard, though. When you got pale skin like me, I blush quite easily, so no, that's great, man. I appreciate the intro, super grateful to be here and just hope to provide some value and give you guys whatever insights I can when it comes to sales and from my experience and the experience I've seen from many, many others.

0:02:01 - (Jared Erni): Why don't we start out, Trevor, with maybe you giving us a little bit of your background and how you kind of your backstory.

0:02:09 - (Trevor Gosar): Yeah, let's do it. Let's do it. So I grew up in Utah, grew up in a family where honestly, hard work was what was appreciated, it was what was rewarded, that was what we were known for. My dad was very proud of just like the breeding hardworking kids, and I loved it, I'm very grateful for it. So from a young age, I really loved getting out and putting some hard work to the skill to try and provide for more opportunity for us. So we had a rule in our family where it was if we wanted to do something, my parents would pay for half of it, we would pay for the other. So, like, when I wanted to play Little League football, I would pay either the league membership fee or I would pay for the pads and whatever rentals that needed to be done there.

0:02:56 - (Trevor Gosar): And so I had to figure out how to make some money. And I was told my entire life that I should be good at sales because I was an extrovert. And naturally as a kid, I think I just didn't have fear. And so it was kind of like a k. I'd go out and I'd spray paint the numbers on the curbs, right? We'd go up and down the neighborhood and it'd be like, hey, your address on the front of your curb is wearing off $5. And we can respray paint it $10, and we can do your favorite university of Utah or BYU logo next to it. And people loved it. And it taught this hard work to me.

0:03:29 - (Trevor Gosar): But when I was 18 years old, went out, got my first official sales job, which was doing door to door sales out in Wyoming and Nebraska. And anybody who's ever done door to door knows that that is a grind. It will teach you a lot about yourself very quick. And so I'd been told that I should be good at sales. I get out there in Nebraska, I can still remember I'm out in Grand Island, Nebraska. The wind was putting the rain sideways.

0:03:57 - (Trevor Gosar): I'm standing the street and I've got a clipboard. I've got this orange dot sign for the company, and that's it. And I wasn't given a pitch, wasn't given anything, and I just fell flat on my face. It was just so bad. I was like, man, I was supposed to be good at sales because I like to talk to people, but I was horrible. And I remember walking up to these homes and literally knocking a door, being like, please don't answer.

0:04:18 - (Trevor Gosar): Because if you answer, then I have to come up with something to say. And I don't know what to say. And it was like, that horrible. And so that progressed. And I literally was in a state at that time of my life where I couldn't afford to go home. It was just like I was stuck out there. I had to figure it out. And so I still remember Cheyenne, Wyoming, was the city where things completely turned around for me.

0:04:40 - (Trevor Gosar): And it all started, it actually was with this one right here. This is the exact copy. I keep it on my shelf for that reason. Brian Tracy the Psychology of Selling it's got all my notes, rip cover in the back, everything. But this is the book that changed my life. I remember waking up every morning learning a routine of like, hey, let's study. Let's figure out how to get better at sales. And that progressed. That was twelve years ago.

0:05:08 - (Trevor Gosar): So I know I look twelve years old, but a little older than that, but I loved it, man. I just fell in love with it. And so one thing led to another. Sales did not come natural to me. It was like I had to learn why I needed to say certain things, or how to say certain things, and why it was important. And so it helped me to be an effective trainer and so at these companies I'd go into, we would hire on reps, and it was like, well, they weren't producing. And I'd be like, hey, let me give a shot at it. I'll help them out. And things would immediately turn around.

0:05:38 - (Trevor Gosar): And we just found some super awesome success early on, had some great opportunity, and was just surrounded by some amazing people. Five years ago, about five years ago, I ended up at Odin Energy. We were a home efficiency company, so doing insulation, duct, ceiling, and we just completely transformed that company. We took them from, like, you say, a million dollars to north of 10 million. And honestly, more importantly, what I was very proud about in that scenario was the service we were offering to the customer.

0:06:08 - (Trevor Gosar): We turned a very boring installation sale into something that every one of our sales reps was 100% behind. They loved it. They were passionate about it, and it was a high ticket offer to the customer, and it really transformed their lives as well. And so it was a fun process to learn, like, hey, how do we take something that may not be as exciting as everybody thinks it is, make it an opportunity that's changing to the customer and to the person, the sales rep that's going out and representing it. And we scaled that thing pretty quickly, and it was a lot of fun. So that takes us to where we're at now.

0:06:44 - (Jared Erni): So one of the questions that I hear a lot from my clients or other business owners is they're afraid to sell because they don't want to turn someone off. They are afraid to be too pushy or come across too pushy. So how do you find that balance of not selling versus being too pushy? What do you tell people then?

0:07:09 - (Trevor Gosar): Really good question. So I have a unique approach to this because I feel like it's too common in the sales space. You either get, like, the polar opposites, right? It's like the don't sell it all, and that inherently makes you a better person that way, or the opposite, which is you have to go hardcore, and you got to be the guy that knows everything to say, when to say it, the silver tongue. Right?

0:07:31 - (Trevor Gosar): And I just don't resonate with either of those. Right. I was taught that sales is about connection. It's not about perfection. It's about getting with the customer and learning the process of connecting with them. And so one of the most effective ways I've done this and this is a perspective shift that anybody that I work with, I'm like, okay, number one, you need to have this perspective shift, and this is the shift I'd share with you guys, is when you're selling, too many people think that it's me against the customer.

