Jeremy Miner Of 7th Level: How To Be Great At Sales Without Seeming Salesy | by Authority Magazine | Authority Magazine

Thank you for doing this with us! Before we dig in, our readers would like to learn a bit more about you. Can you tell us the “backstory” about what brought you to this career path?

I first got into sales 20 years ago as a broke college student.

I got my first job selling home security D2D and the company literally gave me a script, dropped me off in a neighborhood, and said go make some sales.

At that point I really thought it would be easy, that’s what everyone in the office told me.

I started talking to prospects about all of the features and benefits of my product and how much it would help them, but I started noticing I got a lot of objections, such as, “We can’t afford it,” “We don’t need it,” “Your price is to high,”

“I need to talk to my spouse,” “Let me think it over,” “Can you call me back in a week, a month, a year?”

One day after about 7–8 weeks of all the rejection, I sat down on the curb waiting to be picked up late at night. I was exhausted, I remember the sweat rolling down my back from the humidity. I didn’t make a single sale that day after 12 hours of work, and had made zero sales that week.

At that point I felt like I was a failure, how could I go home to my wife at that time and my 1 year old little girl and tell them we didn’t even have money to pay the rent in two weeks. I remember my feet rubbing the hot concrete and my legs worn out completely. I felt broken as a man.

So when my manager picked me up that night he popped in a Tony Robbins CD that changed my life forever. If I had not listened to that CD that night I probably wouldn’t be telling you this as I would have dropped out of sales.

I heard Tony Robbins say something along the lines of:

“Most people fail for the simple reason they don’t learn the right skills necessary to succeed.”

He went on to say that everyone is taught skills, but the ones who fail are the ones who were not taught the right ones!

A lightbulb went off in my head, that maybe, just maybe, what the company was training me, and what I was learning from the “old sales gurus” were not the right skills. Maybe they were outdated and just didn’t work very well anymore.

So I committed to my family, I was going to have to learn these skills.

Because I know you like me also want to provide a great lifestyle for your family as well.

But here was the dilemma.

I was being taught traditional selling skills from my company and the “Old Sales Gurus.” While some of them worked and I would make some sales, I also noticed a lot of techniques didn’t work at all and I would lose a lot of sales too.

At the same time in college, I was majoring in behavioral science and human psychology, and I was learning that the most persuasive way to communicate was in a completely different way from what all the sales gurus were teaching.

So I started learning how to use techniques that work with human behavior whereas traditional selling really teaches you how to use techniques that work against human behavior. Pushing, pushing, pushing. I started learning from human psychology how to get prospects to pull me in where I didn’t have to push, and selling became very easy, and very, very profitable

Can you share with our readers the most interesting or amusing story that occurred to you in your career so far? Can you share the lesson or take away what you took out of that story?

When I was twenty two and got my first job in sales, I was so bad that everyone in the office was making fun of me. I literally was the worst person in sales in the entire company. Within eight months of me being the worst in that company, I became the top salesperson out of over eighty people and everyone started asking me for advice.

Within two years of starting that job, I became the top salesperson in the entire industry out of thousands of salespeople in North America.

The lesson is to never give up. With sales, all it takes is acquiring the right skill sets and then taking action.

Are you working on any exciting new projects now? How do you think that will help people?

Yes we have a new book coming out called “The New Model of Selling; Selling to an Unsellable Generation.” It’s co-authored by Jerry Acuff, CEO of Delta Point Consulting and best selling author himself.

None of us are able to achieve success without some help along the way. Is there a particular person who you are grateful towards who helped get you to where you are? Can you share a story about that?

There are so many who I have learned from along the way. One person stands out for me however and that’s Brian Tracy. My first ever event I went to was when I was twenty two, a junior in college. I had only been in sales for about three to four months and Brian was in town doing a two day seminar. I remember going to the event and seeing him up on stage. After the event I went up to him and talked for about twenty minutes just one to one and remembered how much he truly listened to me and that struck me as very special.

The cool thing is, I reached back out to him seventeen years later, and he had heard of my success in sales. I asked him to be a part of my first sales training course. We recorded it together in his studios in San Diego. We called it the “Ultimate Closer’s Masterclass.”

So the moral of the story is you can be a nobody in sales, learn the right skills and then come back seventeen years later and make a product with someone whom you idolized as a young college student.

