Episode 6: Why We Call It THE SLOW PITCH

Rob 0:00
Hey everyone, I thought it might be a good idea to point on a couple of things for this episode. What I want you to listen for in this podcast is how there’s a process from starting the sales process to finalizing the sale, it’s not as easy as getting the prospect to decide, nor is it as easy as forcing a decision. In this episode, we’re gonna talk about the four big steps to getting a sale. Notice the cadence and the speed at which we talk. In this episode, you’ll notice reflective of what we’re recommending, slow it down. We’ll talk about why that’s important. Remember, you can’t get to third base without passing second, and I think this is the most important nugget you’ll get out of this episode. So listen for it. Once again. Thank you for listening. And now here’s why we call this podcast, this low pitch podcast.

Welcome back to the slow pitch podcast. Hey, how’s it going over there, Lane?

Lane 0:52
I’m doing great. Rob. How about you?

Rob 0:54
I’m doing fantastic. what’s new on your side?

Lane 0:57
The other day someone asked me why we call the slow pitch. Obviously, I know and you know, but it strikes me that we should probably explain to people why we call this podcast the slow pitch.

Rob 1:08
You know, that’s probably a good idea. I know I’ve had people ask me as well. And there’s so many elements to this, that I think it would help to go through that. So let’s do that. For me. I think when we started talking about putting this together, the slowpitch really reminds us all as salespeople to slow things down. There’s a lot of people out there that are very pushy salespeople, and they want to get the sale as quickly as possible. But here’s what it feels like to me. When somebody is pushy, and wants the sale bad. They stink. And what I mean by that is they have this smell about them that says I need this sale really bad. The smell

Lane 1:44
of desperation, smell

Rob 1:45
of desperate, yes, and it’s bad, you do not want that smell. So the slow pitch is really about slowing things down. And if you slow things down, people will come along, people will want you to move faster, people will want more information they will want want want. And it’s like we talked about one time before in another episode was leave them wanting more. And if you can leave them wanting more, they’re more likely to continue to come back. That said if they call you and say we need your service or your product right now, can I buy it and you have to go through a sales process. They’re not ready to buy, they should not be buying and they’re not ready yet. Because as soon as you start telling them prices, they’re not going to buy because now they’re you know, now they’re in a negotiation phase, where they’re like, Well, you know, we need it. But we don’t need it that bad, right? And so all of a sudden now it’s like, well, can you can you? Can you sell me that for this instead of that which you know, 20 3040 50% off, and it doesn’t work very well. So for salespeople, because why would you want to display

Lane 2:50
it? Right? You need to notice the value before you can get to

Rob 2:53
Yeah, and and both sides need that really if like, if I’m selling something, how do I know that what I’m selling is even worthwhile to you. I’m the kind of person that if I find out that you want to buy something I want to know is it going to be beneficial for you. Because if it’s not, I don’t want to sell it to you, I don’t wanna take your money, I want you mad at me, my reputation is more important than me getting money. So that’s really an important differentiation between good salespeople and ban salespeople. And that they can tell the difference between this is money, I’m going to take it versus this is a value, they really want it and it’s worthwhile for them to buy. That is really the difference. And so that’s why this slowpitch that’s how that came about in that whole conversation. Because everything we do is about a little bit slowing things down a little bit so that the prospect the buyer wants something more out of you. And you know, you you’ve got them where you want them in a sense, right so that they’re ready to buy when they’re ready to buy if it makes sense. All these things line up.

Lane 3:50
So rapidly, there’s been several steps. How do you really know when to move from one step to the next? Yeah. See,

Rob 3:56
that’s where we started that conversation. And you’re right, the first step really is essentially in baseball, because it’s the slow pitch,

Lane 4:02
you know, we have the basis, we just have to be careful about the basis and what we’ve what other people would have.

Rob 4:09
Yeah, so if you’re getting to first base. That may mean one thing but but in sales for me, that means there’s a couple of initial conversations happening. We’re really starting to get to know each other, we’re kind of having an exploratory conversation. And so in this first base stage, it’s very similar.

