Have you ever wondered why some salespeople consistently outperform others, even those who, on the surface, appear equally talented? High performance is not just about natural ability - it’s also about the intensity and quality of preparation. Chances are, these top sales professionals are spending more time and energy preparing for their meetings than their peers.  In this Snippet, Dan sits down with Nick Hardwick, former Center for the San Diego Chargers, to explore the parallels between preparing for a high-stakes football game and preparing for crucial sales meetings. They’ll dive deep into why talent alone isn’t enough to succeed in the long run, how to build systems that position you for greater success over time, and preparing for the unexpected so you can stay flexible when the game (or sales conversation) changes. Nick's insights from the world of professional football will challenge you to rethink your approach to sales preparation and give you practical strategies to elevate your game. Ready to transform your sales preparation and performance? Listen to this snippet, and then scroll back to Episode 10, Preparing to Win with NFL’s Nick Hardwick, to hear the full conversation on the power of preparation in high-stakes situations.

Have you reached your full potential? If you’re a high performer, the answer should be a resounding "not yet." There's always room for growth, always another level to reach. Personal growth is a never-ending journey where we are constantly working toward becoming the next version of ourselves.The secret is learning how to embrace that change. In this episode of Breaking Sales, Dan and Pam dive deep into the power of change and experimentation. They’ll explore why experimentation is crucial for personal and professional growth, and how it can help you reach that next level of performance. We'll break down the mindset shifts needed to embrace change, and why being willing to make mistakes is essential for learning and growth. You'll learn how to approach change as a game of creation, and discover practical exercises to visualize and work towards your future goals.  

It's no secret: many people in high-performance careers pride themselves on their work ethic. At first, the late nights, early mornings, and minimal sleep feel exciting and fulfilling. But as time goes on and they advance further in their careers, many begin to realize this approach isn't sustainable, or even productive in the long run. In this episode of Breaking Sales, Dan and Pam explore the critical importance of rejuvenation and grounding for high achievers and why taking time to recharge isn't just a luxury—it's a necessity for maintaining clarity and avoiding burnout. You'll discover how small, intentional habits can make a big difference in your overall well-being and productivity, the hard choices that come with prioritizing rejuvenation, and why being deliberate is so critical to avoiding burnout. Dan and Pam even share their personal methods of mental and physical rejuvenation, from evening walks and classical music to early morning workouts and prioritizing sleep, as inspiration on how you can make a change in your life. Tune in if you're ready to transform your mindset and boost your performance without sacrificing your well-being.  

Has this ever happened to you? You walk into a sales conversation with your product demo ready. You’ve rehearsed your presentation to perfection, knowing every line and figure by heart, only to find your prospect is disengaged and uninterested in your production. There’s a reason this didn’t work: You made the conversation about yourself. Instead of approaching the prospect with curiosity and asking questions about their business, you relied on a rehearsed demo presentation that didn’t require you to step out of your comfort zone and engage with the prospect on their level. So how do we fix this? In this snippet, Dan shares why relying on your demo, though tempting, can hurt your ability to connect with your prospects and close the deal. We’ll explore why this leads to missed opportunities and misaligned solutions, and how you can adjust your mindset to better serve your prospect’s needs, not your own need for comfort and security. Listen to this snippet, and if you liked it, scroll back to episode 42, “Disqualifying You Is Easier” to hear the full conversation.  

Sales leaders often stress the importance of differentiation. But what if I told you that the conventional wisdom on how to stand out in sales conversations actually makes you sound more like everyone else? When have you ever heard a competitor of yours say to the prospect, “our resources aren’t that good?”  Differentiation isn't about having the most offices, the smartest people, or even the best product. True differentiation has to come from within you - how you show up mentally. In this episode of Breaking Sales, Dan and Kristie dive deep into what it takes to stand out in a crowded marketplace. They’ll challenge the conventional wisdom about differentiation and explore why your mindset matters more than any feature or benefit you can tout. How it’s often your ability and willingness to ask the questions others are afraid to ask.   

When was the last time you actually enjoyed responding to an RFP? The harsh reality is that buyer expectations are through the roof. The old playbook just doesn't cut it anymore. But what if there was a way to completely flip the script on RFPs? To turn them from a soul-crushing exercise into a chance to truly connect with your prospects? In this episode, Kristie and Dan dive into the mindset shift that can help you disrupt the RFP game, challenging everything you think you know about the process. What if instead of a scripted song and dance, you could have a real dialogue? What if you could build trust by being radically honest? And what if setting clear boundaries actually led to more success? Dan and Kristie break down exactly how to approach RFPs in a whole new way. One that keeps you objective, strategic, and focused on what really matters: helping your prospects make the best decision possible. If you’re ready to throw out the old RFP rulebook and try something that might just transform your entire sales approach, listen in.  

Are you brave enough to ask a prospect if they've tried fixing their problem with their current provider? Or does the risk that you could potentially lose a deal fill you with dread?  Sales professionals often struggle with getting too attached in these situations, especially when they’re excited about closing a deal. If you want to improve your sales conversations, you have to become very self-aware about this tendency, and remind yourself that your attachments and insecurities aren’t serving anyone’s best interests. In this Snippet, Dan explores how adopting this mindset can help you build trust with insurance industry leader Danielle Lombardo. You'll learn how to shift your focus from closing at all costs to truly serving and understanding potential clients, focusing on creating long-term trust instead of short-term gains. If you're ready to challenge what you think you know about sales tactics, listen to this snippet, then scroll back to Episode 3, Breaking the Sales Mindset with Danielle Lombardo, to hear the complete discussion on avoiding these common sales conversation pitfalls.

Have you ever felt a rush of excitement when a prospect says something positive about your sales conversation? That moment when you are sure you have it in the bag? Not so fast. In this episode, Dan and Pam explore a dangerous pitfall in sales - the temptation to hear what you want to believe, not what your prospect is actually saying. They’ll dive into why labeling interactions as "good" or "bad" can sabotage your efforts, and how to stay objective even when things feel optimistic. You'll learn why "buying signals" might not mean what you think they do, and how to keep pushing for deeper understanding instead of settling for surface-level positivity. Dan and Pam break down real examples of sales conversations gone wrong, and give you strategies to avoid the same mistakes. Prepare to challenge your assumptions, and learn how to avoid disappointment by listening with more curiosity.  

Most salespeople approach rapport-building wrong, and here's why: they rely on superficial small talk that prospects can see right through, they abruptly switch from "rapport mode" to "sales mode," creating a jarring experience, or they assume rapport is only about finding common ground, when it's really about creating a much deeper connection. These mistakes don't just fail to build trust – they actively damage it. In this snippet, we revisit Dan’s conversation with David Thompson, a master interrogator who shares his expert insights on building rapport. David reveals how to weave rapport throughout your entire conversation, how to be a human first and a salesperson second (and why this distinction matters), and techniques from high-stakes interrogations that can transform your sales approach. Plus, we'll explore the power of strategic questioning and why assuming you understand a prospect's needs is a dangerous game. After listening, scroll back to Episode 18, Questions that Build Trust with David Thompson, to hear our full conversation on dialogue and trust in sales.

What if the key to your success is hidden in the words you probably dread hearing most: "Can I give you some feedback?" For most people, those six words might cause your defenses to rise and your mind to race. But what if your mindset around feedback is actually a predictor of your future success? In this episode of Breaking Sales, Dan and Pam challenge the way professionals respond to feedback. We're diving deep into why most people run from criticism, while the top 1% of performers crave it. You'll discover how your instinctive reaction to feedback might be sabotaging your career, why you're probably not as self-aware as you think, and how to transform criticism from a threat into your secret weapon for growth. If you're ready to embrace discomfort and unlock a new level of performance, this episode is for you. It's time to stop running from feedback and start running towards it.

Think about the most valuable feedback you've ever received, or that question that really helped you solve a problem by thinking both objectively and differently. Was there some level of discomfort at first? Did you have to lower your guard a little bit so you could objectively receive and debate either the feedback or the question? And more importantly, how did the experience impact how you felt about the person giving the feedback or asking the question?  This experience is called positive tension. It's the art of asking questions and making observations that may be at first uncomfortable for the recipient, but the exchange is invaluable because it helps the other person to think differently about their situation, experience, and or results. If you want your prospect to make a change, the psychology would suggest that they will need to feel and work through positive tension.  In this episode of Breaking Sales, Dan and Pam dive deep into why creating positive tension is crucial for transformative conversations. You'll learn why your prospects need to feel tension to seriously consider change, techniques for framing tough questions in a way that builds trust, and how to find your authentic voice when discussing sensitive topics.  If you want to stop spending so much time chasing prospects for answers and you want to sell more, this episode is for you. Let's break down the psychology behind positive tension and how you can use it as a tool to help your prospects gain conviction toward change.   

Are you comfortable asking the tough questions? Or do you find yourself holding back, afraid to rock the boat? That hesitation can be counterintuitive, as the ability to ask challenging questions may be the difference between closing a deal and watching it slip away.  So how do you develop the confidence to push past your comfort zone and take the conversation into uncharted waters? In this snippet, Quinn Damon and Dan explore the art of asking tough questions, and Quinn shares a pivotal moment in his career where a single, well-crafted question turned the tide in a sales conversation. If you're ready to learn how to ask the questions that truly matter to your prospect, listen in, and then scroll back to episode 44, “No Shortcuts to Sales Success” to hear our full conversation on mastering the art of tough questions.

What would happen if excuses and insecurities no longer held you back, and you were able to approach your prospecting with calm, confidence, and conviction? In this episode of Breaking Sales, Dan and Pam talk about how you can evolve your mindset and minimize annoying insecurities that hold you back. They cover conviction and how it can transform your performance, including why waiting for external factors to boost your confidence is a losing game, and how you can get results by manufacturing that "I don't give a sh*t" attitude.  This conversation might just be the wake-up call you need to break through to your next level of achievement.  

In this Snippet, Pam and Dan explore the power of process in transforming your sales results. You'll learn how to scale your prospecting efforts and build a consistent, high-performing sales machine. We'll break down how to tackle prospecting in an organized, consistent way, and why daily habits reduce stress.   If you're ready to take your sales game to the next level, listen to this snippet, and then scroll back to Episode 12, Prospecting: The Missing Link to hear the full conversation.