For the benefit of our readers, can you tell us a bit why you are an authority on the topic of sales?

I certainly can but that might be a bit biased since I’m the Chairman of the company. What I can do is tell you why our clients say 7th Level is the authority on sales.

Companies typically come to us because they get frustrated by losing sales to low cost competitors, and they get concerned that their salespeople are not consistently hitting their sales targets every month.

What we do is help sales teams transform the way they sell by learning specific skilled questions and techniques that work with human behavior rather than against it, known as neuro emotional persuasion questions, with the right tonality that puts your prospect’s at ease and eliminates sales pressure. That triggers your prospects to want to engage with you, open up to you and get them to persuade themselves!

This causes them to view you as the expert, as the trusted authority so you can charge far more for products/services and also consistently hit sales targets every single month and scale as a business.

Ok. Thanks for all that. Let’s now jump to the main core of our interview. As you know, nearly any business a person will enter, will involve some form of sales. At the same time, most people have never received any formal education about how to be effective at selling. Why do you think our education system teaches nearly every other arcane subject, but sales, one of the most useful and versatile topics, is totally ignored?

I believe our education system does not teach anything about selling because of the way it’s viewed by society at large. Most of that has to do with the way companies train salespeople on how to sell; by using “traditional selling techniques” which triggers sales resistance in most prospects.

Traditional selling really teaches that selling is “adversarial,” it’s you against the prospect trying to win them over, so you make a sale, and make money. This causes society to view salespeople in a negative way.

But really this way of selling is what average salespeople do in our time.

Sales is really about “collaborating.” If you want to be at the top, if you want prospects to view you as the Expert, as the Trusted Authority in your market; it’s you working with the prospect to help them find and solve their problems to get them where they want to go.

Because after all we are all really in sales now, right? Even if you don’t get paid a commission you are still out there trying to persuade, influence, convince and move others. We call that non-sales selling.

Here are just a few examples of what I mean;

If you’re a business owner trying to get employees to follow your vision of your company, you are trying to persuade, influence and move others.

If you’re an employee trying to convince your boss to give you a pay raise, you are trying to persuade, convince, and move others.

If you’re an attorney trying to convince a judge that your client is innocent, you’re trying to convince, persuade, and influence others.

If you’re a politician trying to get people to vote for you, you are trying to convince, persuade, and move others.

If you’re a teacher trying to get your students to do their homework, what are you doing? You are trying to influence, persuade and move others.

So we are all in sales now no matter what we do!

This discussion, entitled, “How To Be Great At Sales Without Seeming Salesy”, is making an assumption that seeming salesy or pushy is something to be avoided. Do you agree with this assumption? Whether yes, or no, can you articulate why you feel the way you do?

Yes you have to agree with this assumption. The moment you come across “salesly” to a prospect is the moment most of them emotionally shut down. This means that even if you ask some great questions they will never open up to you and tell you what is really going on.

You have to come across more as what we call a “problem finder” and “problem solver”, not a product pusher.

Realize within the first 7–12 seconds of every sales call or sales interaction you are on your prospects are subconsciously picking up on your verbal and non verbal cues from your tonality, body language (if they can see you) and what you are saying and/or asking that triggers their brain to do one of two things

1. If you come across aggressive, needy and attached and you don’t know the right questions to ask, it triggers their brain to go into fight or flight mode, where they try to get rid of you fast and say things like, “I’m too busy now can you call back later,” “I don’t need it, we already have that,” “We don’t have any money for that,” “I’m good, can you call me back in a week, a month, a year?” Does that ever happen to any of you?
2. Now if you come across more neutral, relaxed, and detached and ask the right questions, it triggers their brain to become curious enough that they feel they want to engage with you, and they want to open up to you as you might have something very important to them.

We have to come across as detached from the expectations of making the sale and really focus on whether there is a sale to be made in the first place. Whether or not they have problems that we can solve. We have to get rid of the commission breath.

Now do I mean that you should get on a call and not make sales? No way, your goal is to make a sale on every call, but you have to keep that to yourself, the moment they feel like they are being sold is the moment that they start to shut down.