Lane 4:29
It’s very similar to dating Yeah, now

Rob 4:31
that I think about it. Yeah. So I’m at first base and we’re getting to know each other. So I want to know your your likes and your dislikes, and I want to know what you Okay, maybe not all that stuff, but I want to know your personality. I want to know what you need from me to know that we’re going to be a good fit as a as a buyer seller relationship. I want to know that your personality fits. Do I want to work with you? Do you want to work with me? Very similar, right? I also want to know like, Are you the kind of person that has to see everything Do you need to understand everything because it’s in front of you visually. Or in the case of listening to podcasts, they’re typically people that are of the audible style, right? They, they want to hear things, they want to sound it out, they need a sounding board, there’s things that they need, that they’re going to need to have from an audible standpoint. And then, and then there’s the other group that’s really like, they just have to get a grasp of things. And they’ve got to have an understanding and a gut feeling. Right? So are they those almost like the kinesthetic people?

Lane 5:32
You learn by doing? Get your hands dirty?

Rob 5:34
Yeah, yeah, exactly. Right. Yeah. So if you’re a kinesthetic, there’s things that you just can, you know, you can get a good grasp on. But not until you get the grasp Will you buy, right? So this is kind of the important pieces of that first base. Because if you don’t go to first base and understand those pieces, you’re never going to move to second base, because something’s just doesn’t feel right doesn’t feel raw, there’s, something’s off. If you’re a prospect, how many times have you gone shopping, and when you start to interact with that salesperson, or the person that needs to go through the steps with you, you feel like they’re just not quite right. I don’t know something about him at all like, and sometimes they don’t even know what it is. And the salesperson doesn’t even know what’s happening. That’s happened before, it’s happened to me on both sides of that equation. And so that’s part of the first base stuff. The second base stuff, if you remember correctly, it’s really about finding the pain parts, right? what’s important to them? You know, what, what do they really need? You know, how much is this costing them?

Lane 6:37
So how is that different from from first base, basically, where you’re, you’re learning about them when you learn about some of those pain points during that first base phase?

Rob 6:47
Yes and no. So they’ll tend to during a first base phone call, let’s call it or initial meeting, they’ll tend to want to share some things that sounds like pain. But I will give you this, that the things that they talk about initially, in the beginning, are never really what’s the important piece to them? There, nobody opens up very, very quickly to tell you listen, unless they’re bleeding, okay, unless they’re a bleeding neck, which is what I have from a phrase that I would bring up as a bleeding neck. If you’re going to the hospital, because you have a bleeding neck, it is urgent, you need to do something you’re gonna buy today, it doesn’t matter what’s happening, right? Right. But it doesn’t happen very often. They may sound like they’re a bleeding neck. But they’re not really a bleeding neck. They’re there’s they’re saying these are the things that I want to fix, or these are the problems I’m having. But they’re really not. So those are the initial conversations. Once you get to second base, you’re having conversations about what are the problems they’re having? What are the problems you’re solving? What are the issues that they’re trying to take care of? How much is this impacting you? Is this costing you money, is your money that you could be making, if you get this, whatever the service or product is, Are there things that need to get done, so that you can move as a business further along, but you need my service or product to get there. And if all these things are in line, and it’s costing that business money, or it will make that business more money, then it’s a worthwhile cause for them right to purchase that product or service. But

Lane 8:20
I’m trying to read those signals.

