1 (2s):
Boom, shake the room Fire Nation. JLD here and welcome to Entrepreneurs On Fire brought to you by the HubSpot Podcast Network with great shows like I Digress. Today, we're pulling a timeless EOFire classic episode from the archives, and we'll be breaking down how to master sales, persuasion, and influence to drop these value bombs are bots Cole Hatter into EOFire studios. Cole is a founder of Thrive: Make Money Matter. An entrepreneur, investor in an award-winning speaker. His vision behind creating thrive is to change the way businesses are run forever, creating a new breed of for purpose entrepreneurs, directing profitable businesses that focus on a local or a global initiative.

1 (47s):
And today Fire Nation, we'll talk about discovery questions that will help you find your customers dominant buying motive. DBM. We'll talk about understanding that sales is all about psychology and that you need to build rapport and how to do it. And so much more. When we get back from thinking our sponsors easy to start and built a customized Thinkific enables thousands of entrepreneurs to run their training remotely. Try Thinkific for free today at Thinkific.com/EOF. That's Thinkific.com/EOF. Wondering what to do when you need motivation. Wish you had a go-to guy when it comes to preventing burnout tune in to Jenna Kutcher's The Goal Digger Podcast brought to you by the HubSpot Podcast Network. Listen to The Goal Digger Podcast , wherever you get your podcasts call say what's up to Fire Nation and then share something interesting about yourself that most people, maybe even me don't know,

0 (1m 49s):
Sup Fire Nation, longtime listener, third time caller, part of Podcaster’s Paradise and mentee to JLD actually the last one he had and then he quit. So

1 (2m 1s):
I haven't mentored anybody since. Yeah,

0 (2m 3s):
It was that bad. I was the last one. He said retired from coaching. So something about me, most people don't know I was in a high speed police chase in Mexico and I got away. Wow.

1 (2m 14s):
What do you think would have happened if he didn't get away? I'd

0 (2m 16s):
Probably still be there.

1 (2m 17s):
Oh my God. That's terrifying.

0 (2m 19s):
Oh, jail's still there. Like I would not be in America

1 (2m 23s):
Fire Nation. Thankfully he is in America because coal is going to be dropping an audio masterclass on how to master sales, persuasion, and influence. And I'm going to tell you, I've seen Cole speak multiple times from stage. I've had him on the podcast before he is a master at these things. And I can't wait to chat about them with him today, but Cole, give us a teaser. We're a few things we're going to talk about specifically.

0 (2m 47s):
We're going to talk about how I believe personally, that sales is the number one skill set to have in business. We're always selling something. Even if it's selling someone on working for you, and I'm going to give some very practical, very actionable steps of people increasing their closing ratio. There's a lot of people that teach sales from like this 10,000 foot overview of philosophical type thing. I'm going to be more of a practitioner today and give Fire Nations some steps that they can start doing immediately upon the conclusion of this podcast.

1 (3m 14s):
Wow. That was a lesson in how to give teasers. I wish that you could literally coach all of my past guests and how to do that because epic Fire Nation. You're obviously not going anywhere after that little spiel Cole. I know you're a baller. Unfortunately, not every single person in Fire Nation knows that you're a baller that are about to find out, but give us your sales background. What's the deal.

0 (3m 36s):
So I've been selling basically my whole life. It's funny. My mom reminded me of this story when I was probably about eight or nine years old as a child. You know, when you buy your parents, Christmas presents one, parents just paying for it for the other. Right? And it was probably about eight years old. I realized, wait a minute, this isn't fair for my dad to give me money to buy mom presents. And I'll never forget I was in Macy's and they were selling mistletoe. And I was like, this crap grows in my backyard for free. So I climbed the tree and I pulled out just like 20 pounds worth of mistletoe. And I put a little red bow around it and I went door to door and started selling it like one bundle for $3, two for five, and ended up making like 200 bucks in my neighborhood. Right. And then I went and for the first time in my life, I bought my parents, their Christmas presents and my sisters.

0 (4m 19s):
And that was when they, I guess, more than even just sales, the entrepreneurial light bulb went off in my mind. That's like, oh my gosh, if I want something, it takes money. And I personally can do something about that. I don't have to ask mom and dad for money. I can go earn it. And so since then I've been selling my whole life. I had a clothing company in high school selling t-shirts hats and things like that, where I actually became like a legitimate entrepreneur, like paid taxes, hired people, had an entity. You know, that whole thing was my real estate investment business. And I have sold hundreds of millions of dollars with the real estate in the 13 years have been doing that. Now that's not profits. Of course, that's total volume of real estate from little houses to apartment buildings. And then, and some of the other areas of my business, probably what I'll be really referencing the most on this call is teaching from the stage from stage alone.

0 (5m 5s):
I've been on stage over 5,000 hours. And that sounds ridiculous, but I mean, we can break that down. It's actually pretty easy and have sold over a hundred million dollars from stage webinars and video sales letters. And so what I think, what Lewis Howes a mutual friend of ours coined when I was helping him kind of craft his video sales letters was he says that I have the art of spoken copyright. So I give Lewis credit for that one. And I actually helped you. If you remember that JLD with one of your webinars, just the language you were using is I've become obsessed with using the proper words to move the needle and to not use any filler words like, and on any of that and to really get the sales language down.

0 (5m 46s):
And that works from not just selling on the stage. In some cases, a $50,000 pro program I'm selling from stage that works from selling my daughter to just get dressed in the morning. My five-year-old like me. And like you does not like wearing clothes and it is quite the sale and negotiation to get her ready in the morning. So these are skillsets that work in business that you can monetize. And just in your personal life of getting people to take action on what you want them to do.

1 (6m 11s):
Not only have I not forgotten the advice you gave me for my webinars, it's still in place. It's made me if not hundreds, at least tens of thousands of dollars. In fact, I can say it's made me hundreds of thousands dollars, at least because I use that language in a recent talk. I gave at Lisa Sasevich's event where I sold over a hundred, $8,000 from stage a worth of my podcast is paradise product. So absolutely Fire Nation. You need to focus on the words that you are using and Cole, I want to thank you by the way for something you're not even gonna know what I'm talking about until I get to it because I have so many people say, John, I wish that I could have your guests on two X speed. Cause most of them the talk pretty slow, but you on one XB, because if I have the whole podcast on two X speed, then I can't understand you.

