Reclaiming Sales
We need to reclaim sales. Because sales is NOT what you think it is.
In no way do I pretend to know what’s right for you. I do, however, know that if you’re an entrepreneur, solopreneur, or in any kind of sales, the bullshit you’re telling yourself about sales is not helpful to you.
So, I’ve made you (yes, another) free workbook. Contained within the pages of the Reclaiming Sales workbook are pieces of my proven sales philosophy. I offer them to you for several reasons.
First, because, as I stated above, we need to reclaim sales. From whom? From the shitty bro marketers, the shitty “hey girl” MLM copy/paste methodologies, and the shitty societal connotations of a balding man with a wet cigar hanging out of his mouth and his chest hair popping out of his partially unbuttoned shirt trying to pressure you into a used car that you absolutely do not want.
Second, because I want you to see what other perspectives are available to hold so that you can decide what to try on, what to keep, and what to toss.
Here’s what I’m NOT giving you inside the workbook: scripts, fancy methods, psych hacks, linguistic strategies, or any other kind of copy/paste concept.
Why?
Because when it comes to sales and marketing, that shit doesn’t work. People sell it! You can purchase sales scripts! But not from me.
What I teach is honoring your full self and your clients’ full selves as the core foundation of everything. Copy/paste strategies are bullshit — because they’re not YOURS. There are no magic words, scripts, hacks, or methods to “make people buy.”
If there were, that would be manipulation. And manipulation is the number one fear I hear from my clients about sales. You don’t want to be pushy. You don’t want to force people into anything they don’t want to do. Therefore, YOU DO NOT WANT A SCRIPT.
You THINK you want a script because you think sales is some fancy skillset. But, again, sales is not what you think it is.
Sales happen for two reasons:
A need or desire has arisen organically.
Something has created a need or want.
But you likely have some other, unhelpful ideas about what sales means that are holding you back and holding your (current and potential) clients back. So we need to redefine what sales means in your brain.
To start that process, your free Reclaiming Sales workbook is going to ask you a few questions, such as:
🤔 What does SALES mean to you?
🤔 Why do YOU think sales happen?
🤔 What do you think makes someone GOOD at sales?
🥴 How does the idea of SALES and SELLING feel in your body?
Because, in order to shift into something else, we have first to recognize where we’re starting.
The thoughts you currently have about sales didn’t just come from nowhere. There is some validity in them.
We COULD get into the psychologically manipulative approaches to certain advertising practices and marketing approaches.
We COULD talk about the high-pressure sales techniques that people are TRAINED to do.
But what I want to offer you here is that you think that shit happens naturally, that someone inherently taps into the techniques and tactics that are based on research, taught in universities, trained in companies, and not at all something anyone is magically born with.
It’s a set of intentional approaches that — if you’re afraid of sales — you specifically don’t want to use.
And the great news?
You’re not going to even come close to any of that when you’re showing up as yourself to offer what you have available to someone who wants it.
There are a lot of bullshit thoughts people have about sales. They land in my DMs (alllll the time). They come up on calls (every fucking day) with my clients. And they’re probably spinning around in your brain (constantly), doing you a massive disservice.
👉 Sales is pushy/gross/unethical.
👉 There are certain words or tactics to learn OR just ways of being that make someone good at sales, but mostly in a gross way.
👉 Something, something, something, “overcoming objections.”
These all boil down to a misconception of the meaning of sales — the belief that selling is trying to convince someone to purchase something they don’t need or don’t want.
But what if SALES really just means providing information and making an offer so that the other person can make an informed choice on their own behalf?
And what if by NOT selling, you’re actually taking away their choices and robbing them of their autonomy because they don’t have the appropriate information and don’t know the options available to them?
If I don’t give you the information upon which you can base a decision, I’m making the decision for you. (👈 Do yourself a favor. Read that again. Out loud.)
Here are some more bullshit thoughts people have about sales:
👉 People will buy what they want.
👉 If they want it, they’ll ask for it.
These beliefs make the assumption that their desires will lead them to approach you. But what’s more likely is that if you don’t offer what you’re selling:
They’ll think you don’t like them.
They’ll think you don’t want to work with them (or, in the case of a renewal, that you don’t want to work with them further).
They don’t even know that you offer it and that they can buy it from you!