More and more salespeople are spending too much time and energy trying to find the perfect prospecting message—a silver bullet that guarantees success. The truth is that the real key to effective prospecting is not in the message itself, but in how we frame our goals and expectations.  You can’t control most things in life, including how your prospect responds to your messaging. However, there are four things you can control:  Your mindset, effort, actions, and consistency.  In this episode of Breaking Sales, Pam and Kristie dive deep into the mindset traps that hold us back, and the opportunities to change our approach—and thus, our results. Whether you’re a seasoned pro or just starting out, get ready to reconsider everything you think about prospecting.  

Are you spinning your wheels, feeling like you never have enough time? Think having a wide-open calendar would mean more freedom? Think again. Dan and Pam are about to challenge everything you thought you knew about managing your time.   Resident time-management expert Pam sits down with Dan to unpack two crucial questions:  1. Does your schedule represent where you are today, or where you want to be tomorrow?  2. Are your calendar practices an asset or hindrance?     They dive deep into how top performers use their calendars as powerful assets, common misconceptions about scheduling that might be sabotaging your success, and how to transform your relationship with time. You’ll find out why having the discipline to plan and stick to a schedule isn't just about getting more done. It's about safeguarding your promises—to yourself, your team, and your clients. Whether you're in sales, leadership, or any field where performance matters, this episode is your roadmap to next-level productivity.  

There will be a time where enough is enough. When all of us in sales look back and say, “What were we thinking?” And we ask, “Why would anyone accept a 20 percent win standard from 20 percent of the population?”    Let’s start questioning the sales norms and redefining how we measure success. It will be up to you to decide what level you’ll play at.    Will convention and the current misguided “expertise” keep you stuck, or will you have the conviction to challenge and carve your own path?   In this episode of Breaking Sales, Pam and Dan start to debunk the myth of sales. They move past the temptation to standardize and label prospects, push past closing ratios, and get to the heart of the matter—how to tear into that other 80 percent.  

If you had one chance to build trust with someone, would you choose the path of sharing your competency or seeking to understand their point of view?    Common sense would dictate that most will choose “seeking their point of view,” but why then during conversations does it so often switch? How many times have you caught yourself telling the other person what they should do, or sharing your expertise and experience hoping they adhere to your advice?  This snippet revisits Dan’s conversation with Kent Grayson, an associate professor and researcher at the Kellogg School of Management and an expert on trust and authenticity in the marketplace. Kent and Dan unpack an analogy that demonstrates why competence in and of itself is not enough to build trust. To hear the full episode, scroll back to episode 96: Evolving Trust with Kent Grayson.

It’s no secret: many salespeople dread participating in RFPs (request for proposals). Many feel they are unfair, unclear, inefficient, and otherwise difficult. However, with more businesses adopting RFPs as part of their decision-making process, it’s crucial that sales professionals know how to approach them.    More importantly, the problem may be less about the process and more about your mindset.    In this episode of Breaking Sales, Dan and Pam discuss adopting a mindset that will help you to disrupt RFPs, and what tools and tactics can be used to help organizations in their decision-making during the RFP process.  

While control provides us with a sense of comfort and security, it doesn’t benefit us to keep an iron grip on every aspect of our lives. If you want to create something new, different, or special in your life, you’ll have to learn to embrace things that you can’t control and trust what you can.    In this episode of Breaking Sales, Kristie and I discuss different perspectives on control, and how to develop a healthy mindset around it. The conversation also explores how trying to control too much can cloud our judgment and prevent us from making good objective decisions.  

How do we make sure we remain accountable to ourselves and our commitments when faced with discomfort?   Continually evolving ourselves and our mindset is essential to propelling our lives, careers, and businesses forward. Sustainable change requires a steady adherence to processes and principles that may sometimes be uncomfortable, but encourage long-term personal growth.    In this episode of Breaking Sales, Pam and Kristie explore what it takes to be accountable to oneself, and why this practice is one of the most important contributors to high performance.  

Language is one of the single most important factors in shaping human behavior and psychology. The words we choose dictate how we think, how we behave, and what experiences we have, positive or negative. How do we use our words to control our own thoughts and approach new situations with clarity and confidence?     In this episode of Breaking Sales, Dan continues his discussion with Dr. George S. Everly Jr., a highly accomplished psychologist, researcher, and author. We discuss the relationship between language and psychology: How self-talk helps us find courage and strengthen our tolerance for rejection or failure. We also discuss how questions help build trust and create new possibilities.  

High performers often cite their routines and sleep habits as essential ingredients to improving cognitive ability, productivity, and other aspects of performance. It’s no different when we think of having meaningful conversations as leaders, teammates, or sales professionals. Powerful communication is no accident, and it can be learned.    In this episode of Breaking Sales, Dan continues his conversation with Dr. George S. Everly, Jr., a prolific researcher and author. George and Dan discuss how we can maximize our conversations and interactions with strong cognitive function through routine, sleep, exercise, and support.  

Have you ever wondered what it would take to add some cognitive and behavioral horsepower to your routines and activities? Or what really influences the choices that you make?    In this episode of Breaking Sales, Dan sits down with Dr. George S. Everly, Jr., a highly accomplished psychologist, researcher, and author whose work spans multiple scientific disciplines. The conversation explores the neuroscience behind decision-making, reframing your mindset to be more conducive to what you want to achieve, and what you can do to maximize your cognitive power.  

How has honest but difficult feedback helped shape the individual members of the Lappin180 coaching team for the better? In this behind-the-scenes episode, Dan, Pam, and Kristie share the stories behind the toughest feedback they have ever received, and how it has helped them learn, grow, and achieve better outcomes. This conversation highlights why feedback is so essential to personal and professional growth at all stages of life.  

Our innate instinct to label things as bad may have worked to protect us 20,000 years ago, but it often works against us in today’s modern world. How are people that work in the most high-stakes roles able to keep their composure despite the elevated sense of urgency?    In this episode of Breaking Sales, Dan shares how his recent conversations with pediatricians treating the sickest children have continued to shape his thinking around the power of detachment.    Dan and Pam discuss how these extreme examples of using detachment can be very useful in helping us stay calm and poised in difficult conversations. They also examine why we label potential threats through the lens of evolutionary psychology, and why this runs counter to the demands of today’s conversations and experiences.  

How can you be certain that your day-to-day activities are helping you achieve your goals? Additionally, how do you identify opportunities that you may have missed, so you can capture them the next time around?   In this snippet, Pam shares why metrics are fundamental to knowing whether or not you are growing in your business, and what metrics you need to understand whether or not you are making progress. To hear the full episode, scroll back to Episode 71: You Can’t Grow Until You Measure.

High-performance is heavily influenced by your choices. There are studies that suggest that those who seek immediate gratification are less successful than those who delay gratification.    Do you sacrifice the present for the future? Or do you give up the future to indulge in the present? This is not an easy question.    Join Dan and Pam as they explore how our choices either promote or hinder our routines, commitments, and sense of fulfillment. In this episode, you’ll hear some interesting perspectives on the relationship between commitment and choices that will help you frame your thinking and decide what viewpoints you do and don’t agree with.  

Your prospects are constantly being sold to, and as a result, they have developed a series of biases that help them filter out what conversations are going to be helpful or harmful to them. This reaction is primal, based on instinct that dates back tens of thousands of years. Even a referral from a trusted source may not be enough for them to let down their guard. What can sales professionals do to ease the prospect’s initial uncertainty and innate lack of trust? In this episode of Breaking Sales, Dan and Pam explore how you can level the playing field with your prospects and clients so that both parties can enter the conversation with more courage and curiosity. They’ll explore the psychology behind the beginning of human interactions and what you can do to make a positive early impact.

Get to know the Lappin180 team in this bonus episode of Breaking Sales. In this candid conversation, you’ll get a behind-the-scenes look at coaching and gain insights on how teams operate and build relationships over time. Dan, Pam, and Kristy share their journeys to becoming coaches, the dynamics that allow them to function as a team, and reminisce about some of the successes and challenges they’ve faced together along the way.  

Sharing your credentials with prospects may seem like a strong way to demonstrate your value, but in reality, leaning on your past accomplishments to convey your worth stems from insecurity and scarcity. Worse, while your prospective clients may be able to gain a lot from your experience and expertise, putting it at the forefront of your conversations to prove your capability and worth may actually have a negative effect.   In this snippet, Dan explores why credentialing is a common pitfall for professionals, and how pitching your solution or expertise can unintentionally trigger the wrong reaction from your prospect. To hear the full conversation, scroll back to Episode 69,” Sharing Your Credentials Can Damage Your Credibility.”  

Assertiveness and persistence can add value to a conversation, but only if aligned with helping the other person assess their circumstances more honestly. Neither should be practiced to advance your agenda. How do you know when it is time to slow down and assert?    In this episode of Breaking Sales, Dan continues his conversation with management consultant Kirsten Markley, to explore how curiosity, assertiveness, slowing down, and persistence all work together to create conversations that build trust and differentiate.  

It’s human nature to revert to our routines when under pressure. If you’ve been taught to sell or position value, then you’ve grown accustomed to defaulting to your expertise when pressured by the prospect. You lead with competency in hopes the prospect will eventually “get” your point. Unfortunately, this doesn’t work as often as we’d like, and it often leaves us feeling disconnected and chasing the prospect for a decision.   On this episode of Breaking Sales, Dan sits down with management consultant veteran Kirsten Markley to explore how she uses curiosity to learn and build trust, and take share of wallet away from the better well known competitors in her space.

Explaining why your product, service, or expertise is a better alternative isn’t enough. Decisions are not made based on benefits alone. There might be many “pros” in your prospect choosing to do business with you, but it’s the perceived risks, discomfort, and hurdles that will hold them back.  In this episode of Breaking Sales, Dan and Pam continue their exploration into the psychology of decision-making. They share some personal experiences that have helped them better understand why it’s human nature to rationalize and avoid change, and provide examples of questions you can ask to slice through your prospect’s decision biases.

The purpose of any traditional sales conversation is to help the prospect objectively assess and debate how or if they should make a change to your product, service, or expertise. This requires enough self-awareness to minimize their biases, identify their attachments, and control their fears. Does your current conversation process and strategy account for this? In this episode of Breaking Sales, Dan and Pam discuss the psychology behind decision-making and explore how human beings approach and debate difficult choices. We’ll explore how facts alone are rarely enough to form a decision, and that it’s most often the relationship between perceived risks and gains that determine your fate.