0:08:03 - (Trevor Gosar): We just breathe that, unfortunately, because in our minds, we think that we think it's I need to persuade this customer to believe differently than what they believe now, and therefore it's me against them. The reality is it's actually me and the customer versus a problem. And so if we can position ourselves on that team, what we say, how we say it, the way we approach things, all of that will shift naturally.

0:08:28 - (Trevor Gosar): I don't have to tell somebody when to say exactly when to say it, because if they just believe that, they believe it's. Wait, it's me and the customer versus a problem. Then everything changes from there. And I can start to do things inside of the home or in any type of sale. I'll give you an example in home sales. I'll give it in home sales, and then we can give an example of a different situation. But in home sales, it's very common that if you're doing the service based or something of that nature, we're getting them a quote of some sort, right?

0:09:04 - (Trevor Gosar): We're providing some type of solution. So we're going out to their home for some type of inspection. And what's so common is, like, we'll sit at the table and Jared, if it was you and I, we'd be sitting across the table from each other, and I'm going to show you what I'm doing and what it paints this picture of is it's actually me versus you. And what I found one time when I'm sitting at this table, we're sitting shoulder to shoulder with a customer, and I'm sitting there and all of a sudden it dawns on me. I'm like, oh, my gosh, we're looking at these things together.

0:09:30 - (Trevor Gosar): This is great. We're sitting shoulder to shoulder. We're looking at the solution together. And naturally, what's coming out of my mouth is we and us and let's, right? My conversation naturally fell into that track of, like, we're on a team. We're looking at this together. It's not me versus you. I'm not just showing you. It's like, no, we're looking at this together. And so when we can make that shift, it completely transforms one the customer experience, but then also transforms our sales approach.

0:10:00 - (Trevor Gosar): And it doesn't come across pushy because we're on the same team as each other, right? Or like, if you take another approach, if you took it with outside of the home, right? So if it's over the phone sales, we're doing some type of business to consumer, it's the same thing. It's the we, the let, the US. Let's do this. Why don't we look at this, right? My wife and then I'll stop talking. I know I can get rambling and I get excited about this stuff, but my wife and I were at a doctor's appointment, and it dawned on me when this was happening, because when my son was being born, my wife went to this OBGYN clinic where there were several OBS that were there to help, right? And so every time we'd go visit, it would be a different OB.

0:10:41 - (Trevor Gosar): And I recognized with these OBS that there was a difference in the ones we were comfortable around and the ones we were like, it wasn't a great experience, and it was something minor. And with one of them that we felt very comfortable, I recognized it. We're sitting there and she's talking to my wife, and she goes, okay, so it looks like we've got this going on, right? Like, hey, he looks so cute. We are so excited for you. It was like all this inclusive language around we're a team, I'm here together. It's not, hey, you look like this, or you have this going on. It's like, okay, well, this is what looks like it's going on right now. This is what we have on our hands.

0:11:17 - (Trevor Gosar): It totally shifted. And I realized it's like, man, even outside of like, if we're just trying to build a connection with people, it's all about that team and positioning ourselves.

0:11:27 - (Jared Erni): That thanks for sharing that, Trevor. You made me remember an expert I read out of Magnetic Marketing by Dan Kennedy and talking specifically about home services. He know what someone wants is not always what they really want, but what they say they want is not what they really want. Someone says in a home service space often, right? Insulation, solar, whatever it is, that's not what they really want.

0:11:56 - (Jared Erni): Well, and this is actually something I brought up with Kara at Zero Mold, that's a situation where no one wants to have to come in and get mold removal. It's a situation where they're forced to have to make a decision to do that. What someone really wants is to know and trust that that person is going to treat them fairly and like they would treat their own mother. That's what it comes down to. And so I love what you're saying about creating that connection and using those terms. We I think what that does is it shifts your mindset a little bit to being a team together. I love that. What a great have you ever been told you've been pushing?

0:12:36 - (Trevor Gosar): No, actually, no. Literally, in twelve years of selling, I've been called passionate, I've been called persistent, full of conviction. But pushy, literally, I've never once been called that. And it doesn't mean that I don't go for the sale. We figure it out, right? We figure out how to make it happen. But I believe pushiness can come from a place of you and the customer are not in. You know, my wife, she loves Disney.

0:13:06 - (Trevor Gosar): She loves like, I would put her up against anybody when it comes to how much she loves Disney. I wouldn't say that she's pushy about going to right. Like she's just doesn't like, I just know that she has all that excitement and she wants to go, but it doesn't come from a place of being pushy. She's just convicted. She wants it, and she's determined to figure out how to make it happen. And you can feel that. And so the same thing happens in sales.

0:13:33 - (Jared Erni): Yeah. So one of the interesting things I learned this year in Sales is that 45% of your sale is based on trust and rapport. And being able to create that trust rapport in an effective way, really is about aligning your agenda to serve that client, not to close the deal. So often it's like, man, I need to sell, I need to sell. I got to close this deal. When you talk like that, it's about you and it's about that end result, but you're shifting that agenda to be all about them.

0:14:10 - (Jared Erni): And so I found coming in, basically going through this exercise, like mentally removing my own thoughts, putting them in a box to the side and coming in 100% curious and 100% genuine in what does this person need, whether it's what I can offer them? And that totally shifts the whole mindset of that conversation.

