How can mastering storytelling become your ultimate sales superpower? Insights with Stephen Steers.

Freddy D: 00:02:01

Stephen Steers is a dynamic entrepreneur and experienced sales consultant known for his resilience, adaptability and passion. His entrepreneurial spirit was evident early on, from selling ice pops as a kid to flipping items on Craigslist in college to pay off student loans.

After college, Steven worked as a project manager in construction until a near fatal accident steered him towards full time entrepreneurship. He dove into the New York startup scene where networking and self improvement helped him land a sales development representative SDR role.

Despite challenges including company shutdowns, Stephen quickly climbed a career ladder.

Aided by mentorship, he crafted a successful B2B process for a struggling company leading to consulting work and the founding of his own consulting firm. Realizing a lifelong dream Steven's story highlights the importance of perseverance, continuous learning and chasing your dreams.

Hello Stephen, welcome to the Business Superfam podcast. Glad you could join us.

Stephen Steers: 00:02:58

Thanks for having me Freddy. It's great to be here with you.

Freddy D: 00:03:00

So tell me a little bit about your background and what led you into the sales world that you're in right now where you've been consulting numerous companies all over the world and been traveling to a multitude of countries. What got you there?

Stephen Steers: 00:03:14

How many of errors? That's what I like to say. I got some near death experiences in there. I had some really tough roles.

But I'd say first and foremost, I suppose we should start at the beginning. The first thing I ever sold was ice pops as a kid. So if you ever know those Costco bulk hundred ice pops.

I got those in high school for three or four dollars a pack. I would freeze them in my fridge because I was allowed to have one and then I would sell them for a quarter a pop.

So I'd profit like: 1012

And that was how I would have my candy money or whatever seed money for little silly projects that led me to going to yard sales where I would buy things that I thought were cool and interesting and then I'd post them on Craigslist because Craigslist was coming up and that's how I started to pay off my student loans was with buying and selling things on Craigslist when there weren't other jobs to have. So fast forward a couple of years here.

Graduated college, I got into the construction business, was the first serious actual real quote unquote job I had and I was infield project manager. And so my job was have to go on site and have to be in the office and make reports for my boss.

And so one day I was at the Baccarat Hotel and Suites on sixth Avenue in Manhattan, New York. And the building was basically finished. So nobody there was wearing much construction gear.

We're just walking and doing reports and doing punchless stuff. The project's basically over. People have moved into their 30 and $50 million apartments.

So I walked the entire building from the ceiling, from like the rooftop, all the way down to the construction entrance. Took me about three hours with my foreman.

And we get to the construction entrance, which is a triple height floo, and he's showing me pictures on his phone, we're having a laugh. And then he taps me on the shoulder and I take one step forward towards the door and a cement block falls directly where I was standing.

Literally missed it by that much.

Freddy D: 00:05:05

Holy cow.

Stephen Steers: 00:05:06

Crazy situation. And I remember staring down at this block and the foreman says to me, not everybody gets a chance like that. You're here for something.

And I thought about that very deeply in that moment. I said, hey man, I can't come to lunch. I'll catch you later. And I just went on a two hour walk around New York on my way back to the office.

And I came to the conclusion I was like, I'm gonna die one day. If I'm gonna die, I might as well die doing the thing that I wanna do, or at least be on the path to that.

And I'd always wanted to be an entrepreneur. And podcasts were very new at the time. So I was listening to like smart passive income podcast and any business thing that I could remotely find.

It was just in my head. I was like, I wanna be an entrepreneur, but I don't know what skill I have.

When I thought about it and sat down and asked my friends and everybody else, they're like, you're great with people, maybe you should do sales. And so that's the first spark in my head. I was like, I do selling things. Making money's cool, maybe I should get into sales.

So I've launched a campaign of going to four to five events at night. Oh, sorry, a week, pardon me. In New York that were startup or whatever related.

And in about three months I had an offer to a startup and I got a job as an sdr.

And then I started my cold calling and cold emailing journey with a lot of errors and a lot of mistakes, but a lot of learnings, and eventually got promoted into an AE position.

That company started to not do super well, so they let go of a lot of salespeople, started at another company, my first remote position, and then that company went belly up in a couple of Months, because they built their platform on Facebook and Facebook changed the algorithm. As in diversify friends. That's a good thing for you to do.

But luckily, as it happened, when I was working there running sales, they'd hired a consultant, a super experienced consultant to work with me as we built out our B2B process. And I got along very well with this guy.

He was massively helpful and I let him know that I got the axe from the place, sent him a thank you email, and he got back to me a few days later and he said, hey, I'm sorry to hear that, but maybe we should hop on a call and I can help you figure out what's next for you. And so a half an hour call turned into a three hour call. And at the end he said, hey, I have a job for someone like you if you want it.

And that's how I got into consulting. I worked with him for a number of years, cut my teeth and learned a lot.

And then eventually I was ready to scratch the proper itch and do what I'd set out at the beginning and start my own thing, which is where I am now.

Freddy D: 00:07:21

And what is your own thing now?

Stephen Steers: 00:07:23

Yeah, I run a small boutique consultancy called Context Selling, where we review phone calls, we review B2B phone calls. So the nexus here is the phone call is the lobby to your business.

If you want to build super fans, they got to have a great experience with you from the very get go.

And if they're coming to speak with someone from your team and you don't have that figured out the right way, they're not going to be able to tell anybody about you and they're not going to want to because the experience is going to leave them wanting. So what we do is we review phone calls with a 30 point rubric.

That's everything that should be in a good discovery call, including stories, what stories you can tell, where you should put the stories. And then I'd grade those calls and then coach reps or teams on the findings from those calls with the goal of making your next call your best call.

