Business Growth Architect Show

Ep #157: Steve Wallace: Why Most People Fail at Sales—and How to Win

• Beate Chelette • Episode 157

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Unlock the secrets to sales success with Steve Wallace. In this episode, we break down why leads aren’t the key to winning in sales—and what you should focus on instead. 


In this episode of the Business Growth Architect Show, Steve Wallace, Chief Sales Nerd at Maverick App, brings clarity to the often misunderstood world of sales automation. Many entrepreneurs and business owners are overwhelmed by the idea of automation, thinking it’s the magic key to unlocking sales success. However, Steve shows us that while automation can greatly enhance sales efforts, it is not a one-size-fits-all solution. Instead, it’s a tool to help scale your business—when implemented correctly. This episode is a must-watch for anyone trying to make sales automation work for them.


Steve dives deep into why so many people fail at using sales automation the right way. From relying too heavily on automation without first understanding their sales process, to missing the critical step of building relationships, many businesses make the mistake of thinking automation can replace human interaction. Steve explains that successful sales are built on trust and relationships, and while automation can assist in outreach, it is the personalized connection that closes deals.


Through this conversation, you’ll learn how to strike the right balance between using automation to scale your efforts and ensuring that your sales process still feels personal. Steve offers actionable insights into how automation can be leveraged to save you time, allowing you to focus on what matters: building real, lasting relationships with your prospects. He emphasizes that automation should work with, not replace, your sales strategy.


To learn more about how automation can work for your business, visit MaverickApp. If you found the episode insightful, don’t forget to leave us a comment or share your feedback. We’d love to hear how you are using automation in your own sales process!


Resources Mentioned:

Steve Wallace: Website | Linkedin |  Facebook

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Steve Wallace:

Hi. This is Steve Wallace, the Chief Revenue Officer of Maverick App. It is a sales automation and prospecting platform. And on my episode for the Business Growth Architect Show, I will share the trick to your sales process that you are missing. Stay tuned to find out what I'm talking about and what you're missing in your sales process that will open up doors, avenues and sales that you never knew existed. Head on over to the podcast and listen to the full episode,

BEATE CHELETTE:

And hello, fabulous person! Beate Chelette, here. I am the host of the Business Growth Architect Show and I want to welcome you to today's episode where we discuss how to navigate strategy and spirituality to achieve time and financial freedom, truly successful people have learned how to master both a clear intention and a strategy to execute that in a spiritual practice that will help them to stay in alignment and on purpose. Please enjoy the show and listen to what our guest today has to say about this very topic. Welcome back. Beate Chelette here, The Growth Architect, and today I am sitting down with Steve Wallace, and we are talking about something that you love to hate and hate to love, that is figuring out how to get a proper sales process in place, we are talking about what prohibits most of you to actually embrace the most important thing in business, which is clients helping other people, and what possibly the disconnect would be between Your mindset and your purpose and your actual process. Steve, I'm excited to have you on the show. Thank you so much for being here.

Steve Wallace:

Thank you. B, I'm really excited to be here too. Thank you for having me. It

BEATE CHELETTE:

took us long enough, for sure,

Steve Wallace:

it really did. It really did. So Steve, for

BEATE CHELETTE:

somebody who's not familiar with what you do, will you please tell us who you are and what problem do you solve for your clients,

Steve Wallace:

absolutely. So I am as a person. I'm a father, man of faith. Business is a love language of mine, so it does tend to find its way into who I am as a person. Professionally, I'm the Chief Revenue Officer for a Sales Automation Company called "Maverick App." The problem that we solve is that sales people, when they're actually selling, they're actually not selling, they spend 70 to 80% of their day wasting time doing tedious tasks that need to be done. I'm not making excuses for it. They need to report to their managers. They need to make sales projections. They need to put notes in their CRM. They need to do account research, build lists. They need to do a lot of things, but unfortunately, those things come at the expense of the actual sales, the actual closing so what we do is we automate the time consuming, tedious tasks for sales people like building lists, like making sure they're researched, like doing outreach and following up with everybody who says they need to be followed up with which, let's face facts, that's a huge majority of people you meet. Okay,

BEATE CHELETTE:

I got it, so let's dig in here. I mean, we know that people struggle with sales in general, right? So we already talked on the show extensively about the mindset piece around sales, but you have a slightly different opinion about this. You are looking at this from the perspective, does somebody actually believe in what they're selling? Tell me, what does this mean, and why is this even important?