In a world filled with endless distractions, willpower is our first line of defense against procrastination, and one of the greatest tools we have to accomplish our goals. But is willpower a finite resource, or one that we can learn to manage, grow, and expand?   In this snippet, Pam shares how she uses willpower to manage distraction, and offers an approach to discipline that you can use to stay focused and achieve your goals. To hear the full episode, scroll back to Episode 78: “Stress or Freedom—the Many Perspectives of Discipline.”

What you achieve, create, or experience in your professional and personal journey is reflective of your mindset. When decoding the world around you - your thoughts follow a thinking pattern. This routine dictates the actions you take, or don’t take. So if you want to achieve, create, or experience something more or different - strengthen your mindset. Gratitude is a simple and powerful place to start.    In the final part of my conversation with Chris Schembra, a gratitude expert and the author of Wall Street Journal bestseller Gratitude Through Hard Times, we explore the connection between gratitude and how we think and the actions we take. As well as the impact of negative biographical experiences, and how to shift them to positive.

Is gratitude simply an altruistic way of thinking? Does it have a tangible impact on the challenges we face, and the relationships we attract and build each day?    The answer - yes! It strengthens you and those around you.    In this episode of Breaking Sales, Dan sat down with Chris Schembra, a gratitude expert and the author of WSJ bestseller Gratitude Through Hard Times to discuss. Chris shares how and why you should begin your gratitude journey, and how a gratitude practice will strengthen your connection with prospects, clients, teammates, family, and friends.   

Rejection, self-doubt, imposter syndrome, or simple uncertainty—any one of them can cause anxiety, hesitation, and frustration. All of them reside in your mindset, and it’s often very difficult to consistently shake them.    Enter gratitude.    Whether preparing for a big sales call, leadership moment, or family dynamic, gratitude is a practice that can calm your nerves, instill conviction, and strengthen courage.    Meet my guest, Chris Schembra, a gratitude expert and the author of “Gratitude and Pasta,” along with his latest book, “Gratitude Through Hard Times.” In this episode of Breaking Sales, Chris enlightens us on how practicing gratitude can reshape one's mindset to foster resilience and help us become more resolute in our actions.  

When in a conversation, the process of seeking to understand the other person is core to building trust.     In this Snippet, Pam and Dan discuss how to use questions to help your prospect become more objective as they evaluate your value and expertise.   To hear the full conversation, scroll back to Episode 91—Your Mindset Impacts Your Results Pt 2.  

Changing your mindset is essential for growth, and yet it remains a vague process and destination for so many. Yes, the word is overused and misused.   It’s the absolute determining factor in how you perform and the trust you build in a conversation. It’s the crucial difference between the same results you’ve always experienced and moving into a realm of higher performance. In this episode, Dan continues his conversation with commercial real estate professional and Lappin180 client Jeff Vertun to explore what it took for him to analyze and evolve his mindset. They also look at how changing his mindset translated to the real world by breaking down a meeting that Jeff recently had between his team and a prospect.

Theory, methodology, ideology: life’s full of intriguing concepts, but in the end, success comes down to the risk (and reward) of taking action.    In this episode, Dan speaks with commercial real estate professional and Lappin180 client Jeff Vertun to explore what it means to change your mindset, and how this directly impacts your ability to connect with your prospects by being curious (instead of hiding behind your competencies).  

For the past three years, the Breaking Sales podcast has explored how sales professionals and leaders can develop a high-performance mindset. Now, we’re looking back at the most poignant moments to create the Best Of series, where we feature curated segments on select topics to help you approach your sales conversations and prospecting with more intentionality.    In this episode, we will take a look at several clips focused on how to conduct your sales conversations with the prospect’s best interests in mind, not your own. We call this high-intent or benevolence. It runs counter to the low-intent mindset that many sales professionals have as they try to persuade their way to closing the deal. We’ll visit conversations on asking tough and meaningful questions, the power of staying in the moment when listening, and give a real-world example with guest Stephen Shedletzky of how he applies benevolence in his own business.  

The Breaking Sales podcast has released hundreds of episodes exploring how sales professionals and leaders can develop a high-performance mindset. Now, we’re looking back at our favorite moments to create the Best Of series, where we feature curated segments on select topics to help you approach your conversations and relationships with more intentionality.    In this episode, we will take a look at several clips focused on the relationship between abundance and scarcity, and how mastering these tactics can help you in your prospecting. We’ll examine the psychology behind scarcity and abundance and how to avoid falling into common pitfalls that signal scarcity to your clients.  

The Breaking Sales podcast is looking back at our favorite moments from past episodes to create the Best Of series, where we will feature curated conversations on select topics that will help you approach your conversations and relationships with more intentionality. In this episode, we will be reviewing three conversations focused on Detachment - the ability to avoid labeling what you observe, hear, or experience as good or bad.    Dan and Pam will introduce Detachment and share mindful methods to activate it, before visiting conversations with Dr. Karin Anderson Abrell and Ken Mossman. For more information on Detachment, listen to these full episodes, and look out for future Best of episodes on topics such as abundance, scarcity, and more.  

If you are hungry for the sale, there’s a good chance you’re not curious enough to win the deal. In this episode, Dan and Kristie discuss the tight relationship between trust and curiosity, and how curiosity will outperform competency 80% of the time. 

Why do sales professionals burn out quickly? The missing piece: mindset. In this snippet, Dan and Pam reveal the key to consistent, successful outreach. They share approaches for how to adapt your mindset for success.  If you enjoyed this Snippet, listen to the full conversation in Episode 89 - Your Mindset Impacts Your Results Part 1.  

Achieving the right mindset is one of the most important factors in business and sales, and yet sales professionals frequently misunderstand and underutilize it. In this episode, Dan and Pam break down what goes into activating that next-level mindset, sharing real-world examples and actionable tips in the process.

In this Snippet, we explore the art of asking powerful questions. We'll see how these questions can guide your prospects on a journey of self-discovery, helping them gain a clearer understanding of what they gain or risk in their change or no change debate.  If you enjoyed this episode, scroll back to Episode 80: The Power of Questions to hear the full conversation.

Abrasive outreach might capture your prospect’s attention, but it dramatically reduces the chances that they will respond positively. In this 180 Conversation, Dan shares with Pam an off-putting cold outreach email that he received. The two discuss why this tactic is reflective of scarcity and a low-intent mindset

Author and speaker Stephen Shedletzky joins Dan for a discussion on benevolence, creating successful and long-lasting business relationships, and building a “Speak-Up Culture” in part two of this interview.

In this episode, Dan explores the attributes that define successful leadership with author and speaker Stephen Shedletzky. Stephen is an expert on building “Speak Up Cultures,” which is the idea that a team is most successful when its members are willing to share their ideas openly and without fear. Stephen and Dan discuss this philosophy, as well as why self-awareness, benevolence, and curiosity are critical to successful leadership.

One of the most common reasons that sales professionals struggle to reach their full potential is that many often confuse their own arrogance with being confident, and aren’t self aware enough to see the difference between the two.   Listen in as Pam and I break down what arrogance and confidence are in practice, and share ways to help avoid falling into this pitfall yourself.   If you enjoy this snippet, scroll back to episode 87, “3 Unique Barriers to High Performance”, to hear the full conversation.  

In this episode of Breaking Sales, Dan and Pam discuss the concept of mindset as a setting. Expanding upon a definition provided by David Yeager and Andrew Huberman, which describes mindset as the way we collect, filter, and codify information, Dan and Pam take a deep dive into mindset and how it relates to routine, control, and safety. Listeners will also learn how to avoid common pitfalls that can lead us into a poor performance mindset, as well as why we need to practice the three foundations of a high-performance mindset regularly to make it a competitive strength.

You can develop and strengthen the muscle and skill of resilience, but many people don’t know how. Simply saying “I need to be more resilient” isn’t enough. So how do you become more resilient to achieve that next level of success?   In this snippet, Pam shares why commitment is important to building resilience, and shares a personal story about how she was able to achieve a goal despite a major setback.   Listen to this snippet, and if you enjoy it, scroll back to episode Ep. 83: “3 Ways to Build Resilience” to hear the full conversation.  

Professionals struggle with creating work-life balance. How do we find it, and Is it even possible? In this snippet, Pam shares her own experience trying to create harmony between her personal and professional lives, and shares the tactics she uses to stay in the moment and make focused, quality time.   Listen to this snippet, and if you enjoyed it, scroll back to episode 62, The Myth of Work-Life Balance, to hear the full conversation.  

Here’s a scenario that happens all too often: somebody reaches out to me without doing any prior research, engages with me in a low-intent manner, and then makes a big ask of me. No effort was made to deepen our relationship or make a genuine connection, and I’m instantly turned off. Why do so many people conduct their outreach this way, and how can you ensure you don’t fall into this trap? Enter Chris Tuff, Author of “Save Your Asks” and “The Milennial Whisperer.” Chris is an expert in building connections with high-intent, and shares his methodology to help you deliver value and build authentic relationships. Listen in as Chris and I discuss the give and take relationship that you need to master in order to maximize your network’s value, and why “saving your asks” is a the cornerstone of activating your network effectively.

Every relationship requires the effort of both parties to work together effectively. While I’m not a big fan of customizing approaches to a particular generation, the reality is often that each generation’s set of values (in business and personal life) require professionals of all ages to understand one another and navigate differences.    Enter Chris Tuff, Author of “Save Your Asks” and “The Milennial Whisperer.” Chris and I don’t come from the same philosophy, and we have diverging opinions on numerous topics. However, by engaging in this debate, we explore new avenues of thinking that open us up to disagreement, but also allow us to learn from one another.   Listen in as Chris and I discuss millennial and Gen Z perspectives on technology, family, and interpersonal relationships, and share why you need to understand these to be effective in your business.  

As professionals, we can sometimes be put in situations where we experience a physical and/or emotional response when there is conflict between job demands and the amount of control we have over meeting these demands.This phenomenon, which Neel Doshi describes as “emotional pressure,” can be harmful to adaptive performance. Where does this phenomenon show up, and how can we recognize the signs to avoid succumbing to it?   Listen to this snippet, and if you enjoyed it, scroll back to episode Episode 24, “How Top Performers Self-Motivate with Neel Doshi,” to hear the full conversation.  