0:14:36 - (Trevor Gosar): Yeah. Piggyback on that, right? So my belief of sales, and this is a definition that if you want to write this down and keep it, this has served me so well and others so well, is that all that sales is? It's a transfer of energy and belief that results in a decision. And if we can dissect that right. Like energy and belief, those are two things that I have control over. I have control over my energy. I have control over my belief.

0:15:06 - (Trevor Gosar): Now, too often people think that sales is a transfer of energy and belief that results in a yes. And that's just not the truth. Right. It's not always going to end up in a yes. But what we can help is it to end in a decision whether that's a yes or a no, right? Either one is totally fine. And so in sales, majority of the battle is accepting the fact that I can't convince everybody of everything. That's just not the way it works. And I don't want everybody, I want the people that this is truly going to affect whatever our service, our solution is.

0:15:40 - (Trevor Gosar): I want them to actually be impacted by my service. And so if we know who this impacts, we know what our service does, then as soon as we recognize that person, then we can transfer that energy and that belief that hopefully will result in a yes. But sales isn't about the yeses, right? Sales is just about decisions. And as soon as we can get to a yes or a no, we've done our job. That's our job in sales.

0:16:04 - (Trevor Gosar): And if we can get to that place and avoid all the maybes, I call them the maybe train, then it puts you in a place where you can actually start to get more yeses. It's funny how that works, but just because we start to get creative and whatnot, that's awesome.

0:16:20 - (Jared Erni): I really love that. That actually made me think, what's that Zig Ziglar line? Less selling, more serving? Is that how it yeah.

0:16:28 - (Trevor Gosar): Yeah.

0:16:29 - (Jared Erni): So a couple of weeks ago, I came across a prospect who was really interested in our coaching, but he was stuck on something, and he he couldn't move forward until he got that thing fixed. But he had talked to several people before on this issue, and none of them were willing to sit down with him and really work through that issue. When he described it to me, I said, look, this is not the time on the call, but let's book another call.

0:16:56 - (Jared Erni): There's no obligation. You don't have to say join or whatever, but let me just serve you for an hour and sit down and solve this problem. So that's not normally the process, but that is what I did, because I met him where he was and just came from a place of serving and knowing that I could help him with that issue. We resolved the issue, and today he's a client in our coaching program because of that. No one else took that time to do that. And so I love what you're saying here, being able to transfer that energy and belief. It often is meeting them where they're at and serving them.

0:17:30 - (Jared Erni): Not like where sales gets a bad name, being manipulative to get no.

0:17:37 - (Trevor Gosar): And that's you remind me of a story. So it's actually where we met Jared. So, like, a couple of years back at Funnel Hacking Live. So at the time I was with Odin. I was director of sales, and we were doing a lot of online marketing, and I was a doorknocker converted to online marketing. And I'm spending all this money on Facebook, and it's like, well, it's working, but I don't really know how to scale. Like, it was so bad. It was like, anybody that knows marketing.

0:18:03 - (Trevor Gosar): I remember at that conference, a few marketers asked us, they're like, so what does your retargeting sequence look like? And I'm like, I don't know what that is. We just get a lead, and then we call it. We figure out how to sell. Right? So we were very basic when it came to that, but we were spending a lot of money. Well, we go to this conference, like, okay, we want to find an agency. We want to find somebody that can help us, take us from where we're at now to the next level.

0:18:26 - (Trevor Gosar): And I will never forget. So me and the owner, his name is Rex, we're sitting in the lobby at 1030 at night, and there's these two agency owners that are there chatting with us. And it could not have been a more polar opposite difference. It was such a polar opposite. The one was like, hey, literally tried to hard close us on the spot, put his hand out to get a handshake. It was so uncomfortable. But he's like, you can pay me for an hour of my consulting and I'll give you some info, or you can just hire a company, and then we'll do it for was would not pull back the curtain at, like, not even a peek.

0:18:58 - (Trevor Gosar): The other one, Brandon, he goes, hey, will you pull up your funnel real quick and I'll look at it and I'll give you any insight that you might have? And I was like, oh, yeah, sure. We pull it open. And he gave us two points of feedback, and those two points, I remember going back to the hotel room that night with Rex, and I'm like, oh, my. Like, that was he he provided value right off the bat. Right. The funny thing is, he was two times more expensive than the other guy.

0:19:26 - (Trevor Gosar): Right. And to this day, Odin still uses that company. They have spent hundreds of thousands of dollars with that company and trusted them with it. And it's like, just solely based on the fact that in that conversation, brandon approached it from a I want to give value. Like, even if you choose not to use me, I'm going to leave you better off than the way I found you. Right. And that's really the best salespeople come from that perspective know, if the customer says no, which a good percentage of them will, I want to leave you in a better situation than when we found. And, like, you get value out of this regardless of whether or not you choose to move forward with me, and then naturally, you end up attracting more people, which is really cool.

0:20:05 - (Jared Erni): That's awesome. So I've studied under Neil Tricarico for several months. I actually spent six months in his one on one coaching, and he used to serve as the lead sales guy for Tony Robbins. So this guy is I don't know why he even worked with me. Why did I get that honor? That was crazy. But wonderful friend of mine now. And one of the things he taught me is just that bring in so much value in your meeting that they're going to walk away much better regardless if they buy or not.