Steve Wallace:

Yeah, absolutely. I talk with a lot of sales people. And by sales people, I mean different industries, various roles, insurance agents, financial advisors, business owners, we're all selling something. I think even people who aren't responsible for driving commissions are still selling something. And when I talk to these sales people, there's a couple things that I find happen almost across the board. One is, they're driven to help people. Some of them are money driven, but it's actually almost secondary. Usually, I want to make an impact. I want to help people, especially in the small business space. The second is, is money. And then what happens is, I find it so interesting they they don't want to help someone so much that they're willing to interject themselves into someone else's day, to put their product, solution or service in front of them, to help them if they actually believed in what they did, if They had true, dedicated, heartfelt connection and belief in what they do or what they sell. Why wouldn't you want to put it in front of as many people as possible, as fast as possible, as often as possible. And when you find someone who is like that, it is a contagious, addictive energy like I think back to Steve Jobs. And his method of getting Apple computer in front of as many people as possible was infectious. It was He was rabid at times, right? It was an infectious energy. So why don't sales people have

BEATE CHELETTE:

that? Well, why are they not like that? So what is it? What is it about this? Is it because it's a job? Is it because I'm driven by quotas? We know sales has a bad reputation, but why? Why would I, you know, I mean, we're business owners, right? We're talking to business owners. They come here because they know that they're purpose driven. They're impact driven. They want to help more people. What's the hurdle here? I mean, should it not be the easiest thing in the world to say, Man, I can help you. Woman, I'm here for you. Hello, everybody. This is the solution that will make you feel better, perform better, be better at relationships, you know, be more complete person. What is it?

Steve Wallace:

I really don't believe there's enough conviction there to map actions to values. And if there is, that's actually a good thing, if there's enough conviction to map actions to value. Action being, value being, I believe in what I sell, action being, let's go do the work, execute if there is great. But now you're on to the next set of problems, which is a lack of training. A lot of stars have to align in the sales world to make a sales rep consistent and productive and effective on behalf of themselves or their organization, that messaging matters. The problems they solve matters if they're putting, for example, if they're putting the problems that they solve in front of people who don't have that problem, it's not going to work. Nothing's going to work. And you've spoken about this in some of your podcasts. So there's a lot of stars that have to align target market, messaging, Cadence, frequency, the stars have to be really, really aligned for a salesperson to be successful, day in, day out. And then there's rejection. And rejection, big part of things. Yikes. We could do an entire episode on this alone.

BEATE CHELETTE:

We can do an entire we can do a year's worth of stuff on rejection, right? Absolutely. So, so here's, here's, what I think is, is at the at the bottom of this. So I like that you said, conviction, so I believe in my product. It's a good product, but you said, I don't believe in it enough to make everybody stop what they're doing and listen to me what how many elements are in that, you know, there's number one, rejection, right? Number two, being well behaved, not bothering people, childhood, stuff, society, what else goes into

Steve Wallace:

traumas, right? Yeah, societal, society telling you that you are being a nuisance to them. Perhaps I think I'm a sales guy and I'm an outreach guy, so I tend to think of this from a from a cold outbound perspective, like if I was cold calling you. So I think an element of an answer to your question would also be, um, making sure that you're being respectful self doubt. I think a lot of it has to be self doubt, right? Be

BEATE CHELETTE:

certainly, well, as somebody who's just gone through sort of this big not rebranding, but repositioning exercise about recognizing this internet marketing language and internet marketing nonsense that we've been told it's just not working. I mean, it's just not working anymore. So if you're listening to the show and you're still trying to do this fake limiter, and we're looking for two people who just stop it. Just stop it, it. It's just not working anymore. Say, I'm having a group of 10 people. I have six people that are that have signed up. I would like to fill the group with, you know, 10 really great people. You look like a great person. That's a much better language, then there's only two spots left and doing that. So I looked at this from the perspective of what really annoys the heck out of me, and it is something that I consider fake or a lie. And then you go back to that people say, Well, just be who you are, because everybody's already taken and you go like, what the heck does that even mean? There's so

Steve Wallace:

much fortune cookie wis- wisdom out there. The Fortune

BEATE CHELETTE:

Cookie, wisdom. Thank you. How do I become this authentic, real person that truly believes in what I do? I think that's the key here. What have you found as you're training people and as you're building these systems? What helps people to really step into this and say, if this is my mission, you know, let's just say my mission is to help with my systems and processes other people to make an impact. So we are shifting now as a company begin. Next year, which was the big, big birth of of this year, to say I have created 1000s of pages of processes and systems and strategic outlines, and I can break business steps down in easy things. I mean, I can teach this to anybody. And then somebody asked me about two months ago and says, Hey, can you give me your stuff so I can learn to do what you do? My first reaction is like, Absolutely not thief. My second reaction is, oh, maybe this is the legacy, right? And so

Steve Wallace:

mine is, yes, good luck.

BEATE CHELETTE:

There you go. As I shift right, how do I muster up the courage to say, instead of me teaching people how to run their businesses, how about me teaching people how they can help more people? Essentially, it's the same thing. But is it or is it not right? So there's a shift in this. So now, somebody who's listening this is like, so, well, how do I position this? Help me? Steve,

Steve Wallace:

yes, so I don't believe in silver bullet answers, but this, but this is shucks, but this is the one that comes to mind for me. B, we've already established that people are relational sellers. They want to make an impact. I want to help people. Those all go hand in hand. In my mind, if you want to make an impact, if you want to help people, then you're a relational seller. Face it, okay, if you want to do if you're a one call closer and you're and you're more transactional, fine, there's a space for you, but I'm talking about the relational sellers who want to make an impact. Okay, my advice on how to sell, how to make the transition to be so convicted and so passionate about what you do that you are willing to go the extra mile and put yourself in front of people more often, more frequently and be uncomfortable is to become an advocate for that person. And I'll be more specific. I don't want to give you buzz words, help that person. Help every person you meet, find their enemy and be an advocate with that person against that enemy. If you sell sales solutions, I sell sales solutions. If I'm meeting with somebody, I Yes, of course, I want to position my sales solutions. But if I'm meeting with somebody and their enemy isn't exactly what it is that I sell, I'm going to go hard at that enemy anyway and check this out. I think this takes a bigger picture than just making a sale mindset. But I'm going to go hard at that enemy, a conceptual enemy, a variable with that prospect, even if it's not with something I sell and check out what happens? I need to give a concrete example. Let's just say that the enemy isn't actually more sales. Let's just say it's operations. Your operations are taking so much time that you actually can't add more sales. You can't hire sales. You can't find sales. You can't find new customers. If you were able to redeploy your time into sales, you would the enemy isn't sales, actually ops. So I'm gonna go hard at that problem with the prospects and make sure that I am attacking that enemy to defeat that enemy at the end of our time together, even if they don't work with me. What do you believe would be the outcome of my relationship with that prospect?

BEATE CHELETTE:

Do you believe like a decision? Bingo? Any decision,

Steve Wallace:

any decision, they will have decided they have enjoyed their time with me, or have found the time valuable. They will have decided that I will be a resource to them, if not now, then at some point define what impact means. I bet it sounds something like what I just explained.

BEATE CHELETTE:

Yeah, I think that what really helped me to get my head around my challenges around outreach, was to say, what if I come at it with, like, very simple questions. Question is, can you do this on your own? Like, what's the problem? And can you do this on your own? That's a yes or no question. And if the question is, I can, then the question is, do you want to do this on your own? That's a yes or no question. And if the question is, I can not do this by myself, or I can do this by myself, but I want to, then they already answered that they need help. Then the second question is very simple, am I the right person for this? Yes or No, right? If I have gotten them to that particular intersection, my job is done, right,

Steve Wallace:

right? Absolutely, isn't it amazing questions reveals so much.

BEATE CHELETTE:

Yes, yes, yes. And if you then detach yourself from the outcome and say they choose not to work with me, then the outcome just really is, my intention was to make them have a decision, make a decision, because that's what we do as business owners. And sometimes they say, not yet, that's a decision. Sometimes it's I don't want to do. Anything that's a decision. Somebody, they say yes, and sometimes they say no. All of these are decisions, right? Our job is to tell them, are you okay with living with the concept? So Steve, we talked a little bit about now, sort of getting our head around the overall parameters of of the sales process and some of the stuff that hinders us to go into it, your part really is sales efficiencies and processes around that. Yes, now it's hard enough to make myself get on the phone call, on the phone and make these phone calls, but you even want me to go take this step further. So aside from my dedicated day of sales, you want me to put a whole process behind it. Tell me what that entails and why is my mind not wanting to do this.

