Do you dread prospecting calls? Do you get the jitters and end up overthinking as soon as you call your potential client? Do you want to know how to get rid of those jitters and gain confidence that can win you a client?
 
It’s normal to get scared or anxious when trying to give a prospect call. But what happens if you get too scared and end up stuttering? Or you cannot close the deal because of all your anxious thoughts? You can never avoid prospecting because that’s business, you just have to learn the secrets to making it better!
 
Wendy Weiss is known as The Queen of Cold Calling. She is an author, speaker, sales trainer, and sales coach and is recognized as one of the leading authorities on lead generation, cold calling, and new business development. Clients typically experience 3x the number of qualified appointments they can schedule with a corresponding increase in sales revenue and a shortening of the sales cycle.
 
In this episode, Wendy talks about how you can get over that jitter, present yourself better, and close that deal through the power of confidence! She also shares her insights and tips on how you can get rid of those “what ifs” and learn more about the secret of sales that will help you close your next prospecting call.
 
 
What you will learn from this episode:
  • Discover how to get over that sales jitter and do your next call with confidence
  • Understand the importance and power of prospecting calls and why you need them to grow your business
  • Learn why you need to understand why sales isn’t a skillset nor an intuitive
 
 
“That’s what you do in business. You connect with people and have conversations about how you might be able to help them.”
– Wendy Weiss
 
 
Valuable Free Resource:
 
 
Topics Covered:
 
02:04 – Challenge is getting in their own way and letting their self-doubt and thoughts get the best of them before it even happens
 
04:18 Believing the myth of the born salesperson and believing that they should automatically have the skillset: the common mistake business women leaders make when being in sales or managing their salespeople
 
06:07 – One free and actionable tip you can do to get rid of the expectations and win over your self-doubt thoughts: Once you understand that this is not an intuitive skill set, that it is a learned skill set, then it’s entirely possible to go out and learn this skill.
 
06:53 – One valuable resource to help you get the stress off the sales, overcome the self-deprecating thoughts and secure that client: Coldcallingresults.com/bundle-guides
 
08:07 – Q: How do you start to shift that mindset? A: If you take a look at it, there are the facts. And then there are the stories that you tell yourself about the facts. Now the facts are, what if you’re the salesperson or if you manage salespeople, somebody is going to dial the phone. The salesperson dials the phone. They’re either going to reach the person they want to talk to, or they’re not going to reach the person that they want to talk to.
 
 
Key Takeaways:
 
“And let’s make an assumption here, you’ve done your homework, you’re reaching out to prospects that you believe you can help because you’ve done your homework, then you have every right to reach out to prospects. You’re in business!” – Wendy Weiss
 
“Nobody is born with this skill set. It’s not intuitive.” – Wendy Weiss
 
“This is not an intuitive skill set. It is a learned skill set. Someone might be born with a lot of talent, a lot of athletic talent. That doesn’t mean they’re going to the Olympics. Somebody might have a lot of talent for sales, that does not mean they’re going to be successful.” – Wendy Weiss
 
“Prospecting is a business process by which you acquire new clients. It is one of the many ways that one can acquire new clients is you pick up the telephone and you introduce yourself. And that is all it is.” – Wendy Weiss
 
 
Ways to Connect with Wendy Weiss
 
 
Ways to Connect with Sarah E. Brown
 
 
Full Episode Transcript:
 
Wendy Weiss 0:00
If you manage salespeople, give them the tools that they need to be successful!
 
Sarah E. Brown 0:13
Hello, everyone. Welcome to the KTS Success Factor Podcast for Women, where we talk about challenges senior female leaders face in being happy and successful at work. I’m your host, Dr. Sarah E. Brown.
 
Sarah E. Brown 0:32
My guest today is Wendy Weiss. She is known as The Queen of Cold Calling. She’s an author, speaker, sales trainer, and sales coach, and is recognized as one of the leading authorities on lead generation, cold calling, and new business development. Clients typically experience three times the number of qualified appointments they can schedule with a corresponding increase in sales revenue and a shortening of the sales cycle. Clients include Avon Products, ADP, Sprint, and thousands of entrepreneurs throughout the world. Wendy has been featured in The New York Times, BusinessWeek, Entrepreneur Magazine, Selling Power, Inc, Forbes, and various other business and sales publications. She is the author of Cold Calling for Women: Opening Doors & Closing Sales, and The Sales Winner’s Handbook, Essential Scripts, and Strategies to Skyrocket Sales Performance. Welcome, Wendy. Thank you for being here today!
 