0:20:39 - (Jared Erni): And to tie that into a point you made later or earlier, it's about helping them make a decision. And so one of the things I've learned to always ask that client or customer is when talking to them is the question, how can I serve you? So you have what you need to make the best decision moving forward, whether that's working with me or not. And I think that's such a great place to kind of put ourselves into. Like, don't attach ourselves to the outcome that aligns with our agenda. Attach yourself to the outcome of leaving that person better regardless of the decision.

0:21:20 - (Jared Erni): But also, like you said, Trevor, it's about helping them make that decision, because if they don't make the decision, then we fail to help them make.

0:21:29 - (Trevor Gosar): Is. So I've got a hard, fast rule, and I remember where I learned this. It was here in Utah, Salt Lake City. I was sitting in a home of this guy. It was the funniest family. I will never forget that sale for so many reasons. And so we're sitting there and I had this whole pipeline of maybes and it was all these people that were like, yeah, we'll get back to you. Yeah, it sounds good. We'll let you know.

0:21:55 - (Trevor Gosar): And I was convinced they were going to say yes. I was like, yeah, this is perfect. We got like, a huge pipeline of people. I was so new to sales at the time. I remember sitting in this customer's home, them and I go through numbers and the customer is like, cool, if you can just send me that, we'll look it over and let you know. And I was like, yeah, sounds good. We'll make this thing happen. And I'm like packing up my stuff. I never even asked for the clothes. I just went through numbers. And then he just guided me to the close to wrap things up. And so I'm walking out the door and I remember it dawned on me. I'm like, Wait, I didn't even ask for the sale. Like, what the heck?

0:22:28 - (Trevor Gosar): And so I turned around and I was, hey man, do you want me to ask me? Do you trust me? All things considered, I got thick skin, man. It's cool if you don't. And he's like, no, we totally trust you. I was like, do you feel like the solution is the right fit for you? Is this actually going to solve what you're talking? He's like, yeah, no, 100%. I was like, okay, I'm here, you're here. Why don't you just knock this thing out now and get the thing done?

0:22:48 - (Trevor Gosar): And he was like, yeah, it's not a bad idea. Let's do that. And I was like, holy cow. I had banked on this maybe train. It's like a freight train. And every maybe I would accept was just another cart added to this train that just gets harder and harder to stop because I wasn't helping people make decisions. And part of the reason was I was so afraid to be told no, right? Like, I really was. And so in my hope of getting a yes, I would avoid the no by being okay with a maybe.

0:23:17 - (Trevor Gosar): And it doesn't serve you well at all. Maybes don't pay bills. Maybes don't help anybody. Maybes don't change their life, right? Like, it just doesn't. And so it dawned on me that day. It was like, hey, we're going to derail this train. Let it just crash, crash, burn. And I will never allow myself onto another maybe train again. And it came from a really powerful place for me because I was like, man, I get why I understand this. And it's like in sales, we're not paid for the yeses.

0:23:43 - (Trevor Gosar): We're paid for the no's. We're paid because we're willing to endure through so many people that tell us no. For that individual that's willing to say yes and that we can help impact. Right. And so if we can keep that perspective, it doesn't make you afraid of the no's. Like, the no is like no. That's part of it. That's why I chose this industry, because I can endure through that. I can get through no's, and I can go find a yes. That's why I get paid and compensated at a high level, because we're able to focus on what matters most.

0:24:13 - (Jared Erni): Awesome.

0:24:14 - (Trevor Gosar): Sorry.

0:24:15 - (Jared Erni): I've got to figure out my power cord because it's having an issue. There we go. We're good. That's awesome. That's super powerful. I love what you're saying here, and it aligns so well with the same principles that I've learned here. But if you could summarize, what are the top three principles that you would encourage anyone in any industry to take with them, maybe take from this call to go ahead and improve their sales today? What would you say your biggest tips or principles would be?

0:24:48 - (Trevor Gosar): So I think a lot of it's what we've talked about. It's connection, not perfection. If you want to get better at sales, learn how to get better at connecting with your that we have know it's. It's not just about the buddy buddy. A oh, Jared. You live in Atlanta? I used to live in Atlanta. So now we're in connection. That's not real connection. Right? There's what we call personal rapport, and there's professional rapport, and we have to have a good balance of the two.

0:25:16 - (Trevor Gosar): Right? And so it's finding that perfect balance of those two to be in connection with the customer. Another principle that is what we just talked about, it's one I'm very passionate about is learn how to believe inside. Like, truly, truly believe that there's yeses and there's no's there's no. Like, if we can get ourselves to that, like, watch what your brain does, it's pretty incredible. Like, our brains are not meant to help us thrive. They're meant to help us survive. Tony Robbins talks about this all the not, they're not, you know, set up in a way to help us just absolutely thrive. We have to kind of force it to do that.

0:25:55 - (Trevor Gosar): And so if we can put our back against the wall a little bit and be like, wait, no. I only accept yeses or no's. That means now I have to get creative on how to either ask for the close again or uncover additional value or get creative to spend more time, like you said, with a client where I typically wouldn't. Right. I'm now going to get creative, let this go to work for you. And so if you believe that internally, then that's going to be great.

