In this Expert Insight Interview, Tamsen Webster discusses finding your red thread and simple ways to change how people see you and what they do as a result. Tamsen Webster is a part-keynote speaker part-message strategist, all about building ideas. She has 20 years in marketing,13 years as a Weight Watchers Leader, and four years as TEDx Executive Producer under her belt.

This Expert Insight Interview discusses:

• The concept of the red thread
• The classical storytelling elements used by our brains to understand real-life events
• Why humans are hard-wired for stories

The Red Thread

A red thread is a story we tell ourselves to make things make sense. Human beings are wired to look for a cause-and-effect link, so whenever we see something happen, we always look for an explanation as to why it happened in exactly the way that it did.

This is essentially what the red thread is — the connection our brain makes between these two things, making them make sense with each other.

Classical Storytelling Elements

We can draw from classical storytelling to figure out what people look at when creating their red thread. There’s a reason why traditional stories have the elements that they do — those are the elements that our brain needs to explain, justify, and fully understand the transformation that all stories are about.

All stories boil down to five elements:

1. The goal
2. A problem that the protagonist did not know about that gets in the way
3. A moment of truth where the problem becomes impossible to ignore
4. A choice
5. The actions that bring that choice about
6. These are all the elements that we need to explain, persuade, and help people find our ideas irresistible.

Hard-Wired for Stories

Most of us come from cultures with oral storytelling traditions. Storytellers, poets, and musicians have been highly regarded in our society for centuries. Therefore, we’re hard-wired for this form of storytelling, backed up by tons of research.

Even before we consciously think about a situation, our brain is trying to find things like characters, events, and motivations. The thought that we believe we are just having has already been through the part of our brain that makes it into a story.

Our Host

John is the Amazon bestselling author of Winning the Battle for Sales: Lessons on Closing Every Deal from the World’s Greatest Military Victories and Social Upheaval: How to Win at Social Selling. A globally acknowledged Sales & Marketing thought leader, speaker, and strategist, he has conducted over 1500 video interviews of thought leaders for Sales POP! online sales magazine & YouTube Channel and for audio podcast channels where Sales POP! is rated in the top 2% of most popular shows out of 3,320,580 podcasts globally, ranked by Listen Score. He is CSMO at Pipeliner CRM. In his spare time, John is an avid Martial Artist.

Join John Golden as he discusses the importance of understanding non-verbal cues with body language expert Catherine Molloy. In this chat, they will cover how to develop and use body language to optimize your business results. Also what body language mistakes to avoid.

This is a session you don’t want to miss with Catherine Molloy the International Speaker & Communication Expert, who specializes in leadership, sales & service. With 25 years of experience in business, training, and facilitation, Catherine believes in creating effective engaging learning environments through powerful communication techniques.

Recorded Live March 10th, 2022

EPISODE QUESTIONS:

Q1: How can you use body language to impact your business success?

Q2: Common Body Language Mistakes in Business and How to Avoid Them?

Q3: How to improve your body language?

Our Guest

Catherine Molloy

Catherine Molloy is an International Speaker & Communication Expert, specializing in leadership, sales & service. With 25 years of experience in business, training, and facilitation, Catherine believes in creating effective engaging learning environments through powerful communication techniques.

Links › Catherine Molloy | Linkedin.com | Twitter

Our Hosts

John Golden

John is the Amazon bestselling author of Winning the Battle for Sales: Lessons on Closing Every Deal from the World’s Greatest Military Victories and Social Upheaval: How to Win at Social Selling. A globally acknowledged Sales & Marketing thought leader, speaker, and strategist. He is CSMO at Pipeliner CRM. In his spare time, John is an avid Martial Artist.

Martha Neumeister

Martha is a social media strategist, responsible for all social media platforms of Pipeliner CRM. She is a communication expert with social media affinity, which she has been focusing on throughout her professional career. She has a bachelor´s degree in Entrepreneurship & Management and a master´s degree in Online Marketing which supports her in her career as Social Media Strategist.

About SalesChats

SalesChats is a fast-paced (no more than 30 minutes) multi-media series that provides leading strategies, tactics and thinking for sales professionals worldwide. It can be found on Twitter (#SalesChats), as a live Google+ Hangout, and as a podcast available on iTunes, SoundCloud and right here on SalesPOP! If you think you would make a great guest for #SalesChats, please contact co-host Martha Neumeister.

SalesChats is co-hosted by John Golden, CSO Pipeliner CRM, and Martha Neumeister, Social Media Strategist Pipeliner CRM.

In this Expert Insight Interview, Orsolya Herbein discusses how to rethink marketing and the secrets to making marketing work. Orsolya Herbein is a Partner and Creative Director at Brand3.