Wendy Weiss 1:46
Well, thank you for inviting me to be here today, Sarah.
 
Sarah E. Brown 1:49
As you know, I primarily pitch these podcasts to women who are in business. So what is the biggest challenge you’re helping female leaders face in business today? And what might be the symptoms of that problem?
 
Wendy Weiss 2:04
Okay, and I think this is such an interesting question because if you’d asked me this a few weeks ago, I might have given you a different answer. But I have been thinking about this recently, in terms of some of the clients that I’ve been working with. And one of the biggest challenges that I see, for women sales professionals, the actual salespeople, or the women that manage salespeople is how often they get in their own way. And I’ll give you a very concrete example. I was working with a client yesterday, and because we teach prospecting, part of this skill set is learning to handle a gatekeeper, an executive assistant, to get the information that you need to be able to reach the person that you want to have a conversation with. And she was so nervous, and so she was just getting herself all worked up. “What if they’re rude to me? And what if they hang up on me? And what if this happens, and what if that happened?” She hasn’t even done this yet! She’s a beginner. She’s just starting out. She has yet to encounter a single gatekeeper. And yet, she had this whole thing built up in her head about all of the terrible things that were going to happen if she picked up the phone to try and reach a prospect. And what I said to her was, “Well, first of all, if you encounter someone that’s rude, that’s really on them. It’s not on you.” And let’s make an assumption here, you’ve done your homework, you’re reaching out to prospects that you believe you can help because you’ve done your homework, then you have every right to reach out to prospects. You’re in business! That’s what you do in business. You connect with people and have conversations about how you might be able to help them.
 
Sarah E. Brown 4:02
I get that. And I can tell you, I have been guilty of that “what if?” phenomenon, myself. So I probably know the answer to this question already, but I’m going to ask it anyway. What are the biggest mistakes your clients make before working with you?
 
Wendy Weiss 4:18
Well, the biggest mistake across the board, whether you’re a salesperson or you manage salespeople, is believing the myth of the born salesperson. The myth goes that there are these people out there. They’re just born knowing what to do and what to say. That’s a myth! Nobody is born with this skill set. It’s not intuitive. I was really lucky. My first career was when I danced in a ballet company. And I got into this field by accident because in between my dance jobs, I needed a day job. And I got a job with a telemarketing agency that did business development, and I was really lucky. They taught me this skill set. Learning this skill set enabled me to build a business. And so one of the biggest mistakes that I see over and over again, are either salespeople that make a handful of calls that don’t turn out the way they hoped, and they go, “Oh, this won’t work for me”. Or sales managers that hire brand new salespeople do not give them the skills training that they need to be successful. They say, “Let’s see how they’re going to do”, and often they don’t do very well. This is not an intuitive skill set. It is a learned skill set. Someone might be born with a lot of talent, let’s say a lot of athletic talent. That doesn’t mean they’re going to the Olympics. Somebody might have a lot of talent for sales, that does not mean they’re going to be successful.
 
Sarah E. Brown 5:55
I get it. That’s great advice! So what is the number one free and actionable tip you can give the women who are listening today to help them address this challenge now?
 
Wendy Weiss 6:07
The number one tip that I have is, once you understand that this is not an intuitive skill set, that it is a learned skill set, then it’s entirely possible to go out and learn this skill. If you’re a brand new salesperson, there are resources. Google “cold calling”. Google “prospecting”, or come to our website Coldcallingresults.com. But even if you hate everything that I’m saying today, that’s okay! There are other resources available to you. And if you manage salespeople, give them the tools that they need to be successful.
 
Sarah E. Brown 6:45
Okay, so what’s a valuable free resource you can share with our audience today to help them understand this challenge better?
 
