Brian Will: Mastering the Art of Persuasion for Sales and Negotiations

In this fast-paced realm of sales, your software should be seamless and your CRM should be a single source of truth for tracking your pipeline, managing leads, collaborating easily, and automating all of those annoying little tasks that trip up your workflow. HubSpot Sales Hub brings you that power in an easy-to-use platform. With 360-degree deal management and real-time reporting, you get accurate windows into every inch of your business. And with AI-powered tools like ChatSpot, you'll have a dedicated assistant that knows your business inside and out. So trade cold calls for warm leads and get on track for your best Q1 yet. Check out HubSpot Sales Hub at HubSpot.com slash sales. Hey, everyone.

Welcome back to Make It Happen Mondays, where we talk about sales, business, entrepreneurship, personal growth, mental health, and everything in between with guests who I truly respect and I think make a positive impact on the world around us. Now, today's guest is Brian Will, and Brian is a seasoned entrepreneur and best-selling author known for the dropout multimillionaire and know the psychology of sales and negotiations. He's got over 35 years experience and has ventured billions in sales with some of the clients that he works with and a sought-after speaker and mentor in the business world. This conversation was all about negotiations. That's his specialty, and it's what I train as well.

So these were two people going back and forth, and I always like to learn from peers in the industry on their take on negotiations so I can learn something myself. Because there's all nuances when it comes to negotiations all the way from the start. And this is trying to figure out what I could learn new from him. And so we talked about his overarching philosophy in negotiations and how you have to focus on that first objection, which is basically you're a sales rep. So how do you get past that? And then we talked about active listening, qualifying versus coming with a hypothesis, and then very specifically how he deals with negotiating on price and with procurement. And so very tactical conversation here.

I think you'll see a little bit of value from both of us from a tactical standpoint. Would love to hear your feedback on this one. And maybe this one will help you close that next deal a little bit faster. So I hope you enjoy the conversation as much as I did. Let's make it happen. Brian Will, welcome to the Make It Happen Monday podcast, my friend. How are you doing? John, I appreciate you having me today. Looking forward to it. Yeah, it's going to be a fun one. I think this is two people talking about negotiations who train negotiations. So hopefully this is going to be a pretty valuable episode here. But before we do, who's going to win? That's the question. Well, let's talk about that later on about what win actually means in a negotiation.

But Brian, give us the origin story, man. Where are you coming from growing up and all that other stuff? Like I always say, I want to know where your mentality came from. Parents, work, early age and stuff like that. And then we'll dive into your expertise. So give us a little backstory here. Yeah, I call myself the most unconventionally educated guy out there. Right. So grew up in Ohio, had a grandfather with a third grade education who owned multiple businesses. I used to hang out with in the summertime and run around to his car lots and his construction company and his dozer company. And I don't know at the time if that left an impression on me, but it certainly seems to have as you go back and connect the dots through your life.

So I had a rough childhood, rough upbringing, failed out of high school when I was 16, managed to get back in and graduate, but ended up with like a 1.2 GPA. Had to get kicked out of the house at 18, no place to go. So I joined the military, did four years Air Force, four years Army, did two services, which is weird, but it did. And then got out and couldn't hold a job, kept getting fired from everything I tried to do. And so finally decided that I might as well work for myself because I couldn't work for anybody else. Started my first company. It was in landscaping, built it into seven franchises, lost everything. Had to start over, got into the insurance industry. Two years after I started that, sold it to a venture capital firm.

This was the dawn of the internet back in 1999. Went to work for those guys. We ended up developing a software platform that we sold to the largest insurance carriers in the country. Left there, shorted another online insurance company that I ended up selling to another venture capital firm. It's called getinsured.com today. Powers, I think, nine different states on the ACA exchange. Started another company in the pay-per-performance lead generation space. We sold it to a private equity firm. We were one of the largest digital marketing companies in the country at the time. Got out of that, started doing corporate consulting, sales training, trained thousands of people, sold billions of dollars through our training programs.

Did another couple ventures, started a, bought into a restaurant, turned into a restaurant chain, wrote some books, got into the real estate business, got into politics. I sit on city council now, and I also run a entrepreneurial coaching program currently. So, wow. Quite a diverse background. I was going to say, been pretty busy, huh? That's my ADHD, man. You know, I can't do one thing forever. Yeah. No, I know the feeling. Cool. So, the politics thing, the city council stuff must be interesting these days. Like, I don't want to get into politics, but you must be seeing some very interesting people sit in front of the city council these days with their arguments, huh? You know, I've often thought about politics on a large level, national level, but a buddy of mine who was on city council told me, he said, listen, if you want to be able to meet your friends and neighbors and fellow business owners, find out what their problem is and change it and fix it, and we can do that at city council within two to three weeks.

It's the only level of government where you can make a change that quickly to make a positive impact in the community you live in. And I said, that's for me. Yeah, the whole all politics is local, right? Pretty much. Very cool. All right. So, let's get into it. I mean, I think the topic that caught my attention when we first kind of got engaged here was the negotiations piece, right? Because I train negotiations, but I tend to train it in a very fundamental way, right? In the sense that, you know, not the nuances, not like the Chris Voss of like, you know, deep terror, you know, voice and, you know, inflection points and those type of things. Because to me, negotiations, you know, starts from the minute somebody says, send me information, right?