1 (6m 56s):
But then your guests, the guest is talking at a normal speed, but then if I have you on one X, then your guests just feels like it talks too slow. I have no doubt that everybody right now has us on one XB because you and I, we just don't use filler words. We just speak and we speak with passion with excitement. So thank you for your, your high pace of talk, which I think everybody's going to be happy to keep it at one X for this episode. And that's awesome.

0 (7m 19s):
I do it for the people, bro. I do it for the people. Once I get excited, you might want to actually tone it down to like 0.75, just so you all know, because we're going to be flying through this stuff,

1 (7m 29s):
Fly in. And specifically the first topic we're going to be flying through is the difference between persuasion and influence because there is a marked difference between those two things. So Cole break that down.

0 (7m 41s):
So a lot of people in selling are trying to, you know, kind of beat their client or future customer, whoever it is right down, even daughter to get dressed. And a lot of people will use like threatened type language where you have to do this, or you must do this. Or if you don't do this, these bad things will happen. And they're attempting to go to fear of loss and work in the cognitive bias, which we'll talk about in a bit, but it's not the natural response of a person who you don't yet have rapport that you're yelling at them, not necessarily yelling volume, but you're like, you have to buy Podcaster’s Paradise or your podcast will suck, right? Like that's, what's called threatening language. And that's what people use to try to use persuasion, to get someone to be like, well, I don't want my podcast to suck, so okay, fine.

0 (8m 25s):
I'll buy your program. But our natural response as human beings is to put up defense walls is wow. You know? And, and I shouldn't use you as a bad example here, cause you don't talk like that. But if someone has something for sale and they're like, you have to buy this and you better do this. And if you don't these bad things will happen. You'll, you know, you better buy my software. Otherwise your emails won't get open and y'all have a bad bounce rate. All that type of talk is so common and I'm not going to call out names, but some of the most iconic people who sell like crazy online, we own their software. We bought their programs, freaking are terrible at this. And it makes me feel so bad for them because they could have such better conversions if they just cleaned up their language. So persuasion is forceful.

0 (9m 7s):
Influence is more like gravity it's pulling. And so persuading again was like forcing or, or, you know, trying to oppose what you want to happen on to someone we're influencing them is allowing them to come to the decision on their own that they want to do business with you. And there's, you know, we'll get into that in this talk of the different language and phrasiology that you can use to do that because instead of telling people what they have to do, I'm going to recommend to people what they're going to want to do. And then they on their own will come to the conclusion. You know what I do want to participate in Podcaster’s Paradise. I do want that community. I do want the resources. And by the way, I'm, I'm dead serious. I'm a member of that.

0 (9m 47s):
I'm using my Heil PR 40 right now that JLD told me to fly on the boom that JLD told me to fight with the screen that JLD told me to buy. So with the recording software, by the way, in case you're in fails, the JLD told me to buy. So the point is, I'm talking about Podcaster’s Paradise, cause I'm a part of it, right? But that said, I decided on my own that I wanted to participate. You didn't force it down my throat. And I see a lot of salespeople who want that sale from a, let's be honest salespeople. It's almost a sport. Like even if we don't necessarily need the money, cause we're doing five financially to get the clothes to get the sale is that endorphin release that we all love. But people have what I call commission breath and they just sit there and again, like harass their client customer or whoever audience to buy their stuff.

0 (10m 32s):
And you shouldn't do that. You should lead your audience through influence to want to buy what it is.

1 (10m 38s):
Okay. There's so much stuff here. Fire Nation. Number one, I want you to just remember what Cole was saying about persuasion. Persuasion is forcing it's imposing and by the way, commission breath, that is hysterical. I'm going to use that. Give you credits gave you credit twice Cole, but then it's mine forever. Cause that's awesome. I love it. And then influence is showing them what they want to do, allowing them to get there on their own. So called putting you on the spot real quick here. I mean you gave a couple of paradise. Examples, go anywhere with this. You want, but give us an example of somebody that you've seen do influence influencing in a really good way or just a specific phrase or words that you've seen. People use that you really think work well here

0 (11m 18s):
I'll go with B so I can get people tangible. So what almost everybody tells people is what they have to do. Yo JLD you have to buy this. You know, if you want to have better healthcare, you have to buy this. I want to have better peace of mind. You need to buy this insurance. I mean, it doesn't fill in the blank. It's people are always telling me what they have to do and to change commanding words, like have to must things like that. To desire words like wants to and love. You're going to get a better emotional response. Now again, guys, there are people like me that will buy anything. Like quite honestly, people in sales are the worst to sell because we just want to opt to buy stuff. So you could probably sock and all buy stuff.

0 (11m 59s):
The point is you might look at your sales numbers and say, you know what? I call, I always tell people what they have to do. And it works for me. But what if you could get a five to 10% increase? I'm not saying that this is going to triple your income, but a five to 10% increase across your yield year or even career. If you're in jail, these case could be millions of dollars. So this is definitely worth using. So here's an example, instead of saying, you have to buy this or else you're going to want, you're going to say this and say, you're going to say, you're going to want to buy this because you're going to love the results, whatever those results are. Again, I'm being broad so that people can fill in the blanks. But let's just say Podcaster’s Paradise for a second. You know, you have to buy this because there's a lot of people with podcasts out there.

0 (12m 39s):
So you must know the secrets that I've learned in my careers of running a multiple seven figure business for the last decade or whatever it is, right. That's what most people would say. And it might sound okay. But instead here's what I would recommend using switching those out for what are called desire words instead of forcing and persuading them to buy influence in the say, Hey, you know what? You are going to love investing in Podcaster’s Paradise because you're going to want to get the roadmap that I've walked personally, to know what to do and not to do because the results and your life are going to be awesome. And all I just did was use what are called desire, words in place of threaten or persuasive words. And people start to play that movie in their mind. And so it's just, again, it's never forceful.

0 (13m 20s):
You have to, or you must it's, you're going to want to, because when you do, you're going to love the result. And there's probably 20 different desire words that I use on the regular that, you know, want, enjoy, love all positives as a result to the action of them wanting or desiring to do it. And so that right there, again, it's the cognitive bias, right? There's just something in the back of someone's mind. If you're being too forceful, that they just might not be able to put their finger on it, but they quote unquote something rubbed them wrong. However, if you're using desire words, you're, you're speaking to a different cognitive bias and we'll get into that in a minute, which is it makes them motivated to want to move forward.