When faced with uncomfortable situations, how do you respond? Do you go on the defensive, or do you show your vulnerability and use the opportunity to make a deeper connection?   Colin Hunter is the Founder and CEO of PotentialSquared, a company dedicated to amplifying leaders’ intrinsic qualities to help them build a culture that is more thoughtful, innovative, and experimental. Colin’s approach is designed to help you overcome the discomfort of tough conversations and navigate the tension for positive outcomes.   In this episode, Colin and I dive into the nitty gritty of how leaders can accomplish this, highlighting intent and vulnerability. We also discuss how roleplaying is an essential part of leadership development, and give input on how leaders can facilitate roleplaying effectively.  

Having the right mindset and a strong sense of self is imperative to leading a team and scaling a business. Without the willingness to take risks or the tools to show up authentically, leaders and professionals can do a major disservice to themselves, their teams, and their clients.   Colin Hunter is the Founder and CEO of PotentialSquared, a company dedicated to amplifying leaders’ intrinsic qualities to help them build a culture that is more thoughtful, innovative, and experimental. Colin’s approach is designed to create relationships with purpose by getting under people’s skin and advising them at a deeper level.   In this episode, Colin shares his journey from being dissatisfied and unhappy in a corporate role to starting a business that fits with his core values: harnessing your creativity to make a difference and building playgrounds to disrupt leadership.    We’ll discuss how PotentialSquared accomplishes this, and what challenges Colin has faced in helping others reach their full potential.  

We are all creatures of habit, and all of us have our own set of thinking and reactionary routines. As a result, when someone enters a situation with a statement, question, or demeanor that rubs us the wrong way, it has a tendency to trigger scarcity and attachment. In this episode, Dan and Pam explore three common poor performance triggers (eagerness, demeanor, and competition), and discuss how to avoid the most common pitfalls that professionals experience when they encounter these triggers.

Often in life, we find ourselves comparing our accomplishments to those of others. In many cases, this takes the form of a bitter belief that we are entitled to the same things someone else has without considering if we’ve really earned them. However, if we approach this from the viewpoint of learning where we are and how we can get to that next step, there is actually a healthy way to compare ourselves to others. In this topic discussion, Dan and Pam share their thoughts on creating healthy comparisons and achieving this mindset.

When we make assumptions about things that we think we know, we deceive ourselves with a false sense of security and control. Once we begin picking apart the details, that sense of security begins to go away. What can we do to make sure that we are actively listening and learning in a way that helps us perform at a higher level? Listen to this snippet, and if you enjoy it, scroll back to episode 29, 4 Assumptions that Hurt Your Performance & Limit Trust, to hear the full conversation.

While we often discuss the shortcomings of low-intent mindsets, what does this look like in practice? Why does low intent get the better of so many professionals? In this episode, recorded live at a speaking event, Dan presents a fictional scenario to demonstrate how low intent mindset turns prospects away and lets down those who use it.

When engaging with prospects that are already inundated with computer-generated emails and phone calls, how can we give something of value without coming off like we’re asking for something in return?    In this snippet, I sit down with Jeremy Donovan, Senior VP of Sales Strategy at Salesloft, who shares a simple, actionable tip for how you can provide something of value to your prospect in your initial outreach. This will help to build trust not just with prospects, but with your clients and peers as well.  If you enjoy this snippet, scroll back to Episode 33, Start Asking and Start Giving with Jeremy Donovan, to hear the full conversation.

Benevolence is central to building trust, so why do so many professionals ruin their outreach by making it about themselves? In this 180 Conversation, Dan and Pam examine an email where the writer makes this crucial mistake and jeopardizes their potential for success, as well as other examples where outreach messaging misses the mark in putting the prospect’s interests first.

High performers have a tendency to develop attachments to their successes, failures, and clients. Attaching your personal identity to metrics and people can be a major hurdle to overcome as you try and figure out who you are as a person.    Ken Mossman has seen the catastrophic role attachment to the wrong thing can play in shaping and understanding our identity. As the head of Cirrus Leadership, Ken has been coaching men who have lost sight of their personal identity to help them realign and, as he puts it, get their mojo back.   In this episode, Dan and Ken discuss the role attachments play in the relationship between your personal identity and your professional life, and examine the different voices we listen to that influence our decision-making.  

Failure can be painful, but it’s actually one of the most important tools we have for learning. However, traditional definitions of success and failure leave little room for nuance, which prevents people from applying the knowledge they’ve learned from their failures to be more successful. Listen to this snippet, and if you enjoyed it, scroll back to episode 60 to hear the full conversation.   

High performers have a tendency to confuse their performance results with their identity. Labeling yourself can be catastrophic as you try and figure out who you are as a person. If you play the labeling game – you are going to lose.    Ken Mossman knows this well. As the head of Cirrus Leadership, Ken has been coaching men who have lost sight of their personal identity to help them realign and, as he puts it, get their mojo back.   In this episode, Dan and Ken talk about the game and the journey of trying to accomplish a major career milestone, and how to identify the voices that cause doubt, stress, and setbacks.  

When it comes to setting goals, the amount of effort we put in affects our outcome. However, psychological and neurochemical factors can keep us from achieving goals when gratification is far off. How do we overcome this? Listen to this snippet, and if you want to hear this full conversation, scroll back to episode 56.

“I need to learn about you” isn’t a trendy catchphrase. It’s one of the core components of building trust. Saying this phrase and not executing on it is one of the quickest ways to deteriorate trust.    In this episode, Kristie shares a recent experience with Dan where she was the prospect being sold to. She shares how the sales professional emphasized learning, but was only concerned with sharing their expertise and demo. Ironically, the salesperson’s frustration with not being able to align their solution could have been avoided if they had done simple research and learned about Kristie’s situation. This breakdown will help you avoid making the same mistakes.  

When faced with adversity, it is common to want to retreat into our comfort zones. We revert back to what we can control. When we do this, we end up exerting more energy trying to get out of the uncomfortable situation than we would by facing it head-on. In this snippet, we’ll listen to a story Pam shares where how she realized that excuses build upon each other and directly impact the results we create. Listen to this quick snippet, and if you want to listen to the full-length conversation, scroll back to episode 20.

As we face uncertain economic conditions, many of Lappin180’s clients find themselves discussing rate increases with clients. It can be an awkward and daunting interaction, informing your client of a rate increase knowing that they might be slashing budgets, downsizing, or  placing new projects on hold. In the end, you can only control the controllables - your mindset and how you approach the conversation. In this episode, Dan and Pam discuss four tactical areas where detachment will help you perform in the clutch. 

Nobody likes to fail. But when you strip away the emotion, plenty can be learned and gained from disappointment. In this episode, Dan and Pam explore the topic of disappointment, including why we avoid it, why our expectations and attachments often betray us, and why the most seasoned professionals are often the least equipped to deal with disappointment.

If you want to avoid your prospect’s innate reaction to treat you like a salesperson, you’ll need to stop chasing results. It may sound odd, but that burning intensity that drives you to pursue that new prospect appointment often stands in the way of setting it.   Listen to this quick snippet and if you want to hear the full-length conversation, scroll back to Episode 5.

You already know this, so why do you do it? The more you try and position your value and convince someone that you’re credible - the more caution and distrust you create. When trying to establish credibility, many professionals get confused about whether they should rely on demonstrating their expertise or asking good questions. In this topic discussion, Dan and Pam break down the pitfalls that sales professionals run into with credentials, as well as how salespeople can establish more credibility by asking the right types of questions in the right way.

Although scarcity is an effective sales tool, it can come off desperate and needy when utilized incorrectly. In this 180 Conversation, Dan and Pam break down three outreach messages from the same industry (outsourced prospecting - appointment setting) that are poorly written and emphasize scarcity. Listen in and learn how to spot this inferior approach from those promising to be the best at it.

Do your prospects trust you enough to invite you in, give you honest answers, or put their reputation on the line? Not all trust is the same. It varies depending on the person, environment, and situation. As a leading expert on neuroscience and the medical industry, Dr. Nicole Fisher Roberts can attest to the role our neurochemistry plays in forming real, lasting trust. Nicole is the Executive Director of Feed A Billion, an international nonprofit that feeds girls around the world to prevent food insecurity, exploitation, and trafficking, and the founder of Health & Human Rights Strategies, an international institute that works to promote the advancement of health care and human rights.  In the second installment of this two-part one-on-one interview, Nicole and Dan discuss whether all trust is the same, what is at the core of trust, and the chemical reaction that happens within our brains that causes us to feel trust.

High performers take a different approach. Dan’s work over the past 25 years has led him to the conclusion that it begins with how they think. In order to win, your prospects will need to evaluate and debate change objectively. Assessing your solution is easy – generating the courage to do something different (with you) is hard.   To hear the full-length conversation, listen to episode 4.

Whether the goal is to find common ground or show our merit through raw expertise, salespeople need to meet prospects at their level in order to be successful. As a senior non-profit leader and contributor to Forbes, Dr. Nicole Fisher Roberts knows this well. Nicole is the Executive Director of Feed A Billion, an international nonprofit that feeds girls around the world to prevent food insecurity, exploitation, and trafficking, and the founder of Health & Human Rights Strategies, an international institute that works to promote the advancement of health care and human rights.  In this two-part one-on-one interview, Dan continues his deep dive into the core attribute of sales—that often vague set of social behaviors we call trust. In this episode, Nicole and Dan discuss the relationship between risk and trust, the power of vulnerability, building trust through questions, and how that old sales pursuit of finding commonalities shouldn’t be your only trust tactic.

People buy from people they like, right? No. They buy from people they trust. In this snippet, Dan explores the different levels of trust that are needed to help your prospect decide on change – doing business with you. The more complex and unexpected the change – the more trust is needed. Not all trust is the same.   To hear the full-length conversation, listen to episode 2.

Trust is at the center of how our society functions, and nobody knows this better than Kent Grayson. Kent is an expert on trust and authenticity in the marketplace who has conducted substantial research on how consumer habits are affected by their perception of a company/industry. In this one-on-one interview, Kent and Dan discuss the origins of trust in early human society, risk tolerance, and how sales professionals can build trust in their clients or potential clients.

In this 180 Conversation, Dan and Pam break down an email outreach that attempts to use buzzwords words that reflect trust, but because of the way they are misused they end up deteriorating trust quickly and create a sleazy email outreach experience. If you have to state that you’re trying to be clear - you’re probable not being clear.