The minute you and I start talking is when negotiations and breaking down the barrier that negotiation starts from, you know, pricing, right? Because if that's the case, you've already lost. But why don't we start with your kind of overall philosophy on negotiations of like how you look at it? And then let's dive into some of the details of how. And then I'd love to. Well, actually, then I'd love to learn about how things have changed over the years for you since you've been in the game, right? As it relates to negotiations. So let's start with the overarching philosophy here. Yeah. So I heard this the other day and it was a good way to explain the premise behind my teaching is that the sales process, most people think starts the first minute they lay eyes on you, the first minute they hear your voice or whatever.

The sales process does not start then. If you're waiting to start the sales process, when you're meeting your customer, you've waited too long. The sales process starts in the preparation, first of all. You need to be prepared as a salesperson on what your product is. As I like to say, the big why question, why should they buy your product? And even more importantly, why should they buy it from you? Because if you can't answer those two questions, you're literally pushing a commodity. And if you're pushing a commodity, they can buy anywhere. Then you're never going to grow, scale, get big, or be really good at what you do. So preparation is the first thing. After that, my sales training tends to focus on, and I'm not going to say this, but don't judge me too quick, it's overcoming objections.

And everybody goes, yeah, that's what they all say. Right. But we focus on overcoming objections before the client has them. Because if I can overcome your objections before you have them, then you're never going to have them. Right. And then we talk about, well, how do you overcome objections before the client has them? Well, this is part of your preparation. Right. No matter what you sell, and I've been through company after company, whatever your sales team or your sales force is out there selling, they are finding the exact same objections every single time. And it's either price or it's why or the when, right? It's a price. It's the when. When are they looking to buy? If they're looking to buy.

It's about the company. All the whys and the whys are going to be the objections. So if you can identify what those five or six common objections are that your sales force, your sales team is getting every single time, and we can build a sales script or a sales process around that, then we can work through overcoming those objections in what I call the fact-finding phase. And we do that through pause for effect, and we do that through check-ins and positive affirmations, all the things we teach in sales training. But if you can overcome those objections before they have them, then the client gets to the end of the sales process, and they don't have anything left to object to. Right. So that's a simplistic way of saying it.

And then back to our preparation and our overcoming objections, I always focus on the first objection. And this is the same objection in every single sales situation worldwide, right? The very first objection in sales is that you're a salesperson. See, you laughed when I said that. You're like, yep, that's true. Why? Because people automatically distrust salespeople. And I love to use extreme examples to prove my point. And my first example is, have you ever been, John, and bought a new car on a car lot? Have you ever bought a new car? When you walked on the car lot, did you think that the car salesman was going to give you the best price possible at the best deal possible, and he was going to be looking out for your best interests?

No, you did not. I've never, ever, ever had anybody tell me yes. And so if that's the way you feel about the salesperson that you're about to talk to, that's the way people feel about you. Hey, I want to take a quick minute to share with you what I'm working on these days with my new JBSales membership. It includes live monthly training delivered by me on my two signature courses, Filling the Funnel and Driving to Close. It also includes monthly workshops that I'll be running on specific skills and different tech like ChatGPT and how to leverage it in the sales process. And it gives you access to my entire online catalog with every course and every tip I've ever done. You get all of this for $420 a year as an individual or $5,000 for teams.

And as an exclusive offer to my podcast listeners, if you go to www.jbarrows.com and click on the individual or team membership and use code PODCAST, you'll get 20% off. Let's make this happen together. And you have to understand that that wall of mistrust is between you and that client at the very moment they lay eyes on you and at the moment they hear you speak for the first time. That wall of mistrust is between you and that is your first objection. And if you don't figure out how to get that objection to go away, you're going to be fighting that objection during the entire sales process. And that'll be your biggest one, your biggest problem. So with that, I mean, there's a couple of different approaches to that, right?

One is you educate and show that you're not. The other is to just head it off right out of the gate, right? To your point about objection handling, I talk a lot about proactive. Biggest thing I always tell reps is proactive versus reactive when it comes to objection handling. It's the same thing that you say, which is, you know the objection. I have a couple of answers for it based on, you know, so it's not like the first time you've ever dealt with it before. But when it comes to you're a salesperson, I mean, I could easily see, you know, literally like starting with. So I know for a fact that you're probably only going to believe half the shit that comes out of my mouth. So let's start with that, right?

And almost you could start with humor, but are there some other ways that you break down that barrier outside of that? I mean, I know it comes with preparation and show you've done your homework and that type of stuff. But are there some tactical things that you say that are easy ways to just break through that barrier and kind of earn that trust up front? 100%. So what we need to understand is I always, I start off my sales training with people don't like salespeople. It's not that they don't like you as an individual. You're probably a great guy, right? You have kids, you teach, you coach Little League on the weekends, you have parties, your neighbors are over, you're a lot of fun. But when you put your sales hat on, they don't trust you and they don't trust you because they're afraid of you.

And what they're afraid of is they're afraid of being sold. Because everybody thinks if you're a salesperson, you have some sales voodoo magic, you're going to whip out and make them do something they don't want to do. Make them get a deal that is not the best deal possible. They're afraid of you and they're afraid of the unknown, right? If they're afraid of being sold, then they're afraid of the unknown, which is what you're going to do to try to sell them. And so if we can take away the fear of the unknown and the fear of being sold, that wall of mistrust will begin to come down. And so we do that, and this is going to sound funny because I have literally never heard of the Sandler training process before in my life, but I listened to one of your podcasts and I follow their upfront contract to a T.