0:26:19 - (Trevor Gosar): The third one, this comes from a story. Let me ask this. You guys can put it down in the chat because I haven't asked anybody, but does everybody know who Jerry Rice is? If you can put, like, something in the chat? So I know. You know who? Jerry? Rice is oh, yeah, there we'll tell I'll tell saw. I'll try to think. I saw you may not know Jerry Rice, okay? Jerry Rice, arguably the greatest football player NFL football player ever to play in the NFL. Like, he was a wide receiver, has more touchdowns by a long shot than anybody else. The guy's incredible. Okay, so this story comes from one of his teammates. His name is Bo Eason.

0:27:05 - (Trevor Gosar): And Bo Eason is, like, one of those people if you want to go study somebody, bo Eason is a phenomenal person to study. He, like, flies into the radar, and you start to learn his life, and you're like, My gosh, this guy knows what he's doing. He's done some incredible things. But Bo Eason was known for his hard work. He was always the first person in the practice, the last one to leave. And so he gets traded onto the same team as Jerry Rice.

0:27:27 - (Trevor Gosar): And he shows up to his first practice, and he gets there early. Like, really early. I think he said it was like, 30 or 45 minutes early.

0:27:33 - (Jared Erni): Trevor we were having a tech issue, it looks like. Is everyone able to hear him?

0:27:42 - (Trevor Gosar): Can you guys hear me? Entra yeah. Jared, can you hear me? Let's see if jared, if you can.

0:28:07 - (Jared Erni): Just came back, apologize for interrupting. I just want you to freeze up for everyone.

0:28:12 - (Trevor Gosar): No, you're good. If that happens, you're going to stop me again. So that's so? So Bo Eason gets traded to Jerry Rice's team. He shows up to the first practice. He's, like, super early to practice, and Jerry Rice is already out there warming up. And Bo Eason's like, what the like, that's my job, not yours. You're already the best player to ever, like, why are you here early? So practice progresses, and in the very beginning of practice, they'll do, like, little warm ups, right? So it's like, all the receivers lined up, and he talks about how I think it was Joe Montana is the quarterback. And he's like so these receivers walk up. First receiver lines up, does what he calls the All Pro Glide. Like, really easy little cut, catches the ball, and then walks it back to Joe Montana, hands it to him and gets back in line.

0:28:55 - (Trevor Gosar): The next receiver gets up like, this is warm ups. He's like All Pro Glide, gets a little cut, catches the ball, turns around and walks back to he goes and then Jerry Rice gets up there, and he's like, this is warm ups, bro. And he's like jerry Rice gets up there, and he flies out like a cannon. He's like, boom. Like he's gone. And then he cuts hard. And as soon as he catches that ball, he turns up field, runs 90 yards into the touchdown, and then turns around and runs 90 yards back, hands the football to the quarterback and gets back in line.

0:29:32 - (Trevor Gosar): And then the next guy gets up right? And it's like all pro glide, cut, catched it, same thing. And then Jerry gets up again, and the same thing happens for 3 hours of practice. Just time and time and time and time again. He's given everything, right? Catch the ball all the way to the end zone. He's like, dude, this guy had to have ran who knows how many miles during practice. And so after practice, he's like, I see Jerry in the locker room. I'm like, Jerry, dude, what was, what was, what was that all about?

0:30:03 - (Trevor Gosar): This is practice. And Jerry goes, oh, yeah, it's easy, man. Every time these hands touch that football, my body knows that it gets into an end. Like it's that simple. And so the concept was generosity. And this is the third one for anybody in sales, is we learn to embrace generosity. And generosity is not just about giving money, which we often think about. Generosity is about giving all of ourselves to everybody that we're with.

0:30:30 - (Trevor Gosar): When we're with them, when we're present, be all there. There's no client that's not worth our if I'm with them, there's no client that does not deserve my attention when I'm with them, right? Like, we're here, we're present. There's a ton of other things going on. Be here, be present. And if we can learn that in sales, then I think you'd be amazed at the connection you can enter into with the customer.

0:30:52 - (Jared Erni): That's powerful. Awesome. Thank you for sharing that. I have one other question, and then I think we can turn this open to questions. So those of you who've joined the call, we'd like to have an open dialogue being able to mastermind here. So think about some of your biggest questions in sales, and you can bring that up to Trevor. Trevor and I will both take a stab at that to help you on this call with those questions.

0:31:16 - (Jared Erni): But my last question here, I love those three tips, but I came back to your tip on recreating real connection and rapport. And you brought up kind of that example, but just kind of tell off that what most people do to build rapport is like, oh, where are you from? I've been there before. That kind of small talk that is meaningless. So what are some tips that you've learned and how to create that instant rapport and trust when dealing with a client?

0:31:47 - (Trevor Gosar): That's a good question. Yeah, I used to always think the same thing. It was like I was a big golfer growing up. I loved golf. And so it was like, oh, early on I'd find somebody like golf, and I was like, boom, I like golf too. And I just thought that that was all about rapport. And it's just not. Just because somebody likes golf doesn't mean I'm going to buy from them. Right? Put yourself in the customer's shoes.

