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#295: Secret Truths About Selling – Part 1 (Why Is It So Uncomfortable?)

ByJillian Leslie

Jillian Leslie, host of the Blogger Genius Podcast, uncovers the secret truths about selling, and why it’s so uncomfortable.

Jillian talks about how selling is a skill that everyone engages in whether we realize it or not. In fact, we are always selling, even if it’s not for money. Any time we try to influence someone’s behavior, we are selling. She shares how how to get out of your own way and become a selling ninja.

Jillian’s Four-Part Series on Selling

This is episode 1 in Jillian’s four-part series on concrete strategies for becoming more comfortable with selling. This series is designed to help you evolve your strategies to include selling your own products and services with ease.

Secret Truths About Selling - Part 1 (Why Is It So Uncomfortable?) | The Blogger Genius Podcast with Jillian Leslie

Show Notes:

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Overcoming the Fear of Selling

As we all know, selling can often feel awkward and uncomfortable. It’s a common fear, especially the fear of not making any sales. But Jillian wants to assure you that the more you sell, the more comfortable you will become.

It’s a muscle that can be strengthened with practice. And remember, selling does not make you a bad or greedy person. You should be compensated for the value you provide. Jillian feels women especially need to hear this.

The Power of a Positive Selling Mindset

One of the key strategies Jillian shared in the episode was the importance of having the right selling mindset. This involves reframing your approach to selling and building relationships with customers. It’s about viewing failures not as setbacks, but as valuable market research.

Introducing MiloTreeCart

During the episode, Jillian introduced MiloTreeCart, a tool designed to simplify the process of selling digital products. This tool is a testament to the fact that selling doesn’t have to be a daunting task. With the right tools and mindset, it can be a seamless and rewarding process.

Secret Truths About Selling - Part 1 (Why Is It So Uncomfortable?) | The Blogger Genius Podcast with Jillian Leslie

Embracing the “B-Minus Work” Philosophy

One of the most interesting insights Jillian shared was the concept of “B-minus work”. This is about moving quickly, combating perfectionism, and focusing on doing work that gathers real-world feedback. She personally follows this approach and it has helped her overcome self-judgment and make progress.

Listener Feedback and Recap

The positive feedback Jillian received from listeners after discussing these selling strategies was overwhelming. Many expressed gratitude for the insights provided and shared their plans to create outlines or rough drafts based on her advice. She encouraged them to move faster than they may initially want to and to embrace “B minus work” as a way to find success.

In conclusion, selling is a skill that can be learned and mastered. It may feel awkward and uncomfortable at first, but with practice and the right mindset, it can become second nature. Remember, you deserve to be compensated for the value you provide. So, embrace the art of selling and watch your business grow.

Main Takeaways of the Episode

  1. The Universality of Selling
    • Everyone is selling, consciously or not.
    • It’s importaint to recognize and honethis skill for various aspects of life.
  2. The Discomfort of Selling
    • Acknowledge that selling often feels awkward and uncomfortable.
    • The goal is to get beyond the common emotional hurdles people experience selling.
  3. Selling as a Muscle
    • Selling is a skill that can be developed over time.
    • Comparison to physical exercise like running on a treadmill: the more you do it, the easier it becomes.
  4. Ethics and Self-Perception in Selling
    • Selling does not make you a bad person.
    • Especially for women, selling is not manipulative but a way to be compensated for providing value.
  5. Personality Types and Selling
    • It is not true that only certain personality types are suited for selling.
    • Diverse personality traits can be leveraged in sales.
  6. Failure as Information
    • If no one buys what you’re offering, it’s not a reflection of your worth.
    • Unsuccessful sales attempts provide valuable information for strategy adjustment.
  7. The Importance of Speed and Imperfection
    • Quick action wins always over prolonged planning.
    • “B minus” work moves you forward.
    • The metaphor of a miner: If one area you are digging in doesn’t yield gold, the lesson is to try digging someplace else.

Other related Blogger Genius Podcast episodes you’ll enjoy:

MiloTreeCart, the Best Tool for Non-Techies to Sell Digital Products

I also want to introduce you to the MiloTreeCart, a tool designed for non-techies to sell digital products easily. It comes with features like fill-in-the-blank sales pages, check-out pages, a sales dashboard, upsells, and customer support. MiloTreeCart is currently available for a lifetime deal of $349 or three easy installments of $116.33. Plus, there’s a limited-time offer of a one-hour free coaching call for those who purchase before the end of September.

Full Transcript: “Secret Truths About Selling – Part 1 (Why Is It So Uncomfortable?)”

Jillian Leslie (00:00:00) – My name is Jillian and I’m hosting the Blogger Genius Podcast. Before we get into today’s interview, let me ask you a question. Are you wishing you could sell digital products like digital downloads or workshops, memberships, coaching mini courses, but you don’t know where to start? And are you tired of complicated tech and spending way too much money on monthly subscriptions? Well, you need a tool that makes all of this simple, and the answer is Milo Tree cart. So this is the tool we built for non techies who want to tap into a new income stream with military cart. You get fill in the blank sales pages, check out pages, a sales dashboard upsells over 100 done for you, marketing materials and support from people who seriously care. And right now, for a limited time, we are selling MiloTreeCart for a lifetime deal of $349 pay once or in three easy installments and enjoy it forever. Hit pause right now head to MiloTree. We offer a 30 day no questions asked money back guarantee so there is no risk.

