Meeting Buyer Expectations, Wrestling with Accountability, & The Chameleon Coach w/ Tony Bradberry (Part 3) - Ep. 17

SPEAKER_01 0:00

I joke with people a lot. Like sales is like going to a car dealership. When you go to a car dealership, people you know that sell sports cars don't sell them because they're well thought-out decisions. They sell them because momentum builds, right? People show up, they're excited. You keep getting them excited. Finally, they make this decision, right? Um, whereas like you sell a minivan, it's this very well thought out, well-researched thing where people have looked at crash ratings and they've gone to a lot of people. You want to be more like the sports car than you do the minivan, right? When when people first come in, you want to keep that excitement going, you want to respond as quick as you can. You want to do these audits and these pre-work. You want to know the business, you want to come with questions and even suggestions, and you want to build momentum. And so what that shows is a proactivity, an excitement, a level of service that people then correlate back to what it'll be like once they're paying. Because the general thing that people always do is they say, Wow, if this is the value they've created for me and I've not even paid them yet, I can only imagine what that value will be once I actually start paying them. And that's the experience we want to create. And I think in general, for most people, that's where they drop the ball in their sales and marketing, is they don't create these great experiences on the front end. They know they're great in the back end delivery, but they're not really good at showing that value up front. And when they do that, they're losing out to the people that are creating those great experiences before anybody's ever paid them a dime. Um, and I think that's what now in this AI world you're going to compete with more than ever is people over-delivering on the front end, and you're still trying to stay back in this world where you feel like you'll create that value later, you just may never get a chance to create it for people.

SPEAKER_00 1:36

I I completely agree with that. And it's uh it's how I handle this uh, you know, this you know, sales uh you know system uh that we have in our company. I I I air quote sales is because um when I first started Arrowhead um I had never been in a sales role. Um funnily enough, I would get nervous every time I got on like a call with anyone, really. Um I I I didn't like it, I was shy. And so I knew that that was something I would have to overcome pretty quickly, and and so I had to ask I asked my how can I make sales not feel like sales? And it became relationship building. How do I like and it was like this challenge of how do I, you know, upon meeting someone brand new, you know, who, you know, in a roof uh for a company that is uh you know largely referral based and how we get clients, you know, it's their warm introductions, like we're talking because they have mentioned to someone who introduced them to us that we provide a solution to a problem that they have discussed and mentioned having. So like that part of the qualification I feel like is is already done. And then it's so uh you make this game of how quickly can I create a relationship that just goes deeper than just this transactional level that I hate uh in in life, you know, just in general, like transactional relationships of keeping score and and just looking at it from that perspective. Um and then also just like how can you be a problem solver? And you know, how can you provide uh you know as much value from an hour conversation um as humanly possible before they've even said yes or uh paid you anything? And that has become something that is like extremely fun to do, and then has has helped them and other you know, clients in other areas where because you know, especially being a a founder myself, like I don't look at my own company through this l narrow lens of accounting and finance and numbers, I have to look at the big picture, and so then when there's systems uh or other things that just from hearing them talk about pain points that I can identify, and then I know someone who also provides the solution to that or a way of thinking about it that I've seen work for someone else, you know, bringing that, even though that's not what they would ever pay us for, uh but being able to provide some sort of value and solution to problems that you see, because you just, you know, if you whatever, you know, you're gonna be in a market, uh you know, clients come to you from you guys from for marketing things uh to help with their marketing function, but like you see uh problems and then solutions to those problems in a wide range of different areas that go outside of marketing if you just open your eyes and take your blinders off, right? And you know, refuse to just like stay in your little box and and say I'm never gonna step outside of my lane, because all these functions of business touch one another. And you know, when when we're building systems for a client, I'm also thinking about how will building this system, this accounting finance system, uh affect how sales get the data that they need to operate effectively, or how will this affect the operations team uh or uh and how they get the information they need? Like, does this help them, or does this just help us for our purposes inside our little box? And I and I feel like uh that's where you're uh you know kind of really spot on with uh with uh with that and then the response time thing is like that's uh something that I've always tried to pride myself on is how fast can I get on the phone with someone after I've been introduced via email. And I think the quickest turnaround we've ever had from email introduction to uh signed engagement later, a new client, and actually starting working on them was two and a half hours. Um and obviously it takes the other side, you know, you know, they need to be available also immediately. But when you do that and they are have that urgency and want to meet and have availability, and then you're available, that's like you I don't think you can put a dollar value on how how valuable that is perceived.

