Joe Troyer 1:03
Hey everybody it's Joe Troyer, and welcome to another episode of Show Me the Nuggets. Today's gonna be a little different. Today is going to be interesting. I'm actually really excited. For today's episode. Today. We have Susan McVea on the podcast and I got introduced to Susan through a mutual friend really, really smart, mutual friend. So I'm excited to grill Susan today. And Susan's backgrounds, all in sales, and helping sales people. And today we're going to really be diving into selling specifically to females. And I'm sure you've never heard a podcast quite like that. Right. So Susan, without further ado, welcome to the show. I'm excited to have you.
Susan McVea 1:50
Thank you so much for having me, Joe, I am thrilled to be here.
Joe Troyer 1:53
So real quick, before we dive in, before we go super deep. Susan, tell us a little bit about yourself and how you ended up the sales consultant that you are today.
Susan McVea 2:02
How much time do you have Joe? No, I'm just kidding.Um, my parents were entrepreneurs while I was growing up, I didn't want that life. And so I actually went into corporate, I didn't realize that I stumbled into a sales role. I'm a huge introvert, I always had this negative feeling of selling like selling even now like the word sale, sometimes still, I get where my people come from, because it doesn't make us feel comfortable, right? Nobody wants to be sold to. And so I found myself over 20 years ago, years ago, straight out of college having to pay rent, and I needed a job stumbled into corporate, it ended up being a sales job, which I had no choice because I needed the money.
Anybody ever been like that here right. And what I found was, as I went through, learning some of the rules was at the heart of what sales is, it's about customer service, right? And that's what I had been learning with my parents my entire life. And so once it clicked for me, actually realized I was really good at it. I started training other people I quickly got promoted, and what I thought was going to be a temporary job in order to make rent and kind of pass the summer, I ended up having almost a 20 year career, kind of going up the ropes. Yeah. And so, you know, between personally selling $40 million, and then being able to help other team members sell well over 600 million in a corporate finance background environment. So non traditional sales, I realized that I had a knack for this. But unfortunately, my personal life had other plans, like God had other plans for me, and I ended up having a major car accident, it was the third between the ages of 18 and 33. At this point, I had already two young kids, and was happily mate like everything like picture picture, perfect on the outside.
And yet, after this car accident, it left me wrecked, it left me with chronic pain, that morphed into fibromyalgia. And I was going through the movements of what I needed to do in order to just live, but it wasn't enough. And in May of 2015, I ended up having a complete and utter breakdown like mental, emotional, spiritual, physical, my body just went, we're done. We're out. We're tapped out, like who's next? But there's nobody behind me. And so I ended up what I thought was going to be a temporary reprieve. And it turned into the end of my career. And I walked away from a very lucrative career that I thought I was going to retire from, to be to be honest Joe like, I never imagined that you and I would be having this conversation.
If you had told me this, you know, just even five years ago, I would have laughed at you and said there's no way I had tried that. other businesses, from the age of seven was my first business. And none of them had really worked. I always made money, but they never really quite clicked. And so I never thought that that life would work for me. And in my mind, being an entrepreneur looked like my parents, you know, traditional brick and mortar, kind of 24/7 you had to open the store, you had to close the store, your customers were kind of your lifeblood. And it was hard. It was really hard.
And so I thought, I don't want that. But when I ended up having this breakdown, and having to walk away from this, this career and kind of re create myself. I tried to figure out what do I want to do, and in, in trying to figure out who I was what I wanted to do heal myself, because I was exhausted, I was lonely, I was trying to actually just help myself. And through that I wanted to help other people, services, really one of my core values as well. And in doing so, I realized that there were a lot of mostly female business owners and entrepreneurs, who are struggling to sell, who are struggling to build their business, who are struggling to do the things that I already knew how to do, having built, you know, an offline franchise to $15 million, as well.