The seven stages of a sales cycle are usually broken down to versions of Prospecting, Preparation, Approach, Presentation, Handling objections, Closing, and Follow-up. Which stage do you feel that you are best at? What is your unique approach, your “secret sauce”, to that particular skill? Can you explain or give a story?

We would say you have to be great at all stages of your sales cycle or you stand the chance of losing the sale!

You can’t be great at Prospecting but then have an awful presentation, or vice versa and make a ton of sales! You have to be great in each area.

The seven stage sales cycle is known as the A.I.D.A model of selling. It stands for Attention, Interest, Desire, Action. We would call this the “Old Model” of selling as it was first manufactured in 1898 by St. Elias Elmo Lewis, who sold circuses. No joke, just Google it!

In the information age we live in today, the consumer is much different than they were in 1898.

Ask yourself, does the consumer of our time buy the same way, think the same way, and have the same buying behaviors as the consumer did in 1898 when the A.I.D.A. model of selling was created? Of course they don’t!

So all joking aside, why has the consumer changed? It’s very simple, think about it.

20 plus years ago, what was the bridge between the company and the consumer?

It was of course the salesperson.

The company would send out the salesperson to educate the public about their products and services.

Besides radio and TV, this was the way the consumer learned about the company’s products.

But now with the power of technology and the ease of the internet and especially social media we live in a completely different era.

You see the consumer knows all about your company, your products/services, your pricing, who your competitors are, how long you’ve been in business, they know everything about you by just doing a simple google search on their computer or their phone now.

And because of this new found power, the consumer will no longer be manipulated or pressured by pushy salespeople because they know they have many choices to choose the exact product or service that you sell.

Check this out. According to behavioral science there are 3 forms of communication and I’d suggest you write these down because once you understand the differences in persuasion and where you are at now in your sales ability compared to where you could be, it will be life changing for you.

The first mode of communication, what is called Boiler Room selling or Era 1 type of sales, according to behavioral science, is:

1. We are the least persuasive when we tell people things, or attempt to dominate them, posture them, manipulate them, or push them into doing something we want them to do.

Think boiler room selling, like Wolf of Wall Street type of selling. This consists of sharing that you’ve got a great opportunity, then talk about the features and benefits of what you do and then push and tell prospects why they need to buy or why they need to go with you!

It’s just like if you tell your spouse that they NEED to do something for you, and you push them, what do you typically do? They push back right? That’s human behavior 101.

Here are a few examples of the least persuasive way to sell:

Presenting — We are all taught we have to have a great presentation, and show prospects how great our services and products are. We have the best this, the best that, which by the way doesn’t every salesperson say they have the best product or service?

Once again, how many salespeople you know say their product or service is the 5th best in the market? No one does! They all say they are the best, or have the best!

Your prospects actually trust you less when you say things like that or talk badly about your competitors because they are used to every salesperson saying this to them. According to the data, it’s not very persuasive if your presentation is more than 10% of your sales conversation.

Telling your story — I hate to tell you this, but nobody cares about your story when you are selling one on one, whose story do they care about? They only care about their own story!

Giving a sales pitch — We all have been told to give a great pitch, but according to science, it’s not a very persuasive way to sell. Look at Shark Tank when people come in and “pitch” their product.

Do you notice the body language of Damion John, Mark Cuban, or Barbara Corcoran and how it turns them off? You’ve got to stop the pitch! We even get shirts for our clients to remind them to stop pitching — #DitchthePitch

Putting sales pressure on them — Do you do this?

And the big one, “Assuming the Sale” — According to the data, it is pretty low on the persuasion pole, hence the term “sales is a numbers game.” This is where it comes from, especially if you are in a more complex sale that requires multiple calls and touches.

How many of you use these techniques or were taught to use them? Be real about it. It’s not your fault that you were taught them, we were all taught them.

The 2nd form of communication is Consultative Selling Era 2 type of sales.

We are more persuasive when we attempt to have a discussion. Consultative selling came out in the late 1980’s with books like SPIN Selling, where they taught how to ask logical based questions about the needs of the client.

But what’s the potential downfall of this approach when you only ask logical based questions, or what we call surface level questions. Your prospect is going to give you logical based answers in return.

Do people buy on logic or emotion? Brain studies show it’s 100% emotion and then they justify it with logic.

Here are some examples of Consultative questions that trigger resistance.