1 (14m 4s):
Dang it, Cole, you did it again, brother. You've just improved. My broadcast is paradise masterclass. I've already been, feverously taking notes and Fire Nation. These are the type of words, feelings, emotions that you want your listeners, viewers to be having when they're consuming your content. Did you say you

0 (14m 21s):
Just did it, bro? You just did it right.

1 (14m 24s):
I was hoping it was going to slide through, but Cole called it out Fire Nation. I'm going to be doing this throughout the rest of these interview because it's just the way to operate so-called features and benefits selling. What the heck is that?

0 (14m 36s):
So this is where another, another thing, I guess we're going to start with a negative when we get to the positive, this is another thing that I see people do that is features and benefits. Selling's important only if you're selling the features and benefits that people want to buy. And so I see a lot of people have a great potential buyer in front of them and they talk them out of the sale because they're doing features and benefits selling to features and benefits that don't matter to them. JLD let's just pretend we're both at a car dealership, input Rico, where in our flip flops not wearing shirts. Cause why would you, and we're standing next to a nice new car and you realize, you know what, it's time for an upgrade. I'm making oodles of cash. I'm saving on taxes by being here.

0 (15m 16s):
I want to treat myself to a new car and I'm at the car dealership and I'm selling you on buying this car. And I'm like, dude, it has the best heater you've ever seen. This car gets smoking hot real quick. Also it has three different temperature settings set team, excuse me, heated seats. And you're never going to believe this. It has the winter package on it. So the engine block stays warm, even if you're not driving it so that when you start your car, it's instant heat and you don't have to drive around waiting for it. It's $50,000. Are you ready to buy it? You're going to be like, dude, it's Puerto Rico. I don't ever need a heater. I don't ever need heated seats. I certainly don't need a freaking an engine block warmer to keep my engine warm. I'm paying for stuff I don't need.

0 (15m 58s):
Now at the same time, let's just say that same exact car is a convertible. Let's just say that it has great air conditioning. And let's just say that you and Kate are thinking about it, young ones in the future. And it has some of the best safety ratings. Those are the features and benefits I'm going to want to focus on. Even if it has all the heated stuff in Puerto Rico, that's not going to matter to you. And so what I see people do is they sell their favorite features and benefits, but they might not be your buyers, favorite features and benefits. And so don't just jump the gun of going down this list of features and benefits. Again, I used a car as an analogy. You know, we can do that with any, any program, right? Like I might already own all my audio equipment and then jailed.

0 (16m 40s):
He's telling me how in if I buy Podcaster’s Paradise, he's going to show me what audio equipment to buy. Cool. But I could be like, nah, I already spent 5,000 bucks on this stuff. I don't need it versus what I really want as a community. And if he had focused on the community and how we support each other within that community and all of the, the interaction and, and you know, subscribership to each other's podcasts to support the community. That's what I might've wanted. He might not have even brought that up. I might not even know there is a community he could lose what would have been a lay down sale. Cause he's pitching me on how he's going to help me buy audio equipment. Right. I keep using you JLD but you're a big boy. You can take it. I can. Yeah. And so, so that's features and benefits selling. It's where you just go down the list of what your product does and these again, great features and benefits.

0 (17m 20s):
But if it's not the DBM, what we call a dominant buying motive of your person, your, your client, your customer, whoever that you're, you're having this conversation with, you could inadvertently talk them out of a sale. Because if I sat there and talked about all the heating features of this car, you're going to feel like you're overpaying because you're gonna be like, well, you know what, maybe there's a car that's cheaper that doesn't have all that stuff cause I don't need it. And I'm going to talk you out of the sale because I focused on what I thought are cool features and benefits that weren't what are your dominant buying motives? And so I see a lot of people do this. They, they, they do the features and benefits selling. And again, without having first done what, we'll talk about a little bit of asking proper questions, et cetera, to find that dominant buying motive, you could quite frankly talk a lay down buyers, someone that would have thrown money at you out of a sale because they feel that they're overpaying for the stuff that you're going, you know, the features and benefits you're going through that don't actually, I don't know, interest to them or appeal to them.

1 (18m 15s):
I mean, Fire Nation thinker, you can just shift that conversation. Like what if that car dealer here in Puerto Rico had walked out to me and said, Hey, how's it going there? JLD like, what exactly are you looking for today? And then I was to say, well, there's a lot of potholes in Puerto Rico. So I definitely know that I need a car. That's like at least, you know, 12 inches off and yada yada yada. And yeah, like maybe we are thinking about expanding our family as I'm in the future. So that's kind of cool too. And then once that person knows what I'm looking for, he can tailor his entire chat with me to just what the features and benefits are and the different cars that I want without making me think, well, why am I paying for all this extra crap that I don't even need? So just that one simple conversation and having that one-on-one engagement with your perfect customer client avatar can have so much better fit for you long term, that is going to simply blow your mind.

1 (19m 5s):
That one thing shifts everything. Now Cole has some value bombs that are coming. As soon as we get back from thanking our sponsors. So Fire Nation stay right there. Being customer centric means focusing on what matters most building and growing sustainable customer relationships, maintaining unique customer needs and personalizing the customer experience. If you can do this right then you're already a step ahead of the competition. And a HubSpot CRM platform is designed to help you do this best build, maintain, and personalize your customer's experience into a remarkable one. How do they do it with a CRM powered CMS? This means both your marketers and developers can personalize the customer experience and ensure all engagements are timely and relevant, no more miscommunications internally or with your customers.

1 (19m 53s):
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1 (20m 37s):
With online courses, as a result, we've seen a huge lift in revenue without needing to trade time for money, but don't just take my word for it. Sarah Cordiner, CEO of Main Training was also max out, delivering work for her clients. Her options were that she could hire more people, raise prices or introduce online courses to her business. With Thinkific. She has educated over 9,000 students and 131 countries and has increased her profit margin 100% from previous years, all that without treating in her precious time. If you're ready to scale your business, then get started with Thinkific today for free at Thinkific.com/EOF that's Thinkific.com/EOF.