And I didn't realize how valuable all those skills were, I just thought, you know, if I could just help somebody, and maybe do something on the side while I went back to corporate so that I could pay for my Disney vacations with my kids. That's all I wanted, because I knew going back into the corporate environment, with my health and with my family, and not being able to do the same things that I wanted to do, I wouldn't be producing at the top of my game. And instead, I ended up having this whole new world of building up a consulting and, and coaching. You know, I'm a strategist, so really being able to just help people through my own small business, to help them to grow and build theirs has been beyond my wildest dreams. It is crazy.
Joe Troyer 7:05
That's awesome. That's quite the story. I'm curious to pick your brain on on lots of different points that you said there. Yeah. But real quick before we go to the next step. Susan, what's your website? I know that you also run a podcast. Can you talk about where people can find you real quick before we go any further?
Susan McVea 7:20
Sure. Yeah. So my website is Susan McVea dot com, if you're listening to this, and I spell this out, because my name is a little bit tricky. So it's Susan M, C, V, E, A, dot com. And my podcast is Master the Sales Game because I want selling to feel fun. I want it to feel like a game and for people to know how to win the game. When you know the rules.
Joe Troyer 7:45
Perfect. I love it. I'll have to check that out. as well. We'll make sure to link up the the podcast and your website in the show notes. So let's dive deep then let's get right into it. Susan, when it comes to selling and selling to women, what do you think are kind of the key things that have to be handled differently? We were talking before the show started about how just recently, somebody was trying to sell to you primarily and your husband and your business and they just completely goofed up. Let's talk about some of the big some of the big no no's, if you will.
Susan McVea 8:21
Yeah, for sure. So, I mean, this might feel obvious, at least it does to me, but I'm gonna say it anyways, because I literally just went through this 10 days ago, my husband and I are renovating our new home and went to a big box retailer, I'm not going to name names. I am putting in a complaint though. Just no. And I was in charge. I'm Project Manager for all of this. And I had started the conversation I was having the engagement going right and was starting to put through the questions in order, and the salesperson who was male, Although women do this too, because guess what we're mostly taught through the masculine lens, like most of the best sales, trainers are leaders in the world that are highly visible.
Hello, Grant Cardone, I give you a high five, but, you know, they're men. And so it's really hard even for women to find other female leaders in the sales arena, because there's not very many of us. So immediately, we're engaging a conversation. And then as soon as we had to make some measurements, okay, like, here's the square footage, here's how many feet we need. And he started to do stuff. And I'm trying to I'm very good at math. I'm very good at math, as most salespeople are, and we were doing this thing, and all of a sudden, because he's asking for confirmation and feedback.
Guess whose attention he starts to catch in this conversation. Me and my husband are sitting side by side my husband's actually on his phone. He's not even paying attention to anything. My husband so It would have been fine if he had addressed the two of us together and said, okay, like, here's the calculations and looked at both of us. But instead, he starts talking to my husband. Like almost exclusively.
Joe Troyer 10:14
This happens all the time with my wife and I, I don't handle any of the household stuff. I run multiple businesses, she takes care of it, she owns it, she deals with every contractor. We've done multiple renovations. And I feel like it's really bad with contractors, it's awful. I won't be involved in the conversation, and then they'll call me for payment. And she's like, what, what just happened?
Susan McVea 10:34
Yeah, the truth of matter is that more than 70% of purchases today, are either influenced or made by a woman. For sure, if that's all, that's a lot of money. That's a lot of money that's controlled by women. And yet, we are doing a disservice in the sales transactions and in the interactions because women like interactions more so than men, right? Men are very linear, which is why they don't off even if they're very direct, even if they're very masculine, and results oriented. They want to ask questions, they want to be involved in the purchase they want to be, they want you to act like they are an equal or appear.
And they really do appreciate education. So the more that you can educate, the more that you can see their questions as their ability to make better purchasing decisions, the better you are going to be for them. And for men. I mean, that's just gravy. That's just extra, right. So what I like to say is that once you learn how to sell better to women, you actually sell better to everyone. Yeah, for sure. in this situation. I mean, so here's a lot of women don't yell. As they get angry. I don't know, Joe, this is same for your your wife, when when women get upset, they tend to go very slow. Yep, very direct, like enunciated words.
