How to Sell When You Need Money Quickly

How to Sell When You Need Money Quickly

Hi, everybody. Welcome to the 60 Second Sale Show. I’m Dave Lorenzo. Today’s show is about the question that’s on everybody’s mind. That’s right. I’m talking to you. Today’s show is all about what to do when you need money quickly. At least, and this is absolutely no exaggeration, at least once a week, I get a phone call from someone who says, “I don’t know what I’m going to do. I’m not sure how I’m going to make payroll. I need to get some money in the door. I need to get some revenue quickly.” This happens in good times. It happens in bad times. It happens when the economy’s booming. It happens when the economy’s in the crapper. It happens in every industry. You can’t imagine.

Think of the hottest industry in the world right now. Think of the hottest industry on the planet. There is somebody out there right now going, “I don’t know what I’m going to do. How am I going to get some money in the door?” Today, we’re going to talk about what you can do when you need money quickly. I don’t care if you’re a business owner and you’re facing payroll pressure. Very common. If you’re a sales professional and there’s somebody breathing down your neck to meet quota, “Got to get some money in the door quickly,” if you’re an independent professional, you’re a lawyer, you’re a CPA, you’re an architect, you’re a real estate agent and you got a wife who says, “Hey. The kids are going back to school. We got a tuition bill. We got to pay it in the next 2 weeks. What are you going to do?” I’ve got the answer for you today. I want you to know that this situation is so common that …

Let me give you, let me get into a story which really illustrates how bad something like this can be. Back in 2010, I got a phone call from an attorney in Upstate New York and the call went something like this. He said very calmly, “You know, Dave, I’ve been practicing for almost 30 years. My father practices with me. He’s going to retire in 4 or 5 years, and for the last 30 plus years, we’ve had 1 big client and that big client is an automobile company and I’m a little concerned because I don’t think we’re going to get any work from that automobile company anymore.” My first reaction is to obviously help the guy feel a little bit better.

I said, “Well, I’m sure that’s not the case. I’m sure you’re doing great work. Tell me a little bit about the situation and either we’ll find a silver lining for you or we’ll look at it from a different perspective and see how we can turn this relationship into something that will be productive for the long term.” He said, “Well, that would be great, but I’m not really sure we can.” He said, “My client is General Motors, and on June 1st of last year,” that would be June 1st, 2009, “they filed for bankruptcy protection. My job was to help defend them in a series of lawsuits that were filed against them and I’ve been defending them in this particular type of lawsuit forever. My father was defending them in this particular type of lawsuit forever before that. There are some nuances to the suit that make us uniquely suited,” no pun intended, “to be the attorneys that would handle this.”

 

I’m being a little vague in this area because I don’t want to betray a confidence from this gentleman. He said, “But those lawsuits are no longer relevant because with the filing of the bankruptcy protection, General Motors, they’re not going to be on the hook for big settlements because they don’t have any money to pay. So the suits that were brought, most of them have been dismissed. The ones that were not dismissed are going to be either settled or they’re just going to go away on their own, so I don’t really know what we’re going to do.” I took a moment and I said, “I understand.” Keep in mind, folks, this is 2010. I said, “Let’s think about this. You know, what other clients do you have? What other type of work do you do?” He said, “No other clients. No other work.”

I said, “You mean to tell me that you’ve only had 1 client?” He stopped me and he said, “I’ve 1 client for my entire 30 year career. That’s correct.” He said, “They’ve given us … At any one time, we’ve had over a dozen complex commercial litigation lawsuits. We’ve billed them hundreds of thousands, and some years, millions of dollars.” He said, “It’s myself, my father, a paralegal and a legal assistant.” He said, “I’m not sure what I’m going to do moving forward. These cases will dry up within the next 6 months.” The situation was pretty tough for this gentleman, but there was a silver lining that he had at least 6 months before he had to figure out what to do. Think about what he was facing. Think about this just for a minute. You’ve been doing something, the same thing, where you’ve had the same client, 1 client for 30 years, and all of a sudden, in what seems like the blink of an eye, it’s over.