0:32:09 - (Trevor Gosar): That's not what connects us. Just because we're from the same city, just because we like the same sports team. That doesn't put me in a position to want to trust that person per se, but what does? So when it comes to personal rapport, it's actually advice my dad gave me. So I went and served a two year church mission, a Mormon mission, when I was 19 years old. And I was actually out to Atlanta and love that area. But when I was leaving, my dad sat me down. So we're going out for two years, right? Like, I don't know what I'm doing. I'm like, okay, I'm going out there for two years, living out there away from family, friends, everything, and I'm just doing missionary work.

0:32:49 - (Trevor Gosar): Well, my dad sat me down and he said, hey, Trevor, be interested. Don't be interesting. I was like, what? And it haunted me. Not haunted, but it would not leave my mind my entire mission. It was like, be interested, not interesting. And that's the kicker for personal rapport that I've learned, right, is that we need to be interested in these people. It's not about me being interesting. I could talk you off Tom Blue in the face about things I think I'm interesting about. It doesn't mean anything to anybody. It doesn't mean they're more willing to buy from me.

0:33:25 - (Trevor Gosar): But when I'm interested in them, they care about that. People love to talk about themselves, and so be interested, not interesting. And then the second part to that is understanding that rapport is two parts. So rapport is personal rapport, which is what we just talked about. Be interested in them, interested in. And if you want a good exercise, it's just ask one more question than you're used to. Go one question deeper.

0:33:49 - (Trevor Gosar): So for me, it was, they like golf. My knee jerk reaction was, hey, I like golf too. Instead of saying that, go one question deeper. Oh, nice. Do you have a favorite course? Right? It just shows interest in who they are, and so it's a really good exercise. So that's personal rapport. Now, personal rapport is not what people buy off of. It just helps us knock down some barriers. Professional rapport is where we can really build some trust with them.

0:34:13 - (Trevor Gosar): So in our industries, we're experts, right? I know the mold company here, they're the expert. Zero mold. They are the expert of mold. The customer is not the expert like they are. And so we can either come in and say, like, I am the expert, or we can just help the customer see that in their own mind through questions that we ask. And so a good exercise I'd like to put myself through is put yourself as a mechanic or a doctor, right? Like, if I sit down with a doctor and I've got a broken I've got symptoms, and the doctor doesn't ask me anything about the symptoms and just says, all right, I'm prescribing you this, this, and this hasn't asked me anything, I'm not going to trust that, right?

0:34:52 - (Trevor Gosar): Yeah, you got a degree, but you don't know what I'm dealing with right now. You just prescribed me all this stuff, right? And often we do that in sales. We just go in and it's like, oh, we already assume what they're dealing with and spray and pray versus stopping and realizing that doctor. It's like, cool. Where does it hurt? Does it hurt when I do this? When did you first realize this was hurting?

0:35:11 - (Trevor Gosar): Was there anything that put this into onset, asking certain questions that you're like, oh, my gosh, this guy knows what he's talking about. Naturally, in my head, as the patient, I have trust in that doctor now because he's asking the right questions. And so we need to do the same thing in our industry, right? And that's what builds professional rapport early on. So that's like, when you talk about any sales approach, the first two things that we do in sales is we build personal and professional rapport, and we do that through being interested, and we do that through asking the right questions to help the customers see us as an expert.

0:35:49 - (Jared Erni): That's awesome. Very powerful. Thank you, Trevor. What a great call. Let's open this up to some questions, and since we have a pretty good group with us, if you have a question, just pop it into the chat, and then we'll go ahead and unmic and let you have that dialogue about your question. What questions would you guys have about anything with sales? Be tailored to your specific industry or in general, while we're waiting on those questions, too, as people are thinking through that?

0:36:27 - (Jared Erni): I love what you said. I think there's so much power in asking good questions that that was something that I learned through my coaching with Neil and has been game changing. Normally, when people think of sales, we think of pitching the sale. And when you shift that to prescribing, it would be malpractice for a doctor to prescribe something without truly understanding the client situation. And the only way you can really prescribe a solution is by first understanding asking the right question. So that was awesome.

0:37:09 - (Trevor Gosar): And I think some of it comes from as long as we're going to be an ethical doctor, right? An ethical doctor should not be sitting there saying, okay, I want to prescribe this, so I'm going to ask this question that pigeonholes them into that being the answer, right? And when in reality, it's just like, no, I understand. I have a solution. And the reality is, take Ibuprofen. Ibuprofen can be a solution for many different things.

0:37:36 - (Trevor Gosar): So we can take our one solution that we have, like, zero mold, right? We can take that one solution that we have, and there's different ways we can paint the picture of that solution. And where our service doesn't change, we're not reinventing our offering, but we're painting the picture in a way that makes most sense and is most effective for that customer. But we're asking questions to truly understand where they're at. So we're really curious. We really do need to know. It's not just a pigeonhole.

0:38:00 - (Trevor Gosar): Customers can feel that. I've been on those calls where you're just like, dude, I know what you want me to say right now. And it's just like so uncomfortable. It's just like you really just want to understand, like, hey, where are you at? What's going on currently? Where do you want to go? And let's figure out how to make this work.

0:38:19 - (Jared Erni): We have a question here. I'm going to ask to unmute. Johnny painting contractor. Go ahead and unmute and you can go ahead and ask your question.

0:38:31 - (D): Yes, hello. My question is, every time I go and do an estimate, I tell people I need at least half an hour of your time and when I go to people's homes, they give me five minutes. I don't know how to deal with that. Should I tell just, can you please schedule again? Or is there a way for me to kind of persuade them to listen to me or is there a proper way to deal with those type of people? I mean, it doesn't happen all the time. It happens, I would say maybe one or four times.