If they want what you have available, but you don’t offer it, you’re right! They’ll buy it! But they’ll do so elsewhere, from someone offering it. Because they won’t want to risk humiliation by asking someone they think doesn’t want to give it to them or who they don’t even know is offering it.
And the reason you’re not asking is because you’re making that ask mean more about you than you are about what it could do to help or serve your client.
You’re expecting your current or potential client to have more confidence than YOU have as the seller. You’re expecting them to ask for something you’re not offering. While you may want to actively work to dismantle the relationship hierarchy we’ve socially created between buyer and seller, in the beginning, you’re the one with the power.
That power is to offer them information so that they can then use their power to make a decision. Your part comes first.
Will there be clients who buck the system and ask for what they want? Sure. But they’re the occasional few, not the standard many.
How about a few more bullshit thoughts people have about sales?
👉Taking money from other people = icky.
👉 Marketing is okay because that’s serving an audience for free.
👉 Something, something, something, “capitalism.”
When you accept payment for your products or services — whether on your own behalf or on behalf of someone you work under as an employee or contractor, you’re delivering something in exchange for that payment.
In no way do I believe the relationships you have with your clients are transactional. I believe those relationships are built on trust. However, there will always be an exchange.
Because you are a professional. And the transaction helps ensure you can create and uphold professional boundaries.
They pay for X. You know that. They know that. There are inherent structures based on your professional offer. And you can rely on those structures to uphold the integrity of your work.
There’s a second crucial factor here that is somewhat controversial but that I’ve found to be relatively true in most instances: People don’t show up for free shit.
Personally, I would much rather take someone’s money in exchange for a high-value opportunity for their own growth and transformation than expect them to be as emotionally invested for free. Because I know how much more they’ll get out of the work when they’re invested in it.
Is this a capitalistic viewpoint? Sure.
Would I MUCH rather live in a society that’s not dripping with toxic capitalism? Yes. Yes. All of the yes.
But just like I can choose to let sexism, homophobia, and all the other systems of oppression paralyze me OR I can choose how I want to show up to dismantle them, I can make the same choice about living under capitalism.
Capitalism exists. We can all agree to that as a factual truth of the time and place in which we live. And we could all go live off-grid and opt out of the capitalistic society that surrounds us. But how many people would we be able to reach from there? Probably not many. And how big of an impact could we make there? Probably not much of one.
Plus, honestly, as a coach, I’m pretty confident that my clients paying me means their money is far better off than it would be in the hands of Amazon, PornHub, Miller-Coors, or any other company that profits off of people trying to feel better and then fucks up the world with those profits.
And I’m pretty confident the same is true for you.
There are no magic words. Stop looking for them.
The first question many people ask me when they hear about all the sales incentives and accolades I’ve received over the years is, “What are the words you say?”
They always want my sales scripts. They want me to teach them how to say the right things to make people buy. But I said it before, and I’ll say it again: You don’t want a fucking script.
What you want is to stop being afraid of sales. And you think a script will give that to you, but it won’t.
Of all the bullshit thoughts people have about sales, the main concept is that you don’t want to be “salesy.” Which really means that you don’t want to be manipulative. And if there were a script that ACTUALLY worked or magic words that could ACTUALLY make people buy, it would be manipulation.
By using a sales script, you’d be manipulating people, which is the thing you don’t want to do. That’s the thing you’re afraid of. That’s the thing that makes people hate sales.
Instead, you need to shift your relationship to sales. And to do that, you need to shift your definition of sales.
Sales is nothing more and nothing less than a conversation. Your side of the conversation goes first: You offer them information and an opportunity to make a decision. Then it’s their turn: They make the decision. You don’t make it for them. (Unless, of course, you choose NOT to sell. In which case you’re deciding their answer is no.)
Download your free Reclaiming Sales workbook to work through this concept for yourself.
If you want actual support, guidance, and leadership through shifting your relationship to sales so that you can grow your business, I’d love to work with you inside the SellingU Community. And if you want in-depth work together with 1:1 strategy sessions and an in-person annual celebratory retreat, you want to get into the SellingU Mastermind.
Doors only open once a year, and spots fill up quickly. Get on the list and save your spot in the spring cohort by pre-registering at bit.ly/SellingU.
