Episode Transcript
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SPEAKER_01 (00:00):
Surviving Outside
Sales Podcast, hosted by Michael
(00:02):
Kelly, presented by SalesBuilder Academy.
The goal is to survive andthrive in all phases of outside
sales, whether you're gettingin, dominating, or getting out.
Surviving Outside Sales.
Now off the show.
SPEAKER_02 (00:29):
Welcome to the
Surviving Outside Sales Podcast.
I'm your host, Mike O'Kelly.
Uh today is the first day of Q4.
And Q4 is like the playoffs.
So the rest of the Q1, Q2, Q3 isthe regular season.
This is the playoffs.
This is what separates the goodfrom the great.
(00:49):
The ability to hit the numbers,to scale the business in Q4, and
to end the year strong.
And I always get excited for Q4.
I love it.
October, November, December.
The weather starts to get theweather starts to get cooler.
I love cold weather.
I really do.
Um I love wearing uh longsleeves.
(01:13):
I love wearing jeans.
I love wearing pants.
I love wearing jackets.
I love walking outside andhaving that like cold air in the
lungs.
I love it.
I do enjoy my time, you know.
I enjoyed the summer with thekiddos at the pool, but I do
enjoy the winter and especiallythis time of year.
Q4 and Q1 of every year, Iabsolutely love.
(01:36):
And I'll kind of tell you why.
So Q4 is the execution phase ofall your hard work for the
entire year.
Okay.
Um is the planning, preparation,and the reset for the file for
the next year.
And I absolutely love it.
I absolutely love it.
I love building the process, Ilove uh organizing everything.
(02:00):
And then Q4 is the pull through.
And then I love analyzing whatworked, what didn't work for Q1,
and then starting back over.
We're hurtling towards 2026.
So right now, this is Q4 is thetime for you to pull through
what you've been doing all year.
(02:21):
You're gonna have a lot ofopportunities because a lot of
businesses are gonna have budgetthat they have to spend.
And if you're not familiar withhow budgets work, if let's say a
company has a budget formarketing or sales spend or
investment in new technology,new product, um, new tools, you
got about$100,000, or let's sayit's$100,000.
Okay.
(02:41):
And let's say right now they'reat 80K, they've got to spend
that money, or what'll happen iswhen they redo the budgets next
year, they could lose some ofthat money.
Because accounting, thefinancial side of every
organization is always lookingto tighten up, to pull back.
Okay.
Sales and marketing are alwayslooking to push forward, push
(03:04):
the envelope, ask for more, bemore aggressive.
Accounting, finance, pull back.
I know I'm married to a CPA.
Uh, my wife is in finance, andthat's exactly what she does.
She pulls back.
I try to push, she pulls back.
And it's good to have that kindof balance.
But for companies, they have abudget and they have these big
(03:24):
budgetary meetings, and there'sa lot of time that is spent on
allocating resources andearmarking resources for new
technology, investments, etcetera.
Not to mention the fact thatthere are tax benefits where
they can write off a certainnumber per year.
That's the 179 write-off.
If you're not familiar with the179 tax write-off, you can just
(03:45):
Google it.
Um, every business tries toinvest in new uh equipment,
something that's gonna help thebusiness, capital outlay, and
then the government will let youwrite it off on your taxes up to
a certain limit.
So huge tax benefits for abusiness, and the sales and
marketing team want to spendthat money.
(04:07):
So if you don't know already,that's the first thing you
should do.
Find out the budget, find outwhat they're looking at.
And the the thing that when Italk to sales professionals, I
talk to a lot of salesprofessionals, I've talked to a
lot, I've coached a lot, um,hundreds of sales professionals
over the last several years.
And it still amazes me theshyness that sales professionals
(04:30):
have when they're speaking withbusiness owners or purchasing
managers, office managers, or umsomebody, a manager that could
help them with the final sale.
It is shocking to me how shythey get.
And they don't ask forspecifics.
For instance, they could loveyour product, but if they don't
have budget in 2025, the chancesof them pulling it in are slim
(04:54):
to none.
And here's the reason why everyperson has a boss.
So you go and talk to like apurchasing manager.
The purchasing manager is goingto have to justify why they're
going to go over budget for aline item category for your
product or service.
That means they have to sticktheir neck out and sell your
(05:17):
product to their boss.
It could be the VP of sales, itcould be the VP of operations,
the COO, CEO, CFO, um a seniorlevel executive.
They have to go to thatexecutive and say, this is the
justification for doing XYZ.
They're sticking their neck out.
That means now their fate istied to your product.