And very, very low. Yep. It sounds very stern, right? It sounds It almost sounds scary. But a lot of times men mistake that for slowness, or in decisiveness, or just wanting to delay. And it's not easy, you've probably pissed them off, you probably aggravated them, you've probably indirectly done something that has made them feel uncomfortable or put their back up against the wall. Women like to be involved in the decision, meaning that if there are multiple people, so if you are in a room, virtual or otherwise, where there are multiple people, including women and men, and if the woman is the key decision maker in this transaction, or in the purchasing component, and they go around and try and gauge interest in the room, it is not because she is not as powerful as anybody else.
Do not mistake that for her not being in full authority of being able to say yes, this is how we like to buy. They like to create consensus, they like to, you know, bring people together. It's part of just who we are in our human nature. I mean, that's why when women raise children, they look for advice, they look for your help. And that's why women also buy based on referrals.
Joe Troyer 13:20
A hundered percent Yeah, that makes sense. I'm curious, real quick question, before we go any further, what if you're a salesperson, and you have a husband and wife sitting in front of you? Would it be rude in sales, we do something in, in all of our sales presentations. And every company that I work at, we do a decision maker double check is what we call it. And that's part of like the outline. And the checklist is did you do these things? In order to have a successful sales call, you have to do it. And we always ask who needs to be involved for the sales process. And I was do that in everything that I'm doing, is there anybody else that needs to be here, but also, if I'm talking to multiple people,
I know who's buy- in I really need and who I need to sell, and who can just kind of be the second party in the room. I feel like that that's done in a lot of like software sales companies or more consulting sales companies. That's kind of a typical move. But I don't see that happening outside of our little industry, so to speak, like, I don't ever, I've never had a contractor say. So Susan, you know, who's going to be making the buying decision today? Right? Instead, Susan would start the conversation and then halfway through, they start diverting questions to your husband or to the male in the room. So would you be offended by that question? Or would you welcome that question, because then you know that you're in control?
Susan McVea 14:39
No, I think I always recommend this question, because I think it's important to understand who is influencing their decision making abilities, right, who else and so sometimes it's as simple as who else is involved in helping you make this decision? Right. Ultimately, you may be the key decision maker, but especially if there are other parties if it's a larger purchase, I think it's important to understand who influences that person who else you rely on to be able to help give you some guidance around this, this particular topic or this area is there somebody whose expertise that you are leaning on in order to be able to bounce off ideas, it doesn't necessarily have to be something that makes people uncomfortable, I think there's ways to be able to identify who else is going to get in the way, or On the flip side, be able to help support this person in making the best decision for them, whether it's a man or a woman, but more in particular for women too right?.
Joe Troyer 15:36
I love that. And it's not just so so to speak, like you said, it's not just necessarily the man, right? It's who else is going to be involved? Who else's opinion, if it's not the man, and he's just sitting there, right. You know, also you going to an opinion for that could potentially block the sale. And let's get them in on this call as well. Let's get everybody that's on the need to know, in the conversation. So that was, that was really important. I wanted to make sure we we picked that out. That was great advice.
Susan McVea 16:03
Yeah, for sure. Because I think sometimes we you're scared, right? Like, you don't want to make things harder for you. But I'm going to tell you that the person is the best person to sell your services in your business is you. Right. And I know that oftentimes that is uncomfortable to hear, like you may be trying to delegate this and you're thinking, oh my god, but I was sitting on a plane one time next to a gentleman who owned a massive construction company, like they did a multi million dollar deals because they did commercial properties. And half his sales team had walked out the door. Like literally on that plane, he said they're gone. And his top salesperson had gone with half the other team because they were his buddies, right? They were he was about to go out and open up similar shop.