Please do not use these, they’re outdated and surface level questions.

“What’s keeping you awake at night? Do you still ask this question?

Can you tell me two problems you are having the most?

Who besides you will be involved in the decision?

What are you looking for in a solution? Once again just a surface level question. You have to learn how to go far deeper than that if you want to pull out their emotions and create massive urgency in the sale!

What sort of budget have you set aside? Most prospects will not open up to you with this type of surface level question.

Who was taught to ask these questions or is using them in your sales process? Throw them out the door if you want to make a lot of money as a salesperson.

So while this is more persuasive than the 1st mode of telling your story, the 2nd method puts sales pressure on prospects and assumes the sale.

But you are still playing the numbers game because very little emotion is brought out by asking only logical based, surface level questions!

Now the 3rd mode of communication is called Dialogue, which is Era 3 type of sales:

We are most persuasive when we allow others to persuade themselves. That’s called Dialogue, when we ask what are called neuro emotional persuasion questions which stands for N.E.P.Q.

This is key, and is where we use certain questions and techniques that work with human behavior to get the prospect to pull us in rather than us trying to push them forward.

So, how do you allow others to persuade themselves? That’s the million dollar question.

Do you just show up and give your prospects permission to persuade themselves?

No, you have to learn specific skillful questions, and when and how to ask them in a step by step structure that will get your prospects to sell themselves rather than you trying to do it.

Lead generation, or prospecting, is one of the basic steps of the sales cycle. Obviously every industry will be different, but can you share some of the fundamental strategies you use to generate good, qualified leads?

We run targeted Facebook ads that are typically 2–3 min tips we give on how to sell more. We find that salespeople, sales managers and executives love these as we give value to them without asking for them to buy anything.

At the end of the two-three minute ad, we simply say if they want to learn more daily tips like this to join our free Facebook group. Most join right there and then, and for the ones who don’t we just retarget them with more ads that are similar with more tips on how to sell more which causes them to become curious enough to join our Facebook groups!

We have also just implemented this on Youtube and Instagram as well.

In my experience, I think the final stages of Handling Objections, Closing, and Follow-up, are the most difficult parts for many people. Why do you think ‘Handling Objections’ is so hard for people? What would you recommend for one to do, to be better at ‘Handling Objections’?

Handling objections is hard for so many salespeople because of the simple fact that most of your objections you are getting are triggered by you, the salesperson and what you say.

At 7th Level we train reps to prevent objections from happening in the prospects mind, which eliminates around 70% objections.

For example, if I say, “Go ahead and sign the contract here,” sign and contract are two words that typically trigger a lot of sales resistance, because no one wants to sign a contract that locks them into something they might not want.

But if I just change the word to, “Authorize the agreement,” it means the same thing but is far more neutral. Everyone is okay with authorizing an agreement so they can get what they want.

The government does a crazy good job at this. Take a look at the IRS. It stands for Internal Revenue Service. If it was called Internal Taxing Service which means the same thing we would all be up in arms, but the term revenue is far more neutral than the word tax, right?

So if we hear certain things in the conversation that are signs to you that they are possibly going to have an objection about when you go through your presentation at the end, then you need to ask certain questions to seed in their mind and eliminate the objection.

Let’s say if you sold in the high ticket industry and you sold a training program that teaches business owners how to scale their companies.

If the prospect says halfway through, “Well I’ve tried several programs that just haven’t worked out for me,” now you know they still have that fear in their mind, so when you drop the price of what it will take to buy your services do you think that fear is still going to be there? You bet it is!

So I might say, hold on when you say they didn’t work for you, what programs did you go through? What parts of those do you feel didnt work for you? And were there other people getting results in those?

The prospect says, yes for sure.

So if other people were getting results, what do you feel held you back from having success?

This is where they start to view in their mind that maybe it was them, maybe they didn’t put in the time, maybe they didn’t really work hard enough or really show up and it empowers them to feel like they won’t let that happen again.

And now at the end of the presentation it’s hard for them to have this objection now because you have helped them overcome it in their mind so it doesn’t resurface later in the sales process as an objection.

Now of course you will still get some objections but you can literally eliminate most of them from even happening.

If you do get an objection you first want to clarify what the objection really is, like what’s behind it, discuss it like two people working together to solve it and ask what we call a diffusing question to get them to overcome it!