The old adage still holds true, first impressions matter. Poor outreach tells your potential customer everything they need to know about your intent and value. Remember that they’re not looking for a reason to spend time with you, they're looking for a reason not to spend time with you. Poor attention to details and mismanaged automation is the only excuse your recipient needs. Listen in as Dan and Pam debate the impact and relevance of offering gifts and freebies to solicit time with a prospect.

Filler words, rambling questions, and feelings of hesitation are just some of the symptoms you’ll experience by not being in the moment during your conversations. In this snippet, Dan revisits episode 46, where he shares a process to help you intensify your questions, improve your learning, and take your conversations to the next level. To hear the rest of this conversation, listen to to Episode 46.

Your mindset impacts your results. There are a lot of people out there giving “advice” on how to be a better sales professional. But guess what? A lot of their well-intentioned advice is outcomes-based—not mindset-based. In the third and final episode of a three-part series, Dan and Pam build off the previous two episodes and discuss how much time we spend chasing prospects, our ability to compartmentalize, and our ability to manage bias.

Effective outreach is hard. You must be consistent, confident, and courageous to connect with people. The best outreach also includes honesty and transparency.   Join Dan and Pam on this week’s podcast as they break down an attempt to get Dan interested in a service, where flattery and hyperbole were used, and why it didn’t work. Remember, when it comes to outreach, you get what you put in.

Sometimes it’s easy to omit the basics in our conversations with prospects. If our standards aren’t defined, we aren’t setting ourselves up for success. In this snippet, we revisit a few of Dan’s nine conversation standards that will help you gain self-awareness and drive high-performance results. To hear the rest of the conversation, scroll back to episode 38.

Your mindset impacts your results. In this second part of a three-part series, Dan and Pam talk about how the questions you ask are a dead giveaway of the mindset you’re in. Listen in to test your own methodology for questioning your prospects against Dan and Pam’s advice, and identify whether you’re projecting scarcity or abundance with the questions you ask.

When it comes to outreach, every interaction matters. Building trust is essential if you want an invitation for a conversation. The second your outreach feels gimmicky, a high-quality prospect is out. Listen to this 180 Conversation as Dan and Pam share their reactions to a common outreach tactic – a dead giveaway for a low-intent offering.

Automation is a necessary tool in today’s world, but what happens when it’s used poorly? When it comes to your outreach, automation can destroy one of the necessary components of your relationship with your prospect: reciprocity. In this snippet, we revisit Dan’s conversation on reciprocity with Jeremy Donovan, who was formerly the SVP of Revenue Strategy at the sales engagement platform SalesLoft. If you want to revisit the full-length conversation, scroll back to episode 33.

Your mindset impacts your results. There’s a lot of people out there giving “advice” on how to be a better sales professional. But guess what? A lot of their well-intentioned advice is outcomes-based—not mindset-based. In the first episode of a three-part series, Dan and Pam demystify some of the myths out there around why sales professionals fail, and they begin to share the real reasons, and how to avoid them.

One of the quickest ways to discredit your outreach is to communicate assumptions about why your prospect hasn’t responded. Listen to this 180 Conversation as Dan and Pam share their critiques of an anonymous thread of email messages that reveal the author’s serious scarcity mindset.

If you’re calculating your pipeline wrong, then your business is at stake. That’s why Dan is setting the record straight on pipeline in this snippet episode. Listen in to hear Dan share how he calculates pipeline for maximum accuracy—and, as an added bonus, his method is going to boost your relationship with your prospects, too. To hear the rest of the conversation, listen to Episode 26.

Why do so many in sales struggle to reach their full potential? Many reasons. Listen in as Dan and Pam break down three of them based on their work coaching top performers for over a decade. After listening, you’ll have more self-awareness to identify which of the three is getting in your way.

No credibility = no meeting. If you’re missing the bare minimums in your outreach (Who are you? Why should they care? Who are you associated with?) then you’re never going to get their time. In this 180 Conversation, Dan and Kiley share an outreach that caused Kiley to simply respond: “You have no credibility”. Listen in to gut-check your own outreach—are you being genuine and helpful, or are you being self-serving?

What’s your top priority when talking to clients? If your automatic answer isn’t to learn, you need to go back to the drawing board. Listen in to hear Dan break down 4 assumptions you’re making about your prospects that are holding you back from being a top performer, and more importantly, his strategies for moving past them. If you’d like to listen to the full episode, check it out here.

A lot of work goes into getting your first call with a prospect, and naturally, you want to make sure you’re putting your best foot forward. Or better yet, start off with a competitive advantage. It starts with the science of visualization, making sure you have the right mindset, and then activating it through role play. Just like an athlete, chef, or any other high performer would do. Listen in as Dan and Kiley walk you through their best practices for meeting preparation.

Outreach cadences have become ridiculous. Sometimes it takes 14, 16, 18+ messages to get a meeting. Why is that? Bad outreach cadences like the one in this episode. In today’s 180 Conversations, Dan and Kiley share a painstakingly lengthy one-way outreach cadence that ends in Dan begging it to stop before Kiley is even halfway through. Listen in to hear why it’s more important than ever that you break the pattern of BS outreach.

You can develop and strengthen the muscle and skill of resilience to believe in yourself—but most don’t know how to do it. Simply saying “I need to be more resilient” isn’t enough. So how do you become more resilient to achieve that next level of success? Listen in as Pam and Kiley break down the three components of resilience. Identify ways to increase the toughness and stamina you need to create and experience a higher level of performance.

t’s been over 2 years, so if you still aren’t nailing your virtual meetings, it’s time to straighten that out. Dan and Kiley break down body language cues and give actionable tips to improve your virtual meetings—for you and your prospects & clients. If you’d like to listen to the full episode, check it out here.

If you want your prospect to take you seriously…don’t impersonate your pet. Listen in to this 180 Conversation as Dan and Kiley share an anonymous email that will have you laughing and learning.

Have you ever wondered what your prospects think about change? Are they open or closed? How much is too much? In this episode, Dan and Kiley share a question strategy that can give you tremendous insight into your prospect’s ability to embrace and pursue change.

The smallest actions turn into habits. Those habits make or break your progress toward your goals. Shifting your mindset to commit to the small things spills over into the larger things, and before you know it, your goals are crushed. Listen in as Dan & Kiley discuss what it takes to make your goals happen. To listen to the full episode, check it out here.

Questions can be powerful—are you using them to their full potential? Two things influence how you ask questions in a meeting with a prospect: your mindset and the outcome that you expect. Are you asking questions so you can find an angle to tee up your solution, or are you asking questions that help your prospect think through what they need to in order to evaluate change?  Listen in as Dan and Kiley discuss how to ask questions that motivate your prospect to think. 

If you have ever made a promise to a prospect that you can add value or guaranteed that what you do will help them, listen in! Making promises based on assumptions will create skepticism on the receiving end. This is rooted in attachment to scarcity, damaging trust before you even get to a conversation. This 180 Conversation reminds us why it’s so important to approach prospects with neutrality.

Empathy leads to meaningful engagement. In order to gain their trust, you have to help your prospects objectively debate whether or not their current state is still serving them–and in order to do that effectively, they have to know you're there to help first, not sell. Listen to this snippet to hear Dan and Kiley talk about how important solid listening and question-asking skills are for your first conversation with a prospect. To listen to the full episode, check it out here.

Discipline is a ten-letter word that induces both stress and freedom. In the short term, you feel stressed about making the consistent daily sacrifices to meet your goals, uncertain if your efforts will pay off. Procrastinating these efforts increases stress because you carry the knowledge that you didn’t stay consistent or bring your best. Before you know it, you’ve moved further away from the key habit or routine required to achieve your goal and created a new pattern of not committing to yourself. It becomes a barrier to your success. Listen in as Pam and Kiley provide a different perspective on discipline—how it drives and creates freedom.

In today’s 180 Conversations Dan and Kiley share an informative cold outreach email that has some good elements and some areas for improvement. Listen in for tips on how to end your outreach in a way that will make prospects feel comfortable jumping into the sales process.  

Your prospects don’t know you. They don’t know if you’re there to really help them or just make a sale. Before you can even think about pitching them some kind of solution, they need to trust you and know that you’ve got their back. Doing this out of order can cause distrust and actually add to the potential risk that they perceive. Ultimately, it will result in them staying the course and maintaining the status quo without making a change—even if they really do need to do something different. Listen in as Dan and Kiley discuss the relationship between trust and risk and how to keep this top of mind in your prospect meetings.

Are you using unnecessary or misleading phrases in your prospecting outreach? You might be and just don’t know it. In this 180 Conversation, Dan and Kiley share what happens when you choose phrases and adjectives that don’t further your objective. And don’t worry, they’ve got suggestions to help you avoid these pitfalls.

Sometimes you just need a short burst of inspiration in your day. Enter: Snippets. These short episodes will give you a quick hit of challenging, insightful information that will inspire you to be better in your day-to-day. In this first Snippet episode, Dan is asking: which type of player are you? Are you an A player, who challenges themselves farther, faster, and better–without the need for trophies; Are you a B player, who is a high achiever, but struggles with complacency; Or, are you a C player, who is always looking for the next finish line and a bottle of champagne to pop? Listen in to find out.

Have you ever looked in the mirror and questioned your success or how you created it? You created expectations and standards for how your conversations should flow, how to judge conversational progress (good or bad), and defined an endless list of “do’s and don’ts.” In some circles, you are considered successful. But it’s a road less traveled –and few do – when you consider giving up the familiar for a new approach. Listen in as Dan and Kiley talk with Mike and Sean, their client from the management consulting firm, PointB. They learned to bet on themselves and their teams using a different approach to compete and take down the giants in their space.

Success in sales begins and ends with your ability to connect with prospects in need of your offering. Some circles call it hunting. Others prefer a more distinguished description – business development. Experts everywhere tell you what, how, and when to do it. Consistency is key. Here’s the bottom line: if you want to get better at connecting with prospects, think and manage your behavior. Listen in as Dan and Kiley walk you through eight innate human behaviors that hold the key to better and more consistent outreach performance. Several will surprise you.

Are you making assumptions that could agitate your prospects? In this 180 Conversation, Dan and Kiley break down a set of email outreaches that might not sit well with the recipient.  If you have ever used the phrase, “…maybe this isn’t a priority for you right now” then this episode is for you!