Steve Wallace:

You have a negative presupposition. You have a negative assumption about the outcome before you do it, I'll ask you a question in return. Let's say that you were to to make the calls to line up your actions and do all the execution you're you figure out your messaging and your target market and and the stars align. And let's say that 100% of your efforts work out every time every single person you speak with says, yes, yes, yes, I'll buy. I'll buy, I'll buy. How

BEATE CHELETTE:

quick would you I would do nothing else, right, right?

Steve Wallace:

It's really not the the work that we're afraid of. It's the outcome that we're afraid

BEATE CHELETTE:

of. Ouch. That is, that is, that is reality, hitting, hitting right between the eyes, isn't it? Yeah, if I say if all my sales effort, if every phone call would be positive, would you be making more phone calls, right?

Steve Wallace:

And yes, of course, die right. We're on the Yeah,

BEATE CHELETTE:

heck, everybody would. But then the sales calls are not all positive, so then I'm going to tell myself, I'm bad at sales. Here we go, sales. Sales is just not my thing. So is that where the story comes from? The excuse?

Steve Wallace:

I think part of it, I think, I think there's a lot of factors. This is such a loaded episode. One of the factors is bad training. I come from a background where and it's been fixed. But I come from a background where I was told, Hey, Steve, go have, uh, 100 conversations this week, but not told how to who to what do I say to them? I was not told how long to spend doing it. I was not taught how to manage it. I was not taught how to check off boxes of completion to give myself permission to move on. There's a lot of mental gaming, like gamification and head trash that goes into sales that nobody ever addresses. And I'll give you, for instance, if I were to tell you, go call 100 people today, you would say, okay, simple enough task. And then you'd sit at your front at your computer, stare at the screen and think, shoot, where do I get the 100 people? Maybe LinkedIn, or maybe my Chamber of Commerce website or whatever. And now you'd have to get the email addresses or phone numbers. Okay, great. Now you have your list, hours spent, and now you have your list. Okay, and then pick up the phone. Oh, I actually haven't started the task, hours spent and you haven't made a single call. You just spent all that time building the list. So now you actually pick up the phone and you make the 100 calls in a day. Hats off to you. Congratulations. That's the hardest part, but now your day is shot. B

BEATE CHELETTE:

Oh, it's already, it's already six o'clock in the evening, and I cannot possibly be making any phone calls of six o'clock in Los Angeles because it'll be nine o'clock in New York, and everybody will hate me.

Steve Wallace:

Bingo, right? And so here in this creates an even bigger snowballing problem. First, you have a business to run. You've done none of the tasks that you need to do to run your business, right? That's number one. So you're going to do what, you're going to stay up later, try to work more efficiently. You're going to get burned out,

BEATE CHELETTE:

like, like, I've been for the last four weeks. Yes, bingo, right?

Steve Wallace:

And then it starts over the next day, because you need to call more people? Yes, wow. So not only have you not successfully, consistently prospected, you've also not successfully consistently grown or run your business. And your business development tasks Weren't you weren't trained to do those correctly, and as a result, everything else falls apart. So here's where I'm going with this.

BEATE CHELETTE:

How are you feel? Feel really bad right now, just listening to you.

Steve Wallace:

Well so B, and this isn't your fault, but this goes back to my point about bad training. Yes, no one ever said to you, hey, B, I want you to schedule 15 minutes on your calendar. That is a time you cannot break. You will commit. To getting it done under all circumstances as often as possible, barring emergencies and life happening right during that time, you're going to identify who you're going to reach out to. For the next 30 minutes after that, you're going to reach out to them. And then when that time block is done, this is a simple time blocking exercise. When that time block is done, you're going to say, okay, Steve, I'm done. I did my job. I don't care how many, how many you reached out to. I don't care what the outcomes were. I don't care if you got 12 yeses, 12 no's or splits or none. I don't care if nobody answered the phone. I don't care if you got no replies. You did the job, and you move on with your life. And you get to take this exhale, and you get to say sweet. Now I can move on to the things that I get joy out of. I get to experience the endorphin rush the check box. My prospecting is done for the morning, my list building is done for the morning, or whatever those time blocks represent. And now what happens that didn't happen in Scenario number one is you actually feel good about yourself. And this goes back to your original question. This is a very, very like sales philosophy. Philosophical, yes, but we talked about rejection. We talked about not doing the outreach because of fear of rejection, because of not knowing what kind of answers you'll get. This is a dynamic shift, because now it's not about the outcome. Now it's about doing the activity and putting your brain a position that says, Ah, I did it. I don't care if I got zero yeses. B, what do you think would happen if you time blocked every day your outreach and started on time and ended on time, and it was a time that you would not violate under any circumstances. If you did it for 30 days straight, how many people do you think would say yes, oh,

BEATE CHELETTE:

it's a no brainer. I think it's the inconsistency. And because the inconsistency brings an inconsistency in follow up, and without the follow up, it gets a spotty and then you just lose people. There's a couple of things I want to share that I have really learned this year as I've gotten myself deeper into it. I work with an outsourced team all over the world, so I don't have any employees here in in Los Angeles or in my office, which is a choice. Having employees in California is probably generally a really bad idea, because it's a very unfriendly place, a very expensive place to do business. If I really want the freedom, then I need to find people literally all over the world as a subject matter experts and I need to create processes and systems, which is why we are The Growth Architect. And what you will be very pleased to hear, Steve, and what makes your case is all about the systems that you find and the tools. And so I have found a particular tool that allows me to utilize a linked it's like a LinkedIn CRM plug that connects with my LinkedIn. Because LinkedIn has the shittiest DM thing in the world. I think, you know, I mean, if anybody's listening and you are either at Facebook or WhatsApp or or, you know which is made up, or you are at LinkedIn. Can you, for crying out loud, fix your DMS and make it searchable and give us folders and things like that. I mean, how hard can it possibly be to take this tool as follow up? I mean, help me, help you like your stuff better. So it's all in that the systems that are out there perform only a piece of the action because it's an engineer trying to create something that is not practical in real life. But we, as we run businesses, we know what would be practical. So it's always about finding a tool. And I ran some language about what works on LinkedIn. You know, how long these messages need to be? Enough with a couple 100 contacts to see that is a viable strategy, but it is too time consuming for me alone, because I cannot be this consistent, because I also have to perform the work. I have to get the clients. I, you know, it's just too much, and I have to run the company, so there's not a chance in hell I can do this consistently, because I can't work more than I am. I am, and I really, frankly, don't want to. And then you go and you say, okay, so I can buy lists. We have lists. We have lists of 60,000 people. So the the breakdown on how to make sales really work is, then, what do I need to do with the list that I have with a, you know, I'm connected to 20,000 people on LinkedIn. That's just because I've been one of the first people on LinkedIn, you know, since the early days. It just accumulates. I have a group. Of 60,000 people. Have a newsletter with 13,000 people. So I have the numbers, but I don't have the system. So So talk to us now about if I come to this realization as a business owner, which every business owner needs to come to the conclusion to you cannot do this on your own. What's my next step?

Steve Wallace:

Yeah, yeah, that's a great question. Can't do it on your own? I, and I think you're alluding to it is find the system that works for you. And this goes back to selling the way you would want to be sold, to selling in a way that represents you. So think of it this way, are you a marketing person, or are you a sales person. And this is, I say this a lot, there's only two ways to grow a business. Everything, in my opinion, in my experience, falls into these two categories. You either attract prospects to you, or you go to the prospects. That's it. Marketing, generally speaking, especially in the small business sphere, attracts people to them. Sales goes to the people, as far as the daily tactical activities they're responsible for inside of each one of those styles, I guess you can call them, are different systems. So for example, B you mentioned you have a group of 60,000 people, you've got something going, you've got something that people enjoy. I enjoy this conversation, right? Like I want to join the group, right? Take that as an opportunity to deliver more of you, more of what your prospects, your group finds valuable. Consider systems like school, for example, which is an online platform separate from all the other ones, and they're specifically focused on community, and they're all about you. You can bring on partnerships and bring on other people to lead the school community within it, but you invite your community into it, and now they're just hearing your ideas, and they're just hearing growth ideas and make them offers once a month, and you're going to be slowly, consistently converting percentages of them over to it. Similarly, email marketing, one to 3% conversion rate of a nice big list is beautiful. You don't need to have a school community when you have a nice big email list,