So I don't know if they stole it from me because I've been doing this for 25 years or I stole it from them subconsciously. But we do that by taking away the fear of the unknown and the fear of being sold. And I would say, hey, John, listen, I understand you're looking for whatever, solar panels. Listen, I don't know if what I've got is going to work for you. So what I need to do is I need to ask you a bunch of questions. And once I get through those questions, we'll make a determination on if what I have is going to fit your need. If it does, I'm going to run through a couple options. I'll give you some pricing and I'm going to let you decide, is that fair enough? Okay. By the way, that is almost freaking word for word on what I read on the Sandler training website and I've never seen it before in my life.

Well, what's funny about that, I always kind of, Sandler's so protective of their stuff. Like they're probably the biggest, you know, they're a franchise model, right? So anybody can be a Sandler rep. And so they control their content really, really strictly. And they actually even go after my good friend, Richard Harris came up with the, I think he calls it the trust contract or something like that. And it's similar. And they actually came after him legally saying, you can't do that. It's ours. And really all the Sandler upfront contract is, is a trial close. It's an if then statement, right? It's like, hey, if we were to address all these things, would you feel comfortable taking that next step with us?

And if not, no worries, right? So that's all it is. And they just put the upfront contract, you know, trademark on it, which is ridiculous. I've never used that terminology. I just call it overcoming the first objection, right? So anyway, that's what we do. And as I like to say, the person is not going to say, no, no, please don't give me my options. Please don't let me decide if it's worth my while. Please lie to me and please take it. They're not going to do that. Yeah. And so at that point, as long as I do what I say I'm going to do, I'm starting the process with them. We are moving through it. They know where they are. I know where they're, they know where they are going. I know where we're going.

And we move through the process from there on. So that is the first objection. And when we, we go into organizations, I just came back from Seattle, Washington, working with an organization in windows and doors. And I had to specify in the window and door business, this is what we say, and this is how we do it. And this is, you know, so that is, that's what I base it on. Overcoming objections before they have them. Now, how do you show, because there's a couple of different, right? I want to get to the pricing objection. That's the one probably always everybody asks about, you know, well, at least they ask for me. But there is an art and a science around showing your preparation for a meeting and building that trust, right?

So I think that, you know, you start by breaking down, like, hey, here's what we're here to talk about. If you're not cool with this afterwards, feel free to kick me out. You know, let me walk you through this. And then there's earning the trust by not just being a dipshit solution sales rep who's just going to ask him a bunch of qualifying questions and then giving him a pitch. But it's to show that prep. It's to show that research. And for me, you know, small, I don't want to say hacks, but just very simple things I do is just say stuff to let, like, to not even let them guess that I've prepared. I'll say, hey, Brian, you know, as I was actually preparing for a meeting, I was taking a look at your website and I noticed if you are whatever, right?

So I set the state letting them know I prepared for this meeting, right? And a lot of times I do that with the agenda before the call even starts. But how do you, I guess, show your expertise of knowledge of their business and their situation? Like, how do you ease into that with kind of guiding them through early on to kind of get them to open up? Because inherently, I think starting with the upfront contract or whatever you want to call it is good, but then there's a part of just engaging with them so that they start to open up with you about, you know, actual information as opposed to just the surface level shit. So how do you build that trust early on and how do you articulate the knowledge that you have?

So I call it active listening and connective response. Okay. You have to actively listen to the client. And when you respond, don't respond with some canned thing about your product. You have to make a connective response, right? So if you and I are talking, I think you're in, are you in Massachusetts right now, John? Yep. Yeah. So I like to, I've never been to Massachusetts. I'd love to go up there sometime. Don't you have the Liberty Bell or something up there? No, that's a, that's a, that's a Philly. See, you just laugh. We made it, I made a connective response to something that I was completely wrong, but you're laughing. You're like, oh my God, no, that's not us. And suddenly it starts to build a little trust.

It doesn't really matter, but you got to actively listen and make connective responses, right? And then it's really all about the questions. And in our training, we talk about the why and the when. So I would say, you know, whatever we're selling, I'd say, hey, John, I understand you're looking for these solar panels. Have you shopped anyplace else? And you'd be like, uh, yes. Great. Where'd you shop? X, Y, Z. It's a great company. Why didn't you buy from? Like, why would you not buy from them? It's amazing how people will tell you what's wrong with your competition, but you're not saying it. They are right. Well, no, I haven't shopped. So we're the first ones. Yes. Why'd you decide to come see us?

Well, I either read your reviews online, ding, ding, ding, or my neighbor told me, or I just did a Google search. You did a Google search. Okay. Well, did you read the reviews online? I'm going to ask you question after question. And as you answer, I'm going to try to make these connected responses because I have to build likability and trust. And then part of my preparation is I'm a professional. I know my product, right? As you start telling me what you're looking for, I'm going to start registering everything in my head that you're looking for. If you shopped my competition, I'm going to register what you didn't like. So I don't do that. Right. And if we just continue asking the right questions as opposed to pitching product, you will begin to build that trust.

And as I like to say, clients will close themselves if you do the question and answer portion correctly. Because, again, this gets back to we got to pause for effect and check in and get positive affirmations and all this stuff we can't get into because we don't have enough time. But done right, they'll close themselves. Yeah. So where do you think, you know, I think there's this transition that we're in, right? I mean, you know, Xerox came out with solution selling back in the early 80s, something like that, where it was, you know, asking really good questions. And it started like that was the transition from product pitch, right? And I think the internet ultimately took the product pitch value away from us.

