Episode 4 - Creating an Identity and Prospecting

Episode 4: Creating an Identity and Prospecting

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[Music]

Jason McClain:  Welcome to Evolutionary Sales.  I'm your host, Jason McClain, and your guide to the 21st-century marketplace.  Welcome to Episode Four of Evolutionary Sales, on the Personal Life Media Network.  We've been together for a little over a month now, and if you haven't yet gone back and listened to the prologue, and the previous episodes, do that now.  These episodes are intended to stack on top of each other, to enrich your success.  In the prologue we went over the shift that's happening in the marketplace, the 21st-century marketplace, where we're integrating the Eastern idea of service contribution, and really caring for the planet, opening relationships, rather than closing deals, and this idea of embracing the free marketplace and developing yourself.  We also went over how you can get the most out of these episodes.  So again, if you haven't listened to the prologue, go back and do that now; if you haven't listened to the previous episodes, please go back and listen to them in order.  Of course each one of these episodes is certainly valuable in and of itself, but you will get the most, as a sales professional, or as a practitioner, or as an entrepreneur, out of these episodes if you listen to them in order.

In Episode One, we went over personal work, how your decisions and your beliefs will create, essentially, how you move through the world.  They'll either create possibility, or they'll close doors in your mind.

In Episode Two, we began to teach you how to master your mind, and how to manage your mind.  Essentially that you don't experience reality.  You experience pictures, sounds, feelings, smells, tastes, and language, or V-A-K-O-G-L.  This is how your experience is coded; therefore if you change your internal representation you'll change your emotional experiences.  And we gave you several exercises that will assist you in being at a peak emotional state whenever you enter... prospecting clients, presentation situations, get on the phone, whatever it may be, whatever it may be for you, wherever you need to add resources for yourself so that you can achieve the kind of results that you deserve, as a committed sales professional.

In Episode Three, we went over setting goals, smart goals, S-M-A-R-T... (S)tating the positive, the (M)easurable, (A)chievable or (A)ttainable, (R)esponsible, and then setting (T)ime.  If your goals or outcomes are "SMART", you'll be significantly more likely to achieve them.  We also went ahead and demystified "the secret", or this idea of creating your reality, or manifesting your reality, or the "law of attraction".  It's really just your particular activator system.  So managing your minds, whatever you're imagining, visualizing, or intending, whether that's positive, that's what's going to come to you... or whether that's negative, that's what's going to come to you.  So, really just demystifying that whole community around "the secret" and the law of attraction.  It's pretty straightforward; it's based on your biology.  Finally in Episode Three we worked on your unconscious organization of time.  That is actually, how you can set things into your future, and for those of you are more interested in exploring this, you can also clear things from your past that way, whether it's fear, guilt, shame, sadness, anger, incomplete relationships, or events that did not go well.  Maybe you loop on these events that didn't go well.  Maybe you had a presentation that went poorly; maybe you had an interaction [unclear audio] that went poorly.  When you loop on that it's robbing you of creative energy that you can use for your next client, or for learning, or for just developing yourself... ultimately for earning more income.  We're not going to get into that too much in this particular series of podcasts, but we can talk about that at some point.

But today, Episode Four, we're going to get into three separate concepts:
The first, which may seem a little esoteric to you, and some of you may be asking, "I wonder what the heck does this have to do with sales?"  It has everything to do with sales.  And it's *self-esteem*.  Now, we've taught you a lot about managing your emotional state already, but in terms of moving stages of your ego development, this is what will serve you: to be open to feedback, to not take things personally, and to always be in service of your clients regardless of how they're communicating with you.  This is a *critical*, critical  piece of development, and there're no tips or tricks to it; it's ongoing evolution.  "Ego-volution", I used to call it.  But really it means comprehensive personal evolution, that is evolving how you relate to yourself, and how you relate to the events in your lives.  And I'm going to start this off by reading a quote, from Dr. Nathaniel Branden, from the book "The Six Pillars of Self-Esteem".

Dr. Nathaniel Branden says, and this is under a subsection called "The Challenges of a Modern World", quote:
"In the past two or three decades, extraordinary development has occurred in the American and global economies.  The United States has shifted from a manufacturing society to an information society.  We've witnessed the transition from physical labor to mind-work as a dominant employee activity.  We now live in a global economy, characterized by rapid change, accelerating scientific and technological breakthroughs and an unprecedented level of competitiveness.  These developments create demands for higher levels of education and training than were required of previous generations.  Everyone acquainted with business culture knows this.  What is not understood is that these developments also create new demands on our psychological resources. 