And I said, Okay, so what are you going to do? He said, Well, what do you mean, I guess I'm selling. Right. And so I think it's important to understand that you are the one in charge of your business, and you are the one that's guiding your clients to make the best decision. And so if there's other people that need to be involved, of course, you want them in the room, right? You don't want somebody who's even less experienced in selling your client. And less experienced in knowing the product or service that you actually sell, which is still your client, like they have no idea what it is that you do or how you do it. You're now empowering them to say, okay, go forth and conquer, you know, lady, dude.
And I want you to try and convince your husband or your business partner or your board of direct like somebody else, to now go and say yes to you, so that you can say yes to me. Like that is just ridiculous, right? And so I know when you hear this out loud, you're you're probably nodding. Well. Yeah, I would never do that. But yet, here we are. Because we know we do this.
Joe Troyer 17:58
Yeah, it's exactly why the first slide of every one of my sales presentations asked that very question, right? Because if not, it's so, so often missed. And then you're right, like, we get to the end, and we're expecting a close and we get the dreadful. Yeah, okay, I'm gonna go now present this to my board or to my husband, or my wife, or my president or my owner. And it's like, Ah, right. And then yeah, exactly. And asking them to then go sell the other person. What's the outcome of that? going to be? Not not very good. You also said something, Susan, that I thought was really important. With a gentleman losing his sales team, right? He said that he is going to go sell.
I think that that's crucial. I think it's critical. You're right, that if he expects anybody to sell, he needs to be able to sell if you can't sell it, how do you train people? How do you onboard them? How do you guide them when they're failing? You can't. It's just like, yeah, sorry. You know, you didn't hit your quota this month, Better luck next month, but you can't you can't really advise them or help them or train them.
Susan McVea 18:59
Exactly. Right. And that's the thing. salespeople are fickle. I like to say it's like herding kittens. So if you right now are nodding your head, because you can relate to this, or you have like a constant revolving door for your sales roles. And everything else in your agency or your business is very stable, then it's because you either have created an improper compensation plan that doesn't match the behaviors that you want to drive, or because you don't actually know your sales process well enough that your salesperson can take over. And it's frustrating, right? Like, if you hire somebody that's designed to be closer, but you want them to go out and do a whole bunch of outbound lead prospecting.
Those are two different personality types, right? And so it's really important to understand how you want people to work, how you want them to fulfill your end to end sales process because that's usually the first time that your customer has had some kind of in depth interview. Your action with you and your organization. And if you're not aware of how you want people to talk, and speak about your brand, and your your organization, your company, culture, the products and services that you sell, and you don't know exactly what that looks like, step by step. And it doesn't mean that you're creating an army of robots, like nobody wants that. But you need to be able to guide them through so that it gives your customers consistency.
But also, it really sets the tone for how you're going to work with them once you actually secure the contract and the engagement. And when there's a disconnect, because you have super aggressive salespeople, because let's face it, we all have encountered somebody like that, right? Everything for the sale. And while that's good, because you need to have people who are really hungry for the business, in order to be able to generate the business for you, if that's, you know, the main rule that you have. But at the same time, you don't want them to do it at the expense of your brand, your reputation, your customer service, and more importantly, your ability to actually deliver what has just been sold.
Joe Troyer 21:10
Yeah, I love that. That's so great. Yeah, if you want to shock, start recording your sales conversations if they're not already recorded. And I mean, it is cringe worthy, it is awful to listen to what's being said, even by you would say like successful salesperson and their standards, you're like, what, what did you just say we don't do that we don't offer that service. fulfillment doesn't do that. It's crazy. One of the best things that we found, I'm curious if you've done anything like this, Susan, is, when we onboard a customer, the onboarding team does a selling with quality checklist. And they basically asked a series of questions to ensure that expectations were set correctly.
And that we said what we said what we would do in a correct manner, right so that we don't have mismatched expectations from sales pass off to the onboarding and client fulfillment pass off. That has been really instrumental in long term retention for us. Because if not, a sales guy said something or promise something or set an expectation that the team doesn't know about. And if we don't know about it, then obviously we can't hit that obviously, either.
