Top Secrets of Marketing & Sales

When it comes to getting referrals proactively, that’s another thing people do as well. They think they have to wait until they have already sold something and the client is happy. And that’s not the case. I mean, when you’re talking about asking about referrals, you can do that at any stage, and at every stage, I mean, ask always, right? Why not? David: Hi, and welcome back. In...

Here’s why tariffs aren’t the problem. Because there’s always someone who’s buying. Sometimes it’s harder to find them. Sometimes it’s easier to find them. So if, as a result of tariffs or anything else, it’s going to be harder to find people, we understand that. But it doesn’t mean that business is over and it doesn’t mean that we can just sit...

It’s no fun when clients shop your ideas. If you ever came up with a brilliant idea for a promotion, only to have a prospect think it over, say they’d get back to you, but then ghost you and buy it from someone cheaper, you know the pain of being the unpaid consultant in the room. Being the brains behind a competitor’s sale is not ideal. You’re the one who did the work, thought it through, created...

Want to stop undercharging and get paid what you’re worth? In our last episode, we talked about the dangerous disconnect between effort and results. How being busy isn’t the same as being profitable, and why aligning your actions with your outcomes is the only sustainable way to grow. But what happens when you do align your actions… You do deliver real value… And you’re still not making what...

Busy doesn’t equal profitable. We got a lot of great feedback from our last episode, in which we talked about how many business owners still cling to outdated methods that used to work, but don’t work anymore. We addressed the hard truth that more of the wrong activity won’t fix a broken approach. We looked at the reasons typical performers feel stuck, waiting things out, hoping for a turnar...

Time for a shift in your business? There was a period of time when getting print and promotional product clients was a lot easier. People loved and appreciated your work. They answered and returned your phone calls. They placed orders proactively. Sometimes they even referred enough new clients that your customer base practically grew all by itself. Sounds like a fantasy! But does that still happe...

Arguing with reality in business is a huge waste of time. If you’ve got clients who are in that head space where they’re sort of scared, they’re not quite sure what to do next. If you call them and you’re in that same head space, then you’re not helpful to them. But if you call them with some thoughts or ideas on how you can help them to accomplish the things they wan...

We’ll say things like, “oh man, there’s just so much going on. I’m so busy. I’m just busy, busy, busy every day.” When you’re saying that sort of thing, it’s a strong indication that you’ve got a bunch of unfinished business. You’ve got open loops, and maybe you’re not capturing it. David: Hi, and welcome back. In today’s epis...

I’ve been having conversations over the past couple of weeks about this very topic of creating certainty in uncertain times. So much of it boils down to the specific steps I can put in place in my business. Reach out to the right people, say the right things, in the right order, consistently. That will not only improve your confidence in yourself. It will improve their confidence in you and...

Anytime there is any sort of issue in your business that’s not quite going the way it should, don’t sabotage your sales success. Instead, just ask yourself, is this because the process that I have in place is not working? Or is it because the person who is supposed to be following the process just didn’t do it? David: Hi, and welcome back. In today’s episode, co-host Kevin Rosenquist a...

It’s not always easy to get information from clients. If you’re in a situation where you have good relationships with your clients, but you’re struggling to get the information you need from them, there are very specific things that you can do that will help you to accomplish that a lot faster and a lot more organically. It’ll just feel better when you’re doing it rig...

When we discuss a step-by-step approach to the sales process, we’re taking a scientific approach, which most people don’t do. They just keep going out there and getting in front of people, smiling and dialing, whatever it is they’re doing. And when you take a more strategic approach, you just get far more consistent results. David: Hi, and welcome back. In today’s episode,...

What are the things you can control in your business? What are the things that we can look at? Identifying the very specific companies, the very specific industries that we need to be able to interact with, to be able to get our customers as close to what they need as possible. We might not be able to get them exactly what they want at the price they want it. But most of them are going to understa...

We’d love to help you to get from here to there in terms of eliminating waste in your business. When you’re focused on getting those things done and when you’ve got processes and procedures in place to allow you to accomplish it more quickly, then everything gets a whole lot better. David: Hi, and welcome back. In today’s episode, co-host Kevin Rosenquist, and I will be dis...

If we look at the idea of reactivating your client base in as many ways as possible, it means interacting with the people who have spent the money with us and doing that at a personal level, building the relationship, that’s about the best thing we can do. David:  Hi, and welcome to the podcast. In today’s episode, cohost Jay McFarland, and I will be discussing reactivating your client base. Welco...

There are reasons people buy from you, and reasons they don’t buy from you. Today I’d share a presentation I put together for my clients in the print and promotional products industry that reveals many reasons why clients don’t buy from you, and the one solution that addresses them all. Hi and welcome to today’s presentation Why Promo Clients Don’t Buy from You and th...

Disrupting sales relationships is tricky. When you go into a sales presentation, if you recognize that it’s likely they’re going to have someone, and if you’ve got an arsenal of responses that you can come back with to demonstrate to them why you are obviously the better choice, then they’re going to be a lot more likely to at least give you a shot at that business, than if...

Getting to your ideal prospects involves identifying what our ideal prospect looks like in terms of the type of customer we’re looking for, the type of industry they’re in, the number of people in their organization if we’re selling B2B. All these considerations that are going to add up to the ideal prospect, because until we know who it is we’re going to go after, we have absolutely n...

In order to turn the tables on rejection in sales, there are very specific steps you can take, and we work with our clients to help them do that every day of the week. David: Hi and welcome back in today’s episode co host Jay McFarland and I will be discussing the idea of turning the tables on rejection in sales. Welcome back, Jay. Jay: Hey Dave, it’s always good to talk with you and I...

“You have to create value in the sales process, create value in all the communication that you’re putting out there. When you do that, you’re already positioned better and differently. So when you think about the idea of what you say about what you do, you’re doing it in a way that is actually appealing to people rather than repellent.” David: Hi, and welcome back. In...

Reimagining the essentials is different for everyone. And I hear both sides of that from people. I hear people who are like, ” oh yeah, you know, I’ve been doing this forever. I know exactly what I’m doing and all that sort of thing.” And then I have people on the other side who are like, “Hey, I’m doing all the things that I’ve done before. I’m doing it more aggressively. I’m doing much more of i...

Don’t be invisible to your target market. Do they even know you’re alive? This goes back to the idea of money versus time. Because one of the advantages of social media is that if you have more time than you have money, you can spend more time posting and contacting people directly on social media. If you have more money than you have time, then you can run ads and you can get your ads...

When we’re doing business-to-business or business-to-consumer outbound calls, the truth about call reluctance is that it can seem very real. Those fears can be founded. They might very well say no. Or they might be rude, obnoxious, belligerent. It’s possible they say all kinds of things that you don’t want to hear. So that’s all true. That could happen. One of the things th...

When you’re creating demand for your products and services to the point where they really want it, “listen, yes, I want to do this. I want to move forward with you.” That is extremely powerful. David: Hi, and welcome back. In today’s episode, co host Jay McFarland and I discuss creating demand for your solution. Welcome back, Jay. Jay: Hey, David. Thank you so much. Once ag...

To hit the ground running in 2025, we can start by taking responsibility. Whenever we blame outside factors for things that go wrong, we immediately forget that there are things we can evaluate in ourselves to say, okay, well even if this is the case, even if this was just a terrible prospect, are there things that I could have done better and differently in this circumstance to create a better ou...