"Specifically, these developments ask for a greater level of self-management, innovation, personal responsibility, and self-direction.  This is just not passed at the top, it is passed at every level of a business enterprise, from senior management, to first-line supervisors, and even to entry-level personnel.  As an example of how the world has changed, here's a Fortune Magazine's description of the position of manufacturing production operator, Motorola... an entry-level job: 'Analyze computer reports and identify problems through experiments and statistical process control, communicate manufacturing performance metrics to management, and understand the company's competitive position.' 

"A modern business can no longer be run by a few people who think, and many other people who do what they are told, the traditional military command-and-control model.  Today, organizations need not only an unprecedented higher level of knowledge and skill among all those who participate, but also a higher level of independence, self-reliance, trust, and capacity to exercise initiative, in a word... self-esteem.  This means that persons with a decent level of self-esteem are now needed economically in large numbers.  Historically, this is a new phenomenon."

That's the end quote.  Again, Dr. Nathaniel Branden, "The Psychology of Self-Esteem" is one of his books.  The book I was just reading from is "The Six Pillars of Self-Esteem."  I recommend to any of you, pick it up and get it.  And read it.

Imagine the freedom you'd feel if you had enough confidence in your self-efficacy, that you never took anything personally again.  Imagine the confidence and assuredness you would feel if you knew that when someone was communicating a piece of feedback to you about how you were as a professional, that it was just for your developing your own efficacy as a professional, continued evolution as a professional.  Imagine the freedom you would have emotionally, and imagine how quickly you could integrate that feedback.  That's what self-esteem and ego development can do for you.  And it can do that in all the mains of your life, of course.  That's why I'm an evolutionary guide. 

Which takes us right into the second concept I want to talk about today, which is identity.  We're also going to talk about prospecting.  But identity is really... it's funny, they used to say, "Well, you want to create a name for yourself."  Well, literally, "create a name for yourself."  Who are you, in business?  Create a name for yourself that's both memorable and accurate, that will allow you to distinguish yourself from the market, and that will allow you to use language to impact or prospect your client.  Because the truth is, it's not just you who's experiencing pictures, sounds, feelings, smells, tastes, and language... but it's everybody, of course.  And so you need to master your art of language.  We'll get into framing later on.  But start with language in who you are as a professional.  It doesn't matter if you're a car dealer, or a car salesman, or whether you're a coach, or whether you're doing enterprise-level sales solutions.  It doesn't matter who you are, in terms of your role.  What matters is who you represent yourself to be, and what you step into, in terms of the identity you construct. 

Now, let's go over those necessary components again.  You want to create a name for yourself, that's both memorable and accurate.  That allows you to distinguish yourself from the rest of the market.  And you want to use language to impact your prospect or client.  Now for instance, my title is "Evolutionary Guide" and you've heard me say over and over again, "Your guide in the 21st-century marketplace."  And if you go to my website, EvolutionaryAwareness.com, you can see how I have couched everything within this evolutionary concept.  This is evolutionary sales, of course.  So, everything is couched within that concept.  But let's say you're a car dealer... maybe you're a "transportation expert."  Or maybe you're "the Nissan guy."  Or if you're a real estate agent, you're a "home provider."  There are any number of ways; these are just off the top of my head, but you need to come up with something for *you*.  I tell you what, I haven't had a single person I've handed my card to, that said "Evolutionary Guide" on it, that they didn't go, "Wow!  What's that?"  It's an actual conversation starter.  Suddenly, I have them asking me about my business, rather than me asking about theirs.  Of course, it's a perfect opening for me to turn it around and ask them about their business and see how I can be of service to them.  But initially, just having some sort of title that's both accurate and memorable, and is a conversation starter, that will distinguish yourself from the market, and use language to impact your prospect or client, this will allow you to stick in people's minds, above all of your other competitors in the same vertical market that you're in.  So create an identity for yourself.  And if you're working for someone else, don't even ask their permission.  Buy your own cards, and I tell you what... it's a heck of a lot easier to apologize than it is to ask permission [laughs].  You do whatever you need to do.  Remember, one of the decisions you made in Episode One, is that you're in business for *yourself*.  You are a sales professional.  And you're in business for yourself no matter what company you work for.  And so, there are some decisions you're going to have to make, and it could be that you need to apologize for them later.  But I will tell you that there isn't a single thing I'll tell you to do that I haven't tried myself and found to be successful. 