1 (21m 19s):
So Cole we're back and man, those value bombs you dropped in the first half of this interview were amazing and we got nothing but greatness coming up as we continue going forward. So talk to Fire Nation about a few things that we can start doing right now to increase our closing ratios.

0 (21m 39s):
Well, let's just jump right on, piggyback on what we just finished talking about of asking great questions. Those are what are called discovery questions. And so, you know, if you're at the gym or jogging right now, write that down. When you get home, if you're in a place, you can write that down because discovery questions are how you should start every conversation. Again, you're going to use desire, words and the things we spoke of earlier, but I don't start selling anybody unless I know why they're in front of me. And so they're called discovery questions and that's what helps you find a DBM that stands for dominant buying motive. And I'm getting by asking JLD these questions and be like, okay, he's concerned about the potholes. So this car over here, that's a low rider on, you know, thin tires on huge 24 inch rims. Probably wouldn't be a good idea for him. Maybe this SUV case talking about expanding family.

0 (22m 19s):
So I would be listening to what he's saying to find his down to buying mode. So I think that that's number one of how to include increase closing ratios is to learn your customer before you just start rattling off random features and benefits. And one thing I want to point out, I don't, I don't think this came across this way with, with what we were saying here, but this is nothing unethical. It's not like you're hiding something in the car. You're just focusing the conversation around what most excites your buyer. Anyway. Again, I don't assume everyone in here sells cars, but of the various things that your product or service provides to your clientele. You're just focusing your conversation around the ones that are most interesting. You're not hiding stuff like you're being some swindler, right? So we probably should have, this should have started this conversation off by saying only sell things you believe in that you can sell with integrity and be proud of obviously.

0 (23m 4s):
Right? Which I assume anyone listening to you already knows that. Totally. So, so anyway, that's what I would say is ask great discovery questions. Another thing that I've kind of talked about a bit in this conversation so far is understanding that sales is all about psychology. A lot of people don't really get it, but psychology and sales are so intertwined. And if I was sitting in front of a psychologist and you know, I had some anxiety or some depression or whatever would, you know, motivate us to go and have therapy hour at a time or whatever it is with it, with a professional, what that other person is doing is they're listening to everything we're saying. And they're trying to find what it is that we're struggling with and where it came from. Right? So my mom's a professional mental health professional.

0 (23m 46s):
She's been doing this for years. And so I know someone at the industry and if you were sitting in front of me and you were struggling, or if it's a relationship where a husband, wife, or a couple are struggling, they're going to ask great questions to figure out what's going on inside of your head to then help you either a overcome it or B if needed, add medicine. If, if there's something, you know, maybe chemically going off, right? The same exact thing is true of sales. I need to know the psychology of my buyer to be able to prescribe in this case, the product that they're going to want to buy. And so there's a great resource out there. I'm not affiliated with them. I don't, I obviously know that you're not either a, but a great resource to learn. These 25 cognitive biases is just go to the 25 cognitive biases.com. I'm sure you'll throw that in the show notes there, John, and it breaks these down.

0 (24m 29s):
I would study those before you sell anyone else, take an afternoon, go to that website and read it. Or you can buy different books. I've read the books too. And understanding like the optimism bias, right? Which is one of the number one sales killers out there. The optimum bias is something like this. Hey man, you shouldn't smoke anymore because smoking kills and the person knows that. And they're like, yeah, yeah, yeah. I know that, but it's not going to happen to me. Like, you know, I, I know that. And I've heard about lung cancer, obviously. I'm very aware of it. And you know, the tobacco companies are, I, I understand all that, but not me. I've smoked two packs a day since I was born. I'm 60 years old. I'm fine. And so what that does, again, we're not selling cigarettes, but that optimism bias can kill sales because the person who you're selling can be like, yeah, you know, I see how your product or your service can help me, but I'm good how I am.

0 (25m 17s):
And so if you understand how that works, you can do, what's called objection blocking before you get there of overcoming what these cognitive bias sees or by however you polarize bias biases. Well, well, I'm not an English major. Right. But, but I know what I'm talking about. So, so it can help you understand the psychology that we as human beings share. Now some of us elicit more than others in certain areas, right? Like my optimism bias, I can be talked to anything. So if I have that optimism bias where I'm like, yeah, I think I'm good. You can probably very easily objection, block that and show me how I could be better because I like you, John, I'm a high performer and I was one of the best, right? And so I'm the guy that has an iPhone that works fine.

0 (25m 58s):
But when the new one comes out, I'm the idiot that stands in line for two hours because I want the best. I'm that guy, I'm sorry. Or now I send somebody for me, right? But point is that's that the optimum bias isn't gonna hurt me, but some of the other ones are, I guess it wouldn't impact me hurting you selling me something. But for others, it might. So that's a great place to start is understand. There's a tremendous amount of psychology that goes into selling and you shouldn't go get your psychology degree. But if you read what's available online and listening to various podcasts like this and go to that website or recommend and read these books, it's going to be tremendously helpful to understand what's going on in the brains of the people. And then like the psychology analogist or the psychologist analogy. Excuse me. I used earlier now, as you're talking to people, you'll start to see them.

0 (26m 39s):
Once you understand them, as you're talking to somebody, you'll start to see them presenting. And so how does a psychologist in front of a person who's struggling in their personal life realize, okay, I'm seeing underlying tones of anxiety and a lot of depression, like because they're asking questions and because they went and got their license and they understand this stuff. So they see these things presenting in their clients to know how to help their clients get through it. If you study those biases or bias, whatever, as a salesperson, you can start to see those present in your customer and like a psychologist within preside. I guess it'd be a psychologist with prescribed meds, whatever. You can then navigate the conversation around those. So this is deep stuff, but I know that your audience is next level and that they can handle this.

0 (27m 21s):
Right? I'm not here to talk about superficial stuff. I want to get into the meat potatoes. And so I would say one of the number one factors to answer your question JLD of what has helped me increase. My closing ratios is learning over years. By the way, this isn't something you learn in an afternoon, your gangster tomorrow, this is a work in progress for years. And since there are 25, maybe master three or four at a time over the course of the next year or two to where you can recite the 25 off the top of your head, and you can start to see those presenting in your customers, clients, whatever. Okay. So that's a big one. Again, we already talked about discovery questions. Another one that's obvious, but I think it's underutilized is build rapport. One of the reasons I think John, that you do well in business and that you consistently crush your, your income is your very likable, just your, your personality, your tone allergy, and your, the way that you talk to your friends, family, and future customers.