And this, you know, where we before the internet, we did have the information. So it was somewhat valid to give you a product pitch because you've never seen this before, right? But then solution selling and the internet came out kind of ruined that. And then it came to, and I'm sure you've heard the stats, but, you know, corporate executive board came out with a stat a long time ago with challenger sale, how by the time somebody comes to us or whatever, they're already 60 to 70% of the way through the sales process because they're selling from so much information out there about us. And so now, you know, I did a call with a good friend of mine, Doug Landis, who has this theory that traditional discovery is dead, right?

Like asking just basic questions and then flipping it over to a solution that can solve those problems. And you right now, especially if you're talking with executives, you have to come with some type of hypothesis. You have to come based on your research, based on the prep that you do for that meeting. If you're going to meet with an executive, C-level, whoever, discovering or qualifying them ain't going to fly. Like you have to punch them in the mouth with something that, hey, based on my knowledge, here's what my assumptions are, da-da-da-da-da, you know, here's what I think might be your issue, that type of thing. So where do you fall on that, asking questions versus having a hypothesis when you're talking specifically to like executives of, you know, of companies, if you will, versus individuals?

You know, I'm not sure I believe in the discovery being dead because I tell people this all the time. People get so enamored with the name on the front of the building that they forget that they're just talking to people. Mm-hmm. Okay. I don't care what company you work for and what C-level you've got. You're still a person. And people still react the same. They still want to make a connection. They still want to, you know, buy from somebody they like and somebody they trust. They still want somebody who's a professional. These are still people. Don't get so enamored with the name on the front of the building that you forget you're talking to people, right? And, again, we're just back to this question and answer.

I could give you an example. I was selling software for a company. And they called me in after the first team went in and were bombing. Because the first team went in with a PowerPoint presentation and the executive team was at the table. And the guy was standing up there talking and he's at the PowerPoint going on. His team was over. And it was bombing bad. So, they called me in. And I went in. I had to fly out to California. I got there. And I walked in the next morning and I was facing the Spanish Inquisition, quite frankly. They were already done with us. They didn't want to see what the new sales guy had to say. And I could read that in the room like just hostility. And so, my team sitting over here on my right, PowerPoint behind me, I grabbed a chair and I pulled up to the table with him and sat down.

And I said, all right, I'm not going to sell you guys. I'm not here to pitch you a product. However, I have used your product. And this is what I found was wrong with it. You tell me if you think that's right or wrong. And they all said, well, yeah, that is right. I said, exactly. Now, you tell me what else. What other problems are you having with this thing? And we sat down and talked for 30 minutes and ended up closing a $6 million software sale. Because I literally, instead of selling, just had a conversation with somebody. Yeah, I think that's a little bit of, like, slightly what you explained there to me is a little bit of both, right? Because you kind of gave your opinion about something.

So, that's a lot of design thinking, right? Like, you became, you were a customer of them. So, you could give insights that they didn't have or they probably knew but, you know, weren't able to talk about it with a sales rep. So, there's a little bit of prospectus there of like, hey, like, this is what I see as a challenge, right? Hypothesis, if you will. What else? And then the questions there. So, I think that's the balance that I think reps are trying to figure out here. Yeah, remember, they called you because they have a problem. They didn't call you because they were bored on a Tuesday and they wanted to sit with a salesperson for an hour and a half. So, what is the problem? Yeah. Go figure it out.

And then in your head, maybe try it, use it, whatever. And then that way, when you walk in the door, you can have an honest conversation with somebody. Yeah. So, how has the, how have, I want to get to other aspects of negotiations, but I'm curious from your perspective on how you see, in the years that you've been doing this, negotiations, I guess, as a bucket umbrella topic here, how it's changed? Like, or has it, right? Is it still fundamentally the same in the sense that preparation, you know, setting the stage, breaking down the barriers and objections and, you know, and then sharing, you know, and asking good questions. Has it changed over the past 20 years? Yeah. I don't think human nature has changed.

This, the basis of the negotiation, what has changed is what you talked about earlier. And it's the, it's the unbelievable amount of information that's already on the internet that they can already go out and have done their research before you ever get there. That's the change. If you walk in today and try to BS somebody, I go back to my car example. When I walk in and the guy tells me, this is my sticker. And I say, no, it's not. Dude, I already looked that up online. Right. I love extreme examples like this. So, the information out there has changed the client's ability to understand what they're talking to you about more so than they ever have in the past. So, another reason why you need to be a professional, do your preparation, know what you're talking about when you walk in.

But fundamentally, people are still people. Quick break here to highlight another one of the podcasts on the HubSpot Podcast Network, the audio destination for business professionals. Now, this one is Success Story, hosted by Scott Clary. Success Story features Q&A sessions with successful business leaders, keynote presentations, and conversations on sales, marketing, business, startups, and entrepreneurship. And I just got introduced to this podcast recently, and one of the ones that really caught my attention was the one with Ryan Blair. Ryan's the founder of Aftercall, a platform that offers science-based healing modalities such as meditation and breathwork to awaken humanity to the next level of consciousness.

He also created the Blair Foundation, a nonprofit that supports entrepreneurship education for single mothers and at-risk youth. Now, you all know I've been on this journey to learn a lot more about myself and spirituality and all the different things that are more important than the day-to-day lives, and this is really getting into it. And you also know that I'm a huge proponent of helping at-risk youth and single mothers and women in sales and everything else. So, this really struck home. So, listen to Success Story wherever you get your podcasts, and let's make it happen. Yeah, and I think that's – I think the power shift, to your point, of like they have more information, like a corporate executive board, that whole thing.