(05:39):
If it goes over budget, that'sexactly how it's viewed from a
senior level.
So if you've got a product,let's say it's$50,000.
Okay.
Um, I'm gonna just use examplesfrom the industry that I was in,
which is capital equipment, um,medical supplies, et cetera.
Let's say your device is$50,000,okay?
(06:02):
They've spent all their money.
You have to have a great pitchwith documentation and proof and
a full and an ironclad plan onhow they're gonna get a massive
ROI without the risk, because atthat point, what happens is it
is risk mitigation.
(06:22):
And everybody is not, or mostpeople are risk averse.
They do not, they don't want tohave risk, they don't want to
stick their neck out, they wantto fly under the radar.
And so unless you're talkingwith an owner, a single, single,
single owner, single decisionmaker, controls everything, you
(06:44):
know, if you're talking to acompany that has a board of
directors or you're talking tosomebody that has to go to
report to a senior level, um,it's gonna be a little harder.
But if you're talking to abusiness owner, they can go over
budget because they make thedecisions.
So you have to know youraudience.
You have to know the budget, youhave to know the audience.
And then what you have to do isyou have to create a sense of
(07:06):
urgency by crafting a ROImessage, not strictly dollars
and cents, but what this can dofor the what this can do for
that business or that businessowner today, tomorrow, and in
the future.
And you really have to think ofthings that possibly you've
never talked about before, oryou have to find things that
(07:27):
maybe they haven't even broughtup yet.
So if you're selling somethingand you talk to them and they
say, I have no budget, I wouldcraft a very this is gonna sound
kind of uh like an oxymoron, buta detailed but succinct proposal
(07:53):
that they can pass along andmove on to the next account.
Over budget is very difficult.
You want that low-hanging fruit.
You should already know who your25 to 30, maybe 40 targets are.
I would not do a lot ofprospecting in Q4.
Q4 is where you have to closedeals, period.
(08:13):
I would be working these dealsand working them really hard and
not worrying on prospecting asmuch.
Because think about this.
Also, let's say, for instance,nobody has met you.
I know for me, if somebodyreaches out to me this quarter
is like, hey, I want to do X, Y,Z, I'm like, nope, I'm gonna
mentally I'm already checked outuntil Q1 of 2026.
And then I might revisit it.
(08:36):
So you can kick the tires andsee.
You will get lucky occasionallythat somebody has an immediate
need for your product orservice.
So when I say you don't want todo a lot of prospecting, you
just don't want to go toprospects over and over and over
again, hoping that they're gonnaclose by the end of the year.
You want to focus on the peoplethat can buy and they can buy in
(08:59):
the next month.
Okay, there's only 49 sellingdays.
After today, there's only 48selling days in the month of or
in Q4.
Let me repeat that.
Okay.
There's only 49 selling days.
And the reason why there's only49 selling days is this year,
(09:23):
Halloween falls on a uh Friday.
So that day, I'm telling you,that day is gonna be a wash.
Most business owners, mostpeople have kids.
Most people have young kids.
You know, if you're a businessowner or a person decision
maker, probably in their 30s and40s, they have kids.
(09:44):
There's gonna betrick-or-treating.
Um, it's also because Halloweenis on a Friday night.
Halloween is also an adultholiday.
So people might be preppreparing for parties.
Uh the fact that it falls on aFriday night means obviously
there's no school the followingday.
So I believe that that Halloween2025 is going to be a big, uh, a
big a big day where people justum uh cat uh what's the word?
(10:07):
Catch it in.
Um kind of uh I'm just I'mmissing the phrase.
All right, I'll move on.
I think you know what I mean.
Like um, they're just gonna gothrough the motions that day.
Nobody's gonna make a decisionon October 31st.
Okay, so that day is gone.
That's number one.
Okay.
Uh the week of Halloween, okay,that's gone.
Also, uh Veterans Day.
(10:27):
Veterans Day, if you call inbankers, banks are closed
November 11th.
I don't know, I don't know whenit falls on this year.
Um, if it doesn't fall on a lookat my calendar real quick, I
know in real time this is notgreat um audio.
Oh, it's on a Tuesday.
Okay, so that's Veterans Day.
Banks are closed.
All right.
Banks are closed, so if you callin bankers, but a lot of
businesses will, if they if thebanks are closed, that also
(10:49):
affects their business.
So some businesses will be openon that day, some won't.
For this exercise, I'm takingthat as an off day.
Okay, so that's number two.
The week of Thanksgiving, that'soff.
That's five days.
Okay.
So now by the end of November,we're up to seven business days
affected or or unavailable.