Wendy Weiss 6:53
We have a double whammy gift for everyone, The Cold Calling Survival Guide. And the subtitle of that guide is “Start Setting Appointments in the Next 24 Hours”. And if you are a salesperson, you can download it and just follow the steps. If you manage salespeople, you can give it to your salespeople and have them follow the steps that are in the guide. And then the other part of the gift is a Business Owner’s Guide to Scheduling More Qualified Appointments When Their Prospects are All Freaking Out. So that is a guide that was written for the circumstances that we still live in today. And it’s actionable tips for generating new business today when you still can’t. Depending on where you are, you can’t just walk into a place of business and have a conversation.
 
Sarah E. Brown 7:49
Wow, that’s great! And I will put the URL for that in the show notes. So thank you so much for that. So, Wendy, what is one question that I should have asked you that will help our audience take action to address this whole challenge of sales? And then would you please answer the question?
 
Wendy Weiss 8:07
Sure. Well, I think given where we started, about women getting in their own way, the question is, “How do you start to shift that mindset?” And the answer, if you take a look at it, there are the facts. And then there are the stories that you tell yourself about the facts. Now the facts are, what if you’re the salesperson or if you manage salespeople, somebody is going to dial the phone. The salesperson dials the phone. They’re either going to reach the person they want to talk to, or they’re not going to reach the person that they want to talk to. If they reach the person they want to talk to, they are going to say something, that prospect is going to say something, and that’s pretty much it. Those are the facts!
 
Sarah E. Brown 8:56
Okay, right!
 
Wendy Weiss 8:58
The story is and these- men tell themselves different stories. But these are the stories that I hear from women. “I’m bothering them”, “I’m interrupting them,” “They’re not going to be interested”, “They don’t want to talk to me.” How do you know these things? You haven’t even tried yet! And if you manage salespeople, what are the stories that you’re telling yourself that you then convey to your salespeople? For example, so many managers tell me that they tell their people that prospecting is a necessary evil. Well, if you’ve just hired someone brand new, and maybe they don’t have any call reluctance, maybe they’re not afraid. And then you tell them it’s a necessary evil, or some of my colleagues say “Prospecting sucks. get over it.” So you’ve hired that new person that doesn’t have any call reluctance, and you said to them, “Prospecting sucks. Get over it.” They now have call reluctance because you just told them how bad it is! So what are the stories you’re telling yourself about what your salespeople are doing? And what are they actually doing? What are the facts about what they’re doing? Because the bottom line here, prospecting is a business process by which you acquire new clients. It is one of the many ways that one can acquire new clients is you pick up the telephone and you introduce yourself. And that is all it is. And so looking at it in a very, you know, concrete way if you’re coaching your salespeople. I always ask my clients, “Well, what did the prospect actually say?” And I’ll give you a concrete example– the client I was working with yesterday. She said to me that she did call somebody. She got him on the phone. They weren’t interested. I said, “Okay, what did they say?”, “Well, they just weren’t interested.”, “Okay. What did they actually say to you?” Well, it turns out what they actually said was, “I can’t talk right now. Please call me next Tuesday.” So she made up a story about what that prospect was thinking when they actually said, “Call me next Tuesday.” They wanted to talk to her!
 
Sarah E. Brown 11:21
Very interesting. Yeah.
 
Wendy Weiss 11:24
So what is- because all we have are the words that our prospects say to us. We can’t read the minds. Don’t even try it. But what did they say?
 
Sarah E. Brown 11:33
Great advice about getting around the stories we tell ourselves. Wendy, thank you so much for being with me today.
 
Wendy Weiss 11:41
My pleasure, Sarah! Thank you for inviting me.
 
Sarah E. Brown 11:44
Thanks for listening to the KTS Success Factor Podcast for Women. If you like what you’re hearing, please go to iTunes to subscribe, rate us, and leave a review. And if you would like more information on how we can help women in your organization to thrive, then go to www.sarahebrown.com. You can sign up for our newsletter, read show notes and learn more about our podcast guests, read my blog, browse through the books or contact us for a chat. Goodbye for now.
Sarah E. Brown
Sarah E. Brown

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