The one way that you, and I’m laughing because if I wasn’t laughing at it, I’d be crying because it’s an emotional thing, the one way you feed your family, the way you make payroll, in a heartbeat it’s done. What do you do? I said, “The good news. The good news is we have 6 months to get some new business in the door and that’s actually great news because you have more time than a lot of people,” again, this is back in 2010, “you have a lot of time, more time than a lot of people who don’t know how they’re going to make payroll this week, who don’t know what they’re going to do to pay their kid’s tuition bill, who don’t know what they’re going to do to put food on the table next week. At least we’ve got 6 months, but that doesn’t make it any less important. We need to focus on something right now to get going.”

Let’s take the advice I gave him and you can put this into play right now to get more business in the door and it could be as quick as even this afternoon. Here’s what you do. The first thing I want you to do is I want you to get out a piece of paper and write down what you think makes you different from everyone else who does what you do. What makes you unique? What’s your competitive advantage? Then, I want you to begin calling. Start with your best clients and that’s the question I want you to ask them. “Mr. Client, what makes me different? Why have you chosen me? What is it about me and my company that you really like? Why do you enjoy working with us? Why do you continue to work with us?”

Write down all the answers. Write down all the answers you get, and then when you’ve done it with 15 people, with 15 different clients, I want you to start looking for a common thread. That will help you get an understanding for what really makes you different, for who you are in your business and why people choose to work with you. We are so close to our own businesses that we don’t realize what makes us special, what makes us different. We need to hear that from our clients. There’s a reason that I want you to do this. Find out what makes you different. Find out why people use you, and what makes you better than everybody else. After you do that, if you do that half a dozen times, you can explain to people why you’re doing it.

Say, “I’m launching a new initiative. I’m taking a new marketing approach. I’m really being aggressive with my sales process and I want to highlight what’s best about me. I want to highlight what’s best about my company and I want to really focus in on that while I’m talking to people about this new approach.” What will happen is, as you’re calling these 15 people, asking this question, they’re going to say, “Oh, that’s great. What’s your new approach?” You’re going to tell them, and you’re going to call everybody you know and you’re going to say, “I feel like I’m uniquely suited to provide value in a specific area” and then you’re going to tell them about the value you can provide for your clients in whatever you’re really great at.

You’ll get their feedback and I want you to go out and I want you to do this with everyone you know, everyone in your contacts database, all of your former clients, you’re going to call them up and you’re going to use our 60 second sales process. At the end of the 60 second sales process, you’re going to add your unique value proposition. You’re going to add the thing that makes you different. Let me role play it with you. You’re going through your contact database and you’re calling people you haven’t spoken with, let’s say in months or years. You’re going to call up and you’re going to go, “Hi. Joe, how are you doing? This is Dave.” Of course, you’re going to put your name in there. I’m using my name, Dave, because that’s my name. “Hi Joe, it’s Dave, Dave Lorenzo. How are you doing?” “Great.”

“I’m just calling to check in and see what’s going on in your business. It’s been a while since we’ve spoken. How are your kids? How’s Betty and how are the little ones?” “Oh, they’re 14 and 16. They’re not so little anymore.” “I guess you’re going to start to plan for college soon. What are you looking at?” “That’s terrific. So tell me about your business? How are things going?” “Oh, great.” “What are your plans for this year? What are you hoping to accomplish?” That’s the second question. “What are you hoping to accomplish this year? What are your goals?” “Ah, I see. Now, why is that important to you? You know, Joe, why is that important to you personally?” That’s the third question in the 60 second sales process. “Why are those goals, those business goals important to you personally?”