This Expert Insight Interview discusses:

• What most small business owners and marketers are doing wrong
• How Brand3 changed its branding to align with its customers
• Why it is crucial to take a step back and look at branding strategically

Biggest Missing Link in Marketing

Small business owners and marketers tend to dive straight into tactics. When you think about marketing, the average feedback on what it includes is SEO, website, social media, ads, etc. The problem is that marketers usually gravitate straight into doing marketing rather than looking at the strategy aspect.

This is often the most prominent missing link when it comes to making marketing work. It would be best if you thought about marketing strategically aligning your brand with an audience.

Story of Brand3

Brand3 used to be Brand3 — Brands That Deliver. However, Orsolya and her business partner Matt realized that the company was not getting traction this way because branding was so misunderstood.

Essentially, Brand3 is a branding company wrapped into marketing words because they chose to wrap themselves into what their customers want, and everybody wants marketing. Their clients call them up thinking that they will get all those marketing tactics mentioned above, but what the company is really selling is branding in terms of fixing and aligning the brand before going to market.

Taking a Step Back

Many people approach marketing from the tactics backwards, including people who have been doing it for a while. Instead of doing this, marketers need to take a step back, look at who their audience is, where these people are, how they want to be communicated with, and what they value in this communication.

Only then can you decide where to go with your marketing efforts from a tactical standpoint. That is what Orsolya means when she talks about rethinking marketing. The idea is to rethink marketing in terms of branding, align the brand with its audience, and start off on the right foot.

Our Host

John is the Amazon bestselling author of Winning the Battle for Sales: Lessons on Closing Every Deal from the World’s Greatest Military Victories and Social Upheaval: How to Win at Social Selling. A globally acknowledged Sales & Marketing thought leader, speaker, and strategist, he has conducted over 1500 video interviews of thought leaders for Sales POP! online sales magazine & YouTube Channel and for audio podcast channels where Sales POP! is rated in the top 2% of most popular shows out of 3,320,580 podcasts globally, ranked by Listen Score. He is CSMO at Pipeliner CRM. In his spare time, John is an avid Martial Artist.

In this Expert Insight Interview, Monique Allen discusses her book Stop Landscaping, Start Life-Scaping. Monique Allen is a business coach and the Founder, CEO, Lead Sales Manager, and Creative Director of The Garden Continuum.

This Expert Insight Interview discusses:

• Monique Allen’s motivation to write Stop Landscaping, Start LifeScaping
• The challenge of codifying one’s mastery
• How Monique approached writing this book and systematizing her knowledge

Reasons for Writing the Book

Monique started in the landscape business very young. She was 18 years old when she was introduced to the concept of the landscape business, and she immediately fell in love with it, all of a sudden finding purpose and meaning within her life. Fast-forward about ten years, and she started to see that there was a lot more there.

Landscaping included design, sustainability, environmental protection, lifeforce energy, etc. Every single time she pulled on a different thread within the industry, it just kept her for a little longer. This has been the seed of building The Garden Continuum, which is her flagship company that does LifeScaping, as well as the impetus for writing her book.

Codifying

Stop Landscaping, Start LifeScaping is a tongue-in-cheek title because Monique Allen still very much landscapes every day. The book is more about methodology and looking at one’s business and life more broadly. It is also about codifying Monique’s ideas about the concept of LifeScaping.

Codifying something is often the hard part. Often people are unconsciously really great at what they do, but they’re unable to explain or teach others how to do it.

Systematization of Knowledge

For Monique to write this book, she had to “peel the onion.” She had to look at what she was doing and ask herself “why,” and as she answered one of these “whys,” she had to ask the next one.

She learned throughout this process that when you move into mastery, you’ve essentially climbed up a mountain. However, you don’t remember how you got there. You don’t know what you know, and you can’t systematize it.

Our Host

John is the Amazon bestselling author of Winning the Battle for Sales: Lessons on Closing Every Deal from the World’s Greatest Military Victories and Social Upheaval: How to Win at Social Selling. A globally acknowledged Sales & Marketing thought leader, speaker, and strategist, he has conducted over 1500 video interviews of thought leaders for Sales POP! online sales magazine & YouTube Channel and for audio podcast channels where Sales POP! is rated in the top 2% of most popular shows out of 3,320,580 podcasts globally, ranked by Listen Score. He is CSMO at Pipeliner CRM. In his spare time, John is an avid Martial Artist.