0:39:11 - (D): People always rushing me. I don't know, because I don't know if I'm just doing a painting estimate, it's not something that they need to have done right away. I'm just trying to see what's the proper way to deal with the speed.

0:39:26 - (Trevor Gosar): Hey, I feel you. I know that because we dealt with the same thing on the insulation side, right? Like everybody just pictures. Like, contractor comes over, they're going to get their measurements, write it on a sticky note, give it to you and see you later. That was the typical approach. Most people are conditioned to believe that's what a contractor will come do. And so the nice thing is as soon as we break that belief, you're now the awesome solution for them. If you can break that. So what I think is the most important is take one step back.

0:39:56 - (Trevor Gosar): Johnny so we oftentimes when we get an objection, we oftentimes think, what do I say next? And that can be important. But where I would say to start is rewind and say, wait, what happened so far? That got the customer to that point? So it sounds like you've tried doing the 30 minutes. Like, hey, we're going to take 30 minutes to do this. Right? Something I found very effective is making sure that both all homeowners or all decision makers. What do you want to call it on the appointment setting call? We're very clear about that. We don't shy around. It's just like, hey, cool, and we lay out the expectations for the visit.

0:40:29 - (Trevor Gosar): Hey, we're not your typical contractor. I know most are going to come over, write it on a sticky note, leave it with you say see you later. What we're going to do is actually figure out what's going on, show you guys how we would serve you and if you like it, great. If not, we'll move on, shake hands, be friends and keep life simple. Does that sound fair? And they're like, yeah, that sounds fair. Awesome. Well, for me to come out there, it's completely free, no cost to you. However, the only requirement that we have is that everybody that's a part of this decision or everybody that is a homeowner that they're present for it because everybody's got different questions, everybody's got different concerns. So with that in mind, when works best.

0:41:01 - (Trevor Gosar): And that just kind of inherently sets the expectation that you're going to need to talk to both of them, right? Does that make sense? So that would be number one. Number two is if you're doing that and you need to know what to say next, there's two ways you can go about it. One is you can meet them where they're at. And it's not a hardball but just respecting your time, right? Of like, hey, man, just to respect your time and my time, let's find a time that works best for me to come back and we can make this happen.

0:41:28 - (Trevor Gosar): And just having that rule for yourself because it is important. It's tough when they don't give you a time, there's not much you can do, right? And so it is a frustrating feeling. I hope it's not happening too often to you because I know that feeling. But if it is just I would say look at first, how are we setting up the expectations? Second is you can kind of meet the energy. It's called matching them or mirroring them where they're at.

0:41:54 - (Trevor Gosar): And then the third one is just get super clear when you're with them about expectations. We call it lay the foundation. When we're first with them, we're going to lay the foundation of how this works. Right. We get there. Hey, what brings me out? They're going to kind of show me that awesome. Cool. Well, here's what's going to happen. I'm going to go ahead and take some measurements. Then we're going to sit down and I'll show you exactly what I found, what I'd recommend, and get your guys'perspective on all this design whatever needs to happen so that we can get you guys an exact quote that's specific to you guys.

0:42:21 - (Trevor Gosar): Does that help? A little bit. Okay, cool.

0:42:25 - (Jared Erni): Yes.

0:42:26 - (D): Thank you.

0:42:27 - (Jared Erni): Another question from Entra. I'm going to go ahead and ask to unmute and you can ask your question antra.

0:42:34 - (E): Yeah. Thank you. I just would like your perspective on thing that first blew my mind and then I started thinking of it and was finding more and more rationale in it. It was a conversation between me and one of the most successful guys in our industry. I come from a wellness field and Cryotherapy and his name is Raul Aguilar. He built really, an empire in Mexico so that nobody could stand even close.

0:43:07 - (E): 18 locations in four years, then sold it for millions, now is venture capitalist, and so but he was sharing his approach, and obviously it was 18 locations. So you have a team and you have training programs and processes in place and everything. And he told that sales start at no, and his team is trained to get any new client to know within the first five minutes of a conversation, and then they turn it around.

0:43:40 - (E): And that no would normally happen with the price. Okay. Also, oh, no, this is not what I am willing to pay. It's like, wait, this is not what you will be paying. And then you just kind of turn things around and then start getting into completely different conversations. Kind of an icebreaker, but it's counterintuitive, right? And many people would say, oh, my gosh, when I hear no, then I have failed and I have to talk to the next one.

0:44:11 - (E): What's your take on it? I know it may be a little.

0:44:15 - (Trevor Gosar): Surprising, but no, that's a good question. So it reminded me, actually, one of the first sales teams I was a part of, we were selling a service or a product where typically the sales pitch, right? Like the pitch that the company would teach you was like 45 minutes long. It was like forever long of a presentation, right? And so the first week I go out and I shadow the top producer, and he had that mentality. He's like, we're literally ten minutes into the appointment, and I'm like, whoa, he's already going to numbers. Like, what the heck?

0:44:50 - (Trevor Gosar): We're not even a quarter of the way through the typical pitch, and he's already going for the answer. And it was so funny because he would sit there and then he would go was it felt like forever, an eternity of objections? And he was just like, no, that's your actually. And anybody that wants that, I can put my email in here afterwards, and you guys can email me. I'll send you. It's a framework for the perfect pitch when it comes to especially, it's tailored towards in home sales.