0 (28m 17s):
You're easily likable. Some of us aren't as easily likable and we have to earn that trust and rapport. And so one of the number one things I see people do wrong is they flaunt success and wealth because they believe, and to a degree, it's true that by showing you how much money I have and how successful I am, you're going to want to buy from me because if I'm successful and you buy it for me, you will be too. And to a degree, credibility is important. Of course. So sharing some of your successes with them in moderation is important to create that credibility. However, when I see people just flaunting and showing their mansions and they're freaking, you know, super cars and wearing $50,000 Rolexes on stage and $5,000, Armani suits, you no longer have report your audience because they can't even relate to you anymore.

0 (29m 6s):
They're like, yeah, well that works for that guy, but he's super human. And so it's so important to come down to their level while still having posture. I'm not saying that you're necessarily an equal because you want to maintain posture. If you have what they want, you got to have that posture, but looking just like them. And this is one of the things that helped Lewis house with the most. When he launched his legacy course, I helped him write all that copy was, you know, he's a New York times bestselling author. And in JLD again, you, most people don't make a hundred grand in a year and you're making hundreds of thousands a month. So it's very easy for you for people to not be able to build a rapport with you because you're superhuman. You're a freak of nature that sits not wearing a shirt and pumps up millions of dollars from his computer, staring at the ocean.

0 (29m 46s):
And then how's the beach look, today's night sparkling right now, while most people are sitting in a cubicle, looking at a picture of a Caribbean, saving up for years to be able to come and visit for a few days. And so having that credibility is important, but making your person again, customer, client, whoever it is feel like, oh my gosh, I'm just like JLD was when he was doing commercial real estate commuting to a job. He didn't like wearing a suit. He didn't want to wear in a career. He didn't want to work at working for a boss. He wanted to punch in the face. I'm just like him. And I can see that defining moment in John's life, where he made the decision to quit against all odds and pursue his dream and has now become a multimillionaire.

0 (30m 27s):
And one of the most successful, not just podcasts, but media outlets in the world. I can see myself in his shoes and I could see myself making that same decision. You know what? I've got to buy Podcaster’s Paradise because I want to have a similar story myself. And so again, it's important to have that credibility, but when I see these people, it might even be a degree of insecurity. I used to do that just so you, everyone knows this is something I had to work the hardest on because I got started in business at 21 years old investing in real estate. Everyone I was working with was 40 or older. They were twice or three times my age. And so I overcompensated and even came across arrogant talking about my success because I'm like, yeah, yeah, I'm 21, but I make more money every month. And you make every, I mean, I wouldn't say that that's just being a jerk, but you get the point, right?

0 (31m 10s):
Like I was so overly compensating my insecurities by flaunting my brief successes that I came across as just this little arrogant a-hole and being coached and having people speak wisdom into my life who I give permission to shoot straight, kind of hurt my feelings. They're like, cool. I know you and your personal life. And then put a microphone on your cheek and put you on stage. You're a total douchebag, stop it. And I had to really like set aside the Eagle and look at that and be like, oh my gosh, I'm really not that arrogant. It's because I feel insecure on stage that have all these people judging me. Like what's this 20 something year old know. And again, this was early in my career, I'm in my thirties now, but what does this guy know? And what's he going to teach me? And so I overcompensated by flaunting my success and what it did was it cost me because then I looked like a prodigy kid, like, holy crap, okay, this kid is mega successful.

0 (32m 0s):
And he's 22, 23 or whatever it was. So, you know, that's why he's had his success is because he's special. And you know, this John, most people out there are way smarter than I am. And so point is find that balance and give your, you know, be honest with yourself. If you guys are listening to this of overdoing success, quotes, and, and income statements and all that. When I say income statements, I'm not talking about like monthly reports like you do, John. I think that transparency is important. I'm talking like I make seven figures a year, every year in my sleep. I like those type of like verbal statements of how much income you make are only going to cost you sales. So it's a line of, of a degree of credibility without becoming arrogant.

0 (32m 42s):
If that makes sense. And so the point though is to learn how to build rapport. And so there are a lot of rapport building skill sets. We can go deeper than that if you want JLD. But what I see a lot of people doing wrong is they lose rapport with their audience by being overly flaunting of their success. And what you want to do is you want your buyer to see themselves in your shoes to want to make the same decision you made. Now that might really be specific to podcasts there's paradise, but anything guys, if you're selling insurance, if you're selling cars or whatever, you're going to want to build rapport. So that person, kale teaser, right? Knows like sand, what does a JLA trust KLT and the only way to get KLT know, like, and trust you is by building rapport.

0 (33m 26s):
And one of the ways I see people blowing that onstage and on webinars and on video sales letters specifically is in the, in the attempt of gaining credibility, they overshoot it and lose their audience because people like this, guy's a freak of nature. I can't do what they do. So build rapport. That's another thing to help increase closing ratios.

1 (33m 45s):
Wow. I mean, there's so much stuff in that little rant right there, Fire Nation. I want to go over some of what I think are the key takeaways. Number one, those discovery questions. They need to start every single conversation. Why? Because you have to find the DBM that dominant buying motive. If you don't have the DBM, you're not going to get anywhere. And sales is all about psychology. So I actually loved that bookie recommended, and it is Fire Nation for your reference, the 25 cognitive biases uncovering the myth of rational thinking and the author's name is Charles home. And it's only $3 on Kindle. So get over there, invest $3 in yourself. Read that book, the 25 cognitive biases and Fire Nation, just to emphasize the last thing that Cole was chatting about, building rapport, people need to know like, and trust you.

1 (34m 32s):
If they're going to invest in your opportunity that know like, and trust has to be there, period. And something that Cole was talking about that I really, really believe in is that you have to balance the ordinary and the extraordinary, if you're just ordinary poor going to be like, okay, I relate to that person. But you know, it's not really inspiring if you're just extraordinary. They're like, wow, that's impressive. But I can't relate to that. I can never be there. You have to connect on both levels being ordinary so they can connect with you. Like Cole was talking about when I was in commercial real estate and hating my life, et cetera, and then extra, extra ordinary where you're and I live in Puerto Rico and I'm living the island life, et cetera, et cetera. So it's the combination of the, both you have to balance one or the other won't work.