Susan McVea 22:23
Exactly. Yep. I love that. So yes, I have had clients that have implemented either a checklist style, right? So within their standard operating procedure, where as part of their onboarding for their clients, their customer success rep will go through and just verify, okay, what what did we build into this proposal or this project? What does this actually mean to you? And what did we promise that may or may not fit the parameters of the actual deliverables that we are then going to be able to service, so to have complete clarity, so whether that's through a checklist, or an email or some kind of discussion, I find that for more complex sales transactions, and again, depending on the nature of your business, and the size and the scope of the deals, that is often helpful to have a quick kickoff call, where the sales rep and the account manager, whoever is going to handle that accounts, whether it's a project manager, account manager has a conversation with the company rep, and says, what exactly are we working on? Like, what? What did we sell you? So what did Joe sell you in the conversation? It's all there in one neat and tidy place. And then from there, it formulates out the actual project scope, and the document that's going to become the actual living component of the the service agreement.
Joe Troyer 23:48
That's beautiful. Wonderful. All right, let's, um, let's change direction a little bit. I'd be remiss if we didn't chat a little bit about your consulting and how you help people build out their businesses and their sales processes. So my my podcast editor, edwardo, did some research and found that you have helped 30 of your clients grow to seven figures. And so you have a cool perspective, because you're not just one of those businesses, you're involved in all of them, you see everything kind of from start to finish, you have a really cool bird's eye view of what's happening in each of these businesses. So
I'm really curious if you had to pull out the 80/20, so to speak, and apply it to itself. What are the main things right that like you see are the success drivers that differentiate these 30 clients from all the other clients that have approached you or they've worked with you or not worked with you? What are the things that they do differently? That really makes them you know, propel and hit that seven figure mark?
Susan McVea 24:53
Yeah, for sure. And there's actually there's not a ton. There's not a lot of differences which I know that sometimes we're looking for Oh, they must have like, all the stuff, right, they have a leg up on me, especially when we see these things happening. And truthfully, I mean, the core foundation for sales is is mindset. Like, if you can't believe in yourself, if you can't believe in your product, if you can't believe your client can do the thing that you just sold them to do, you're not going to, it really doesn't, right. And it's the same thing. Because I mean, sales is the foundation for your business. Because without it, you don't have money coming through the door, you don't have clients that you can help.
And more importantly, I know that the clients that I help want to get results, they don't just don't want to crank out sales, right? I mean, any I can teach anybody how to just sell and sell and sell. But if you can't deliver the goods, you're not going to be able to keep a sustainable business. And so the clients that I work with, they are all highly experts in the skills that they have. Beyond that, they are decisive, they make the so they make decisions quickly. And as a result, they take action quickly.
Now, this is not to say because there is a percentage of the population that does need to think about it right, like, so if you're processed, driven, and you really need to just go back and think through things. That's not what I'm talking about. I'm talking about people that don't sit in it, that they don't allow themselves to dwell and look at Okay, paralysis analysis, I'm going to review 100 different million ways, when really, it doesn't really matter. But just pick one, just pick one and go because you are smart enough and resilient enough that if it's not quite right, we can adjust, right, we can just but let's you're on the wrong road here. Maybe we need to take the country road for a little bit.
And then we're going to go back on the highway and do a slight detour. And the quicker we can make decisions together on the fly, the better. And so as a result, they see everything as a learning or a growth opportunity. And that's because they have a mindset that's geared geared towards abundance and growth, right? So they don't look at other people's successes as oh my gosh, like why them? Why not me, and that means I can't do it, they cheer other people on and go, that's amazing that that person can do it, because it means that I can do it too. And maybe I can even do it faster, I can do it better. Maybe I can find a simpler way. And so for me, those are like the four main things that when I think back to the greatest success factors that have really influenced the clients that were able to go far and quickly. And those would be it. Yeah, the key difference makers.
Joe Troyer 27:35
So to repeat that high level, you said,you said decisiveness I know was the second one. First, you said that they believe in what they sell, right? So they believe in what they sell, they can get the results, they know it, they can feel it, they feel good about the sales. Second is decisiveness. What were three and four.