Then the fourth question. “Wow, that’s really interesting. Would you like some help achieving those goals?” Then that person will say, “Sure, I’d love some help. What does that look like? What do you mean?” Then you’ll either move into offering to introduce them to someone who can help them or offering help yourself. If it’s the first one and you offer to introduce them, “I happen to know Bob Smith. He does exactly what you’re looking for. Would you like me to make an introduction? I think he could really help you.” “Great, fantastic.” “Let me tell you a little bit about what I’m working on. I’ve just re-focused my sales efforts. I’ve got a new value proposition. Here’s what I’m doing. If you know anyone who’s interested in that, I’d appreciate you forwarding their information to me, you making an introduction, you connecting me, you referring them to me. That would really be helpful to me. Thank you so much.”

That’s the entire call right there. Each call may take 10 minutes. It may take 20 minutes, depending on the amount of time you’re going to spend on the line with them. Here’s the critical thing. You’re offering to help the other person first. That is the essence of the 60 Second Sale. It’s you going out to help other people achieve their goals. Now, I want you to do this process with everyone you know. That means you’re going to spend a lot of time on the phone. The first thing you’re going to do is you’re going to call your 5, your 10, your 15 best clients. You’re going to ask them what it is that you do differently, why they chose you, so you have a unique value proposition to offer at the end.

Then you’re going to get into these calls with everybody else you know, everyone in your contacts database. Even if you’re the least connected person in the world, you’re living in a cave somewhere and somehow you’ve managed to survive all these years, you must know at least 150, 200 people. I want you to get on the phone with everyone and I want you to have this conversation with everyone. I want you to offer to help first, using the script I just outlined. “How are you? What’s going on? Tell me a little bit about what’s happening in your business? What are your goals for this year? Why are those goals important to you personally, and would you like some help achieving those goals?”

Then you offer an introduction or you offer to help them yourself. Then, after you do that, after you do all that, you tell them what’s going on in your world, tell them about the unique value you can provide in the area that you discussed with your clients and then you ask them nicely and politely to introduce you to anyone they know who you think you could provide value to. Those calls are the most important thing you can do. If you get through the first 2 days of making these calls and you haven’t gotten at least a great lead that you can follow up on, you’re doing something wrong. This process, if you make 100 calls, will result in at least 2 or 3 new clients, 2 or 3 new pieces of business, 2 or 3 ways that you can get revenue in the door quickly. You will be amazed at how this works.

Here’s the thing I need you to caution you about. When we get into the place where we need money, our first reaction is to go, these days, is to go on the Internet, right, and we post stuff on Facebook or we’re on Twitter, ranting about how the deck is stacked against us. You can’t do that. You need to call everyone you know and stay off the Internet. I want a complete Internet blackout from you. I don’t want you on Facebook. That is a complete waste of your time during this process. I don’t want you to ever tell people that you’re desperate for money. I don’t want you to ever feel the need to express the desperation of your situation.

Talk to your wife. Talk to your husband. Talk to your significant other. Talk to your partner. Talk to someone you trust in your family about your feelings. Better yet, find a way to go out and get a shrink. Go get a psychiatrist. Talk to him or her. Do not share your neediness with the world, especially, neediness with the world, especially on social media. Do not, do not waste your time surfing the Internet looking for solutions out there. The solutions you need are right in your database. They’re right in your contacts file right now. Simply get on the phone and use that formula. If you need money now, get on the phone and use that formula with people you know. They will introduce you to the people who are going to be your next 2, 3, 4, 5 clients.

Now, here’s the other thing I need to caution you about. You’re going to get through this process and I had this happen to a client of mine just 2 months ago. They go through this process and within the fourth or fifth phone call, I think, they get a deal. They get business. What do they do? They celebrate. They go nuts, right, and they stop the process. [They’re 00:14:34], “Okay. That’s it. I got business. Here’s what I’m going to do. I’m just going to go and work on this and I’m not going to worry about business anymore.” Then what happens? In a month-and-a-half, guess what? They’re back in the same place they were.

Keep the process moving. Follow the process through all the way. Don’t quit after you get your first deal. Quit when you get through everybody on your list. Then when you get through everybody on your list, think about people they may know, and ask them for other names of people you can call. My friends, this is sales, this is selling. This is what you got to do. If you’re desperate for business, you need business now, get off the Internet and pick up the phone. Okay, now, it’s time for us to move into our mailbag segment. For that, I’d like to bring in our fantastic producer, Nancy [Pop 00:15:19]. Nancy’s got a question for us, I think, about … I don’t know. Nancy, what is our question about today?