In the journey to high-performance, you need a scoreboard. Without it, you have no idea what’s working or not and how to make adjustments for better results. In this episode, Pam and Kiley dive into the uncomfortable conversation of metrics. You’ll learn why they’re so important, why we might not like them, and why you need to pay close attention to what you’re NOT measuring.

Do you have expectations of your prospects? In this 180 Conversation, Dan and Kiley share what happens when you expect a response from your cold outreach. In the end, your expectations may be killing your chances of getting a response.

Credentialing yourself is about elevating yourself on a pedestal. It mostly happens when pride collides with insecurity. Instead of impressing the recipient, it leaves them feeling skeptical and unimpressed. If you want to impress, double down on your questions and learning. Take a genuine interest in the other person. In this episode, Dan and Kiley explore the issues with credentialing and break down the five things you should do before sharing your accomplishments with the prospect.

Are you using language that makes you sound desperate in your prospecting outreach? In this 180 Conversation, Dan and Kiley share a prime example of what it looks like when you show up trying to convince, persuade, or push your prospect. Spoiler alert–it doesn’t get you a meeting.

Tired of asking questions and receiving surface-level answers? This episode is for you. Over the past three years, Dan has listened to 100s of recorded prospect conversations, and behavior trumps skill. Yes, it’s critical to prep your questions before any conversation so you have a roadmap of what you want to learn. But it’s your ability to become self-aware and self-regulate five specific behaviors that forever changes the effectiveness of your questions – what you learn and how those questions build trust between you and your prospects. Listen in as Dan and Kiley blow the lid off of asking better questions and out-pacing your competition.

Do you sacrifice your credibility to make your outreach stand out? In this 180 Conversation, Dan and Kiley break down an outreach that starts out promisingly but ends with a chicken sandwich. Confused? So was the prospect. Listen in as Dan and Kiley explore what happens when you try too hard to stand out and why using frivolous tactics is never the solution.

What do you do when a prospect says they’re not willing to share information with you? In this Conversation Dissection, James Chalmers, Senior Advisor at Moneta, joins the show to share his experience with a distrusting prospect. As Kiley and Dan take James through the exercise, they explore how you can proceed with empathy and detachment in these interactions, while paying attention to the red flags you’re feeling along the way.

What would happen if you could seize the moment instead of squandering it? Instead of contemplating all the things that could go wrong when you risk reaching out to a prospect, ask an important question, or push back in a conversation – think deliberately about what could go right. In this episode, Dan and Kiley discuss how to experience a steadier grip in the moment to push yourself, expand outreach, and drive conversations forward. Avoid the habit of hesitating and pulling back – making the moment the enemy. Empower yourself to let go of short-term control and comfort, so you can minimize long-term discomfort and achieve more future success.

What happens when your cadence is well-timed, but your content misses the mark? In this lively 180 Conversations episode, Dan and Kiley analyze a series of two emails to demonstrate how your approach can minimize the prospects’ perception of your value and expertise – and get them to ignore your outreach. Hint: stop making the outreach about what you want – no one cares. Your prospect only cares about the things that matter to them and surrounding themselves with people who have their back.

Work-life balance sounds great, but does anyone ever truly achieve it? In this episode, Kiley and Lappin180 Coach, Pam Evanson, introduce the concept of work-life integration to describe the symbiotic relationship between personal and professional life. You’ll learn how to prioritize and stick to your goals, structure your time for optimal efficiency, and employ discipline and accountability to get the most out of your business and private life every day of the week. This enlightening conversation covers mindset, process, and the high-performance results you can achieve from taking deliberate action.

With email outreach, a few important tweaks can radically transform your results. In this 180 Conversation, Kiley shares the before and after versions of a client’s prospecting email, while Dan breaks down the adjustments to highlight what works and what doesn’t lead to better engagement.

You can take failure and identify with it as a permanent label or use it as nothing more than temporary feedback. Focusing on failure causes failure. The more you measure your worth through an outcome, the more pressure you place on yourself, and the higher the likelihood of procrastinating the actions you need to take to achieve success. In this episode, Dan takes a quick deep dive on reframing your perception of failure to help you embrace it as part of your high-performance journey.

If you want your prospect to consider making a change to you, they’re going to have to embrace some discomfort as they think differently about their business. Think of your own life and business. Do you solve all of the issues that cause you pain? Of course not. Sometimes, it’s easier to live with what you know versus what you don’t. The familiar versus the unknown. Your prospects are the same. Listen in as Dan and Kiley dissect a real deal with a client who needed to get comfortable making their prospect uncomfortable. If you’re having comfortable conversations, your prospect will remain uncomfortable with change.

Would you refer business to someone you’ve never met or spoken to – not knowing anything about their reputation or character? When your first touchpoint is asking someone to network, it can give the impression of scarcity. The approach might attract other scarcity-minded professionals, but it rubs others the wrong way. In this episode, Kiley and Dan share a similar experience of someone who wanted – but failed – to connect with them due to their odd, automated outreach approach.

When it comes to high-pressure sales conversations, your mental game is everything. Have you ever wondered how elite athletes and other top performers can quickly bounce back from mistakes to perform in the clutch? Let’s take the mystery out of mindset. In this episode, Dan and Kiley reveal the power of anchor and activation thoughts to influence how you react or respond in prospect meetings. Listen as Dan shares some of his own activation thoughts for performing in the clutch with high intent, abundance, and detachment.

Where you find yourself 12 months from now is up to you. For most people, New Year's resolutions are made to be broken. Without a plan or process in place to achieve success, it’s easy to quit, make excuses, and fail. In this episode, Dan and Kiley offer meaningful suggestions to get more out of your business (and life) in the new year. It begins and ends with the process you build and hitting incremental milestones along the way. Remember, you can’t control your results – but you can control your process.

Have you ever had a sales experience where it was so obvious that your prospect would be better off making a change to you – but they didn’t? In this episode, Dan draws a parallel to sales from a story in Chip and Dan Heath’s book, The Power of Moments. The story is a powerful example of how the obvious can be hard to see when habits, biases, and perceptions go unchecked. Discover how the positive tension you create with your questions will always outperform your demo and presentation

Setting and pursuing goals can be tedious. To change your results – you first have to change the way you look at things. Simply committing to more discipline, hard work, and a better attitude isn’t going to cut it. In this episode, Dan and Kiley go deep on four transformational paths that will add energy, fulfillment, and momentum toward whatever it is you want to achieve or experience in 2022. Listen in as they share their own experiences on what drains energy and what ignites it. The best part? You decide what, when, and how often – one step at a time.

The end of the year is a natural time to pause and reflect on your performance – what went well, what didn’t, and what you want to continue. In this 180-episode, Dan tells Kiley about Stop-Start-Continue, an exercise he uses to prioritize the adjustments he wants to make going forward. To get started, all you need is a journal, honesty, and no judgments. High performers embrace this kind of self-assessment. It often becomes the catalyst for small but powerful changes.

In an industry where the average new business sold per year can range from $100K to $200K, two producers (sales professionals) are averaging $600K every year in new sales. Everything about their approach is different, and it’s paying off big with their prospects. Join me as I talk with Barry and Byron from MJ Insurance. They share why mindset is foundational to their success – and how they've learned to thrive in uncomfortable tough conversations.

This episode with Dan and Collin Henderson is a mindset masterclass. Collin is an authority on high-performance mental conditioning and the author of Master Your Mindset. His teachings are embraced by leading organizations, including Nike, Salesforce, and Microsoft. Dan and Collin share powerful advice for mastering your inner dialogue, building confidence, overcoming imposter syndrome, and visualizing success. If you struggle with consistent performance and want to create and achieve at a higher level – this episode is loaded with concepts and tactics that you can implement right away.   

Do your thoughts lean negative or positive before reaching out to a prospect or asking a tough question? How much time do you waste debating the consequences of screwing it up versus getting it right? Do you torture yourself crafting round after round of the perfect email? Welcome to loss aversion, a common human bias where the urge to avoid pain is twice as strong as the pleasure of what you could gain. In this episode, Dan shares how this mindset impacted a recent result – and how this bias translates into your daily sales experience.

Your competitiveness and drive are valuable sales attributes, but it’s critical to know when and where to use them. Your prospect should never feel them through your outreach frequency. Listen in as Dan and Kiley share an example of how a good, well-intended email approach that initially grabbed the recipient’s attention fell apart because the salesperson pushed too hard and reverted to silly gimmicks.

What’s the best way to appeal to an elusive prospect? In this 180 Conversation, Kiley shares a recent coaching call with Dan about a client who successfully connected with their prospect. The key was focusing on meaningful questions and showing empathy in the conversation. Listen as Kiley breaks down their approach and gives valuable insights on how empathy can impact your interactions.

Who's teaching these obnoxious outreach tactics? Lead generation solutions (companies) play on your innate distaste for outreach while appealing to your ego to close more. They make promises of more appointments, qualified selling opportunities, and  revenue (wins). They do all the hard work, so you can breeze in to make the close. Yet, when soliciting for their own business, their approach is often desperate and gimmicky. In this episode, Dan and Kiley break down what these so-called professionals do and provide an alternative that builds trust and engages your prospects –  intro, purpose, the "give,” and outro. 

Being in the moment is a real skill and strength. High performers know the dangers of cognitive overload. They work hard to free themselves from the often-overwhelming weight of conversation expectations and past regret when talking to prospects and clients. Filler words, rambling questions, feelings of hesitation are just some of the symptoms you’ll experience by not being in the conversation moment. In this episode, Dan and Kiley get specific on a process to help you intensify your questions, improve your learning, and take your conversations to another level.

You work hard with the skills and tools you have to schedule new prospect conversations – but your results are average at best.  Your drive for success compels you to seek out and talk to more successful peers. You read books, listen to podcasts, and sign up for a free online prospecting workshop that assures better outcomes. In this episode, Dan and Kiley break down another well-intended effort that, unfortunately, misuses automation, makes annoying uninformed assumptions and empty promises that generate skepticism. Instead of engaging and drawing a prospect in – the cynicism you create pushes them away. Unfortunately, it’s a very common approach.

Imagine it’s Monday morning, 9:30 am. Your day is full of commitments over which you have no control. What have you done this morning to move your business forward? If you’re Quinn Damon with Lockton Companies, you’ve prioritized some key activities – including outreach, and you’ve already made your 15 calls for the day. Why? Because you’ve learned the compounding effect of process. In this episode, Dan and Quinn talk about some of the critical lessons learned in Quinn’s first four years in sales and how he learned to bet on his mindset and conversational approach to compete with those ten to twenty years his senior.  

