How to Be in the Top 1% of Earners – In Just 7 Minutes with Doug C. Brown

Resources/Links:

• Want to know what’s stopping you from getting more sales? Click here: https://ceosalesstrategies.com/

Summary

Do you want to know how you can turn your sales desires into business realities by chasing the right sales?

Not all sales are worth chasing, and not all things are meant to be done alone. To grow your business and increase your stream of sales (A.K.A. be a part of the top 1% of earners), it’s crucial to know the importance of asking for help or others’ opinions and investing your time into the right things!

Doug C. Brown is the CEO of CEO Sales Strategies. He is the international best-selling author of the book, Win-Win Selling: Unlocking Your Power for Profitability by Resolving Objections. He is also a nationally recognized sales revenue growth expert and consultant.

Grab a drink and listen to Doug and his life-changing advice on how you can become part of the top 1% of earners just through the power of honesty and investing your time into the right things.

Check out these episode highlights:

• 01:21 – Doug’s ideal client: So my ideal client is somebody who’s selling, normally a business coach, business consultant, salesperson, solo business owner, or people who even have sales teams.
• 02:01 – The problem he helps solve: I think the challenge for these people is they have the desire but don’t have the skills and knowledge how to navigate their sales processes and sales in general. So they can’t be in the top 1%.
• 02:48 – The symptoms of the problem: Well, the typical symptoms, frankly, all boil down to they’re not getting the right results for themselves. And they’re working way too many hours. They’re frustrated.
• 04:44 – Clients’ common mistakes before consulting Doug: I think basically, well, they’re trying to think that they can accomplish everything in a two-day book or seminar, right? So when they’re trying to learn these types of skills, they’re trying to do them in a vacuum.
• 06:05 – Doug’s Valuable Free Action (VFA): Well, I think the first thing is to start with an assessment of self-honesty, assessment, right? So what do you really want? You know, a lot of people are chasing sales, and they’re not sure why they’re even doing it.
• 06:56 – Doug’s Valuable Free Resource (VFR): Want to know what’s stopping you from getting more sales? Click here: https://ceosalesstrategies.com/
• 07:27 – Q: What keeps people stuck from making the money they pursue? A: They think they’re in their business and what they’re in, they need to be in this client acquisition vs their own service business.

Tweetable Takeaways from this Episode:

“There is a reason that people are in the top 1% vs people who are not, and that really comes down to whether we are being truthful with our goals.” -Doug C. Brown Share on X

Transcript
(Note, this was transcribed using a transcription software and may not reflect the exact words used in the podcast)

Tom Poland 00:10
Welcome, everyone, to another edition of Marketing the Invisible. I’m Tom Poland beaming out to you from the Sunshine Coast in Australia, joined today by Doug C. Brown. Doug, good day from Down Under. Sir, where are you hanging out? Where are you based?

Doug C. Brown 00:21
We are in New Hampshire in the United States and good day to you too!

Tom Poland 00:25
Folks, if you don’t know Doug, he’s the CEO of CEO Sales Strategies. He’s also an international best-selling author of the book, Win-Win Selling, which is music to my ears, and the subtitle of Win-Win Selling is “Unlocking Your Power for Profitability by Resolving Objections”. He is a nationally recognized sales revenue growth expert and consultant. We all know how critically important sales are to a business. The old saying is, “Nothing happens in a business until something is sold”. Now, you, listening to this, whether you realize it or not, you’re influencing your selling. Hopefully, you’re doing it authentically, and ethically. The title of this interview is going to be hopefully very, very important to you. It’s, “How to Be in The Top 1% of Earners”. So please listen up, because there are going to be some gems and gold nuggets in the next seven minutes, which Doug is starting now. Question number one sir, who is your ideal client?

Doug C. Brown 01:21
So my ideal client is somebody who’s selling, normally a business coach, business consultant, salesperson, solo business owner, or people who even have sales teams. And they’re looking for themselves or someone on their team or all of their team members to be in the top 1% earners in their whole industry through selling. Really, people who value quality. They like quality time. They want access to higher income, you know, the better payoff for them. They want to pay off their house and money for the kids in college or spend their business or whatever it might be.

Tom Poland 01:52
Yeah, great. So we’re looking at people who are very goal-orientated and growth-orientated. Tell us about the problem you solve for them. How would you define that? That’s question two.

Doug C. Brown 02:01
I think the challenge for these people is they have the desire but don’t have the skills and knowledge how to navigate their sales processes and sales in general. So they can’t be in the top 1%. They want to get there, they want more money. And at the same time, they don’t want to spend 24 hours a day trying to achieve what they want. And so they really don’t have what I would call “sales leverage” in their business. They’re acting transactionally or, versus, creating leverage through the process.

Tom Poland 02:27
Yeah, so it’s all of it random by the sound of it, and fly by the seat of your pants and make it up as you go and just see what happens. What would you say, question three is what’s going on in their sales conversations, perhaps, or on their business type, generally, that would give them a tip as to the fact that they need to find out more about what you do? In other words, what sort of typical symptoms they are experiencing?