1 (35m 14s):
And one thing that Fire Nation loves cold. They absolutely love this ninja tactics. So share some of those specific ninja tactics. For instance, we mentioned building rapport. You might have some deeper things on that, that you've actually picked up along the way.

0 (35m 27s):
Totally. I'm going to go there, but I'm going to ask you to do your audience a favor. I don't know if the video is still out there, John, that you made, where it tells your story. It used to be what loaded at the, of your

1 (35m 38s):
Website. Now it's EOFire.com/about and is right at the top of my, about me page.

0 (35m 43s):
So go and check that out because John's lived the hero's journey. And again, I think you you've earned your success, but I think one of the key factors of why people Cale to you so quickly is like, here's a man served our country officer in the army, gets out into civilian life, pursues his career, you know, has his degree. Like it's just so, so the American story and then gets to that point of, am I going to do this for the rest of my life or not? And I think that was a really well done. I think it's five minutes or less video. I watched it a bunch actually tried to rip it off and recreate it myself. But my story is nowhere near as cool as yours. So I just killed the project, but I watched it a bunch and you know, that's, what's so cool. So yes, John's making millions of dollars a year now and just gets a stare at the Caribbean all day, every day.

0 (36m 25s):
But because you know, his backstory of having served our country, then corporate America, then commuting to work saying, there's gotta be more. And then saying I'm over it. I quit. And then boom, pioneering becoming the first seven day week podcast. And that whole story, any as you guys can tell, I know a thing or two about this going on here. Also, if you want to win him over, bring him a bottle of Johnny Walker, blue,

1 (36m 50s):
The upgraded now. So Johnny Walker blue is actually still high on my list. And by upgrade, I mean price wise, but Oban 14, if you had one of those in a

0 (36m 57s):
While. No, I don't think I've ever had, okay.

1 (36m 59s):
Have one take, take a picture of it when you're doing it. Send it to me. I want to know your feedback. I love it.

0 (37m 4s):
Cool. So point is Fire Nation go to that website? What was it? EOFire.com/about. Yes. Yeah. And watch that video because that is what you and your own, you know, specific details want to communicate to your audience to get that report. You asked for a ninja tip and report. I'll give you one more. This isn't mine. This is an oldie, but a goodie. Some people have heard of some habits. I'm gonna ask you, John, do you know the acronym? Ford. F O R D. No. Perfect. And I'm gonna teach you, so this isn't my content. I didn't, and I don't even remember why, like actually, you know what I think the first person ever taught this to me was a fire chief, my previous career before being an entrepreneur as a firefighter. And I had a friend that was a chief that was teaching me how to do interviews, to get my fire department job. And he taught me this acronym Ford and how to interview well on my oral interviews.

0 (37m 48s):
And so credit to him and whoever invented it. But F O R D is an acronym. F stands for family O stands for occupation R stands for recreation and D stands for dream. And if you can have that conversation and as quickly as a minute, or as long as it's a half an hour, depending on how long you have with someone like for me and my, you know, oral interviews for firefighter, I had an hour. That's how you find commonality and build rapport. So F is family ask them about their family. Do you know the fastest way to get someone to like you get them to talk about themselves? If I'm in a conversation and at the end of that conversation, they've said 10,000 words, and I've said a hundred, they're going to leave being like, man, I really like that. It's the funniest thing back to human psychology.

0 (38m 29s):
Right? And so family you'll talk to them about their family occupation. Talk to them about what they've done and what they're doing. And you know, R is recreation. What do they enjoy most of their hobbies, right? Like for me, I'm a, my water sports enthusiasts. I'm gonna talk to John about the beach and the ocean surfing and kite surfing, whatever else he's doing out there recreationally. And then D dreams, like, where are you going, man? Where are you building your business? And at the end of going through that, I guess context or that framework is a better word. You're going to come out the other side of having more rapport with that person than, than you would have. Otherwise. Now that won't work in a video sales letter or speaking from stage because you're not going to have a two way interaction. You're just talking to them. But in those of you that sell, one-on-ones like maybe over a cup of coffee at Starbucks to get them to buy a health insurance planner, whatever it is, Ford is a great framework for you to follow credit to the fire chief that Tommy that long ago, and whoever invented it originally.

0 (39m 22s):
Okay. More ninja skills. Okay, here we go. Another thing that is just a straight up ninja tip that most people don't do is to do what I call climbing a sales gradient, or what has been taught to me from my coach climbing a sales gradient. And so let's just say that I want to get someone to buy Podcaster’s Paradise and what I don't know. Well, let's just keep this evergreen because I'm sure your prices will go up and down, but let's just say hypothetically, it's 10 grand, cause it should be right. So maybe you need to up your prices. But if Podcaster’s Paradise was $10,000 and I was JLD and I want to market that to the world, to get them to want to drop $10,000 on Podcaster’s Paradise is a big jump it to say, Hey, I'm John, you should wire me $10,000 today.

0 (40m 10s):
And I'm going to give you this stuff. Now he would still get a closing ratio, but what the, and that's what most people do they go for the kill, but what you should do instead is get what's. I call climbing a sales grain, imagine a staircase and one step at a time to the top, instead of making one big leap is easier. If you're at the bottom of let's just say five stairs. If you run and jump your highest, you can go from the bottom to the top, right? You can probably, most people listen to, this can jump up five stairs, right? What does that three and a half feet or so, however, it's probably a whole lot easier and less energy to just go one step at a time. So here's what I would do. If I was you John, trying to sell Podcaster’s Paradise for $10,000. And again for the audience, put your own specifics and you know, products and services in place.