Rob 8:21
Yeah, and you have to understand those signals, but not only the signals, you need to have those real conversations. So second base, I feel like is where all the magic happens. second base is the best place on the field to because when you’re on the field, you could see everything around you everything that’s going on, on that baseball field. So you can see the catcher giving the signals, you can see what they’re where the pitcher is looking, you can see where the outfield is standing where they’re if they’re drifting more left or right, because they want to make sure that because the person that bad is, is hits more more to the right field or left field. There. There’s all kinds of things you can see from that position. And you learn those things by asking all the critical questions, and getting that prospect to open up, give you some answers so that you have a good feeling and understanding that it’s worthwhile for them to buy. If you don’t have that feeling, then you might as well just stay on second base and not go any further. Just wait wait it out. That’s what I would have. Because at that point, you’re gonna have to tell them we’re not a good fit. And I’m sorry, that just doesn’t work. And that’s a weird and hard, difficult conversation to have. Because if you’ve already made it a second base, you think, well, I can make it home. But guess what, you’re not gonna there’s no no need and there’s no pain. There’s no expenses that are happening because you don’t have your product or service. And I think that’s that’s a critical component that a lot of people miss is that until you have that you have no sale. I don’t know if that’s clear enough. But if you don’t have any sort of pain, you don’t have a sale and that has happened to me 99 times more than I would like to admit that I go down that road and think that I got paid until I started to figure out and realize that with No pain, there is no sale. And I don’t care how hard you force it try it is not going to happen, you can do a suicide squeeze and it ain’t going into home, I’m sorry. Now from second base, it’s not. Right, that but that, to me, that’s just the best place to be. And that’s where you want to spend the most amount of time. Because you can get a lot of information, I then would say you want at best a third base if you have all the pain you need. And it makes sense. And as we go into these other episodes in this podcast, we’ll get into more granular pieces of pain and and how to have that conversations and the questions you should ask to get that information out of them. But once you get to third base, you’re kind of like setting up for this for the for the sale, right? You’re getting ready to go home. Here’s what I feel like whenever I watch baseball, the rarely has any anybody ever make it to third base and stay there and never make it home? I mean, it happens. But like their goal that at that point is to make it home. And sometimes it’s a good point. Yeah, yeah, there, there’s a weird ways that don’t get home like somebody will bunt they’ll, they’ll base haircuts and all kinds of things can get them in. But if you’re not a third, you there’s no easy way to get there. If you’re on second or first it just doesn’t get there as easily. So So to me, the third base is really finding out do they have the money? And do they have the funds? And where is it coming from? And who’s involved? Who else needs to have interest in this conversation? Who else needs to have the input into making that decision of whether or not they’re going to buy or not? Because if you don’t have go ahead?

Lane 11:25
Yeah, how you figure out if they actually have the money to pay for this?

Rob 11:28
Yeah, so that’s another series of questions. And honestly, it’s a very simple question. Because once you’ve gone through all the pain, and you’ve learned all of that, then you can literally transition without even trying, all you have to do is ask it, you know, if they’re, if it’s costing them a lot of money, even having the conversation to say, okay, so as I understand it, in, in what we’ve just talked about, this is costing you $1,000 every day, and it’s been going on for three months. I know your budget is really big out there, what you make in revenues? I mean, how do you how do you plan to fix that problem? And what are you looking to do? And and I know there’s probably some funds set aside to make that happen. And I don’t I don’t want to pretend that I’m going to know how much that is. But have you thought about how you’re going to fix that? And how much that might run? Have you? Have you had any of that conversation internally? And by asking some questions like that, or similar to that. They feel like they have to answer it. Now. Sometimes they’ll say, No, we have not had any conversation about budget, right? And then sometimes it’s a matter of answering back then and saying, alright, if you’ve not had that conversation, and that’s not unusual, I have that all the time where people say, I don’t have any idea when it’s gonna run. I just that’s why I’m calling you. Right? Yeah. Any, any guesses as to what it’s gonna take? Because I mean, with that kind of, number that you’re, you’re, you’re costing yourself every day. That’s not an easy fix. And it’s gonna take a bit of time. And so you’re probably gonna lose a little money still, until we get things up and running in place. So I know it’s gonna, you’re gonna, you’re gonna spend money and it’s going to cost you money. But then you’re gonna, you’re gonna hire us to help you with it.