Susan McVea 27:53
So decisiveness was also linked to taking action quickly. And then three was being able to see everything as learning or growth. And then it's being able to have that mindset of growth and abundance.
Joe Troyer 28:06
Okay. When you talk about getting results quickly, are you thinking like Fast Start, right type of people? Right, specifically in there? Or what's your thought? There's
Susan McVea 28:15
kind of I you know, it's funny, Joe, cuz I wrote down quickstart- question mark. I was like, are they all quickstart? So if you do Kolbe, you know, the Kolbe quickstart. So, yes, and no, I think this is where you don't necessarily have to have a natural propensity to be a quick stato or a quick starter. I think that the main thing here is that you don't get to the point where you overthink things to your own detriment, right? Because I'm going to tell you, there, there's rabbit holes everywhere, right? Like you pull threads, apart from anything, eventually you're going to have nothing because but you have wasted all this time. And so it's for folks that realize that you know what, I know that if I do this, I will get a result. And that result will help teach me more than anything. And with my guidance, like with Susan helping me because they are coachable, and they're looking for the help.
So being able to say, okay, I've taken this action, it may or may not give me the exact outcome that I'm looking for, but why or why not? Right? And how do I use that information in order to propel me to the next step. And so it's really about taking 1% improvements, to be honest, rather than looking for the thousand percent growth trajectory, because it's exponential. And if you did 1% compounded over and over and over again, basically every single day, you would eventually hit a huge number.
But too often what ends up happening is that we're looking for this massive number, and we get overwhelmed, or you just you just kind of shut off and then it causes the overthink it causes the overwhelm it causes like the shiny object syndrome and listening to everybody else instead of really thinking about what does what makes the most sense for you. What do you want to do? what feels right? What do you believe to be true for you? What do you believe to be true for your clients that you're here to serve? And being able to kind of cut away the noise and being able to focus, I think actually allows people to move faster. whether or not they're actually a quick start.
Joe Troyer 30:18
Yeah, completely, completely agree with everything you just said, Wow, powerful stuff. Really good. All right. So we're gonna start wrapping it up. Can you tell us real quick about your three step six figure blueprint and kind of give some of your tips and takeaways and some some things that maybe the audience can start implementing right away?
Susan McVea 30:37
Sure. Yeah. So I like to make things very simple. And I like systems and processes. My brain is very orderly. For any personality junkies out there, I am an INTJ, on the Myers Briggs, which as a woman is also rare.
So for me, it comes down to your you know, your marketing or your messaging, it comes down to making sure you know how to sell to people, and then being able to look at leveraging your time and your effort. So things that would allow you to kind of sell one too many things that would allow you to stop being the bottleneck in your business. And so in that leveraging component, cuz sometimes people get a little bit confused by what I mean by that, it's really looking at your automations, it's looking at your team, it's looking at paid advertising. So what I always recommend is that if you don't have anything proven in your business yet, meaning that you don't know if your offer your message, and who you want to serve, if it hasn't been validated, your number one job is to validate.
And I believe that there is you can't do enough validation, right? Because even now, you may have faced some changes in your business structure with everything at the time of this recording. We're in the midst of a pandemic, right? And even if you have a successful business, have you been able to pivot or shift and again, not a complete 180 or, or a huge directional change? So it might be 1%, it might be just adding in a different payment plan, right?
And so when I'm thinking about those three things, I build it this way, like messaging, and then sales, and then your your leverage products. Because too often what I see is people want, I don't want to work with people. If they start with all the one too many things, I want to do paid advertising, I don't I want to do all of these joint ventures, and it's like, do you have a proven model?
Do you know that it converts? Do you know that it converts really well for your people? Can you deliver the results. And so when you are clear, and you're able to articulate exactly what you do and who you do it for, and you know, you can get results. Even if it's just a couple of testimonials, that's really all you need. Right. And if you because I'm in an industry, even now where a lot of people come to me because they they think they should be doing better in their business than they are. And it creates a lot of guilt, it creates a lot of guilt and shame, because they're often working really, really hard.