BEATE CHELETTE:

well, first you have first you have to clean it, warm it up and and bring it in, you know. So you say, find a find a place to do community. I personally do not recommend Facebook, because I've been de platformed in the beginning of the year overnight, nobody told me why. I lost every community, every contact, every ad, everything that I've ever built, I was just shut down with no explanation. So do not under any circumstances, use a free platform where it says in the end user agreement that they have the right to your content and to do whatever they want. You better pay for it and have control over it. That

Steve Wallace:

is a great point this. You've heard this phrase before, but I'm a big advocate for people putting skin in the game? Yes, there's a reason why colleges charge tuition,

BEATE CHELETTE:

some something like that. Exactly. Talk to me about what your system does, because I think it's we wouldn't do you any any good or our audience any good you have the system, you're gonna have to tell us what it does.

Steve Wallace:

Sure. Sure. Yeah, absolutely. So the answer to this is, I like to put it in context of a business owner in day one or sales person in day one of growing their book of business. And I say day one because it means everything is a zero, no revenue, no referral partners, no prospects, nobody, no meetings on the calendar, and you think to yourself, shoot, well, what do I actually have to do to grow my company or to grow my book of business? If you're a sales rep, well, it you have no budget. Remember, this is zeros across the board. So the work that you would have to do is actually what our software does. So, for example, day one in my business with zeros across the board, I thought to myself, shoot, I need to go get in contact with 50 business owners. And that was, that was my call quota. Every single day like that, I gave myself. I need to call 50 business owners. Shoot, here we go, and it's right back to that situation I walked us through earlier. I now have to go find those contacts. It's not as simple as saying I need to call 50 people. I now need to go find them. Who am I calling, right? Who am I calling? And then once I have them, once I have their information, is the number good, and I spent the time calling the numbers that were bad and experiencing the pain in the butt, frustration with with calling a number that was deactivated and saying, Okay, well, the number doesn't work. I'll send them an email instead, the email bounces back undeliverable. Like, okay, so I spent five minutes five. Sending the phone number and the email address and the company information the person

BEATE CHELETTE:

and they were just laid off over Christmas, and

Steve Wallace:

they were all that for nothing, right? And I have to do that every day. Maverick App, does that build a fresh research list of people who was with good, usable information every single day. Now you can do that anywhere you can go find a list generation service that is pretty good, not great, but pretty good, fine, but they don't actually do the outreach for you as well. Here's the big key. We spoke about consistency, if you were to do the list building and then do the outreach, now you don't have time to run your business. So you either have to sacrifice running the business or you have to spend more time, stay up late, put yourself under pressure, get sick, right? Lack of consistency is really the symptom here. Maverca is running right now, while I have while I'm on this great podcast with you, so I don't have to sacrifice me running my business in order to keep on prospecting. But it's not a replacement. When I'm done with the day, I look at my reports, let's just say 4pm I can look at who was emailed. I can look at whether or not they opened my email. I can look at how many times. I can look at the subject line. I can say, Okay, I've got some sales insights here and now, what I would do is I'd make my end of the day calls and say, B, I'm using you as an example, but I'm going to call B, she opened my email four times. Something's up there, and I'm going to assume that you actually don't know my name. I'm going to assume that you don't know Maverick app. That's okay, but I'm still going to use that as as insightful data for me to make educated cold calls in unison with the prospecting emails that went out. I still saved myself 567, hours today. I still did my admin work, I still did my prospecting. I still get to check off all the boxes, but now I've got higher intent, higher revenue, generating time on the calendar based on the prospecting that mat recap did. So it's list building, doing the outreach and giving me insights into who I should follow up with.

BEATE CHELETTE:

And I really want to add something here to that is I see that a lot of times when people don't have sales, they rather go and learn how to speak, or they learn how to do an online course, or how to do a funnel and all of that kind of stuff. Just stop it. Just stop it. Right? Figure out none of this is going to help unless you figured out your sales process, because if you don't know what your product is, what your customer actually wants, and what they're willing to buy and give you money for, and how much money they're willing to give you for a solution that you're offering, you can you can spend another$250,000 in courses, and it's not going to change the outcome. And that is the big lie of the internet marketers, and that's worked really, really well for them, not for you.