Doug C. Brown 02:48
Well, the typical symptoms, frankly, all boil down to they’re not getting the right results for themselves. And they’re working way too many hours. They’re frustrated. They’re dealing with a lot of clientele that really isn’t what we would call “sales-qualified clientele”, more lead-gen qualified. They know that they want to do better, but they really don’t know how to or they know how to but they have no system or accountability around on how to. And so they’re stuck with some impedance in some capacity.

Tom Poland 03:18
And you mentioned the difference between sales-qualified and lead gen-qualified. Is that- did I get that right?

Doug C. Brown 03:23
Yes, sir.

Tom Poland 03:23
What’s their difference?

Doug C. Brown 03:24
Well, I mean, if you think about this, there are three forms of leads, right? There are leads. You know, i.e. someone comes in, and I don’t know, they got a pulse, really. You know, they’ve expressed some interest in some capacity. People think, “Oh, wow, that’s a lead!” That is– it’s a lead. But then a marketing-qualified lead would be they have some type of expressed interest, but there’s some type of established need in the process that they’ve kind of identified. But a sales-qualified lead, and there are two types really, but the sales-qualified lead ranges from, “Okay, we have their information. We know they have a need. Now we’re going to find out upfront, do they have a budget? Do they have a must-have versus a need?” Right? “We’re going to find out who are the influencers.”All of the discovery processes that people are trying to do in the discovery process today can be done upfront. Therefore, we now have a qualified sales lead, i.e. we should be talking to them about actually making a sale vs a discovery session to find out if they actually have the need.

Tom Poland 04:23
Perfect! I love the distinctions you’ve made between those different levels. Thank you for that. And that alone can help you, folks, because once you understand that, you know if you’re dealing with potentially just a tire kicker or someone who must have a solution that’s prepared to act. Let’s move to question four, with just under three minutes left. What would you say is one of the biggest mistakes that people make in trying to solve their problem with a lack of conversion?

Doug C. Brown 04:44
Oh, that’s a loaded question! I think basically, well, they’re trying to think that they can accomplish everything in a two-day book or seminar, right? So when they’re trying to learn these types of skills, they’re trying to do them in a vacuum. They’re really kind of chasing different marketing methods, or they’re not really thinking strategically about their business models, and they’re coming at it from their own frame. So they’re trying to do things on their own. And they’re not asking for help or objective feedback from the process, or they’re not seeking it out. So we will all, as human beings, create in our own heads what we think is the right answer. And so, you know, there’s the person we think we are, is the person other people think we are, and then there’s the person we really are. So if we look at a business in that context, you know, that’s where they’re making the mistake. They’re not thinking long term, they’re thinking short term. And they don’t know how to prioritize activities in the right way. So they’re spending a tremendous amount of time burning themselves out in trying to gather sales that sometimes when not even worth chasing, right? I mean, in Win-Win selling, you want to disengage if the client isn’t the right sale.

Tom Poland 05:50
Absolutely! Let’s carry that theme on. Question five is a top tip. What can people do to move a step in the right direction that’s going to pick up some of the themes you’re talking about right now? Just under two minutes left but give the folks a top tip if you would.

Doug C. Brown 06:05
Well, I think the first thing is to start with an assessment of self-honesty, assessment, right? So what do you really want? You know, a lot of people are chasing sales, and they’re not sure why they’re even doing it. So they’re playing win-lose in a lot of capacities because even if they win, they lose. Right? They give up things in their life that they don’t need to. So the question is, are you truly committed to the work and the amount of work you really want to give? Right? So if you take an honesty assessment on that process, you know, is the difference between nice to have and what’s necessary? And it’s about that vs commitment to actually growing into a 1% earner. Because there is a reason that people are in the top 1%, Tom, vs people who are not. And that really comes down to, whether are we being truthful with our goals. And then do we have the plan to get there? And are we working alone? Or are we having other people to help us? It’s a game you got to have other people to help.

Tom Poland 06:56
And it’s a conversation you got to have as well. So question six is a valuable free resource. I’m going to give folks the URL for that just to save time. Folks, go to ceosalesstrategies.com. And look for the “Sales and Marketing Audit and Checklist” because that’s going to get you started. And that will be a big part of the self-assessment. Doug, thanks for offering that! Ceosalesstrategy.com, Sales and Marketing Audit, and Checklist. Last question, sir. We got a whopping 15 seconds for it. What’s the one question I should have asked you, but didn’t?

Doug C. Brown 07:27
You know, what keeps people stuck from making the money they pursue, right? And I’ll give you the answer.

Tom Poland 07:32
Yeah.

Doug C. Brown 07:32
They think they’re in their business and what they’re in, they need to be in this client acquisition vs their own service business.

Tom Poland 07:38
Perfect! Yeah. So that’s the focus. Doug C. Brown, thank you so much for your time and your insights.

Doug C. Brown 07:44
Tom, thank you so much for having me. I really appreciate it!

Tom Poland 07:48
Thanks for checking out our Marketing The Invisible podcast. If you like what we’re doing here please head over to iTunes to subscribe, rate us, and leave us a review. It’s very much appreciated. And if you want to generate five fresh leads in just five hours then check out www.fivehourchallenge.com.