Jillian Leslie (00:01:08) – And if you purchase by September 15th, I will give you a customized product action plan. We’ll get on a short call. I’ll hear all about your business, and then I will deliver you a step by step plan of how to create your first three digital products. I usually charge an additional $250 for this, but you get yours free before September 15th. So head to military.com to sign up.

Announcer (00:01:39) – Welcome to The Blogger Genius Podcast brought to you by Milo Tree. Here’s your host, Jillian Leslie.

Jillian Leslie (00:01:47) – Hello, friends. Welcome back to the show. I’m doing something a little different today after getting on over 120 calls with bloggers, creators, entrepreneurs and coaches to talk about digital products and making money and mileage regard. I, of course, have seen some themes and patterns that I wanted to share, and one of the biggest themes I see is how much everybody struggles with selling.

Now, coming up with product ideas is much easier for many of you than actually selling them. So I wanted to talk about selling from a variety of angles, and that’s why I’m doing a four part series solo episodes where I share concrete strategies on how to become more comfortable selling.

Jillian Leslie (00:02:37) – Even when you are thinking up selling. Yeah, that’s not for me, so I’m just going to skip this episode, so please don’t because I think this is important and here’s why we’re all in the business of selling whether we realize it or not. If you think about it, you’re selling your readers on why they should stay engaged with your blog posts.

You’re selling your partner on why you guys should binge watch The Bear, which, by the way, I highly recommend you’re even selling your parents on things like, Hey, you guys should move closer so we can you could spend more time with the grandkids and maybe babysit. The bottom line is life revolves around selling.

Anytime you are trying to persuade somebody to do something or not do something, you are selling now. Also, technology is evolving. There’s a new thing called AI, and the way we engage with content therefore is changing. And for me, for example, I just recently needed a brownie recipe and I went to ChatGPT and I said, Give me a chewy brownie recipe and boom, there it was.

Jillian Leslie (00:03:42) – And it was kind of shocking how easy that was. Look, the world is changing and the way we make money from our blogs will probably change as well. So if you’re not evolving your strategy to include selling your own products and services, you could be leaving yourself vulnerable. Now, I’ve been hosting The Blogger Genius Podcast for over five years, and there’s a trend I can’t ignore those ranking in kind of making the most money. High six figures to seven figures all have one thing in common, and it’s that they sell something.

This realization was honestly a wake up call for me a couple of years ago, and it made me see the importance of diversifying our businesses to include products and services. And this is my recommendation. You should think about this too. Okay, so you’re listening to this and your head is saying, Yep, like hopefully Jillian’s making some good points, but you still find yourself hesitating because you’re thinking, Oh, selling is hard. And I’m going to tell you that not selling is even harder.

Jillian Leslie (00:04:45) – And this is why, my friends, we all need to start with the right selling mindset. But what is this right selling mindset? I think it boils down to feelings, and that’s what I want to focus on in this episode because I’m going to say it, selling is awkward and super uncomfortable, and these feelings definitely show up when you are trying to get somebody to pay for something that you’ve created. Like there are just so many possible vulnerabilities there.

Of course there are people who can sell anything, but I believe that most of us find it awkward and uncomfortable. However, if we can face these feelings, we can start to understand this about ourselves and hopefully normalize them. Now, why is it so weird? Well, I think it’s the kind of transactional nature of selling and the fact that it involves money. And for many of us, money can be triggering. So when you find yourself in a situation where you’re essentially asking someone to part with their hard earned cash, that is not easy.

Jillian Leslie (00:05:58) – And another reason selling can be weird is our fear of judgment. Like most people I’m talking to, are women. So I see this a lot. We worry about how will be perceived like will people think we’re greedy or will they think our products or services aren’t really worth it? Or How can I really charge money for this? These internal dialogues can paralyze us before we even start. But here’s the thing. Just like anything else, the more you sell, the more comfortable you get with it.

So I do yoga and I do that sweaty, hard kind of yoga. And I have to say, I’ve been feeling really good about myself, like I’m in such good shape. So I just joined a gym. And I went there yesterday. So I get on the treadmill and I’m like, I’m just going to run like maybe five miles. And it was so much harder than I thought it was going to be. I barely ran a mile and I felt horrible about myself. But guess what? I am going to go again tomorrow because I know that if I keep going back, I will get better and I will run a mile and I might even run two miles.

Jillian Leslie (00:07:07) – And maybe someday I’ll get to five. But selling is similar. You get better and better at it the more you do it. So in my journey, both with my card and the podcast, I found that acknowledging the awkwardness is the first step to overcoming it. So once you confront these uncomfortable feelings, you can work on reframing your approach to selling. Now, I also need to say this loud and clear selling isn’t about manipulating people into buying something they don’t need.