SPEAKER_01 6:51

Yeah, and there's there's a lot of old school way of doing like lead routing, especially larger companies, where historically a lead comes in, it gets scored, it gets sent for validation by people. They want to have like a discovery call, then they want to reroute that back to you know an account executive or a sales director or something after it's been validated. And the reality is that people really don't accept that anymore as being the real reality now, right? Like, look, with everything available to you from tools to the internet to AI, right? You should be able to see my problem, know my problem, and get me to a solution as fast as possible. If it's transactional engagement where strictly I need to buy this thing, um, I want to get to it. One of the things that's happened a lot is SaaS used to hide pricing and they'd make you get on a demo with a sales rep, and they wouldn't tell you anything, and they couldn't schedule the demo for a week and a half because the reps were all booked. And people just move on at this point. Like, if you're not gonna put pricing out in front, that's okay, but you need to be able to get to pricing very quickly. And you know, so people's expectations of how that interaction is supposed to work have definitely changed. And I think, you know, this is no trade secrets. I tell people a lot like, if you're not willing to change your operation to get with people's expectations, you're not gonna keep up, right? If you see declining form fills, well, it could very well be because you know your CTA doesn't work anymore. A lot of times people are like contact us or contact sales or things like that. And there's some solutions. Well, I don't want to talk to a sales guy. Uh, my guess is your sales guy's not qualified to talk about what it is I want to talk about. I need to talk to an engineer, I need to talk to an expert and what I'm doing. And if you're telling me I gotta get on a sales call to listen to a guy run through a pre-programmed deck, I'm gonna move on to somebody who's gonna get me in contact with an expert faster. And so we talk a lot to our clients about, you know, consultation is a better CTA than you know, contact us or demo or a sales call, right? Because the idea should be I'm gonna take what you're telling me and I'm gonna give you very specific, customized responses or answers to your problems. If it's truly a sales call, people don't like being on sales calls. There's nobody in the world who wants to be sold to. There are people that want to get their problems solved, that's it. And so if you're still running a playbook that is, I'm gonna run this sales rep out with a pre-built deck that's gonna talk, you know, for 80 minutes about how great we are in the last, you know, the first 10 are gonna be discovery, and then I'm gonna not listen to anything you just told me and already run through my pre-written deck that I had, anyways, from the last five calls. That doesn't work anymore. Um, people have to learn that, and that's something that I think a lot of people could really benefit from doing very very quickly.

SPEAKER_00 9:30

Yeah, no, it's funny you say that because uh that's uh with the SAS uh example, that has been the very thing that has made me not uh ever try a lot of different uh SAS products. Um because especially when you add in a personality type that is very impatient, uh, I don't want to wait for my 30-minute call with the sales rep in a week. Um I just I don't want to then do a demo. Like I just want to know how much does it cost and can I try it? Or can I uh like I just want to get in there and start or talk about how like would this apply for my business or my scenario, which is front of mine today, right now. And you know, and that's I feel like that is the emotional part of buying is uh there's been a lot of things that uh that I've saved before uh that right then and there I was like, oh tomorrow I need to I need to look into this. This this looks like this is this isn't super important. Uh and then you get to tomorrow, and then it's like the emotion of that in that moment has worn off, and I'm like like sometimes I don't even know like where that was coming from yesterday.

SPEAKER_01 10:56

Um and so you're not buying that sports car anymore, right? That's what we were talking about. You're no longer interested in buying that sports car because you went home and thought about it and thought what a dumb idea that was, right? Yeah, uh it's exactly it's exactly the the idea of momentum, and people just don't capitalize on it very well.

