 I think one of the biggest mistakes around staying on the surface is making assumption. They said this emotion, oh I know exactly how they feel, I know exactly what this is like and then you start putting your frame on them. And of course we're not taking it deep. We're not listening and unpacking what's really going on there. Because at first blush, like you said, many people don't want to show their hands. What's up everybody and welcome to the show today. We drop great content each and every week and we want to make sure that you guys get notified and in order to do that you're going to have to smash that subscribe button and hit that notification bell and if you've gotten a lot of value out of this make sure you give us a like and share our videos with your friends. And then and this is where it gets really tough for salespeople. Far too many salespeople live on the surface. So if I'm asking you a question and I'm getting your talk, you're getting you talking and I'm what I'm trying to do is trigger something called the self disclosure loop and there's a lot of science behind this is that when people start talking about themselves, they get a dopamine hit to the brain. So I call it brain cracks. So they're getting they're getting a basically a hit of drugs. And you can actually see this on MRIs. The brain will light up like a Christmas tree. So when that dopamine hit comes, if I can stay out of the way and let you keep talking, what you'll do is get me deeper and deeper and deeper. And you know this when people are in a conversation with you and they don't know you or there are they feel like they need to hide something from you, which is true in most commercial conversations. A salesperson and the buyer, the salesperson is trying to protect their interest. The buyer is trying to protect their interest. So we have a tendency to stay above the water. If we're looking at a high, you know, an iceberg versus getting below the surface. When people start to self disclose and I can get out of the way, they move further and further below the surface. And it's there that deep listening really comes into play. Like I've got to watch and listen for the emotional cue, whether I'm on the phone or I'm on a video or I'm in person. It's those emotional cues. If I can ask questions around those that first of all tell the person that I really do care about you and I'm really listening and I'm paying attention to things that are important to you. But that's where you find where there's opportunity to help the person. That's where they're hiding things that they're, you know, that they don't want to show you because they feel like that that it shows their hands and it puts them in a bad position because they think you want to sell them. But the more you can ask about those things and the more they can tell you, that's when they begin to tell you their story. Now, their story and their language is their language of pain and opportunity, aspirations. It's the things that are irritating to them. It's the things that they want to accomplish. It's their emotional language. And if I can listen to that and then come back and talk about that, I can say, you know, AJ, you told me that one of the things that's really bothering you is when you come in in the morning and you try to get your day started, you've got this, this, this and this that are in your way and you're not able to really focus on the things that give you the most joy at work. And that's exactly why I recommend that we do this because if we do this, I'm going to get you that time back and I'm going to focus on the things that you don't like to do where you can focus on the things that you do want to do. If I'm saying that what I'm doing is you're going, wow, this person really gets me. And I've had people say that. I mean, and I said it often. I had a CEO the other day go go, you're the only person we've talked to that really understands us. All I was doing was repeating back to him the words that he told me. It's not that hard. But if you get, if you're just on the surface and you're just thinking about what you want, you don't do that. You don't tell them about their story. So when we start thinking about this as a skill, and I love what you said, Johnny, it is total skill. It's the things we can learn. It does begin with emotional intelligence. Like we have to learn how to sacrifice the things we want now for what we want most. And we have to learn how to be organic in the moment and get out of our own way while at the same time remaining outcome focused on there for a reason. When I leave this conversation, I've got a target next step and I'm going to ask for that next step. But in the between, what's happening between if I'm organic in the conversation with you, and you've probably been with salespeople where you can tell they're thinking about the next question they're going to ask versus really listening to what you're saying. And you know how off-putting that is. But if I can build organically in the conversation, it is like this beautiful symphony. Like it's this thing that happens and you are saying like you see these things that are happening with it. You can feel it. Like you know when you get into the zone and people just do all the work for you. You really don't have to do that much effort because when they get done, they're like, there's no one else in the world that I want to buy from other than you. I mean, it's no different than if you're in a conversation with another person. There's no one in the world I want to spend time with more than you. And it's not about what you say. It's about what you hear. And that's what gets missed so much in all of the noise around what makes a good salesperson versus what makes a bad salesperson. I think one of the biggest mistakes around staying on the surface is making assumptions. And of course, in sales, you love the product. You've probably experienced other customers or clients having success with the product. You feel like, you know, all of the roadblocks, all the reasons someone would come to your doorstep through prospecting and looking for your service. And then you start making assumptions as a salesperson. They said this emotion. Oh, I know exactly how they feel. I know exactly what this like. And then you start putting your frame on them. And of course, we're not taking it deep. We're not listening and unpacking what's really going on there because at first blush, like you said, many people don't want to show their hand. And if you just stick with their first answer and you make assumptions based off that first answer, you're going to take the car off the road and you're not going to be able to get to the destination of actually closing the deal versus making far less assumptions. Coming in with a completely blank slate, not assuming that you know what their problem is and