‘Closing’ is of course the proverbial Holy Grail. Can you suggest 5 things one can do to successfully close a sale without being perceived as pushy? If you can, please share a story or example, ideally from your experience, for each.

Closing is one of the most misunderstood things about selling. The sale is never won or lost at the end when you use closing techniques, such as:

Do you want the red one or the green one? (option close), Who should the contract’s name be in, yours or your spouses? (assumptive close), or Why don’t you give it a try? (invitational close).

The sale is won or lost during the discovery part of the sales process. It’s win or lost with your questioning ability on your sales calls that allows your prospects to view in their mind that it’s far more risky for them to do nothing, stay in the status quo and their problems stay the same and nothing ever changes for them, than it is to get the funding, or the money, budget together to purchase your solution, solve their problems and get them where they want to be.

Which is more risky?

At the end of your calls, if it’s a one call close or a two call close or even if you are in a more complex selling environment, you are simply asking what we call commitment questions to get the prospect to commit and take the next step to purchase so their problems get solved.

Like this for an example; Do you feel like this could be the…answer for you?

Now why do I pause there, why not just ask this question fast?

Because by pausing it causes their brain to think deeper about the questions I am asking them.

95% will say yes, or yes but, and then have a concern. Whatever they say you should ask: Why do you feel like it is though?

Or if they say yes, but we don’t have the money; respond with, Well money aside why do you feel it would though?

Then they tell you but more importantly who are they telling that this is what they feel they need? Themself, and when people tell themselves why they need what you offer, is that more persuasive than you telling them why they need your solution?

We don’t use the term closing at 7th level, we don’t want to say we closed someone, we want to use the term commitment to get them where they want to go.

Finally, what are your thoughts about ‘Follow up’? Many businesses get leads who might be interested but things never seem to close. What are some good tips for a business leader to successfully follow up and bring things to a conclusion, without appearing overly pushy or overeager?

Let’s first address why leads who were interested never closed.

Buying decisions only stall because most sales teams are using sales techniques that work against human behavior and trigger sales resistance.

All selling is is change. It’s about one thing only and that’s change. Selling is about how good you are at helping your prospect view in their mind that by changing their situation, paying for your product or service, that that’s far less risky for them than doing nothing at all. By staying in the status quo, their problems stay the same and nothing ever changes for them.

So whether they want something better or are trying to get away from pain, it’s all about change.

Now here is your problem though, human beings do not like change even though they say they do. It makes us feel unsettled and uncomfortable especially when it’s initiated by salespeople ready to pitch their products or services within 10 seconds of meeting a prospect.

Human behavior shows that we value tradition, consistency and something that is familiar even if we don’t like it that much over something that is new and foreign to us.

Realize you are not selling the thing, you’re selling the results of that thing.

So a few good consequence questions need to be asked in that conversation after and only after you help them see what their future is going to look like once all these problems are solved, we call that their objective state.

An example of a consequence question is, “What if you don’t do anything about this though and you (repeat back their problem) for the next 3, 6 or even 12 months from now?”

Let’s say if you sell lead generation services, you help prospects get leads for their business.

Hold on though, what if you don’t do anything about this, and you keep getting these lower quality leads to your sales team and your sales keep stagnating another 3, 6 or even 12 months from now? Or consider, what are the possible ramifications if you don’t do anything about solving this?

Now let’s talk about how to effectively follow up! You had a great discovery call, maybe a great demo, or a great presentation.

The prospect seems so into your solution, maybe they even said they are ready to go, and it seems like the sale was yours but then POOF, the prospect just goes MIA. They disappear, you call, you text, you send emails and nothing, they don’t respond, what do you do at that point?

It’s very simple whether you sell B2B or B2C, you can use this one small text and email that will get most of your prospects to respond with the “truth” of what is really going on. Because wouldn’t you rather know what the truth is rather than them leading you on, and ghosting you?

The first step is to call and leave this voice message. Let’s say you have already called a few times. You don’t want to call 3 times a day as it makes you look very desperate like you’re just trying to sell them something.

The rule of thumb is you don’t want to call more than once per day. But for this example let’s say you have already called three times and left a few messages over a period of 3–5 days.