SPEAKER_00 11:14

Yeah, no, a hundred percent. Um so one thing uh uh when we very first talked, I don't know if you remember we um when you had talked about your uh we I think we we kind of connected a little bit on the on the wrestling side of things, right? So like uh uh when you talked about wrestling, I um uh um I come from a I didn't wrestle. I I uh my discipline was judo and muay thai uh growing up, but my dad and my grandfather uh were you know lifelong wrestlers. My grandpa my grandfather was at the went to the 1964 Tokyo Olympics for wrestling, and and so like I love wrestling uh you know to watch, and um but then just another thing that is very interesting to me, um just having gone through, you know, like I was uh you know, I've been in athletics and sports my entire life, came over to the United States to play college baseball, um, and then now you know found my way into entrepreneurship. Um what you know, being one a you know, a wrestler yourself, but then coaching wrestling. What uh what are some of the the parallels that you uh that were you know invaluable to your entrepreneurial career and business, uh the way you look at business, especially from you know wrestling being like an individual sport inside of a team sport uh in a way. Um like how does that has that shaped at all the way you think about in like individual accountability versus you know team culture?

SPEAKER_01 13:07

Yeah, so what's really fascinating is I think the structure of wrestling for those not familiar with right, at any given time there's only one person on the map versus another person, right? So nobody on your team can come help you. But a lot of the preparation that goes into that, um, the the practices where you're working with all the different members of your team and learning and conditioning and getting better, but also the way scoring works, right? You end up winning a match, whether it's in a dual meet or a tournament, and your points go towards the collective greater good. It's a great representation for what business actually is like. It's very, very rare that at any given time uh all people are working on the all all the exact same thing at the exact same time, trying to get a win for the company. A lot of times it's people individually working on pieces of their responsibilities that if they let you down, the team fails, right? And that's how what kind of happens with the way scoring works and those different things. And so I think what it teaches you is you know, when it's show time, you have to deliver on your piece, and your teammates around you, you have to trust that they're going to because you can't do anything, you can prepare them uh and you can work with them. And uh obviously from the coaching standpoint, that's the way you have to look at it is you can do as much as you can for them when you're in the room, and the their teammates can help them get as good as they can get, but when it's time for them to perform their own job, they have to be accountable and and contribute for that. And so as I've looked at you know, gray matter in the business and growing it, we talk a lot about that, about the accountability, right? We we kind of break our business up into these sub-teams um within them, with each individual role player in there. Again, when you get on a call with a client or deliver the work, one person may be delivering the work, but everybody had to contribute their piece to it. And if somebody failed to hold up their end of the bargain there, um, you know, we lose, right? Our score wasn't good enough. And so that's what I think, you know, that parallel makes a lot of sense. And and not to knock the team sports like I love football, I love, you know, I love team sports, but I think in a lot of ways it's easier to hide, right? It's easier to hide when you're on the floor or on the field or wherever you may be, and there's a bunch of people around you that great performers can hide your lack of contribution. Whereas, you know, more of the individualized sports, and it's not just wrestling, there's a lot of those that have similar scoring functions. They require you to be great at what you're doing as a contributor to the rest of the team. And so that's why I always have loved wrestling for that function, uh, aside from just what it requires. Uh, but I love it from a teaching tool as well. When I coached, but also here on the team of look, you you have to win your match, but you need everybody else to win theirs as well for us to have a chance to be successful. Um, when individuals let us down, you're you're gonna be much more exposed. You're out there.

SPEAKER_00 15:57

Yeah, no, that's like it's it it it's an interesting it is an interesting dynamic and balance between, you know, uh that uh you know the kind of culture you need to build to be successful in that realm uh when there is that huge component that is individual. Um and it's uh you know, one parallel I think I'm I've uh I've uh you know similarity that I've no uh noticed for myself recently is that you know the last fourteen months I've uh um gone down the uh the the journey of trying to become as good as uh as as good as I can at golf. Um and which is uh uh which is uh you know both a rewarding and humbling and fun and frustrating journey so far, you know. But when uh is when you have uh different formats of golf where it's teams match play, right? And and but you can't, you know, you you're talking about uh high performers kind of being able to and you being able to hide on a on a field, you know, right? It is you know is the same and you know, you know, the same kind of uh stereotype and you know and and you know the younger grades of baseball, right? You throw the the big kid at first base and the worst on the team in right field and try and hide them away, right? And put them you know at the worst hitter at eighth in the lineup, try and hide them and limit how much damage they can do. You know, obviously it's different when you go up to uh the higher you go in in any sport. Um but then in uh in you know in wrestling or in that kind of team match play golf format, um you can't just you know the team that wins is not gonna be who has the biggest the one individual biggest stud and then no one else that can contribute to the team because one person can't win the whole thing. Uh and you or carry it, you know, a team in that in that kind of sitting. Uh because like you said, like the preparation, you can help each other and and contribute, uh, but then when you're out on the mat, it's no one can no one can wrestle for you. Uh and so it's there is that kind of pressure as well, but uh on in in that kind of sense. Um another kind of question is especially in uh any combat sports, martial arts wrestling, um you know, it's it's uh you know, those are uh I feel like part of you know part of the fun in those kind of uh sports is um that you know the element of you know getting fired up you know before a match or uh before a fight, um, because that is you know can be a big part of it, but you know, and staying uh you know motivated in that kind of realm. Um what did coaching teenagers teach you about motivation that uh an MBA program will not teach an entrepreneur?