0 (40m 50s):
The first thing I'm going to acknowledge is that what this is, is education. So the first thing I'm going to do is get them to buy in and I'm going to sell them to believe that education matters. So I'm going to say something along the lines of, and I'll abbreviate. You know, if I were John, I'd go a lot deeper into this, but I would say, you know, there are a lot of people out there trying to do podcasts, most podcasts don't get through what their third episode or a lot don't even launch to begin with. Right. And so, so I'm going to ask them, why do you think it is that most people want to do a podcast, but never do, do you think it's that they don't believe that's going to work? Or is it that you'd believe that they don't know what they're doing? And then the obvious response is, well, no, it's because they don't know what they're doing. And so now what, I just got my audience, if I'm on stage or the person in front of me to on their own acknowledge is why podcasts don't succeed for some is because they didn't know what they're doing.

0 (41m 38s):
And so what I just use as another ninja tactic is called like an AB answer or an either or answer where you give them their only options. It's multiple choice. And the obvious choice is the one you want them to take. So, you know, for people out there that want to start a podcast that actually launched the first few episodes and then fizzle out or that never even get around to launch it. And why do you think, is it that they didn't believe that there's value in having a podcast or they just didn't know what they were doing? Everyone's gonna answer, well, they didn't know what they're doing. And then you're going to say, you know, I agree with you. It's just a lack of knowledge. And then they're going to say, yeah, it was a lack of knowledge. Boom that's step one. I got them to agree that having an education around podcasting is valuable. Now maybe I start price framing. And I start talking about the various podcasts out there and sponsorship revenue.

0 (42m 20s):
And even without having a traditional sponsor, who's paying you to be your own sponsor and market your own products and services on your podcast and the income opportunity there to frame why $10,000 is not a lot of money. And so I'm going to be real specific. And I'm going to do think this out ahead of time for you, John, you can talk about the, probably at this point million plus dollars you've made in your career of sponsorship revenue altogether, or the millions you've even documented of selling podcast is produced or whatever it is. Right? So talk about the upside and why relative to the upside earning potential of a podcast, $10,000 is not a lot of money. So they're going to agree to that. And I'm going to throw that exact number out there. The exact number that the investment is for whatever it is I'm selling, I'm going to get them to agree that it's nothing, that's a whole another ninja tip that we won't have time on this call for a that's called a frame.

0 (43m 9s):
And I just framed why 10,000 bucks is not a lot of money relative to the upside earning potential of what it is they're going to get as a return of that investment if they do the work. Right. And so, again, I'm, I'm going on an hour here with you, but we do these trainings across two days. So there's a lot here. So now I've climbed to two steps of giving them to want to buy Podcaster’s Paradise for 10 grand. Number one, that they agree that they need education to succeed. Number two, the $10,000 is not a lot of money. Now. I also probably understand that the majority of people buying this, I shouldn't say majority, but many of the people buying this might not be in the liquid position of just writing a $10,000 check. They might need to use a credit card. And for some people out there, people are credit card debt adverse because their grandmothers told them stay out of credit card debt.

0 (43m 52s):
Right? And I completely agree with grandma when it comes to Nordstrom's or when it comes to consumer merchandise, I'm not going to walk into best buy and buy a TV on a credit card. And I'm going to go into Nordstrom's to get new shoes on a credit card because that's consumer debt. That's no good. But what I would then do is create maybe a little training or a framework around how business debt can be good. And I would talk about, you know, Tesla, or maybe that's too big. Maybe I bring it down to something smaller, like a car dealership in general, not a whole car brand. And I would point out that a car dealership isn't paying cash for the inventory, that Mercedes-Benz dealership that has a hundred Mercedes-Benz on the lot. They did not pay cash. That dealership financed their inventory on a line of credit.

0 (44m 34s):
Why would they be willing to go tens of millions of dollars into credit debt? Because when they sell those cars for a profit, they pay the debt off and keep the profit grocery stores. Are they paying cash for all the milk and all the eggs and all the bread and all the alcohol in there? No, they're financing it on lines of credit with their vendors. And then when they sell their products and merchandise, they pay their vendors off. And so I'm going to create a context in the business world about how credit is normal and how basically only Dave Ramsey is the person that doesn't use credit for business. Right? And how the difference between consumer debt and leveraging OPM, other people's money for business is complete opposite ends of the spectrum because other people's money for profits, you pay the money back and keep the rest.

0 (45m 19s):
And I'm going to use some illustrations like car dealerships or grocery stores or whatever, to get my audience or the person I'm having coffee with whatever to really be like, yeah, you know what? I get that. Yeah. You're not buying shoes. You're buying a laptop that you're going to run your podcast off. You're going to make money with, and then you pay your laptop off of your credit card. Can I get the difference? So now I've got them to agree to three things. Number one, that education for a podcast to be successful matters. Number two, the $10,000 relative to the income earning potential. If they do the work, cause you don't wanna make false income claims, right. A is relatively nothing. And number three, that if they don't have the money putting on a credit card and making minimum payments, wow. They ramp up their business is yes, credit card debt, but it's no different than lines of credit that hotels and car dealerships and grocery stores and airlines.

0 (46m 5s):
Do you think I got it. I'm getting on an airplane today to go to Chicago, to look at some real estate than I'm buying. I highly doubt that the pilots of the American airlines airplane I'm going to get on is out there on the tarmac, shoveling out cash for the gasoline. Now, American airlines is going to have some big ass line of credit with orange county airport, John Wayne airport, that at the end of each month, or however they do it, they pay for the gasoline that used. And so the point is it's very normal to go into debt for business. If the debt creates profits that's dude, I'm going to go. I'm flying on that airplane to go to Chicago, to look at real estate where I'm going to go millions of dollars in the debt. We're looking at a big commercial property out there, right? And so outside of sales, real estate is my jam. But that being said, I'm a Google millions of dollars into debt.

0 (46m 45s):
Why? Because the property is worth about a million more than I'm going to pay for it. And it's going to cashflow me $7,000 a month beyond its expenses. So I'm going to walk into an $84,000 a year, passive income opportunity and have a net worth increase of over $1 million by going a few million dollars in debt. So I think I've, you know, I've labored this enough, you get the point. And then now I'm going to make them the offer of wanting to get the education for relatively no money at all, compared to what they're going to make and using a credit card if necessary, because they understand the difference between good debt and bad debt. Are you ready to move forward with Podcaster’s Paradise? And they're going to say yes. And so that's, what's called Climbing The Gradient.