In this Expert Insight Interview, Lee Chaix McDonough discusses creating a sustainable coaching business. Lee Chaix McDonough is the CEO and founder of Coach with Clarity, a training and education company for life and business coaches. She is also the host of Coach with Clarity Podcast and author of the #1 best-selling book Act on Your Business: Braving the Storms of Entrepreneurship and Creating Success Through Meaning, Mindset, and Mindfulness.

This Expert Insight Interview discusses:

• Why do we avoid seeking support in our respective fields of expertise
• The prevalence of change in our lives and why we must always be prepared for it
• Some of the qualities that make a good coach

Seeking Support

We are willing to invest so much money in our hobbies, getting coaches, and paying for professional guidance, but we refuse to do the same for the thing that puts bread on our table. On some level, this must have to do with the assumption that we should just be good at what we do inherently.

Seeking support from someone else in our field of expertise might have been interpreted as a weakness once upon a time. However, we are seeing a paradigm shift and the fact that really strong business owners need a team of people to support them, including a coach.

Expecting Change

One thing is certain, and that is change. Regardless of what we have going on at any given time, we’re guaranteed to have some kind of change waiting around the corner. Trying to go through these changes alone is a very isolating experience.

Surrounding yourself with people who have your back and who you can trust will help you navigate the uncertainties that come with any kind of transition. That is one of the many reasons business and life coaches are such a smart investment for high-performing professionals.

Finding a Balance

There may be many people out there who would make fantastic coaches but don’t realize it, simply because we don’t all inherently understand what it takes to be a good coach. The truth is that there are qualities that can be honed to take somebody from being a good coach to being a great one.  For instance, there are good coaching apps that can improve your professional practice greatly. Adding them to your business model can help you scale, while still delivering practice-branded, personalized solutions.

One thing that Lee Chaix McDonough always looks for in people is their ability to balance their internal voice with the need to really focus their attention on their client and what they’re communicating both verbally and non-verbally.

Our Host

John is the Amazon bestselling author of Winning the Battle for Sales: Lessons on Closing Every Deal from the World’s Greatest Military Victories and Social Upheaval: How to Win at Social Selling. A globally acknowledged Sales & Marketing thought leader, speaker, and strategist, he has conducted over 1500 video interviews of thought leaders for Sales POP! online sales magazine & YouTube Channel and for audio podcast channels where Sales POP! is rated in the top 2% of most popular shows out of 3,320,580 podcasts globally, ranked by Listen Score. He is CSMO at Pipeliner CRM. In his spare time, John is an avid Martial Artist.

In this Expert Insight Interview, Blair Singer discusses personal development and change. Blair Singer is a best-selling author, Rich Dad Advisor, one-of-a-kind teacher, and founder of the Blair Singer Training Academy and Blair Singer Apex System, which train and certify the best change agents in the world. He has worked extensively with companies like Singapore Airlines and L’Oréal.

This Expert Insight Interview discusses:

• The importance of personal development
• How the pandemic has shifted our perspective
• The reason empathy is crucial in all human interaction, including sales

Personal Development

We often think about change and impact from an external point of view, neglecting to focus on our personal development journeys. Although a shift in this perspective began before the pandemic, the lockdown has challenged people to start looking at themselves, what they’re doing, and why they’re doing it.

The whole concept of personal development used to be an afterthought considered something you may or may not choose to do, but now we realize it is necessary.

Eliminating Distractions

Many people were forced to spend a little time with themselves and reflect on these past couple of years. We live in a world where we’re surrounded by so much distraction, with our smartphones and other gadgets offering us a way to avoid our thoughts in any situation.

Now is the time for people to start putting these distractions aside and figuring out where they want to go with their lives. The moment you eliminate distractions, you’re left alone with yourself, and that can be a crazy conversation if you’ve never had it before.

Empathy

The one thing we’ve learned out of this whole pandemic situation is that we are all creatures of connection. We need to connect with other people, whether in person or digitally, and communicate, stay connected, while at the same time resolving who we are and being ourselves.

A little bit of empathy can go a long way. We all need to learn to relate to other human beings, knowing that they’re going through their problems. Many people don’t realize that the selling process has changed since the pandemic. It has turned from trying to heap more value onto the offer into giving the prospect insurance that they’re taking a smart risk.

Our Host

John is the Amazon bestselling author of Winning the Battle for Sales: Lessons on Closing Every Deal from the World’s Greatest Military Victories and Social Upheaval: How to Win at Social Selling. A globally acknowledged Sales & Marketing thought leader, speaker, and strategist, he has conducted over 1500 video interviews of thought leaders for Sales POP! online sales magazine & YouTube Channel and for audio podcast channels where Sales POP! is rated in the top 2% of most popular shows out of 3,320,580 podcasts globally, ranked by Listen Score. He is CSMO at Pipeliner CRM. In his spare time, John is an avid Martial Artist.