But I do agree, the human nature – that's why I tend to read a lot more books on psychology than I do about sales, right? Because psychology doesn't change. Tactics change left and right and sideways daily at this point. Let me ask you this. Do you know Dave Meltzer? I do not, no. He's a big – he's a coach to three of Fortune 50 CEOs in this country. This is a big-time guy, right? Like Tim Cook of Apple has a coach. These guys all have coaches as well as board of directors. And I was on his podcast. He was on mine. And I asked him a question. I said, you're coaching some of the biggest names in the business. What's the difference between doing that and coaching somebody who's running a $10 or $20 million company?

And he said, nothing. Really? Same issues. He goes, now, I help them with dealing with a board of directors and dealing with an investor group or dealing with the public, whatever. But from a personal management standpoint and how they deal and how they – it's all the same. Yeah, I think ultimately people – that's why I try to – younger reps, when they always freak out talking to a senior executive, I'm like, do yourself a favor. Next time you go to the store, next time you go to the grocery store, just look in line. And I guarantee you somebody in line who's probably all disheveled and their kids are, you know, hanging all over them. That's probably an executive that you're scared of. And they put their pants on just like you do.

All right, so let's dig into the pricing one, right? Because I think that's the one that people are getting the absolute shit kicked out of them right now, which is, you know, I mean, across the board, it's brutal when it comes to pricing. Because I'm noticing – I've heard stories of CFOs right now just blanket sending an email to every vendor that they have, you know, of, hey, we need a 30 – we're going to cancel our contract unless we get 30% off or 50% off or something absurd. And it's like this, what the shit do I do with this? So, obviously, hopefully, we have a really good relationship and we have some champions in there that can fight with us. But what's your approach to dealing with the pricing, right?

And knowing that pricing is going to be an objection, so that's going to be the ones that we tackle along the way here. Do you just come right out and ask, like, where is pricing following this decision or do you build value first? Like, how do you handle the pricing objection, but also as it relates to negotiations? Honestly, I tend to do that more upfront, I would say, in the first 20% of the conversation. And I do it – I call it anchoring the sale, right? This is the way I do it. And I know what is available to me. I know what price range I can be in, whether – depending on the level of product or service I'm providing. So, the first question I would say is – or not the first. One of the questions I would say around pricing is, listen, the product solution you're looking at ranges from whatever, $25,000 to $75,000, depending on the bells and whistles.

So, I don't want to waste a lot of your time, so you tell me where in that range you want to fall. You want to be on the bottom end at $25,000 or the top end at $75,000, and they say, we can do $25,000? You know, then I'm – I know I'm never going to close 100% of my deals ever. So, if you're telling me out of the gate that I can't even do you at my low-end $25,000, then there's not much I can do for you here. So, let me – like, this is the one I always struggle with a little bit, right? Which is – say they – like, they can, right? Because ultimately – like, because there's above the power line, below the power line, right? Below the power line, they get given a budget, and they're told you can't do anything.

Above the power line, you can fuck around with budgets a little bit and steal money from other places. It's really about the belief in the ROI. Like, when I have a conversation about – like, one of my – and you and I are similar fields. Like, my first question to you is – well, one of my questions to you is, what's your ACV? What's your average contract value, right? Because I'm the same range, like, 25 to 75. Like, and if your ACV is, like, $500, I know I'm going to have a hard time selling you a $25,000 thing, right? But if your ACV is $100,000, you and I are not having this conversation. Like, I literally say to people when they're like, oh, John, you're too expensive. I'm like, no, I'm not.

And you're like, excuse me? I'm like, I'm not. I'm like, like, you told me your ACV is $100,000. You're telling me that by going through my training, not one person is going to get one extra deal that's going to close? Then why are we even having this conversation, right? So, my point is, I guess, pricing is always relative, right? Budget is always relative. And so, if somebody says no, but you're looking at them and, you know, you look at them from the outside, they fit a similar perspective, you know you can add value, you know they got that problem that you just identified to that other person, how do you handle that? Like, where you're just like, you know, because you might walk away from something where if you dug a little bit, because I'm the same with you.

I walk away from shit. I'm like, if you can't afford this, I'm out. I don't want to waste my time here. But I also look at it, I'm like, shit, you actually do really need this, and I could really make a difference for your business, but that $500 budget that you have is just ridiculous. I literally had this conversation this morning. Somebody that came out of my past from about three years ago, hey, man, I really want to talk to you about your coaching program. I really would love to have your help, and can we have a conversation? I was hoping, since we're friends, you could maybe cut me a break on the price. And I said, I got to be honest with you, I don't even know if I can work with you, number one.

Number two, I'm already working on so many projects now, there is no discount on the price. Number three, I got to be honest with you, if you work with me, you're going to make way more money than what I'm charging you to do this. So you need to make a decision if it's worth making way more money, or if you're just worried about a price. And so he was like, okay, fine, I'm in. And again, John, this depends on the product or service, right? There's a difference in selling somebody at IBM who's got a big budget, and maybe they don't even know what their bottom dollar is, versus somebody that's selling $25,000 coaching program, or $50,000 worth of solar panels, or this company in Oregon, $50,000 worth of windows.

So that answer is, I think, subjective a little bit to the person that you're selling to, or the process, or the company, and how much you really want to dig into it. I found on the corporate world, a lot of times, the people we're selling to, at least in the beginning, aren't the people that are really going to make those decisions anyway. And by the time you get to the end of the sales process, now you're talking to the people that are going to say, done, right? But I think that's kind of usually the, I guess how, I call it sophisticated versus unsophisticated buyers, right? There's sophisticated buyers who know what they're talking about. They usually have a good idea. They've seen the options out there, and they know roughly what things should cost.