When your prospect cuts your meeting down to 15 minutes, but you planned for an hour, how do you respond? When the prospect tells you to recap the meeting and send them the notes – what does it indicate? Does it matter if you know why your prospect took the meeting with you – from a need or obligation? Join Dan and Kiley as they break down a real prospect conversation with a client. In this episode, they help him identify how his mindset impacted his responses and results.

What happens when someone tries to sell you something that you’re not sure you need? Do you spend energy trying to qualify their service, product, or offering? Or do you spend your time disqualifying it? If you qualify, you’re on the hook for spending money, trying something new, and possibly making a mistake – getting it wrong. If you disqualify, you maintain control of the story and avoid the discomfort of doing something different. How often do prospects make this choice? Listen in as Dan and Kiley provide insight into how to avoid your prospect’s innate desire to disqualify you.

There’s a fine line between unique and bizarre when it comes to piquing prospect interest. The more your outreach stretches convention, the more you risk alienating your audience. Sending an email or leaving a voicemail that entices the recipient to scream, “That’s me!” is rewarding, but the odds of that happening are slim to nil. Maybe 10%, per the research. So, what impact does unusual outreach have on the remaining 90%? Join Dan and Kiley as they dissect an unconventional approach.

Listen, learn, and practice. Individually, they won’t move the needle, but together, they create a powerful chain reaction. Talking about what you’ve learned makes you feel knowledgeable. Putting it into practice with a willingness to fail produces results. In this 180 Conversation, Dan and Kiley add a new twist. They break down an actual cold call voicemail message from a Lappin180 client. Bottom line: You have to be willing to fail if you want to succeed. 

When your prospects compare your email outreach to your competitor – outside of your name and company, would they be able to tell the difference? The answer might surprise you. In this episode, Dan and Kiley offer you a glimpse into what prospects experience every day – an inbox saturated with offers for free demos, gift cards, and a pledge to take only 20 minutes of your time. Hint: if you don’t own Starbucks stock – maybe now is a time to buy.

Everything has a standard, and high performers follow and pursue a very different paradigm. In many cases, they look for conversation benchmarks that are 180-degrees different from what most sales professionals seek and observe. There’s a strong likelihood that you might be valuing things in your conversation that provide little impact on your results. Listen in as Dan and Kiley deep dive on nine conversation shifts to help you build trust faster and improve your performance.

You can spend hours crafting the perfect sounding sales message, but if the prospect doesn’t understand it, it’s worthless. In this episode, Dan and Kiley talk about the perils of using buzzwords, empty promises, repetition, or language specific to your inner circle in your outreach. You may think you sound well-informed, but the only one you’re impressing is yourself.

Flattery reeks of insincerity. When you walk into a store and a salesperson greets you with a compliment or an assumption, how do you feel? Does it trigger skepticism or trust? This style of outreach feels disingenuous: “I’ve been impressed with your work” or “It appears you’ve been doing well.” Listen in as Dan and Kiley break down how praise can create barriers in your outreach strategy.  

Are you an A, B, or C-level player? Everyone likes to think they’re an A player, and every leader wants A players on their team. But the reality is the journey to high performance starts with self-assessment, courage, and commitment. You have to take stock of where and how your talents and behaviors show up. If you’re interested in self-assessing from the safety of wherever you privately listen to this podcast, tune in as Dan breaks down the differences between an A, B, and C players using the following eight high-performance competencies – learning, feedback, focus, failure, success, risk, motivation, and betting on oneself. Whether you’re an individual performer, mentor, or sales leader, this episode makes a great growth opportunity for you or your entire team.

When your prospect meeting is going well, do you get ahead of yourself and become lazy with your questions and learning? In this 180 Conversation, Dan shares the importance of maintaining your focus on asking deep questions and learning. Never assume anything. Even when the prospect is ready to commit to another meeting.

With 5.7 million sales professionals making an average of 25 outreach attempts per day, your prospects are inundated with requests for their time. Prospects are savvy and skilled in learning how to avoid the time-suck of reading your conversation invite. Join Dan as he talks with Jeremey Donovan, SVP of Sales Strategy at SalesLoft, about tactics to help you avoid your prospect's immediate disqualification.

When you send a LinkedIn message or introductory email to a prospect, do you ask for something or give something? Nine out of ten outreach emails ask prospects for their time and interest. Based on previous experience, what does this tell your prospect about your conversation intent – if they invite you in? It tells them you want to advance or position a sale. In this episode, Dan and Kiley share some thoughts and ideas on giving vs. asking.

Are you speaking your prospect’s language, or your own? In this 180 Conversation, Dan and Kiley break down an outreach that uses plenty of industry jargon but alienates the prospect.

Platforms that help you scale and leverage your outreach time and effort can have value, but if your approach focuses on you, your services, and what you want – the only thing you're automating is your neediness and desperation. In this episode, Dan and Kiley review a specific example of how automating outreach can go wrong.   

Making assumptions during your prospect conversations is a clear indicator of an amateur (sales) mindset. It limits the trust you build, what you learn, and creates the prototypical sales experience that your prospects have come to expect. Every time you assume anything, you make it easier for the prospect to disqualify you and harder to differentiate yourself from your competition. In this episode, Dan and Kiley break down the four most common assumptions sales professionals make and the impact they have on your ability to help your prospect debate change.

How does outreach automation feel and sound to your prospects? In this 180 Conversation, Dan and Kiley clarify the difference between using automation to leverage and scale your outreach efforts versus deploying it out of laziness. Your prospects can tell when you are simply trying to play the numbers game - the “spray and pray” approach only tarnishes your brand. Why would your prospects invest time in getting to know you – when you invest minimal time in them? 

What is your outreach telling your prospect about your value? What’s the cost of becoming too cute with your approach? Nothing against hippos, but they don’t do well around humans or within your email strategy. In this 180 Conversation, Dan and Kiley break down the ways your outreach is diminishing your value before you even start a conversation.

This episode may change how you view your sales process. Do you assess your prospect conversation based on what you got out of it or what your prospect experienced? You bring a perspective into and out of every prospect conversation: Did we connect enough? Did they answer our questions? Did they agree to next steps? These are common benchmarks for many sales professionals in measuring the quality of their prospect conversations. Unfortunately, they have very little to do with how your prospect assesses the conversation and have little impact on their ability to debate change successfully. Listen in as Dan and Kiley walk you through how the prospect assesses the conversation.

How are you approaching prospects on LinkedIn?  LinkedIn’s technology and automation are misused 90% of the time, potentially destroying any opportunity to start a conversation. When you approach prospects on social media, your intention may be to scale your outreach efforts but you risk hurting your brand. In this 180 Conversation Dan provides guidance on the high-performance approach to prospecting on LinkedIn.

People often assume that money is the sole motivator for a career in sales.  While it may be the carrot for some sales professionals, high performers have deeper incentives.  In this episode, Dan and Neel Doshi, NY Times best-selling author of Primed to Perform, discuss the powerful motivation of play, potential, and purpose to maximize top performance and minimize stress.

Are you sending the wrong message to your prospects?  In this 180 Conversation, Dan breaks down what the style and quality of your outreach reveal to prospects. If you want to connect with someone and open up the possibility of a conversation, invest in educating yourself on what they post or follow. A blind monkey can reference a profile (sorry blind monkeys).

Your home is your safe haven. Now it’s become the place where you try to break free of comfort zones to hold yourself more accountable and build high-performance routines. If it's true we perform at the level of our environment, what does your current home office environment say about your future performance? About 55% of what we communicate comes from body language, 35% verbal tone, and 10% through our words. How are these innate human communication mechanisms being affected, and what do your prospects observe and interpret? In this episode, Dan and Kiley share ideas and techniques to help you maximize the virtual experience you create for your prospects and clients.   

Dan and Kiley get to the heart of effective sales outreach in an episode devoted entirely to prospect communication. Prospects receive tens of millions of LinkedIn invites, emails, and voicemails. How can you frame the conversation to stand out and sound different from everyone else?  It’s a matter of mindset, exuding confidence, assuming nothing, and removing expectation. Tune in for tangible insights and real-life examples to help you change the conversation.

2020 was a year of disappointment and opportunity. Standards and routines were disrupted. These challenges may have sparked a new practice, the insidious habit of giving up ownership and making excuses. Excuses are like muscles—the more you use them, the stronger they become. Eventually, they pave the road to defeat. Join Dan Lappin, Pam Evanson, and Kiley Schmitz for an intense episode to help you to take ownership of your choices. Learn how excuses work, why they’re deadly, and how to slow down the comfort train.

Can’t wait for 2020 to be over? In this year-end wrap-up, Dan and Kiley share the key themes and takeaways from 2020 and the lessons learned from our guests. Tune in for 20 minutes of candid, fluff-free, sales-shattering truths that culminate in one deceptively simple question: what did you learn about yourself in 2020? It may be a scary thought process, but it’s the one that will pay the most dividends in 2021.    

Are you guilty of making your prospect feel like the subject of an interrogation? David Thompson, an interrogation and interview expert, shares his experiences teaching the FBI and law enforcement how to build trust through non-confrontational questions. Imagine interrogating a suspect hell bent on avoiding any admission or prosecution and your job is to build enough trust so they confess to the crime. It can feel the same way with a prospect when you know you can help, but they refuse to see it. Listen in as Dan and David dive into the mindset and types of questions required to break your prospect from the prison of their biases.

Can self-awareness, ownership, and resilience be trained? In part two of our conversation, retired U.S. Navy SEAL and author Mike Sarraille shares his personal story of how he learned these critical qualities as a Marine before joining the SEALs. Mike also previews his book, The Talent War, breaking down the nine characteristics high performers must have to be successful in sales. 

What do sales professionals have in common with Navy SEALS?  More than you think. The drive to succeed, commitment to the process, and the willingness to push personal boundaries are surprising common ground.  Failure to perform is directly linked to how much you’re willing to invest in yourself, and the personal standards you set.  In this episode, retired U.S. Navy SEAL officer and author Mike Sarraille examines resilience and the value of pushing yourself to your edge – vital elements of high performance.