Then we get to Christmas, okay?
(11:09):
The last two weeks of the year,I'm counting those off.
I know, Mike, you know, Mike, alot of people buy at the end of
the year.
Yes, they do, but you don't wantto try to be pulling things the
last two weeks of the year.
Trust me, I have done it.
It's not fun.
I have done it for variousreasons.
Some some deals got delayed, andI've I've literally had
paperwork uh signed on December31st.
(11:33):
Uh, you know, I've had 30,$30,000 commission checks
hanging on the balance onDecember 31st.
So, which is not fun.
It's not fun to wait that long.
So you don't want to do that.
So those two weeks are gonebecause a lot of people are
gonna be taking vacations.
Now, does that mean that everysingle one of your prospects or
(11:54):
every single one of your futurebuyers are gonna be taking off
those last two weeks?
No.
However, that is a disruption inyour business.
And anytime there's adisruption, you have to take it
away from your available pool ofproductivity.
Okay.
So you take those 10 days away,what are you left with?
You're left with 77.
Okay.
There are 22, there are 22business days on on average for
(12:16):
every month.
So that means there's 66 perquarter on average.
You know, obviously February'sgot less, but on average, it's
about 22 business days permonth.
All right.
That's 66 days.
Let's take 17 away and thenlet's take away today because
today's gone.
Uh, by the time you're listeningto this, it might even be later
than that.
So now you have 48 businessdays.
(12:38):
48 business days, 48opportunities to hit your number
for Q4.
If you have not put a plantogether, if you do not have a
strategy on how to do that, youare behind the eight ball.
Now, if you want to have astrategy call about your Q4, you
(12:58):
could always sign up for a freestrategy session with me.
Um, you can email me, Mike isthrivingoutsales.com.
You can book some time on mycalendar.
The link is in the show notes.
Or you can reach out to me onLinkedIn and say, I need a Q4
strategy.
Because this is where careersare made.
(13:19):
This is where commission dollarsare earned.
This is where job security comesinto play.
You have a very strong Q4,you're pretty much gonna
guarantee yourself another twoto three quarters.
You gotta have a strong Q4, andyou have to be able to pull
through business.
All right.
(13:40):
So, three things you can do topull through business.
Okay.
Number one, you gotta be callingon the right people.
Okay, you got to know budgets,you gotta know decision makers,
you have to be able to talkabout budget return on
investment.
Okay, so you gotta have theright buyers, okay?
You have to have the right timeand attention, okay.
Uh I closed a big deal uh when Iwas selling radiation machines
(14:03):
because I went by an office 15times in Q4.
15 times.
This was not close to my office,uh close to my house, about two
hours away, kind of in themiddle of nowhere.
And I had to do that.
But I knew that this was a buyerand I was right, and I got this
person to purchase.
But I allocated a lot of mytime.
(14:25):
So, time and attention.
You've got to focus on thepeople who are going to buy.
Number one, budget, return oninvestment.
You've got to understand ifpeople do not have budget,
they're just a prospect, kickthem to the next year.
Okay.
If if they've already spenttheir budget, you've kind of
missed your window already.
It doesn't mean you're justgonna throw in the towel and
(14:46):
you're not gonna do anything,but again, time and attention,
48 business days.
And that is if you start onOctober 2nd, 48 business days
left.
So you've got to have time andattention.
So think about it.
That account that I, the accountthat I had 15 meetings with in
Q4, it was several severalmeetings a week, several touch
points, several conversations aweek.
(15:08):
Now, some of them was likeliterally we were talking every
day, walking through thenumbers, walking through the
logistics of how it would work.
Because also remember thisyou've also got to talk about
how it's going to affect thebusiness that you're selling to.
If you're selling a product orservice, how is that disruption
gonna happen?
There's gonna be training that'sgonna be needed for their staff
or for the or for the businessowner.
(15:29):
There's gonna be training,there's gonna be downtime,
uptime.
Downtime is how much time it'sgonna take them to do the
training, and then how much timeis it gonna take them to be
hands-on and and put that intotheir process?
Downtime, uptime.
And then what is the reasonablerate of return that they're
gonna get in the next threemonths, six months, next year?
(15:50):
That's what you have to focuson, okay?
So budget, understanding thefinancials, time and attention.
And then number three is you'vegot to force the issue.
Okay.
This is not sales, is not I'mgonna lead a horse to water and
hope it drinks.
Okay.
Sometimes you have to force theissue.
(16:12):
You have to nudge the client,you have to nudge the buyer.
Sometimes, sometimes buyers donot can't get out of their own
way.