And they're not seeing the same amount of results. And so I'm sharing this right now, because I feel like somebody right now may be listening and going, Well, I'm just new, or I work in a sensitive area, like my business is unique Susan, and I don't seem to be able to get the testimonials of case studies like people just won't share my business. And so what what do I do around these three areas, I want you right now that even if you can get information that would help you where you can share this as a case study, don't use names, don't use their business particulars that would help identify, but you can share their story to such a degree that somebody else can go, Wow, that's powerful. That's me, that's all you need.
And when you do that, you allow their story to share your message in a way that really deepens connections. So for me, I want you right now is to go and find someone to serve. If you only did that if you entrusted your, your team yourself, your clients to find someone to serve every single day, it creates such a ripple effect. And because for me selling is serving, and when you are able to do more good in the world through the services that you provide. And by being able to provide that at the highest level by charging people appropriately by being unapologetic and relentless in getting your thing out there, which you have to do when you sell, then you're able to do so much more for not only yourself but your communities and the world at large.
Joe Troyer 34:34
I love those three steps. They're so fundamental. I would even say three steps to seven figures, right? Like those steps are so huge. And I even look at seven figure businesses that are lost and they're struggling. And usually they don't have one of those steps down, right. And they've just made it by sheer willpower. You know the owner or a sales guy or somebody just like pushing or you know, pulling that business along to get it to that level. And I see those three steps are just absolutely huge. And you're right. They're not just for getting started, those three steps are super important that you're always looking at the business.
Like you said, during the pandemic, the market shifts, the market changes the needs, and wants of that market are going to change too, and you got to adapt or so those are skills that you should always be looking at, and strategies you should always be implementing. So yeah, we help a lot of people get kind of those first three steps down, who is your niche? who really are they though, right?
You're going after dental. Okay, great. There's a lot of dentist who is actually your market, right? And we like to put in a filter so that we get really particular about who that person is. And then like, there's the research, and then there's what do they need? And what do they want? What's the offer? But then we got to make sure, obviously, that they get results as well. But you should be able to do that, that market research all the time. I agree with you wholeheartedly.
Susan McVea 35:54
Yeah, for sure. And I think, I think sometimes people are looking forward. Like they're, they're trying to create imaginary things, imaginary results. AndI don't know if you if you see this show with your, your practice and your clients, but look in the rearview mirror, look in the rearview mirror, because whether it's for yourself, and and don't discount the work that you yourself have been able to achieve and accomplish, because it's very easy for us now, what I like to call experts curse that gets so easy for you that you don't even realize that this is really hard for someone else. And so look at yourself, look at people who have come to you for help, even if that's for free, even if that's for a lower cost and what you want to charge and look at is that a result that your customer base wants?
And is that a result that you want to help them with. And once you have that look to figure out what is the highest level of value that you can provide that makes this a no brainer, regardless of the price point where you would go, hell yeah, you should be buying my thing, even if it's a 10,000 50,000, or even $100,000 engagement. If you know what the results are, and you feel confident in your ability to provide those results for the right person, then it makes it a lot easier for you to consistently sell, and never have to worry about actually selling it. And you'll see your conversion rates go well above industry standards, right? Like I don't like my clients 20% and want you 50,80 90% or more.
Joe Troyer 37:32
I love that I'm a little off topic. But I saw YouTube ad literally last night, laying in bed about to go to sleep, watching a video and I see a YouTube ad and the start of the ad is Do you have an extra $30,000 to invest? And I'm like, holy shit. Like you just said that in a YouTube ad. You're asking somebody if they have $30,000 to invest in something. And I'm like, wow, like they know their market so well. Right? And if they get somebody on a strategy session that has $30,000 to invest, and they're not happy with the returns that they're getting, like, that's gonna be an easy, yes. Right?
And I was just like, I was kind of floored I kind of just sat there for a second was like, did they really just say that? Um, and the more I thought about it, I'm like, that's so smart. And so you're right. You need to you need a hell yes. Right. You need a Yes, I have 30,000. And yes, I'm not happy. And I'm not, you know, I'm not happy with the returns I'm getting and the market right now is scaring me. Yes. I'm interested in other investments. So I think that that's, that's so true. You need to Hell yes.