Don’t count on prospects to perceive your relationship the same way you do. Every time you enter a prospect conversation looking for signs of approval or the chance to prove your expertise, find pain, or get a commitment on next steps – you're pushing a sales experience. Even if the prospect likes you, it doesn’t necessarily mean they trust you. In this episode, learn two simple conversation approaches to help you develop a prospect relationship based on trust and competitive advantage.

Prospecting isn’t about giving away your character – it’s about finding it. When it comes to business development, one of the worst traps is tying your self-worth to outcome. The pressure you feel to deliver results works against you as you buckle under the weight of self-perceived humiliation of rejection. Lappin180 team member, Tom Short, has built an impressive prospecting machine that consistently delivers four or more conversations every week. But that wasn’t always the case. In this episode, Tom shares his struggles with self-doubt and poor results before changing his mindset and his definition of success to produce high-level BD results.

2020 is closing quickly and 2021 is right around the corner. If you want to have a different experience and create different results, you will need to think, plan, and execute differently. In this episode we talk with Bob Wierema, Executive Vice President of Lockton Companies. Bob has been through the ups and downs – the second guessing and self-doubt – and has come out the other side as a top performer at his company and in his field. Listen as Bob shares some of the tactics that he uses to set up his day and week for success, as well as the philosophies and mindset that keep him constantly moving forward and evolving.

Are you prepared to prospect in a virtual environment? We’re taking a deep dive into prospecting for the next few episodes and what you need to know to rejuvenate and sustain your pipeline. Pam Evanson of the Lappin180 team joins the conversation to discuss the importance of process and its impact on prospecting. Are your processes propelling you forward, or is the lack thereof causing you to waste energy and time playing pipeline catch up?

In today’s Breaking Sales episode, we’re featuring two conversations, one with Pro Bowl Center Nick Hardwick, and Erica Ballard, a health and wellness expert. They join Dan Lappin to discuss the impact sleep, nutrition, and exercise have on your ability to perform in the clutch. You’ll learn how you work towards your success – or against it – by the way you take care of your health both mentally and physically. Connect with Nick Hardwick: https://hardwick.life/ Connect with Erica Ballard: https://www.ericaballardhealth.com/about-me Connect with Dan Lappin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/lappin180 Connect with Kiley Schmitz: https://www.linkedin.com/in/kileyschmitz/ Learn more about Lappin180: https://www.lappin180.com/

Preparation is critical to perform at the highest level. Whether it’s for an important prospect meeting or facing an immovable human wall in the NFL, what you do before the game matters most.  In this episode, former NFL Pro Bowl Center Nick Hardwick from the San Diego Chargers joins Dan Lappin for a powerful lesson in preparation and performance. After You Listen: Take this assessment to determine how and where you can improve your sales results. https://www.lappin180.com/assessments Connect with Dan Lappin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/lappin180 Connect with Kiley Schmitz: https://www.linkedin.com/in/kileyschmitz/ Learn more about Lappin180: https://www.lappin180.com/

Mindset is essential to succeeding in sales. Whether it’s preparation or detaching from outcomes, putting yourself in the right state of mind will significantly impact your ability to perform. Mindset also plays a crucial role in successful relationships. Dr. Karin Anderson Abrell, psychologist, author, and relationship expert joins Dan in this episode of Breaking Sales to address the mindset similarities between dating and sales.  After You Listen: Take this assessment to determine how and where you can improve your sales results. https://www.lappin180.com/assessments Connect with Dan Lappin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/lappin180 Connect with Kiley Schmitz: https://www.linkedin.com/in/kileyschmitz/ Learn more about Lappin180: https://www.lappin180.com/

As pandemic uncertainty continues, you’re either frozen in place waiting for external events to dictate your next move, or you’ve assessed the risk and decided to take action in anticipation of a better business climate. This episode addresses the reality of both situations with ideas to get unstuck so you can move your business forward. After You Listen: Bookmark this episode as we build upon this conversation from episode to episode. https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/breaking-sales/id1503234243 Take this assessment to determine how and where you can improve your sales results. https://www.lappin180.com/assessments Connect with Dan Lappin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/lappin180 Connect with Kiley Schmitz: https://www.linkedin.com/in/kileyschmitz/ Learn more about Lappin180: https://www.lappin180.com/

Flow is the mental state of optimal performance. With flow, you execute an activity with complete focus and intentional control, unhindered by distraction, doubt, or negative internal chatter. In this second of two-part series, Indianapolis Colts’ Brian Decker reveals how to achieve this high-functioning state of mind and how flow applies to your sales practice. Learn about the three combined elements that make up flow – preparation, visualization, and mindset - and how it drives high performance. After You Listen: Bookmark this episode as we build upon this conversation from episode to episode. https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/breaking-sales/id1503234243 Take this assessment to determine how and where you can improve your sales results. https://www.lappin180.com/assessments Connect with Dan Lappin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/lappin180 Connect with Kiley Schmitz: https://www.linkedin.com/in/kileyschmitz/ Learn more about Lappin180: https://www.lappin180.com/

What’s the biggest indicator of success? For Brian Decker, Director of Team Development for the Indianapolis Colts and a former US Army Special Forces Officer, it always comes back to resilience. Brian shares lessons gained from his experience identifying and preparing men for combat, both on the football field and in the military. He talks about the difference between natural and learned resilience, and how you can improve and evolve it. In this first of two-part series, Brian shares his insights on resilience, and Dan applies it to sales performance. Learn how to embrace obstacles as part of the process for improving your resilience, so you can take your performance to a new level.   After You Listen: Bookmark this episode as we build upon this conversation from episode to episode. https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/breaking-sales/id1503234243 Take this assessment to determine how and where you can improve your sales results. https://www.lappin180.com/assessments Connect with Dan Lappin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/lappin180 Connect with Kiley Schmitz: https://www.linkedin.com/in/kileyschmitz/ Learn more about Lappin180: https://www.lappin180.com/

If you want to avoid your prospect’s innate reaction in treating you like a salesperson, you’ll need to stop chasing results. It may sound odd, but that burning intensity that drives you to pursue that new prospect appointment is often what stands in the way of setting it.  Focusing purely on the outcome causes anxiety, hesitancy, and pressure before you make the initial phone call or send the email. Worse yet, your prospect can pick up on your nervousness and indecision. If you want to improve your prospecting results – you’ll first need to remove all self-induced stress and pressure.  Join Pam Evanson, Dan Lappin, and Kiley Schmitz as they breakdown the prospecting pitfalls holding you back from having meaningful conversations.  

17 million sales conversations happen every week. These conversations all focus on finding pain, sharing expertise, and proving value – and they all sound the same. High performers take a different approach.  It begins with how they think. In order to win, your prospect will need to objectively evaluate and debate change. Assessing your solution is easy – generating the courage to do something different is hard. Pam Evanson, of the Lappin180 team, joins Dan and Kiley on the latest episode. Pam is in the field every day coaching hundreds of high performers from New York to L.A. on how to shift their mindset and conversations. Together, Pam and Dan share insights and experiences on how to become a top performer.  In Pam’s words, “how you think is everything.”

High performance in sales starts when you realize that it’s not about winning, but helping the prospect effectively debate and decide if making a change matters. Danielle Lombardo, a top performer in commercial real estate with Lockton Companies, shares her experience in shifting her traditional sales mindset - focused only on making the sale - to an advisor mindset, to earn the Top Producer of the Year award in 2019. In this episode, learn the importance of conversation self-awareness, asking questions that help your prospect objectively evaluate change, and how mindset can be used to stay positive under pressure. Danielle shares her journey and process for breaking her own sales mindset. She calls it her “sales detox.”  After You Listen: Connect with Dan Lappin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/lappin180 Comments, show ideas, guest requests?  We want to hear from you:  https://[email protected] Learn more about Lappin180: https://www.lappin180.com/

People buy from people they like, right?  Not true. People buy from people they trust. When it comes to your prospects, are you more focused on getting them to like you in order to buy from you? Or are you actually invested in what’s best for them?  You have the opportunity to build trust with every human conversation - sales or not - and trust comes in layers. In this episode, you’ll learn the depths it takes to build trust and how you can shift your mindset to build it naturally and authentically with your prospects.  After You Listen:  Are you building trust with your prospects? Get honest with yourself by taking this quick assessment: https://www.lappin180.com/consultative-acumen-assessmen Connect with Dan Lappin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/lappin180 Comments, show ideas, guest requests?  We want to hear from you: https://[email protected] Learn more about Lappin180: https://www.lappin180.com/

In this episode, experience the sales process from the prospect’s perspective – from the warm introduction to your first meeting over coffee. Very often, the meeting is an obligatory courtesy to the person who made the introduction.    Putting yourself in your prospect’s shoes is something sales professionals often fail to do.  Instead, we ask questions to uncover pain so that we can quickly solve it with our solution. But this is not the biggest mistake sales pros make. There is an even bigger one you may be overlooking.  Uncover the one thing you’re doing that is holding you back from becoming an elite sales professional. Grab a cup a coffee, a pen, and paper, and learn how to change the trajectory of your sales conversations.  After You Listen:  Bookmark this episode as we build upon this conversation from episode to episode. https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/breaking-sales/id1503234243 Do you want to know why you’re not getting the sales results you want? Take this assessment to determine how and where you can improve your results. https://www.lappin180.com/sales-performance-assessment Connect with Dan Lappin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/lappin180 Give us your comments, show ideas, and guest requests:  https://[email protected] Learn more about Lappin180: https://www.lappin180.com/

We guarantee you haven't heard a sales podcast quite like Breaking Sales. Everything you thought you knew about sales is annihilated by sales renegade, Dan Lappin. His unapologetic rejection of the status quo will entertain and enlighten you, triggering new breakthroughs in your own sales process.  This show is for anyone who sells any product or service, and for everyone who has experienced the tried-and-died tactics that fail you, and your prospects.  You’ll hear real stories, exclusive interviews with seven-figure earning sales professionals, and exclusive content from the Lappin180 professionals. Each episode will provide high-level concepts while breaking it down for direct application, equipping you with the ability to achieve long-term success in your sales career.  After You Listen: If you’re ready to accelerate your sales career while learning foundational skills to become an elite sales professional then subscribe to Breaking Sales. Subscribe to Breaking Sales: https://podcasts.apple.com/us/podcast/breaking-sales/id1503234243 Connect with Dan Lappin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/lappin180 Learn more about Lappin180: https://www.lappin180.com/