0:45:17 - (Trevor Gosar): But the 7th step on it, the last step, is titled Do Your Job. Because yes, sales does not start with the pitch. Sales starts once the customer said no. Right. If we identify ourselves as helping somebody make a decision, then yeah, that's where the fun begins. And so I personally don't have the mentality of, hey, in five minutes, let's get it done. I've definitely seen where that's been the case for a lot of people.

0:45:42 - (Trevor Gosar): I believe there's more some more value and stuff that you can build before that. But the concept of, hey, it's totally okay to get a no, let's get it. Don't be shy, don't be afraid of it. It's okay. To get that early is really healthy to have when you're in sales, and then just do that last step of the framework, which is do your job. That's when the fun begins.

0:46:06 - (E): Thank you.

0:46:07 - (Jared Erni): Great question. Any other questions? See anyone else in that thread here? I had an interesting experience in talking about cells and time frames, too. Sometimes we can get into a habit of drawing this out into a longer meeting than it needs to be. And this was a while back, I was having a down month. And so I connected with my sales coach, and I asked him, what do I need to do? Give me something to do.

0:46:48 - (Jared Erni): And I explained the issue, and he gave me a challenge. He said, Look, I want you to go back and find your best month, and I want you to go and find your worst month, and I want you to look at the recordings. And I would actually I know this isn't always able to do in your space. It's not like you can record yourself necessarily, but just like football players, sports teams, they record themselves and they go back and they watch the replay, and they watch the replay, and they learn from it, and they make adjustments. And they watch it again and make adjustments.

0:47:16 - (Jared Erni): So if there's ability to be able to do that, it can actually serve you really well. I went back and looked at all my calls, and there were two things that I noticed that were really different. Number one, on my best month, my sales calls were short. Worst month, my sales calls were long. As much as twice as long, twice as much time. That's super interesting. Why is this happening? The second thing that I noticed that was really interesting is that I wore the same shirt.

0:47:47 - (Jared Erni): It's not this shirt, by the way, but I wore the same shirt you often see me in, which is a little blue collar up with a little like, dark blue and some dots. I always wear it now, but I was wearing that in every single call that went well for me. And I thought, man, that's so interesting. Why is it it's not the shirt. It's not that it looked good on me or whatever it made people want by, but what I realized is the physiology of getting away from myself and actually putting on a button up and just like what that did to my mindset and how I showed up for that call was completely different.

0:48:23 - (Jared Erni): And it's kind of interesting. You can think of it in some ways, an alter ego, but you want to be able to put yourself in that positive mindset. And so I learned from that, implemented both those things right away, and it was like turning on light, switching in on the sales side, I thought it.

0:48:40 - (Trevor Gosar): Was kind of to that right. It's exactly what we've been talking about. Sales is a transfer of energy and belief. Like the whole Jersey mentality right. That is really important because our body reacts to things that we're used to, and we have routines that we do, we have rituals that we do, right? And so in sales, we should have those as well. If we just anticipate that, it's just, hey, show up and then it's going to happen, we're probably not going to have that process isn't going to serve us well.

0:49:13 - (Trevor Gosar): Whereas the belief system of, oh, no, I want to have something that kind of kicks my head into gear, my energy into gear, and that's putting on the jersey, right? Like, no athlete is going to go out on the field without their jersey on. That's their identity. And so it's like, yeah, what is that for us as salespeople? And there's something else that lost my mind. But anyways, yeah, I totally agree, man.

0:49:40 - (Jared Erni): Well, it sounds like we got all the questions that wanted to be asked. And so, Trevor, I just want to thank you so much for taking the time to be with us today. If anyone's interested in diving in, following Trevor, where can we find you? How can we connect with you?

0:49:54 - (Trevor Gosar): Yes. So I'm putting in the chat right now. Feel free to email me. So if you want that pitch framework and just know that this is not a framework where it's like, you have to say this this way, and this is how you do it. Right? It's like what you were talking about earlier, Jared. This is the framework of like, hey, this is the process we go through to help a customer have an incredible journey and to experience something to then take action. Oh, I remember now.

0:50:24 - (Trevor Gosar): It's the process that helps us simplify and intensify the experience. So you talk about your sales pitch and the time frame, right? It's like simplify and intensify. That's all that matters. We purchase off of emotion. So we just need a feeling for them to they need to start to feel that. And if we can keep things simple, it will intensify that feeling for them. So feel free to email me if you want that, and I can send over I'll have my team send over that framework for you. You can look at me on social media. Go. Solar is not a common last name, so feel free to search me. You'll easily find me on there and I try to stay up. I should be better about staying up on content on there, but yeah, there's some stuff there, but happy to help. Feel free to email me and we can chat.

0:51:09 - (Jared Erni): Thank you for tuning into the For Impact podcast, where we're all about driving positive change through entrepreneurship. Remember, your impact matters and your journey matters. If you found inspiration in today's episode, please subscribe rate and leave a review. Your feedback fuels our mission to empower impact driven entrepreneurs like you. You can stay connected with us on social media and go to for impactpodcast.com

0:51:41 - (Jared Erni): to take our Impact marketing challenge, keep pursuing your dreams, making an impact and living life on your terms.