Susan McVea 38:36
I love that example. And for me, it's how confident are they right in being able to say, like, you give me your 30 grand, and I know that I can do a better job then yeah, Bill down the street or Sally up the up in the corner office that is twiddling their thumbs and you have no idea what's happening with your return and you're going like, times a tickin.Yeah, it's awesome. I love it.
Joe Troyer 39:03
Awesome. So we're gonna wrap it up with one last question, Susan, this has been awesome. I so appreciate you coming on the show. It's been great. I know the audience is gonna love it. I'm an avid book reader, and so are my fans and people that follow me. But I find that a lot of people are like me with books. They they open them the read the first chapter and it's either like a it's a hell yes. Or it's a hell no, right? It's, yes, I'm reading the whole thing. And I'm not going to put it down for the next two days. And then I'm going to be finished or, yeah, I'm over it, and it never gets read. And it took me a really long time to learn that it's okay to say Hell no. And to read half the first chapter and go
Yeah, I can't read this. But I love when I have awesome talks with people like you on the podcast, to ask them the question like what's the one book that's made? The biggest difference? difference in the way that you do business? The way that you run your life? What would the number one book recommendation be for me and to the listeners on the show?
Susan McVea 39:59
This was, this is such a hard question for me because I love to read, like, I'm an avid book reader. And so I really had to dig deep to try and figure out if I could only pick one, what would it be? And so I went all the way back. And you're probably going to be surprised that it's not a sales book. It's not even really a business book. It's a, it's a person, I guess, personal development time management book. And it's from Stephen Covey. Seven Habits of Highly Effective People are, but here's the thing. I read this first when I think I was like, 20, because I didn't want to have to spend a lot of time doing things, I was frustrating myself. And so for me, this is like the foundation of how you build your life. Right, like how you build your life and how you make decisions around the things that are important and not important. And be able to delegate and outsource everything more effectively and with more ease and with more grace, because you know that it comes from a place of is this effective for me, is it efficient.
And because of that you never have to worry about saying no, like, I love what you just shared about being able to read I do the same thing. Now. As somebody who loves to read that's it's been really hard. It's been a journey, right? And so knowing exactly what you do, being able to understand even Eisenhower's matrix, gosh, that's a tongue twister is super important, right. And as a business owner, especially as you begin to really grow and scale, you understand, you can't do it all. And these are the basic foundation pieces that again, just like with my three step system, if you get this, it is like your true north and it allows you to make all of the decisions was so much more ease, because you have a very strong foundation piece. And I think sometimes we skip steps, and then we have to go backwards. And I'm just really grateful that this book has allowed me to not only build my business, have my family, but also ultimately honor my health and the other priorities that are important to me. me too.
Joe Troyer 42:08
Sold, I gotta go reread that book, it has been I don't even know if I have it anymore. years ago, I cleared out my library. One point, but uh, I'm gonna have to go buy it. Amazon is making a fortune for me in books lately, especially during COVID. But I super appreciate the book recommendation, I love your takeaways from it. I think you're right. It's such a foundational book for the future for no matter what the future will bring. So super excited to read that. And Susan, thanks so much for being on the show. Super appreciative, you are frickin awesome. Thank
Susan McVea 42:42
you so much, Joe well, and for your, for your audience for the two gifts that I have that we talked about today. Just wanted to make sure that you have access to that. So if you want the assessment on how to sell to women, I want you to go to selling to her.com and you can grab that to just do a little bit of a check and see where your business is at no judgment here. We're all here to learn and improve. And if you want my three step system, you can grab that at SusanMcVea.com/nuggets.
Joe Troyer 43:12
Perfect there you guys have it you guys got the goods. Thank you so much, Susan for over delivering super appreciative have a fantastic, fantastic day. I hope you guys enjoyed the podcast, Joe Troyer.