And then there's the unsophisticated buyer that is just basically looking, right? They're Googling, and they're usually being told what to do. And I'm a lot more direct with the unsophisticated buyer, right? Like, I'll say, if somebody's like, well, I only have a budget of $10,000, I'll be like, good luck, quite frankly. But based on what you told me you're trying to do, there's not anybody in this industry I know that will do that for $10,000. Yeah, I got to be honest. I know this industry inside and out. I know everybody in it, and that's not going to happen. And if you think it will, go out there and look. But I'd be very, very careful about what you may think you're going to get for that, because it's just not out there.

Yeah, and I think that's what's so important. That's where I think reps struggle the most is when they, you know, pricing is, I think, the reason that most reps flake on pricing is because they don't really have a good understanding of where pricing comes from. So, question for you. You and I both know how we came up with our pricing, what's involved in our pricing, how much we're worth, and all that other stuff. But most, you know, 23, 24, 25-year-old reps who come into an organization, that's the price. They always get beat up on it, so they're always shy about it. So, they always, you know, when somebody says, how much is it? The answer should, you know, say it's $10,000. The answer should be $10,000.

Right. But most reps don't say that. They say, well, it's $10,000, but it really depends on. So, I guess, is it important for a rep to know what goes into the pricing so they can justify it when given an objection, right? Because as you know, and I, you know, there's the justification approach. Well, this is why we charge what we do. Is should they just really be focused on the value they can bring to the client? That's a good question. I don't really know if I have the perfect answer for you. In fact, I would like to hear your answer to that question. Yeah. I think it's, you know, it's an interesting one because I, to a certain degree, it's not the client's business, right? It's like, for me, it's like, well, how'd you come up with your pricing?

None of your fucking business, right? Like, I came up with my pricing because I came up with my pricing. But I do know what I invest in. I do know why I'm so confident in my pricing, right? And because I also know how good I personally am at doing in the results I've delivered. But I think that there is something to be said for, from a business, from a business acumen standpoint. Because I always look at things from a perspective of, yes, sales techniques are great, right? But if you really want to improve your sales results, improve your business acumen. Understand how businesses work. Understand how businesses make money. Understand how investments get made, right? And so, I think it's important to know whether I use that information to justify it.

That might come across sounding like a little shitty to a client to say, well, the reason that we're so expensive is because we invest XYZ and R&D and everything else. But I think my answer is more about the confidence that this just isn't a made-up price and that this is where we're going and why we invest and what our roadmap is and how we're allowed to do these things versus the knowledge exactly of why so I can justify it to the client, if you know what I mean. You know, we have a saying in politics, if you're explaining, you've already lost. Yeah, exactly. Right? So, there's some semblance to that also in sales. It's just not – it is what it is. Like, my pricing is this and that's what it is.

I mean, I – Well, I think the challenge, like, I live mostly in the SaaS world, right? And so, SaaS pricing is, like – It's an enigma, right? It's like, oof, can nose. And most of these companies are unprofitable. So, it's like, you can't tell me that you – So, you look at it and you're like, well, I know, like, for Salesforce, for instance, $1,500 a license. It costs them a fraction of a penny to give me that extra license. So, I'm not saying it's all profit, but it's pretty freaking profitable to say – So, that's why I feel bad for reps who are selling SaaS-type solutions. It's like, well, I have 100 licenses here. Well, that should be X amount of dollars. Well, come on. It doesn't cost you that much more.

Give me an extra 20 for free or something like that, right? And they have a hard time. So, let's use that scenario. Say it's 100 licenses. The client's trying to get additional or beat you up a little bit. Outside of justifying pricing, outside of trying to deal with that objection up front, what else do you do in that scenario? Or do you get something else in return? Like, how flexible are you on some of that stuff towards the end? So, it's interesting. I also, again, as I said on City Council, get to make decisions on buying licensing. I mean, we just did a giant one with Microsoft not too long ago. So, I can see both sides of that argument. So, if I was talking to you about buying those, I would tell you that everything's negotiable.

If I'm talking to you about selling them, then my first question to you as a salesperson is, do you have any room personally to make a decision to either knock that price down or give them a deal? Because if you don't, then we don't even have, you don't need to have this discussion because you don't have that option. If you do, then now we're going to get into this whole, you know, conversation about how you anchor and what you're willing to give up and what you're not. So, I mean, I just renegotiated a deal with Microsoft and we got a deal. So, it is possible to do. But, again, we're back to what the salesperson's authorization is. Yeah. And I think that's the problem is that, like, it's so flexible for most organizations as far as pricing is concerned.

And when a rep does, I think the unfortunate part is a rep will almost always default to what they can give away, right? That is a challenge. Right? They'll lead with whatever the price, like I said, or even how they present it. It's $10,000, but it really depends. Like, now, I might have listened to your competition. I heard $20,000 from this one, $15,000 from this one. I heard $10,000 from you. I was like, holy shit, that's actually really, like, that's really good. But, literally, as soon as the word but comes out of your mouth, I'm not paying $10,000 anymore. Like, you just gave me a discount without even me asking for it. Again, I think we're back to your preparation and knowing your competition.

And, hey, who have you shopped with? Well, we looked at XYZ Company and XYZ Company over here. Really? That's, I mean, they're great companies. Why didn't you go with them? What were they wanting to charge you? You need to be doing your due diligence not only before but during the sales process to find those questions out because that's an objection we want to try and overcome when we get down the road, if possible. We're back to overcoming objections before they have them. Can't do that unless you have the info. I think that's the challenge right now. It's almost a race to the bottom right now with a lot of people. And a race to the bottom is always a loser, right? I know. Always. The guy at the bottom is going to go out of business and yet you're trying to compete with him.