Lane 13:17
Which is it sounds like, Yeah, sounds like you’re really trying to get them to tell you how much money they have to spend. Yes, rather than just saying, here’s, here’s what my price is?

Rob 13:26
Yeah. Because I want to understand, well, yes, I want to understand what their budget is. But I also understand, not everybody has a budget, and not everybody’s willing to share it. I’ve had it several times where people go, I know my budget, I’m not telling you. And they’ve told me that straight out like, you’re not getting that number from me, you’re gonna tell me how much this is going to cost? And I’m okay with that. And I and I tell them, I’m not going to force you to tell me a number. I’m asking because, and this one, literally, I’ll tell the people all the time. I’ll, I’ll give you a number. But the reason I’m asking you is because I’ve had people approach me and say, well, it should cost $500. And it doesn’t. I mean, we’re talking in this situation, we’re talking 10s of 1000s of dollars, and I don’t want to scare you away. But if that’s going to be an issue, we should probably deal with that now, should we? And if they go, that’s what I figured 10s of 1000 that’s what I figure. Okay. You know, now I know, all right, we’re in the acceptable range. But if I’m in the in the budget, and they’re saying, Yeah, well, 500 I was thinking 500 to 1000 is plenty. That’s all I should be able to put into this. Meanwhile, they’re bleeding $8,000 a day. Okay, really, you’re gonna fix 4000? No, I know better than that. But sometimes people do that, and I’ll play that game. So I want to make sure that I’m having a very frank conversation. And it takes a little bit of a different attitude toward money. I’ve had people who in their life don’t see money as anything other than a problem. It could be. They have some sort of money really Relationship issue. They never had enough money, or they’ve had more money than they’re embarrassed to have. There’s some sort of an emotional connection to money that’s causing them a problem to be able to have a good solid conversation about budget. And I don’t know what that is. I mean, I know my problems with it. And I’ve kind of started to work on those things. But I don’t know what everybody else has there. But that’s what I’m trying to say is, I don’t know what everybody else has. Everybody has their own. Yeah, yeah. And whatever that issue is, until you overcome it, it’s going to be difficult to have that budget conversation. So understand it’s a normal conversation, it is okay to ask those questions. And no matter how uncomfortable it may be, no matter how uncomfortable it is to say, Yeah, I know, you don’t know your budget. But you know, right. No, they know they have an idea.

Lane 15:45
Now, yeah, everyone has an idea whether it’s realistic or not. But it Yeah, so it sounds like you’re really trying to figure out if they if they’re thinking that along the same lines as you are. And if they’re not how you can end up back and start to reframe the value proposition.

Rob 16:00
Yes. So there is a component of sales where their ability to understand and accept a budget that you’re going to throw at them, if they have a previous conversation with another salesperson that’s similar to you. That’s extremely high, or extremely low compared to you, it’s going to be very difficult to shift that. Imagine going to the store and you go to this one store, you see a TV, it’s a it’s an 80 inch TV, and they have it priced at $800. And you’re like holy cow. $800. That’s a, that’s incredible. That’s a great price for that size TV. You okay, I’m gonna shop around. So you go to the next door, and they have it for $3,000. You’re like, what, what happened? Why is that one? 800? Why is that 3000? And do you know the difference? No, I don’t know the difference why so elegant to decide which one do I want to talk to what happens then a third bid, they go to somebody else, and they go, alright, I gotta find somebody else. Because I don’t know which one’s right, which is the right area to be. So they go to their store. But if you can have the educational conversation, and you understand the pain, how much it’s costing them, we’re running them in the meantime. And then you have this budget conversation, where you’re really framing things in terms of what they know is their expenses, and what you’re pricing it at, and the value of the price is relative to their expenses and what it’s costing them, or the value that they perceive of it, it becomes an easier, I can make that happen. I mean, I’ll give you a good example, I had a conversation with somebody who wanted to spend money on something. And then they looked at what we were talking about as a sales tool, rather than an expense. And as soon as they looked at it as a sales tool, their whole conversation changed. They were like, hold it, it’s gonna cost $3,000 for this, but I can make a 10 and 15 $100,000 sale by using this item to make my sale easier. That’s a done deal. And when they say that you could see the whole conversation happened between these two guys. And when they had that conversation, I knew they had no choice but to make a decision to go with us. And once they did, they were happy because they continue to come back. But it’s one of those until they have the realization from the pain part. The budget makes no difference. You can tell them the budget all you want unless you’ve had the pain conversation, you’re not making the sale. That’s why second base, you can’t go from first base to third base without going through second base camp. And if you try, you’re out, right. Very true. Yes. So I don’t know any other way to put it. So I think after you get through the budget, and then really the conversation about who is involved in making this decision with you, which is another conversation that can be a little bit risky, because nine times out of 10. When you ask the question, hey, well, who else has to be involved in this decision on making this purchase? They’re gonna say, me, and even though they’re not,