30% of people are always gonnasay yes.
30% of people are always gonnasay no.
And it's the 40% of the peoplein the middle that you have to
convince.
And that 40% of people, that iswhere sales careers are made.
(16:34):
It's not in the 30%.
If you just do enough, if youjust do enough volumes of sales
calls, you'll find 30%.
And depending upon your productor service, if your product or
service has national TV ads,national campaigns, if you have
a huge budget where you can geta lot of one-on-one time, that's
great.
If you haven't, if you have aproduct that has name
recognition in the market,fantastic.
(16:55):
Most products, especially theclients that I reach out to, um,
and I probably reach out, Imean, a lot of clients, a lot of
people reach out to me in thesales world.
Uh, they run, uh they reach outto me because they don't have
the the name brand.
They don't have the ones wherethey walk in and they say, hey,
I'm with so-and-so company andthe velvet rope opens, or oh
(17:17):
yeah, we've been dying to trythis product.
That's most people that I speakwith.
And it probably makes sensebecause if you work for one of
those companies where the velvetrope is opening, you probably
aren't struggling, or youprobably don't feel like you're
struggling.
But a lot of the salesprofessionals that I speak with,
they're struggling with gettingpast the gatekeeper.
(17:38):
They're struggling with gettingtime and attention from their
accounts, and they're alsostruggling with their
pull-through.
So they feel like they'respinning the wheels and they
feel as if they're just notgetting anywhere.
Again, if that's you, reach outto me.
See if, see if I might be ableto help you.
Because I I I was I was actuallyjust talking to a client earlier
(17:58):
this week, and I said, Youtomorrow is not promised in the
sales world.
Next month is not promised inthe sales world.
Next quarter is not promised inthe sales world.
You have got to do what you canwith today.
You can't say, well, you knowwhat, I'll just pack it in and
(18:19):
I'll see what happens in Q1.
I guarantee you I know it'sgonna happen in Q1 if you pack
it in.
Or if you just say, you know,it's too hard, it's too much
work, Mike, it's too hard.
If that's the case, sales mightnot be for you.
I did have somebody that I spokewith about three or four months
ago, and I flat out on the call,I just said, um, you know, I I'm
(18:40):
not sure if sales is your strongsuit.
This person asked for my adviceand I gave my honest opinion.
Not everybody is built for this.
Not everybody's built for sales,especially outside sales.
Inside sales, you know, phonecalls, Zoom meetings, it's a
different beast.
(19:00):
Outside sales, you got to poundthe pavement, you have to see
people in person, you have to gointerrupt their business day
when they may or may not knowyou're showing up.
You're gonna you're gonna youhave to deal with a lot of
rejection.
You're gonna hear no tens ofthousands of times, and it can't
affect you.
It's not personal, but you haveto be able to push through.
You have to have a level ofgrit.
(19:21):
And this individual that I wastalking to, he just did not have
the grit.
And so I recommended that he hego elsewhere.
And I've coached, I've coachedsomebody before um that was more
of a marketing guy, and Irecommended finding a marketing
position.
And he did.
I've said, you know, I thinkyour strong suit is actually
marketing, it's not in sales,because you have a really good
(19:42):
mind for like coming up withideas and stuff like that.
And he went back into marketing.
And I thought that was really, Ithought that was a really good
decision.
So if you want to have a chat,I'll give you um, I'm a very
open book.
I'll give you my honest opinionon what can happen, what you
should do.
And I do offer coaching.
If it makes sense that youwanna, you want my help and I
(20:03):
can guide you through Q4 andgetting you prepared for Q one
of 2026.
Still crazy for me to say that.
I feel like the year has justabsolutely flown by.
But if you want to get clarityon what you need to be doing,
how you need to be doing it, andwhen you need to start, book a
(20:24):
free strategy call with me.
Reach out to me on LinkedIn,reach out to me, Mike at
SurvivingOutsides.com, and let'shave a conversation about what
you're going to, what you'regonna need to do this quarter in
order to set yourself up forsuccess, not just this quarter,
but for the quarters to follow.
So I started Sales BuilderAcademy for sales professionals
(20:46):
as a resource and a tool tolearn how to build a business
that'll scale so you can spendmore time working on your
business as opposed to in yourbusiness.
I've been there, I have done allthe sales calls, I have spun all
the plates, I've done all theactivity where if I took any
time off, any time off, like twoor three days, I saw a drop in
(21:08):
my business and a drop in mymomentum.
And it was until I got greatmentoring and great coaching
myself that I realized that Iwas doing it wrong.
And it was just smalladjustments.