On this call you simply say something like this, “Hey John just called and left a voicemail again. I did try to reach you the last 3 or 4 days and left you a few messages but didn’t hear back. My question is “where do you think we should go from here”? Here is my number. I’ll be here for just a bit today.

Then you are going to text and email this message. You simply craft this email, or text that’s short, concise, and right to the point.

Here is the example: Hey Sally we tried to reach you a few times but we did not hear back from you….How do you want to proceed from here? Or Where do you think we should go from here?

And that’s it, no waffling, no 2 or 4 paragraph emails or texts with a bunch of fluff in them. That makes you appear desperate for the sale.

How many emails do you get that are 3–4 paragraphs long and you never even read them? Or it makes you feel that the salesperson is very desperate to close the sale?

You simply address you tried to reach them a few times but didn’t hear back.

And then you ask them “How do you want to proceed from here?” Or “Where do you think we should go from here?”

Once you send that email or text you will be shocked by how most of your prospects will return that email or text within a few minutes with the truth of what is going on.

A lot of the time, they just got super swamped and might say so, or that they decided to go with someone else, or their CEO has some concerns.

Now if they have some concerns at least you now know what they are and you are in a much better position now to be able to help them resolve their own concerns because you know the truth of what is really going on with the sale.

When you simply ask a lead that ghosts you “How they want to proceed from here?” or “Where do you think we should go from here?” it shows them that you are not desperate, you don’t need them to buy, you have a ton of other clients, and you don’t need to chase them.

You’re pretty much doing them a favor to pay your company to solve their problems and get them where they want to be.

It triggers them to view you more as an expert, and as the Trusted Authority who is there to help them solve their problems and get them where they are wanting to go!

Now if they by chance do not even respond to your text and email, give it a few days, and then you will leave this final voicemail and email or text.

“Hey John left you a few voicemails over the last week or so and sent you an email/text but we never heard back from you, we are not sure if you got abducted by aliens, you retired and moved to Bali or maybe you won the 500 million dollar jackpot lottery!

However this will be our final attempt to reach you, if you want to reach my number is __________ and once again this is our final attempt to reach you!

You will send the same text and call it a day, and either the prospect gets back to you which almost everyone will or the few percent who don’t you just move on and at least they are out of your calendar and not taking your valuable selling time!

As you know there are so many modes of communication today. For example, in-person, phone calls, video calls, emails, and text messages. In your opinion, which of these communication methods should be avoided when attempting to close a sale or follow up? Which are the best ones? Can you explain or give a story?

I believe these modes are all effective but it would depend on where you are in the sales cycle. For example you would never want to just email over a proposal to a prospect where they can just go through it, possibly not understand it, have some objections and then you are not there to answer those. You would want to go over the proposal in person or if distance is a problem over Zoom or something similar.

We also believe that if you cannot be in-person then being on video calls like Zoom is far more effective than just a voice on the other end of a phone call.

Our data shows that when the prospect can visually see you it triggers more trust than if they can only hear you. When they see you they put a face to a name, it causes them to have a bit more trust as you are a real person, not just someone on a phone call from who knows where.

Ok, we are nearly done. Here is our final “meaty” question. You are a person of enormous influence. If you could inspire a movement that would bring the most amount of good to the greatest amount of people, what would that be? You never know what your idea can trigger. 🙂

This is easy, it would be teaching people how to communicate properly to each other. Think about it, communication is key to solving the world’s problems. Wars are started because of a lack of communication, a lack of understanding. People fight over political opinions because of a lack of understanding one another, a lack of communication.

The great author Steven Covey said “first seek to understand, then be understood”. This concept we find to be almost completely missing in politics, business, parenting, and relationships, the world over. And because of that, it’s the cause of so much suffering in the world.

Our mission as a company is to be a part of that change, one company at a time, one person at a time.

How can our readers follow you online?

The best way to learn about what we do is simply go to www.salesrevolution.group . Here you can find many resources that we give to sales professionals, sales management and business owners for free.

We also go LIVE inside this Facebook group 3–4 times a week with different trainings and Q&A’s to help you sell more. If you want to learn about our flagship sales training programs or have us train your teams, just simply tag me in the group and someone can message you more details to see if we can help.

Thank you for the interview. We wish you only continued success!