Steve Wallace:

Yes, the this is huge. You raise a great point. I'm really glad you're putting a spotlight on it. I actually don't believe in leads. I don't think they're real. I think we're all clamoring over the three percenter, which means out of 100 people, three are actively buying, are aware of a problem they have, and are ready to pay for a solution at some point, maybe not now, but at some point, 97% will either never buy from you or need to be followed up with for days, weeks, months, sometimes

BEATE CHELETTE:

years, years, sometimes yeah, sometimes years, sometimes yes, yeah, right. I think the rule of eight that became the rule of 12 is now the rule of 200

Steve Wallace:

it is, yep, I call that the private buyers journey. It's the journey they're doing behind the scenes, looking at your website, watching your content. They're in your pipeline, but you don't know it. They're watching from the side.

BEATE CHELETTE:

Yeah. And it's interesting to me, because ever so often somebody you know says, oh my god, the podcast. You don't know who listened to which episode, or somebody took an online course five years ago, and they and they still remember, I had this case where somebody throws themselves in my arms at a conference in Chicago and says, Oh my God, you changed my life. Never met this person. Have no idea. She says, we spent three days together and did not know that. She says, Without you, I wouldn't have had a business so or somebody who says, five years later, I've always wanted to work with you. You just don't know these things. So don't make these really. Don't make these assumptions. I think this is in this episode is particularly critical, and I want to make sure we point this out. This is a time where you have a choice. Step up and lead, because you either are going to sit off the fringes of the pendulum on the wild swing to the left or the right, and you're going to be yakking and being upset at what's happening on the external world. But the more the focus is on the external, the more we focus on the internal and what we can do and. And that's what this episode is about. Get your butt off the couch. Build the system, test the system. Help more people.

Steve Wallace:

Absolutely, wow, maybe that's the title right there.

BEATE CHELETTE:

Get your butt off the couch and help more people. I like

Steve Wallace:

it. I really, really do my MO so to speak, is do the work.

BEATE CHELETTE:

Yeah, that one of my coaches said, do the work. Get the results right,

Steve Wallace:

right? I think there's so much going on in the business development world. You've alluded to a few funnels, automations, and I work for automation company, so I understand. I'm here for it. I like it, but don't let it replace the work. It's not a replacement. It's an efficiency system. So if you're already doing the work and you've identified the stop gaps, the problems, where the bottlenecks are. That's the word I'm looking for. If you've identified where the bottlenecks are and you can't scale, that's a buzzword, but scale is, I believe, the actual appropriate word if you cannot scale as a result of bottlenecks, as a result of problems, as a result of not being able to duplicate yourself or fire yourself from your own business. Now it's time to talk about automation, not to suddenly create a sales process that you yourself don't even understand.

BEATE CHELETTE:

Yeah, yeah, yeah, no. I mean hard, hard, hard, hard, learned lessons. They are and I certainly did every mistake on the planet. Steve, where are we going to send our audience and anything, anything else you want to tell them as we wrap this up,

Steve Wallace:

I'd love to I'm on LinkedIn all the time. Steve Wallace Chief Sales Nerd Maverick App. maverickapp.io is the website you can email me at steve@maverickapp.io and my parting words are this. This this is for the relational sellers, the people who just want to help. Is two things, is be an advocate for the prospect. Figure out what their enemy is and attack it with them. And number two, you don't need leads. You need conversations. Because it's through conversations that relationships are built. Through relationships, you can build trust. Trust allows you access to their world. So put first things first.

BEATE CHELETTE:

I love it well. Thank you so much for being on the show. It was an absolute pleasure to take this whole sales process and automation thing and put put some humanity to it.

Steve Wallace:

Thank you B. This is great.

BEATE CHELETTE:

And that's it for us, for today, until next time and GOODBYE. So appreciate you being here. Thank you so much for listening to the entire episode. Please subscribe to the podcast, give us a five star, review, a comment and share this episode with one more person so that you can help us help more people. Thank you again, until next time. Bye.

People on this episode

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Beate Chelette

Host
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Steve Wallace

Guest