It was small adjustments toleave a lasting impression on my
accounts where it was almostlike I was omnipresent.
(21:29):
I was everywhere.
It was just little things that Iwasn't doing.
I was doing a lot of hustling,like sprinting to accounts,
making tons of sales calls, alot of activity.
But it wasn't as productive asit could have been.
It wasn't as thoughtful.
I wasn't lingering on the mindsof my prospects after I was
gone.
And that's what you have to do.
It's very similar in the datingworld.
(21:50):
You know, it's not about howmany dates you have.
It is are people thinking aboutyou when you're not there?
That is how people fall in love,and that's how people decide
that they want to buy from you.
It's how people also get hired,by the way.
It's the exact same thing.
Most of the big decisions inyour life happen when you're not
in the room.
When I heard that for the firsttime about 15 years ago, 16
(22:13):
years ago, it absolutely blew mymind.
It's so true.
Most, if not all, of the biglifetime decisions in your life
happen when you're not around.
So it was pitched to me by oneof my mentors 16 years ago.
Mike, how do you stay on themind of your account when you're
(22:40):
gone?
And it really is becomingmemorable.
So if you're gonna be memorable,are you gonna rush in, rush out?
Are you gonna just say what yougotta say, spew all the features
and benefits, and then you'regone?
Or you're gonna have athoughtful conversation where
you connect with the otherperson, you bring them into your
(23:01):
world, you eliminate whatever'shappening around that person.
Until I had heard that, I wasjust doing lots of activity.
So my sales were growing, but itwas at a pace that I could not
keep up.
I would wear myself out, I'd getexhausted, I would crash.
It wasn't until I learned how tobecome memorable and stay on
(23:26):
people's mind did people startreaching out to me.
That was the big change was Iwas doing, I was reaching out to
them, I was reaching out tothem, I was reaching out to
them.
Then all of a sudden, peoplestart reaching out to me.
Hey, let's meet.
I want to talk about XYZ, let'smeet.
Hey, you know, I really needyour help with XYZ.
I get phone calls.
(23:47):
I need your help.
Hey, you said you know, you saidyou can do this.
I was wondering if you could dothis.
Shoot, I still get calls.
I haven't been out in the fieldsince 2021.
I still get calls from offices.
I got a call about a month ago.
Said, hey, we want to have a wewant to sit down and have a
meeting about uh one of theproducts that I used to I used
(24:10):
to have.
And I called the office back andI said, well, I I actually don't
even know if there's a salesteam in the United States for
that product anymore.
I don't know.
Um the company was out ofSwitzerland and the the sales
director, the director of salesthat I knew passed away.
So I I don't I don't I have noaffiliation with the company.
I don't I don't know.
I'm sorry.
(24:30):
You know, you might want to callwhatever numbers on the website.
So Q4, if you if you're lookingto make this the best quarter of
your career, let's chat.
I might be able to help.
Mike at survivingoutsides.com orreach out to me on LinkedIn.
(24:50):
Uh redoing all my websites.
So my websites, uh I'll have alink for my websites later, but
I'm working on my websites,slow, slow but sure, slow and
steady, wins the race, they say.
And so uh they're not quite doneyet, but um, they will be
shortly.
But yeah, just reach out to me,email me, or LinkedIn's the
best, connect with me onLinkedIn, and just say, hey, I'd
(25:11):
love to have a strategy call.
Just listen to the Q4 episode,and uh we'll go from there and
we'll set you up for success inQ4 and beyond.
Um appreciate everybody who'sbeen listening.
It was another big week ofdownloads, which absolutely
still blows my mind because I Ihave not been able to record and
put out new episodes frequently,but I do appreciate everybody
(25:31):
who's listening.
There's a lot of new listenersout there.
So um it was actually, I thinkit was the fifth biggest week of
downloads in the history of theshow, which is crazy to me.
I absolutely love it.
It just means that people aresearching for this, they're
seeking for it.
So if you're listening to thisright now, you're not alone.
Share this with a friend, sharethis episode with a friend, talk
(25:51):
about your Q4 plans with otherpeople.
And if you need guidance onthat, um, or you're a lone wolf
or you don't have anybody tochat with, uh, reach out to me
and I can help guide you and getclarity for Q4 to the best uh
the best quarter of your careerwith the most commission
dollars, so that in January,February, you'll get those
(26:13):
commission dollars and you'll begrinning from ear to ear.
If that sounds like you, let'schat.
Like at Surviving Outside Sales.
Hope everybody has a great startto their Q4 and uh we'll see you
next time.
Cheers.