In this Expert Insight Interview, Benson Agbortogo discusses overcoming fear in business. Benson Agbortogo is an investor, author, and founder at Consistent Profit Tree. He is the author of The Business System that Never Fails.

This Expert Insight Interview discusses:

• The fear of rejection and how to overcome it
• How to respond to rejection and look at it as an opportunity
• Shifting your mindset as a salesperson

Fear of Rejection

One of the most notable fears seen in sales and business, in general, is the fear of rejection. People are afraid that they will be rejected if they present their product or service to a prospective client. Since many people are so scared of being rejected, they don’t even try to go out there and talk about their product or service.

The fear of rejection is part of sales. The best salespeople look at a “no” as an opportunity rather than a rejection. The late great Zig Ziglar used to say that when you talk to people about your product or service, and they say “no,” you should interpret that to mean that they don’t know enough.

A “No” Can Be an Opportunity

It is your job to educate your prospects to get to a place where they can say “yes” to your proposal. This is the case if the people you talk to are qualified to use your product or service.

Sometimes, it is good to get a “no” from some people. Some people are not qualified to use your product or service, so by saying “no,” they are saving you a lot of time, energy, and money. This enables you to move on and look for the right people. Sometimes we stick with the wrong customer profile for too long, which can be a tremendous problem.

Shifting Your Mindset

So how can salespeople start to address the fear of rejection? This is a big fear inherent to the sales profession, and it is constantly there. The problem is that many salespeople have the wrong mindset, thinking about sales as a manipulative practice, so they resist their own profession.

Selling is not about manipulating people to get money from them. Instead, it is the distribution of solutions. People have problems, and you have an answer, so you should be proud and enthusiastic to go out there and distribute that solution if you care about your customers.

Our Host

John is the Amazon bestselling author of Winning the Battle for Sales: Lessons on Closing Every Deal from the World’s Greatest Military Victories and Social Upheaval: How to Win at Social Selling. A globally acknowledged Sales & Marketing thought leader, speaker, and strategist, he has conducted over 1500 video interviews of thought leaders for Sales POP! online sales magazine & YouTube Channel and for audio podcast channels where Sales POP! is rated in the top 2% of most popular shows out of 3,320,580 podcasts globally, ranked by Listen Score. He is CSMO at Pipeliner CRM. In his spare time, John is an avid Martial Artist.

In this Expert Insight Interview, Allan Grant discusses where you should focus and how you can cut out extraneous things. Allan Grant is an ActionEdge business coach, food service specialist, MBA candidate helping owners achieve their vision at Stand Fast Consulting.

This Expert Insight Interview discusses:

• How to overcome the struggle of what to focus on as an entrepreneur
• Setting aside the time to work on your business and committing to it
• Focusing on the things that will make the most significant difference in your business

The Struggle with Focus

Entrepreneurs, small business owners, even people running departments in larger companies constantly struggle with what to focus on. This is particularly true of entrepreneurs and small business owners, of course.

Small business owners often feel like they should have a little more control over their time. That is why many of them start their own businesses in the first place. To achieve this is to focus more on what you know you need to do to move the business forward.

Setting Aside the Time

Business owners often know what they need to do in their heads, but they don’t take the time to focus on these things.

This is essentially what Allan Grant helps business owners do — focus on the things that make the most significant difference, make sure they put these things into their calendars, and commit to spending a certain amount of time every week working on the business and not just in the business.

Default Calendars and Protected Time

You probably care about your business more than anybody in the world; therefore, you always feel you have to take care of things, put out the fires, etc. However, if you don’t set aside time, you will never get that time organically. You will never suddenly get a moment to work on the business.

This means that you need to have the discipline to set aside that time and stick to it. Think about your “default calendar.” This calendar shows what you would be spending your time on in a perfect world. If there is a time that you can set aside to work just on your business, that time should be protected. No matter what happens, who emails you or calls you, short of the building falling on your head, you must commit to doing what you set out to do.

Our Host

John is the Amazon bestselling author of Winning the Battle for Sales: Lessons on Closing Every Deal from the World’s Greatest Military Victories and Social Upheaval: How to Win at Social Selling. A globally acknowledged Sales & Marketing thought leader, speaker, and strategist, he has conducted over 1500 video interviews of thought leaders for Sales POP! online sales magazine & YouTube Channel and for audio podcast channels where Sales POP! is rated in the top 2% of most popular shows out of 3,320,580 podcasts globally, ranked by Listen Score. He is CSMO at Pipeliner CRM. In his spare time, John is an avid Martial Artist.