Lane 18:51
is it fair to to maybe phrase that as Will you be signing the the, the the order? Or is there someone else that will need to be signing that who who needs to sign off on it?

Rob 19:05
That’s a good question. I would my my initial answer would be, I wouldn’t phrase it that way. And the reason I wouldn’t phrase it that way is it sounds pushy. And it sounds like you’re asking for the sale. And to me, your goal is to never ask for the sale. The goal is for them to ask for the sale. And that sounds weird. But that’s why we call it the slow pitch. You want them to say, All right already, can you can we just sign this? What do we need to do here? We need to do to get started. I know that sounds weird to do, but it works. It works way more than I ever expected. And so, so that so the phrase that you might use is you know who else needs to be involved? Because in the past when I’ve dealt with companies like you or like yours, I have found that the CEO or I found that the CFO usually has a few questions that come up. Or I have, I’ve found that the chief marketing officer or whoever, right, somebody high up somebody higher than that person needs to needs to understand a few questions, and they want to ask a few questions. And when they hear that question asked, they then say to themselves, I have an option here to lie about it. And answer No, no, no, they don’t care. or right. Yeah, you know, he, he, she whoever might want to know, or might want to have a conversation, let’s loop them in. Or if they don’t automatically offer to loop them in, I might even ask the question. I don’t, I don’t suppose you whatever, loop them in on this conversation, this next conversation that we might have down the road. Because in that conversation is going to be some very critical questions that come up. And so I try not to move on to home base, or home plate, until all the people that need to be involved before we get to the contract are involved, because they have to be a part of that process. Otherwise, they’re going to make decisions that don’t make any sense. They’re gonna say, Well, you know, there’s other vendors said this, or, and they’ll have no idea as what why the conversation ended up where we are. It makes sense. Yeah. So at at third base, you’re going to not only find out the money piece, you’re going to find out who’s involved. But you’re also going to start to put together and formulate a, I wouldn’t say presentation, I would say the structure of the contract. And by that, I mean, you’re going to wrap up all that conversation with Alright, here’s what I understand. I understand these are the pains that you’re having. Roughly, here’s how much it looks like based on what you’re describing. And here’s what we talked about, from a budget standpoint, that we decided that the budget for this project is going to be let’s just round numbers 10,000. And we know that the CEO needs to get involved with this particular conversation next. And if that CEO is not already involved, it’s the next obvious step would be the CEO involved, and bring that person into the into the meeting, either at that same time, or at a future time. We don’t make any presentations. We don’t offer anything, we don’t offer a written document, no contract, no nothing until the CEO or whoever else has to make a decision is involved. And they’re gonna throw a fit about that. But unless they imagine they’re gonna throw a fit fine. But my answer to that is always okay. But if I put this together for you, I guarantee you, it’s going to be wrong. It’s not going to be what they’re looking for. Because I’m basing it based on our conversation. And every time I’ve done this in the past, whoever else needs to be involved? Who didn’t get a chance to ask their question, will ask a question, like, well, what happens if the dog decides he wants to go out the door? And it’s like, what does that have to do with anything? But that’s the question that they asked. So it has nothing to do with what what we just talked about, we’re actually solving the problem. But for some reason, they just think differently, and I don’t get it. And so they go, Yeah, no kidding, right? So so they start to think, alright, I need to bring this person in. Because if they insist upon getting an agreement, now I have to make a decision, am I just going to give them an agreement, or a contract or not, or an estimate, and nine times out of 10, I’m not the only time I’ve ever done it before, where I give them an estimate written out is, if I almost at that point, are like, if I get this, it’s worth it worth me my time, my aggravation of waiting for you to give me an answer. And I don’t care whether or not you get this job or not. It’s really doesn’t matter to me. But if it matters, and it’s a job that I want, I’m going to wait. And I’m going to ask for that person to be involved. Okay. Does that make sense?