It’s about showing them how what you’re offering aligns with what they need. Think of it as a conversation where you’re helping someone solve a problem and remember, it’s okay. It’s great actually, to be compensated for the value you provide. So here’s something a lot of people have to hear. You are not a bad person for selling. You’re not a used car salesman.

Selling is about matching the right solution with the right problem. You’re not pushing your aligning now when both parties benefit. That’s not just a transaction, it’s a relationship. And this is what I talk about a lot on this show.

Jillian Leslie (00:08:20) – You want to build these relationships with your customers because these are the people who will continue to buy from you and grow your income. Also, you don’t have to be fake or like a crazy extrovert to sell.

A lot of selling is and we’re going to talk about this in a future episode is about listening and it’s about empathy. It’s about problem solving. So you do not have to become someone you’re not. In fact, if you’re saying that to yourself like, I don’t have the personality to do this, I’m sorry, you are wrong. So keep listening to this episode. And finally, one of the deepest fears that creators, bloggers and entrepreneurs face is the dreaded What if nobody buys? So you poured your heart and soul into a product.

And by the way, I see this a lot. You poured your heart and soul into a product or service. I’ve seen this happen with people creating full on courses. They go to sell them and it’s crickets. And this experience can be absolutely gut wrenching.

Jillian Leslie (00:09:23) – It’s not just the financial investment or the time investment. It’s the emotional investment you put yourself out there and the lack of sales can make you feel like a total failure. Now, it’s tempting to see it as a statement about your self-worth, and believe me, I have done that myself. But please, please don’t let it. It’s not what it is, is it’s information.

Data points for your business. These quote unquote failures tell you what didn’t work. So you can try something new in my journey, catch my party, our military pop up app and my literary card. I have had my fair share of ideas that didn’t take off. But instead of seeing it as a dead end and by the way, I used to see it as a dead end, I now view it as valuable market research that I didn’t even have to pay for. No one gets it right every single time.

You can think of yourself as a baseball player and you want lots of at bats because the most successful entrepreneurs are those who take those hits, gather the lessons and come back swinging with something even better.

Jillian Leslie (00:10:28) – And this is why speed is your friend. So the faster you can put your products out there, the quicker you get real world feedback. Trust me, no amount of brainstorming can replace the insights you get from actually doing it. And of course, another reason to move quickly is to combat perfectionism. As a recovering perfectionist, this speaks to me because perfectionism is your enemy.

It keeps you polishing and tweaking and second guessing until your product never sees the light of day. This is where B-minus work comes in. I share this all the time. It is above average. I am not saying do average or below average work, but b minus work helps you move fast and it is doable. You want to find out information. If people want what you’re selling, you do B minus work. And this is funny for the people who buy my literary cart, I get on a call with them, a coaching call, and I usually say, Hey, what would you like to create? And they tell me and we kind of brainstorm and come up with ideas.

Jillian Leslie (00:11:38) – And afterwards they typically email me and say, Oh, wow, I’m thinking about this. And you gave me some really good insights and I’m going to go off and I’m going to create an outline or I’m going to create a rough draft. And I always respond with something like this That is awesome. I’m excited to see what you come up with and hear me in your head. Move faster than you want and do b minus work.

And I always get like a LOL back or something like thank you for the reminder. So for you listening to this, please move faster than you want and do b minus work. This is how you find success. And by the way, I remind myself of this every day. I have a post-it that says B minus work every day, and whenever I send something to my Head of Marketing, Clarita, let’s say it’s a rough draft of a sales funnel or some emails, I always say, Don’t judge me, here is my B minus work. So I want to recap what I covered in this episode, not necessarily that you’re going to internalize all this and become a sales ninja, but hopefully it will help you chip away at some of the emotions and some of the beliefs that are holding you back.

Jillian Leslie (00:12:48) – Number one, selling is what we all do, whether we know it or not. So this is a skill I recommend you get good at. Number two, selling is awkward and weird and uncomfortable for almost everyone.

Three. But it is a muscle that if you work it, it will get stronger and you will get better and better at it. Again, like me running on the treadmill. Four You are not a bad person for selling, especially for you women out there. You’re not a used car salesman. You are providing value and you should be compensated well for that value.

Five You do not have the wrong personality type to sell successfully. Six And if no one buys what you’re offering, it’s not you or your self worth. It’s information that you can use to change up your strategy. And seven move faster than you want and do B minus work. And as I like to say, as a miner mining for gold, all you’re learning is to go dig someplace else. So please let me know what you think of this episode.

Jillian Leslie (00:14:01) – Email me at Jillian at milotree.com. I’d love to know what resonates with you and whether this made you feel braver when it comes to selling your own products and services. In my next episode, in my series on selling, I’m going to share where the best places are to sell. And some are going to surprise you. So definitely look out for that.

And by the way, anyone who buys MiloTreeCart gets a customized action plan where we get on a call, and when we do, I will remind you of all of these selling mindset tips so you can sell with success. And I will see you here again with part two next week.