Which brings us to the third concept today: And again, first we talked about the role of self-esteem, and ego development.  And if you want to email me more about that, I'll be more than happy to take some of those questions.  And again, one of the ways you can get the most out of this series of podcasts is you get to comment on the blog, and I'll answer the best questions.  You can also get a free gift from iFrogz.com.  They create custom covers for your iPod.  But really, that's how you can get the most out of this, is to ask questions in the blog, and you can find the blog by going to PersonalLifeMedia.com, clicking on "blogs" in the navigation bar, and then you just click on me, Jason McClain, your host for evolutionary sales and coaching the life coach.  The other way you can do it is simply email me at [email protected] (and there are two '"L's" in PersonalLifeMedia.com) 

So that brings us to the third concept today, Prospecting.  You know a lot of people say, "Well, I'm just looking for everybody, anybody who has money."  That's really not... first of all, it's not true.  And I'd love to see your product, if that's the case.  But second of all, you're not going to be able to find "everybody", or... I was speaking to Coach Laurie Molari [spelling is not available], and she was talking about how she worked for somebody who said, well, our prospects are... well, everybody was "skin."  And she realized the silliness of trying to market to that, because either your market is going to be so diffuse you won't be effective to anyone, or you're going to have to come up with a dozen different marketing pieces.  So, who are you trying to reach?  What's their gender?  What are their habits?  What magazines do they subscribe to?  How old are they, or what's the age range?  What's their financial status, or their tax bracket?  Do they have children or not?  Do they work out?  Do they go to yoga?  What kind of events do they attend?  What kind of workshops do they attend?  What kind of events, in terms of industry, trade shows, and the like?  Because, the first question is "who?"  And you get that really well distinguished, and there are plenty of list brokers that you can actually buy lists from, really specific lists, including magazine subscriptions.  I'm quite serious!  You can go to the library if you want to do it on the cheap, or you can simply buy it from a list broker.  But also make sure, you want to inquire, that they haven't done a list blast to someone similar in your business recently, so that you can make sure that you're distinguishing yourself even further from the other people who are competing with you in your own personal vertical.  But then once you distinguish who they are, where are they?  Where are those people?  And go and hang out there. [laughs]  Find 'em, find 'em, find 'em!  And you know, there's a sales classic in the movie "Glengarry Glen Ross".  And there are a lot of things in that movie I don't subscribe to because, quite frankly it's 20th-century sales, not evolutionary sales or sales for the 21st-century marketplace.  In fact, when I watch it I consider it kind of a parody of sales in the 20th century.  Be that as it may, there's something that Alec Baldwin's character... he did this hysterical presentation on "always be closing", and the kind of, well, equipment you needed to always be closing.  I would say,  always be prospecting, always be "in the mode" of providing service to your clients, and your prospects.  Who can you be of service to?  Where are they?  Whose pain can you help solve?  Whose problems can you help relieve?  These are the questions you need to be asking yourself.  So go and hang out there.  So prospecting really is about discovering who these people are, and then where they are, and then going and connecting with them

Which leads us to Episode Five, in which we'll be talking about rapports, the first critical skill-based distinction within the evolutionary sales process.  This has all been foundational work.  This has all been groundwork:
In the Prologue, shifting your thinking to a 21st-century marketplace.
In Episode One, having you take responsibility for your own personal work, your decisions, and your beliefs and how they create possibility or close the doors in your mind. 
Episode Two and Three, mastering your mind, how to manage your mind, through pictures, sounds, feelings, smells, tastes and language, and your internal representations, setting goals, if they're smart goals, and your unconscious organization of time. 
And then today we talked about identity and prospecting, creating an identity for yourself, creating a name for yourself, literally, so you're both memorable and it's an accurate representation of what you do that's special, distinguishing yourself from the marketplace, and using language to impact your clients or prospects, and of course [unclear audio] your prospects, their gender, their habits, the magazines they subscribe to, the event they attend, how old they are or young they are, their financial status or tax bracket, their children, or whatever interests they have.  And you know social networking is such a profound piece of technology nowadays, so if you're not on some social networking webste, I would encourage you to go and do that now, once you discover your identity for yourself.

To wrap things up, what I'll say is I encouraged you in the prologue to make sure that you had a partner for some of this stuff, because practice, practice, practice(!), especially as we get into some of these skills like we will next week when we begin to talk about connecting and what rapport actually means and how to do it, both unconsciously aand consciously.  That's going to be critical for you.  The other thing I'll say is that while a partner is great, and these... you know you're getting these podcasts for free, and these are of tremendous value, and of course you all realize the value of a coach, so if some of you want coaching, I have a couple of slots available, usually all the time because people are completing this all the time, but you can reach me at [email protected], and we can see if it actually is a fit for you to work with me, and we can talk about what you want to achieve and see if I feel if I'm the right coach for you and you're the right professional for me.  Again, I don't work with everybody, so it's important that we're really a fit, and our styles are a fit, and we can talk about all of that.  Again, [email protected]

I look forward to contributing to you next week, when we start to talk about rapport.  Again, I'm Jason McClain; you can reach me at [email protected] if you have any questions about this episode or any previous episodes.  For transcripts of this show, or any other shows on the Personal Life Media network, feel free to visit PersonalLifeMedia.com, again there're two "L's" in PersonalLifeMedia.com.  Thank you for listening; I'm your host Jason McClain,  and your guide to the 21st-century marketplace.