Lane 23:55
Yeah. Yeah, totally. I know, it makes sense. In my mind, it’s tough to kind of take a step back and go while you’re, you’re potentially throwing money away, or you’re risking losing the sale, but at the same time, I understand what what your what your approach is, but Well,

Rob 24:11
yeah, my question to you would be, are you really risking that sale? Because if you how, what’s the likelihood of you getting the sale? If the key person who’s going to make the decision is involved? Let me rephrase that the person you’ve been working with? Do they have the ability to say no, always, always. I don’t care what level you are. They’re happy to tell you. We didn’t go with you. They’re always the person that can make that decision. Are they always the person who can say yes, and here let me sign not always and until the person who’s in the room is the ability to say, yes, let me sign you don’t have a sale, right? It’s important to get that person in front of you. And it’s important to have that conversation and I get it. You’re not going to be able to have a conversation. When you’re dealing with a big company. You’re not going to get the CEO in the room, but you need to have the high enough level the right appropriate level to be able to make that decision and get the signature in the make it stick until you have the right person for that whatever level that is, you’re going to have a hard time saying I had that sale, because the person that you’ve been talking to is probably a level or two below. They’re gathering information. And it’s like, okay, you may or may not make the sale. And and you’re you’re welcome to submit if you want, but I certainly wouldn’t count on it. And you should know at any given moment in time, where you are in a sale, whether or not you’re going to get the sale or not.

Lane 25:29
No, and I get that. Yeah, I hear that you never have the sales? And let’s actually see, yeah,

Rob 25:34
yeah. So I think then the real next step, after that conversation, you’ve agreed on all those elements and components, you now have the ability to say, Okay, what is our next step? And I always ask that question at that point. What’s the next step? Because we have all the right decision makers, we have the budget, we know the pains, we know how much it’s costing your expenses, your as a business without doing anything, or how much value it’s going to bring to your company. We know all these things, what do you want to do? And and I get that look on their face like, Well, what do you mean, what are we going to do? Well, we need to give you write it out. Write what out? And like, what do you want me to write out? And they’re like, well, don’t you have an agreement? Oh, yeah, that’s what sorry, yeah. I just wasn’t sure if there was anything else you wanted to do or talk about? Because what if all of a sudden they say, Yeah, I have another question. And that could be totally different than what I had written on that estimate. So now that they, let’s get an estimate, if they say that, then I can put that estimate together and start to come back. The other thing I never would do is just email an estimate back. And a lot of people just send it over and go, here you go. And that’s highly ineffective. And if you do that, and I can’t tell you how many people have done that, because I’ve asked for questions or quotes on things. I had somebody a landscaper come over, and I said, I need to know how much it’s going to take to cut down these couple of these trees, trim these other trees and get this stuff ready for this. And and he’s like, yeah, it’s gonna cost this much. Okay, can you just send it to me? Yep. And then he walks away and like, sends me an email and estimate an email. And I’m like, Well, okay, like, that’s highly ineffective, why would you not go through the proper steps to guarantee your sale? Because if somebody says to me, can you just give me an estimate? My answer is going to be no, I’m not going to give you an estimate, I don’t know if this is gonna be what you need or not. Let’s talk a little bit more in detail about what these pieces are that you need. And while he knows visually what I need to do and what it’s going to take, he may not have time to care about an estimate and may not care about the job either. But to just email it over as a guarantee that the odds are very low, he’s going to get the sale.