SPEAKER_01 19:37

Oh god. Uh well, teenagers are motivated by a couple things, and that will make a lot of sense. No, um, I think it's it goes back to this idea that's very true in business as well, is that everybody's motivated differently. You talk about like getting fired up. It's interesting because I've had kids that I coach that you know they they essentially wanted you to like slap them, which by the way, I'm not gonna slap you, your parents will sue me, that's not a good idea. But the point being is like they need to get fired up in a much different way. You have some people that literally don't want you to talk to them, they want to be in a corner by themselves and just get completely focused on what it is they're about to do. And there's between those two polars, there's a bunch of stuff in between. And so I think as a coach, you start figuring out what it is they need to do. Like, some people want you to sit there and talk, you know, talk to them, some people want you to leave them alone, some people want you to joke with them and keep them from you know getting too nervous. Other people, it'll make them nervous if you talk to them, right? And I think when you talk about management motivation of employees, it's very similar that like the style you choose to do is gonna be very dependent on the people you're working with. And no single style is gonna be uh the right fit for everybody. And so you you gotta be a little bit of a chameleon and understand how to get the best out of your people is to meet them where they need to be to perform. And if you can do that within the realm of you know your business and and doing it in a feasible and and you know scalable manner, I I would always suggest that because you you're gonna get the best performance from people when you can make them the most comfortable possible as possible. Um and so yeah, I think fired up is unique. Uh and you you want people to be excited about what they're doing, but how you get them there is always gonna be unique to that person.

SPEAKER_00 21:21

Yeah, no, that's uh no 100% agree with that, because and it one you know, one thing I think about is uh as far you know is motivation is you know, I think a lot of leaders think that money is the primary motivator, which I mean I think it you know for anyone working a job anywhere, like it that should be right, uh one of the most important things that motivate you. And uh but obviously it's it's not the only thing, and that's been if So if you know financial rewards are you know more or less a universal motivator, uh then finding out those other things can be difficult, but it's like that's also it can be pretty fun to because getting to know that person to find out what it is that motivates them, is it you know, is it uh is it having an impact? Is it being of part of something? Is it some kind you know, is it having uh you know, is does more freedom motivate them? Uh does like do they get motivated when you publicly praise them in front of their peers? Like that's one that I didn't really understand and um until uh you know I talked to someone who uh you know trying to solve this exact thing uh with the first person who joined uh joined us uh almost two years ago, um and just walking through the the different ways that this leader uh approached this very thing of trying to find out what are those things and what uh you know what's their uh he's he called he used the you know like the phrase of what's their workplace love language, uh you know, is different to motivation, but you know, I you know, ideally meaning the same thing. And you know, some people then you know hate being praised in uh in front of an entire company, you know, wide Zoom call uh makes them uncomfortable and it might have the opposite effect. And so knowing who's on your team uh and getting to know them as people I think is uh is is like super important for any leader to do, just like in like you're uh you're saying of um you know the guy who likes you wanted to be slapped and the guy who wanted no one to talk to him and to sit alone and just go, you know, mentally process that themselves, and then everyone in between. Uh no, you know, no two people are alike.