And that's what scared me about a lot of this SaaS stuff. It was a race to the bottom purposely just to get top line revenue numbers versus profitability. And there's a lot of those companies that, I mean, WeWork's a perfect example. You know, there's a million of them out there that you can use as storylines to say, well, yeah. That's why they're doing that, right? Because they can, but guess what? They might not be around anymore. The perfect example, I own a little chain of restaurants and one of my restaurants been there for 35 years and I've owned it for 13. And every two years, another restaurant pops up nearby and they offer cheaper beer and cheaper food. And my staff freaks out, oh my God, sales are going down.

We got to lower prices. And I'm like, no, they will go out of business just like the last 12. Most recent one is they had cash poker games, which are illegal in the state of Georgia. And they said, well, we have to offer cash poker games. I'm like, no, first of all, we're not breaking the law. That's crazy. And second, we're just not going to do it. And it wasn't 60 days later that place was shut down and they're out of business. So race to the bottom doesn't work. No, it doesn't. That's why I think it's, it also, to your point earlier about like knowing who you are as a business, right? Are you the low cost provider? Well, then your negotiation is going to take a different approach than if you're the high cost, high value provider, then go from there.

All right. What, as it relates to procurement, right? I mean, legal and procurement. There's one thing about negotiating with our buyer. And then there's that wall that gets thrown up with procurement. And usually it's almost, you know, ideally you have the champion that guides you through there and tells you what the landmines are going to be and, you know, all that other stuff. But say you're in that, hey, our process is, it was our process. You and I come to an agreement here and then you go over to talk to procurement and good luck with it. Do you take a different approach when it comes to procurement and legal as it relates, you know, compared to the approach you take with the business or the technical buyer, if you will?

You know, the only thing I will do is set myself up as the buyer's representative within the system to give them the – I mean, I hate to say this, but I'm giving them the illusion that I can help them through the process. I mean, sometimes I can't, but I might just be there sounding bored to complain about what's going on and, oh, you know what? That makes me mad too. Let me go see what I can do. Ah, unfortunately, then you're just back into your sales game. Unfortunately, I can't do anything about that. But, yeah, if you set yourself up as just the buyer's champion within the process, at least they're going to like you. They might not like the company, but they might – they'll always like you.

So, how about walk-away lines? Do you believe in walk-away lines? And I use the example of, you know, Shark Tank, right? Where it's like, you know, it always cracks me up when people walk in. They're like, I'll give 20% of my business for 30%, you know, for, you know, whatever, $100,000. And then they walk out giving away 90% of their business for 50 bucks. And it's like, what happened? And I look at it as, well, you have to have a walk-away line. But that walk-away line is like it's like – like say it's 30% for 100 grand. Like that's your – like you come in at 20, you'll go to 30. But once it hits 31, F off, right? I'm out of here. That 1% is such a hard thing to walk away from. You know what I mean?

Like if it does get there and it's like, you know, they'll say, okay, give me 32.5%. But your walk-away line in your head was 30 grand or 30% no matter what, so F off. A, do you believe in walk-away lines? B, what's your approach to them when it gets past the point? Because I believe we all have a walk-away line in our head whether we like it or not. Buyers and sellers both, by the way. The fear of loss is the fear of loss. If you're trying to sell me something for 100 and I'm offering it 80 and we're all the way down to 82, you have the same fear of loss of losing the sale that you've already decided what you're going to spend the money on, right? And it's like, oh my God, it's only 1% but I talk about in my book all the time, you need to walk away.

And my argument has been the very worst that's going to happen is you're going to get it for the other price. That's the worst that's going to happen, right? They're not going to be like, I'll sell it to you for 82 and you say 81 and we walk away and when I come back, they want 83. They're still going to want it. It's still 82, right? But I will walk away because I don't get emotionally involved in these type of deals in any deal. I'll walk away and then let everything sit. And I'm telling you, it's amazing how many times those deals will still happen. 100% walk away. It's that call in their bluff, basically. And I think that's what I learned from a good friend of mine was they, especially when it comes to procurement, they call it nibbling, where what they'll do is they'll wait all the way to the end, right?

Literally day of signing. And they'll just get that one extra little shit thing right before. So they'll say, like, say you agreed to a three-year contract at this discount rate and everything's locked up and whatever. They'll come back right at the end and be like, look, we're ready to go. Just instead of doing a three-year, we just want a one-year. So if you just make that quick little upgrade, you know, we'll sign today. And most reps will fold because they're so, like, they put so much into it, right? I do it all the time to reps. Yeah. And then what you do is you just say, okay, no, sorry. And you walk away and 90% of the time, nine times out of 10, they'll probably say, all right, well, let's move forward.

Yeah. We call this the Brian Will Negotiation Sales Training Course within my companies. And all my managers that work for me know it. They're like, oh, my God, here we go. I can't believe that worked. Because I'll be like, no, tell them no, walk away. And they'll come back and they say, okay, they did the deal. Yep. Yep. And I think that's where, like, again, know your audience, right? Know how much value, know that you are the best provider. I think there's got to be some confidence in there that you know you're the best fit for what they're trying to accomplish and that the others aren't. And it's not seen as a, you know, apples to apples comparison of you and the vendor who is 20%, 30%, 50% cheaper.