Lane 27:38
Right? So rather than emailing you and set up another call or another meeting, and walk through it.

Rob 27:44
Yeah, yeah, he really should set up the meeting or set up a phone call and say, hey, let’s get on the phone. Let me walk you through what all these elements are, here’s why we’re doing it this way. And it doesn’t have to be very long call, I do these calls all the time. And you know, they literally take me 15 minutes to go through. Because all the stuff we are on the estimate, or all the things we’ve already talked about, nothing’s a surprise, they’ve seen all the numbers, they know all the things that ain’t going into it all the processes, they might not know the technical things, but they know everything already. And it’s not a surprise. And when they get done, they’re like, Oh, that’s easy. Okay, we’ll sign it. And that’s just literally the simplest process there is. And that’s the simple version of everything. And there’s nuances to it, and everything else. But that is the way it goes. And that’s really the home plate step really, is getting to verify the purchase. So you’ve passed their base, you’ve got all those different pieces. Now we put together that estimate, or the proposal or whatever you want to call it, and you go home, and you take them to home plate, and you verify on your estimate. These are all the pieces that we talked about. This is the numbers that match that, here’s the timelines, or whatever that needs to be in your estimates. We’re going through all these details. And when we get done with this, we’re gonna know Are we Yes? Or are we No. And that’s literally what you’re going to set up your next meeting for homeplate? Are we a yes? Or are we a no. So when I get done with an estimate, review, I know, we’re either going to be working together or we’re not going to be working together. That’s all they want. I don’t need to know anything else. Because nothing else is really important for them or for me, right? And I just want to make sure that they’re I always want to make sure that we’re making a rash decision. So if I’m, I’m in that mode, where we’re going through the estimate, there’s a whole bunch of steps to that. When we go through that I’m going to verify that you’re okay with making this decision before I leave. Because if I walk out of here, I don’t want to get a call, right? I don’t want to call Never mind. So there are some questions that I need to ask to make sure that they’re serious. That Yes, here’s the nut. Here’s the signature. Here’s the check. And there’s not going to be a call later from a remorse standpoint, because I’m going to ask some more conditional questions. Now, go through all that you got the sale. The next step might be because they’ve they’ve made their decision. To work with you, now they’ve gone to the place of giving you the signature, give me the deposit. Now you have to go to the place of asking for a referral. They are in a position where they, they love you. They’ve made their decision. They’re working with you. They’re excited. Yeah. Who else do you know?

Lane 30:18
So you’d ask for a referral. When you get the contract signed? before you’ve actually actually really done any work for them?

Rob 30:25
Yeah, that’s the best time well, because you already know, you know, I wouldn’t do that. If you’re very new in business. Right? I would do it after you’ve proven yourself a few times, and you really can show it. But if you’re in a position, where you if you do this all day long, every day of the week for years, you know, you can do it, there’s no question you can do it. They know it, because they’ve already made a decision based on the your conversations with them. And I guarantee you half their decision was made before they even called you the first time because they’ve done enough research. Now, why wouldn’t they refer you over and say, Well, here’s somebody that might be of interest for you to talk to, and you know what they may not. And if they say, you know, I can’t think of anybody, you can help them with some very specific questions. But at the end of that conversation, if you don’t get a referral, that’s okay, you’ve planted the seed, that that’s what you’re looking for long term. And at some point, it will come back, I guarantee because it comes back all the time. When I’m walking around doing things, all of a sudden things are going well this person is related to that person related. And by related I mean, they do business with this person that business is built right, here we are and all I do business, all of them now, you know, that kind of thing. So it happens slowly over time, but plant the seed right then in there. Gotcha. So that is why we call it the slowpitch.

Lane 31:36
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