👋 Welcome to Dialed-In

Your Monday morning bolt of sales energy. 

Each week, we’ll share one deal-winning idea, quick tactical sales tips, and motivation to get shit done.

🧠 Monday Mindset

“The two words information and communication are often used interchangeably, but they signify quite different things. Information is giving out; communication is getting through.”

– Sydney J. Harris

This week, ask yourself: Is my communication strong enough to get through? 

How to take control of a sales call from a steamroller

Sales is just results-driven communication. That’s it. You’re trying to drive an outcome: a yes or a no.

But what happens when you lose control of the conversation?

Meet the steamroller: a lead who shows up to a sales call with a random grab-bag of questions they think they should be asking. 

The steamroller isn’t just a lead—they’re a leader. If you’re not careful, they’ll lead you in the conversation, not the other way around.

Suddenly, you’re more of an order-taker than an expert at selling the very thing they’re considering buying. 

You’re being reactive to them rather than being proactive and guiding them to see the whole picture.

So how do you take control of the conversation early?

First, understand that the thing all prospects want is: to leave the conversation with clarity.

They’re worried they won’t get everything answered by the end of the call, hence the avalanche of unrelated, in-the-weeds questions. 

Let your lead know you both want the same thing: clarity.

Here’s one approach you can take:

Before we start, let me state my goal for this call and what I have planned for us today.

For the first part of the call, I want to focus on your long-term future needs. What are your biggest challenges? What are you most excited about? What new tools are you using? What are your big problems? I want to talk high-level strategy with you to make sure I’m giving you the clarity you need to make a decision, yes or no.

Of course, you might still have tons of questions, and I want to hear about that in the second part of the call.

If you find yourself further into a conversation that’s going off the rails later, try to guide them back:

Let me quickly interrupt you, [NAME]. All these points are really good! We’ll get to them. I just want to make sure that we take 10 minutes to talk about this thing that I think could be really game changing for you. 

Ignore the fact that every one of us would rather peel off all our skin than have to do something as rude as interrupt someone. Be brave and remember: you’re doing it to help them. 💪

Taking control of a sales conversation does a few things:

➡️ It sets expectations. If you can remove doubt and let them know where you’re going with this convo, they can relax.

➡️ It establishes you as the trusted advisor. This ain’t your first rodeo. They know they’re going to be taken care of if they hand the reins back to you.

➡️ It lets you connect the dots for them. You can leave them with a stronger picture of how their life will be different with your solution, rather than crossing your fingers and hoping they can connect the dots on their own.

It shouldn’t feel like a struggle for control. Gently assure the steamroller: I got you, fam. 

This week, pay attention to how well you lead the conversation. Stop wishing for results and start driving them.

⚡️Get Dialed-In:

Write an agenda for what you want to accomplish on your sales calls and share it with your customers as soon as the call starts. Show the agenda in writing—on a slide deck or a text doc—so that it sticks. 

📺 Check out the latest episode of Will vs. Jen for more advice on how to lead better sales calls from two seasoned sales coaches.

Cheers,

PO Box 7775 #69574
San Francisco, California 94120-7775

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