SPEAKER_01 24:07

I think I think we naturally are biased, right? And so we we tend to look at it as well, I don't know you know why they would like that, or I that's not what I would like. And so, you know, I've found for myself I've had to be better at like what you talked about, the the call outs in front of people, right? I'm not the best at that because you know I've never really gotten motivation from those kind of things. And so, you know, I I think as leaders, sometimes it's hard to get out of those biases of what you think people are motivated by. Obviously, money, money is a motivator. Uh, I think it's more table stakes, but money's a motivator to a certain point. But one thing we found, right? We're a completely remote company. Um, and what's been really interesting is when we do have openings, the amount of people that will apply to jobs that are overqualified for a role, that they probably come from a role where they did make more money and they're willing to give it up to be remote. And you ask them, like, okay, you know, I get the freedom, but but why? And you know, they'll tell you, like, hey, it it allows me to spend more time with my family because I'm not driving 45 minutes each way. It allows me to get up in the morning and go to the gym because I just have to make it back to my desk and turn on you know my computer, right? You they start talking about the quality of life shift that it gives them. And you know, I I think being open to those ideas, obviously remote work was huge during COVID and it started to kind of ricochet back. I think people sleep on that. They really think that the advantage is in you know paying people or doing these other benefits, which again, people love those, but that's not going to be what motivates people. There, there is a wide swath of people, and I've seen the studies on it, that would take 20, 30% less money to be remote because of just the deep impact that can have on their life. And so, you know, we try to do both, we try to pay well and let people work remote and do you know other things for them. But I think as other people think about it, you know, you you really need to ask yourself like what advantages are gained from the decisions we make and and you know, maybe talk to people about what those impacts are to them beyond the obvious things. Because a lot of times there's things that are not obvious that you never think of for why people are motivated the way they are.

SPEAKER_00 26:25

Yeah, no, it's um yeah, it's uh you're you're only really gonna understand uh to a large degree the reason like behind what motivates you you, yourself. Uh and you know, it's if something if someone else gets motivated in a different type of way, I think, yeah, uh you know, try to understand the why behind it, but then at the end of the day, even if you can't, you it's important to get on board with it. Even if it doesn't, you c you know, there's some things, you know, it's like it maybe you still will not be able to make sense, you know, internally yourself because you just don't get it because it just is so remotely far away from what's true for you. But then at the end of the day, it's it's if that is the thing that motivates someone else on your team and you want to create a an environment um of high performers and get the most out of people and have people enjoy uh what they're doing and working uh part of you know is towards whatever your your company's vision and uh direction is, then you you gotta get on board with it. Well, Tony, thank you so much for uh for coming on and and uh I've I've learned a lot uh in this discussion and conversation. How can people uh find you find your uh uh your conversations? Uh you know uh you know you you're very present on LinkedIn. I know that's probably I would say one of the best places to find you and what you're talking about, whether it's on AI or SEO versus GEO and and everything in between. Uh yeah, you have a lot of great insights, but uh on on a lot of a lot of these topics, but where else can people go to to find you, get in touch with you, or to work with Gray Matter?

SPEAKER_01 28:28

Yeah. So obviously LinkedIn, like I said, is a great place. Um I try to post there often just about what we're seeing in the market and how it's impacting uh various clients. Obviously, um our website, if you need to get a hold of us, go graymatter.com uh is a great way to get a hold of us. There's actually a chat bot on there. It's not an AI agent, it actually comes directly to me. So if you'd like to talk to me directly over a DM, you can. Um or you can reach out to us, right? Um, I love to have consultations with people, whether you're fit for gray matter or not. Um, I'll still usually take those consultations and we'll just talk marketing and try to get you in contact with the right people, whether it is us or potentially somebody else we can refer you to.

SPEAKER_00 29:04

Amazing. Thank you, Tony. And last question uh is one that I ask everyone at the end of each interview is uh, you know, the name No Trade Secret. So what is your one trade secret that you don't think should be a secret anymore? And you know, it's in business or in life, uh what what is your what is your trade secret?

SPEAKER_01 29:28

Um yeah, I already I already cheated, I already gave it away, but uh sell the problem, not the solution. Um people spend too much time talking about themselves and and how great they are. Uh talk about what people are having their problems with, and if you show that you understand it well enough, the business comes behind it. It's it's really simple.

SPEAKER_00 29:47

Amazing. Thank you so much, Tony. It's been a pleasure. Thanks. See ya.