the emotions tied to it. And for many, that means setting aside your own experience, right? Many of us will start a sales job because this service helped us and we love it so much and now we want to advocate and we want to sell it. And that's a real difficult balance, especially for people starting out in sales. So for someone who maybe is making those assumptions or as quick to judge, do you have a process or do you have something that you use in your repertoire to get you to slow down and dig deeper to get to that bottom of the iceberg? We drop great content each and every week and we want to make sure that you guys get notified. And in order to do that, you're going to have to smash that subscribe button and hit that notification bell. And if you've gotten a lot of value out of this, make sure you give us a like and share our videos with your friends. Yeah, I think we would begin with process. So we know that if you follow a step by step process that your outcomes are going to be very predictable. So what happens when you're when you make assumption, you say, why do I need to do this? Because they already know this. Why do we need to ask them questions about what they want? Because I already know what they want. So if that's the case, why don't just say hello when I buy? And that's what a lot of sales people do. Hello when I buy and and that can work if you've got a high velocity product where you're talking to millions of people. I mean, if you were sitting in, for example, Times Square and you ask 100,000 people during the day if they wanted to buy something, somebody's going to say yes to you. So and you can play the game that way. It's just a low probability game. So the key thing is understanding that you need to go through the process and and the and the process is I connect with you as a human being. I begin by asking you questions. I learn about you. So I typically want to ask start with a big broad open into question that's easy for you to answer that you like answering. So I make you feel good about it. Then I need to do discovery and you to understand everything about you. Then I need to formulate a case. So the case is building a set of solutions of value bridge and all the reason I bridge a bridge from where you are to where you want to go. And here's how I'm going to do that using your language, not mine. And then I got to ask and then I'm going to deal with objections and questions and and fear and all the things that come when you're asking human being to make a change because we're all basically risk averse. The safety bias is strong and every human being and then I'll deal with I'll deal with down the road. I'll deal with negotiation. So so that's the key but we have to also begin with like something you just said like quit making assumptions about other people like if we just got down to be a human being I work with military recruiters. I work with military recruiters in every branch of the of the military. And I wrote a book called Fanatical Military Recruiting and we teach something called recruiting EQ. So if you think about your military recruiter, your gung ho, I did this for a reason. It changed my life. I love this. So you're sitting down with a 17 year old and the military and a lot of in a lot of the recruiting schools is teaching the recruiter to go out and tell their story. And I've been at recruiting college with with military recruiters who are doing that and I'll show them how to flip the square script. Stop talking about you. Ask them about them. And then all you do is as I'm talking to AJ, for example, or I'm talking to Johnny and Johnny saying, well, you know, the reason that I want to join the military is this, you know what, that was one of the reasons that I joined the military because I was just like you sitting in your shoes. I remember not knowing exactly what I wanted to do, but I wanted to be more than I am today or or AJ says, you know, I'm really looking to take care of my family. I want to make sure that I've got enough financial resources down the road. And I would say, you know, that was really important to me as well. Or another person says, you know, I want to get a college education and I go, yeah, that's one of the things that the military did for me. I've got a master's degree because I joined the military versus showing up and throwing up all over them about your story that they don't care about. Your story only matters in context of their story. And the way that that I avoid being, you know, being assumptive is two things. One is I remind myself to be curious, like set aside all of all of my, you know, my my, you know, the things that I believe my assumptions or whatever, but set it aside suspend judgment and just be curious, like, because I walk through somebody's plant and go, how can you do it that way? Or why are you doing it like that? Or why are you like, I know why you're doing it, but I'm asking the question so you can tell me because when you're telling me and I'm listening and you love me and that I just know that works. So it doesn't make a difference what the answer is. If you're talking, you're happy. And if you're happy and I'm the person that's making you happy, you're probably going to buy for me because you're going to buy me before you buy my product. That's just simple. So I do that. The other thing I do is I use this little acronym called weight. And when I'm in situations where I my ego gets a little bit ahead of me and I feel like I want to tell my story or I feel like I want to pitch you on something. I have that on a card. I usually have it like on a notebook or I have it on my iPad or have it in front of me. And weight stands for why am I talking? And I and I just have that and I flash it in front of myself just to keep myself focused on if there's not a reason for my mouth to be moving, it needs to be shut because as soon as I start talking, the buyer that I'm working with turns off and so do my ears. When you bring up such a great point, many, especially early in their sales development, avoid the long silence. They even call it the awkward silence and they want to fill it with their own voice and keep the process moving because it's forward momentum. But seasoned salespeople understand that the longer you can hold that silence and let the prospect fill in the awkward with what's really going on, you actually set a stronger frame. And I've been on many calls where I just pause and pause and it feels endless and all of a sudden the prospect now divulges why they're really on the call. What's really going on? And they'll even say, you know, I've never said this to anyone else. I'm being honest with you. It's a little shocking. But many of their conversations are other people filling the silence, speaking for them, filling in those gaps, making assumptions, which, of course, doesn't lead to the sale.