0 (47m 27s):
Don't just be like, yo, I'm, you're lucky that you're even getting my attention. It's 10 GS. You're welcome. Here's my wiring and whatever. Here's my freaking PayPal or here's my Stripe. Swipe your card. See, on the other side, which that's a little ridiculous. That's kind of a caricature of what I literally see. People's video sales letters that there's just the arrogance. Hey, if you want to live in the Caribbean, like being fly in private jets, swipe that 10, I'm going to show you how cool climb that sales grading. And that might be the biggest ninja tip. I can give your audience in the hour that we have. Again, this is why we teach this for two days. Right? And so that being said, that's the sales gradients.

0 (48m 9s):
And I think that that's one of the biggest thing people can learn is to get these little miniature buy-ins okay. They bought in, they want education. Okay. They bought in the 10 Jesus, not a lot of money, relative 10 Jesus, a lot of money to lose gambling. I do well for myself financially. I'm going to be in Vegas on Monday. So I fly from Chicago to Vegas. If I put $10,000 on red and rolled in, it came up black. I would be nauseous. I would literally be sick to my stomach. Cause I feel like such an idiot. However, $10,000 to learn how to make six figures or even multiple five figures or in your case, multiple seven figures is fricking nothing. So it's all relative. So $10,000 and a lot of money and then credit card because I'm an individual and I'm not fricking a hotel credit card.

0 (48m 52s):
Debt is what I have available to me. Boom. I'm going to go $10,000 in credit card debt launched my podcast, monetize my podcast, pay the credit card off and have funded my business, using other people's money and let the profits of my business, pay those people back. Boom done.

1 (49m 6s):
Yeah. Fire Nation. I really hope that you can see why I change Entrepreneurs On Fire to an audio masterclass because this is gold. This is the kind of stuff I wanted to bring to you on these longer form podcasts. So awesome stuff. And just real quick, cause it's been a little while since you heard Cole when he started at the beginning, but that acronym was gold Ford family, occupation, recreation, dream. And then of course going all the way through that sales, gradient, incredible stuff and Cole, you and I could talk about this stuff for ever, but right now I want to shift this conversation for, you know, the final few minutes that we have. I really want to talk about something that I am just to this day continuously more and more impressed with is this movement that you started around your conference thrive.

1 (49m 54s):
I been able and honored to speak twice at thrive. Now with the likes of Gary V, Robert Hirschevac, and just the list is unbelievable. How many incredible speakers you've had there and just human beings in general. And this coming September 14th to the 16th, 2018 Fire Nation, depending on when you're listening at the hard rock thrive is happening. So called talk about thrive. And you know why you put this together and you know, all the stuff around it, how far nation can get involved. And of course being cognizant that we are wrapping up here just real quick.

0 (50m 28s):
I mean, you already, you already nailed it. It's a three-day business conference. What makes us special is we teach entrepreneurs how to make money and to make it matter. I made a decent amount of money and then I lost it all in the recession and then I've made it all back. And when I had nothing, I realized that while I had something, I should have done more with it. And so I started what I call for purpose businesses that don't just make money to make an impact. Best example would be Tom's shoes. Although they've changed their model. Now, when they started for every pair of shoes they sold, they gave a pair away and it wasn't a matter of getting rich someday and giving back. They gave back in their business model as they moved forward. And so I said, I'm going to do that too, so that, you know, if I'm not as rich as Bill Gates someday, at least while I ran my companies, I made a huge impact in the world.

0 (51m 10s):
It caught fire people. Like you asked me to share it on their podcasts years ago. And I got bombarded through social media. People like teach me how so we did that very first inaugural event, which was designed to only be a one-off that you came and spoke at and freaking rock to the stage. Always do. And like you said, Robert Hirschbeck and Gary V read that first one. And it was so well received. We now made it an annual event. So this will be the fourth thrive. We've got gangsters coming like Eric Thomas hip hop, preacher himself. Like I am my let coming out this time, Jesse Itzler Nevine Jane. We have two different billionaires speaking at thrive this year, right? So it's a, it's a big deal. And what makes it special is we're not just teaching how to run businesses and make a ton of money. We're teaching how to run businesses that make a ton of money and built in their business model.

0 (51m 53s):
Give back. So then on your quarterly reviews, when you're measuring those KPIs, it's just not, Hey, what was our marketing span? What was our revenue? What was our top line revenue? What was our Bubba and what was our impact? It becomes a key metric in your business. So I'll leave it with that. You know, probably to learn more. You can just go to a 10th thrive.com and if they want to join us, we'd love to have them out this year, bro.

1 (52m 14s):
Attend, thrive.com, Fire Nation and check it out. And again, it's all about making money mattered. I can just tell you the vibe at Cole's conference. I've been to a lot of conferences. I'm not gonna talk bad about any conferences cause there's a lot of great ones out there, but the vibe, the vibe at thrive, I love that rhymes is just so cool. I mean, people are there because they have the right mission of mind. They want to make an impact. They want to be for purpose. It's just a really great overall genuine conference that I can't recommend enough. And I'm actually devastated that this year I'm not gonna be able to make because I'm going to be traipsing around Europe as part of my 65 day 17 country European vacation that starts on September 11th and does it until mid November.

1 (52m 58s):
So I just go to say Fire Nation, show up in my place, bring the heat, bring the fire, do your thing and make money matter. That's attended thrive.com and Fire Nation. You know, you're the average of the five people you spend the most time with. And you've been hanging out with CH and JLD today. So keep up the heat in Cole. Thank you for sharing your truth with Fire Nation today, brother, for that, we salute you and we'll catch you on the flip side. Hey nation, hope you enjoyed our chat with Cole today. And listen, goals are so important. If you want to accomplish your number one goal in a hundred days using my proven system that over 30,000 people have invested in check out the freedom journal over at thefreedomjournal.com.

1 (53m 44s):
Use promo code podcast for a little discount for listening to my podcast. And I'll see you. They're easy to start and built a customized Thinkific enables thousands of entrepreneurs to run their training remotely. Try Thinkific for free today at Thinkific.com/EOF that's Thinkific.com/EOF. Wondering what to do when you need motivation. Wish you had a go-to guy when it comes to preventing burnouts tune in to Jenna Kutcher's The Goal Digger Podcast brought to you by the HubSpot Podcast Network. Listen to The Goal Digger Podcast , wherever you get your podcasts.