I always tell people, listen, you better become a good negotiator in whatever business you're in. Because if you're not and you come up against a good negotiator, you're going to lose. Yeah. Yeah, that's why there's a couple of things I picked up from Chris Voss where, like, you know, professional negotiators will act. You know, everybody says we want a win-win situation. Like, that's the ultimate goal, right? But if somebody ever walks into a negotiation and says they want a win-win, all your spidey senses should be up. Because they're probably a professional negotiator and they're going to start with a very inflated version of what they want and end up ultimately how they wanted. Whereas you're going to start with what you wanted and then you're going to end up with less.

Yep. You're going to let the client, if you let the other person anchor that sale, whether the top or the bottom, you've already, you're screwed. You need to anchor it. Richard Branson has this quote, if your first offer, if your first offer doesn't insult them, you've offered too much. Which gets back to the no. Like, no matter what the offer is, I'm going to say no. Just because it's just no. I may end up paying what you want, but my first answer is no. All right. So, let's finish with this. What's been your favorite negotiations that you've ever done that you got, like, you thought was fun? You know what I mean? And it wasn't just easy. Like, was there one that stands out for you that you were like, that was a blast?

So, this one was on a purchase I made. So, I told you I own a small chain of restaurants. This goes back about 13 years. And I had looked at my friend of mine who's a broker sends me this thing for a restaurant that was for sale. And I said, send me the numbers. And so, he sent me the numbers on the restaurant. I realized that they had four of this. It was a little four restaurant chain. And I looked at the numbers and I looked at the P&Ls and realized that we had what we call a distressed owner, not a distressed business. And so, I said, well, send me all four. I want to look at all four restaurants, not just one, which would have been way over a million dollars to buy. And so, I got the numbers and I started doing my due diligence, by the way, my preparation for the negotiation, only to find out that this guy was six months behind in his rent.

He hadn't paid his federal taxes of the tune of about 180 grand and he hadn't paid state taxes of the tune of about 105. So, he was almost $600,000 in debt. I also found out by talking to the landlords that they had filed a dispossessory against the guy and they were going to shut him down the following Monday. This was the day before Halloween 2010. So, I called the broker and I said, have this guy meet us over at the restaurant. And so, I went into one of the restaurants and I met him. His name was Billy. I said, here's the deal, Billy. I'm not bullshitting you. You're out of business on Monday. You got nothing to sell. You owe everybody everything. So, here's what you're going to do. I handed him four pieces of paper.

I said, you're going to sign over all these restaurants to me and you're going to walk away. I'll let you drink for free for six months. And in turn, I will help get you out of some of this debt. I ain't paying it, but I'll get you out of some of this debt. And he signed. And I got four restaurants doing about $6 million in revenue for $0. I mean, left the money in the till, the liquor on the shelves, the food in the freezers. He just walked out the door so he could drink for free for six months. That was an amazing deal I did. I made millions of dollars off of those restaurants. Nice. Yeah. I mean, again, it's – and I'm always curious. It's due diligence though. Yeah, exactly. Due diligence, right?

Because you have to – there's the other thing about lifestyle versus growth businesses that I always look at, right? Especially when it comes to individual owners, like are they doing this for a lifestyle and what does that lifestyle look like? Because I go back to Shark Tank. Like some people like have got their whole life savings and then the sharks look at them and say, what if we just bought this from you for a million bucks? Like – and they – you know, it's their baby and they're like, no, but it's like you got to give that away because you are just – this is going to be your boat anchor. That's going to take you down. Be psyched that somebody is willing to pay a million dollars for something you created, right?

Or be psyched that somebody is just going to get you out of debt so you don't have to deal with this anymore. 100%. Those guys are expert negotiators, man. You're not going to win against them. No. Absolutely not. Awesome. Well, this has been fun, Brian. Tell people where they can find out or a little bit more information about you, your program and everything else and where they want you – where you want them to connect with you. Yeah, brianwillmedia.com. brianwillmedia.com. My books are on there, my podcasts, my coaching programs. Everything's on brianwillmedia.com. If you have any questions, drop me a message on there. We'll get back to you. Awesome. I appreciate it. And everybody listening, it's a pretty easy name, Brian Will, W-I-L-L.

You can probably find him on LinkedIn and all the wonderful social channels. Yeah, so your profile is pretty legit. So I'm looking at it right now, as a matter of fact. But awesome, Brian. Well, thank you so much for coming on, man. I really appreciate it. It was, like I said, a fun conversation. John, thanks for having me on Make It Happen Mondays. Love it. And for everybody out there, I hope you enjoyed the conversation. Such as I did give you some good nuggets and tips and things to think about that you can use to negotiate towards the end of this year and close out that you're strong. And like I always say at the end of all these podcasts, go out there and make somebody smile today. Because no matter how bad your day went or you think it's going, you make somebody smile and you know you had a good day.

And the world needs a lot more of that right now. So thank you all very much. And I will see you on the other side. I hope you enjoyed that conversation as much as I did. With your support and our incredible guests, we're one of the top sales podcasts out there right now. And I can't thank you enough. Now, to keep the momentum going, it would mean the world to me if you could go and leave a five-star review on your favorite podcast platform and share some of your favorite episodes with your network. Also, check out my new website, jbarrows.com, where you'll find even more ways to engage. There's a ton of free content, and you can also get trained from me directly as an individual or for your team.

Look, I'm out there selling every day just like you are, and I'm doing my best to stay on top of all the latest trends in sales and technology. So if you're looking to level up and you give a shit about this profession of sales, let's connect and make it happen together.