Hey, Dave. Our question today is from Mike in Binghamton, New York. He said, “My business conversations always stray into politics. It’s who I am. How do I discuss politics, share my beliefs without offending people and losing business?”

Ah, thank you, Nancy. What a great question. We’re recording this during the time of the year when politics is really, really heated. If you’re listening to this years from now, who knows how this current election is going to play out? We’re recording this in early August 2016. As I was eating breakfast this morning, just flipping around the channels, every station is about scorched earth and how the Republicans and the Democrats are going at it and everything is just so negative. The thing that really strikes me is exactly what Mike was saying. Everybody’s got an opinion, right? Everybody’s got an opinion on this. The discussion about politics is one that we’ve always been warned to stay away from.

They say, “You shouldn’t talk about 3 things. You shouldn’t talk about sex. You shouldn’t talk about religion. You shouldn’t talk about politics.” You know what? If you don’t talk about those 3 things, your conversations are going to be pretty darn boring. I encourage everybody all the time, “Look, if you believe something and you feel really strongly or really passionately about it, get it out there. Just put it out in the open. Be respectful. Throw it out there and have productive discussions.” Now, I get what you’re saying, Mike. Those conversations can be polarizing. People may want to judge you but it’s all in how you phrase it.

When you discuss politics, what I want you to do is I want you to say, “Hey, I’m really interested in hearing points of view on,” and then throw the issue out. “I’m really interested to hearing points of view on the Supreme Court nominees. I’m wondering what you think about the fact that we have a vacancy in the Supreme Court now and it’s going to go almost a year being vacant. A lot of key decisions will not be able to be made. What are your thoughts on that?” and see what the person on the other side has to say. Then, be respectful but share your beliefs and don’t judge other people based upon what they believe. Keep in mind that you can work successfully with people who don’t share your political ideology, as long as you are aligned to achieve the same goals.

In my business, for example, I help people make more money quickly. I help people close deals quickly. I help Democrats. I help Republicans. I help people who couldn’t care less about politics. I help people who have not spent a day in their life thinking about politics or voting in an election. I help people who are absolutely opposed to my point of view on just about every issue. Why? Because I’m aligned. My passion is to help them. Always bring the conversation back to that point of commonality, the goal you share together and make sure you leave on that note. Make sure you leave on a note where, “Hey, listen. No matter what you believe or what I believe, I enjoyed hearing your thoughts, hearing your beliefs and we’re coming together to make sure that we achieve our goal of getting you new clients, that we achieve our goal of making sure that your company grows.”

Always bring it back to that point of commonality. Always tie it up nice and neatly with that. If you do so, you can share your point of view. You can share your politics. You can share your thoughts on religion, on sex, on anything else with everyone. The rules. Number 1, be respectful. Number 2, always listen, hear the other person out. Number 3, always finish up your conversation, bringing it back to that point of commonality, the common goal that you both share and everything will end on a high note. The one thing we need more of, regardless of where you live, what your political beliefs are, the one thing we need more of, we need more conversation.

We need more people sharing their beliefs coming together so that we have a mutual understanding of where people stand. As long as we listen to one another, we’ll be able to get along together, and the world will be a better place. Mike, thanks very much for your question. It’s particularly poignant this time of year and I hope I gave you the thoughts you were looking for. I hope you can bring that back home and make it useful. All right, folks. This has been the 60 Second Sale Show. I am Dave Lorenzo, and remember, you can send us your questions on Twitter. My Twitter handle is at thedavelorenzo, at T-H-E Dave Lorenzo, D-A-V-E L-O-R-E-N-Z-O. You can also find me on Facebook and Instagram with the same username. Until next week, I hope you make a great living and live a great life. We’ll see you soon.

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