So I wrote a book called Superpower Storytelling that informs a lot of the ways that I teach folks, because stories sell and they close the sale, but they never close the conversation. And if you want to build super bands, you got to keep the conversation moving.

Freddy D: 00:08:29

Absolutely. What's the name of that book and where can people find it?

Stephen Steers: 00:08:32

It's called Superpower Storytelling, A tactical guide to telling the stories you need to lead, sell and inspire. And you can get it on my website at stephensteers.com or on Amazon, if you are so inclined.

Freddy D: 00:08:44

Excellent. So tell us a little bit of a story of how your method has transformed some company.

Stephen Steers: 00:08:51

Yeah, great question. So I could speak to two that really make me extremely excited.

There was a company in the podcasting space and I came over there to help them build out their sales and so rewrote their entire series of sales scripts, redefined their stories, trained our team on it, and we were able to triple revenue in 12 months. Wow. So that's super exciting. And work feels really nice.

There's another company in the consulting space that works in the medical side of consulting, and by adjusting two or three questions inside of their scripts and helping them always make sure to book the next meeting on the call, we increase their close rates by 25% in three months. So those are two. I'm really excited.

Freddy D: 00:09:35

Talk more about the power of storytelling and how that really transforms the whole conversation and creates super fans that in turn attracts more of the same.

Stephen Steers: 00:09:49

Absolutely. There's a stat I researched when I was writing the book and it says that 65% of information is retained when shared in story form.

So if you think about this, you could tell people all the stuff that your company does, but if you can tell them a story about another founder or another company that came to you, what that founder's name is, what their business was like when they came to you, and the vectors that you've been able to influence and change through methodologies and the results you got them to, that's something I can take to my team.

That's something I can take to somebody else that I meet at a meetup or somebody in one of my many groups and say, hey, yeah, they worked with John over at Lagavulin Construction company And when we started working with John's team was flatlining. But what we were able to do is help them understand four specific places that they were able to grow in.

We doubled down, triple down, and we doubled the goal that we had because we were super stringent about the criteria where they weren't previously. And so now they've grown their team, they've grown their influence in the marketplace, and they're one of the best known people in the business.

Freddy D: 00:10:54

Excellent.

That's just amazing because when you think about it, I look back in my sales career and share stories about other manufacturing companies because I was selling manufacturing software and how the technology that I was marketing had transformed those companies. So that intrigued especially the executive management team, because we were talking not about features and functions.

We were talking about business growth strategies in the manufacturing world where I was at, which was a tool and die. Scrapping metal cost them money. So we talked about that business part of the equation.

But it was all about stories of how this company had those issues, they bought our technology and those issues went away.

Stephen Steers: 00:11:43

Exactly. And I think the other reason that storytelling is super important is there's a quote I really like about it.

It's by a guy named Horace, and it says you need change only the name and you are the subject of the story.

So if you're talking about great results for a company in a similar industry, manufacturing tool and die, et cetera, if you've gotten great results for these folks, I can see myself as getting to those as well. And so it's a social proof point because it's not just you saying, hey, I'm great at my job. Buy my services. I'm great at my job.

It's, look what we did for John and Sally and their family business. It creates a different emotional space around the issues.

And then furthermore, most importantly is stories enable you to sell an outcome which is what people want to buy from you in the first place. Don't care about the widget. I don't care about what language your platform is coded in, at least not yet.

I want to know that you've thought about me and what you can help me to achieve. And I think the story is the easiest way to get people to understand that.

Freddy D: 00:12:44

Yeah, you bring me a point. That was one of my techniques, was with the owners of the company, especially in the tool and die shops.

That was my world that I was in for a decade and change. I didn't get into the features.

It spins this way, it turns that way and it's blue or it's green or the button, the menu button isn't the right size or whatever got out of all that stuff we focused on. Okay, Stephen, where do you want to be in three years in the company? What's your goal for the company? What are the challenges to get you to the goal?

And the other part that I would talk about is, okay, when you want to be profitable with this investment in technology. Because it's not about, when am I going to get installed, it's when you want to make money with it.

So it'll be you and I on a marker board laying out all the steps that need to take place to achieve the profitability and the goals you want. We worked it backwards because you got to run two systems simultaneously. The old Way the new way. You can't just shut it off.

You got business to do, then you've got to get productivity and everything else steps in the way, and the people got to be trained and et cetera. And we would lay all that out, and it'd be like, Steven, to meet your goal. Can you give me that PO today? It's your goal.

Stephen Steers: 00:14:05

Yeah.

Freddy D: 00:14:06

You'd be surprised how many deals close that way. Because I emotionally, through the story, in a sense, laid out the plan. You agreed, you put it together, you gave me the timelines.

So it's your story.

Stephen Steers: 00:14:20

I'm just gonna correct it.

Freddy D: 00:14:21

Yeah, that's it.

Stephen Steers: 00:14:23

Do you know the sales trainer Tom Hopkins?

Freddy D: 00:14:25

Yes, I've met him. Met him a couple times, actually. Funny story. Since we're talking about stories, I got one of his books, and I lost it.

So I sent him a letter saying I was at this event that he was at, and I had gotten one of his books, and I lost the book. He sent me a free one, mailed me a free one with his signature on it. I still have it. And it was like, that's a cool dude.

Stephen Steers: 00:14:51

I love that guy. And I think one thing I've been doing with my sales journey is just going back even closer to source material. Yep.

I follow a guy named Patrick Bet David. He says he learned from Tom Hopkins.

Freddy D: 00:15:03

So I was like, yeah, I know. I know Patrick.

Stephen Steers: 00:15:05

So I was like, oh, who's this Tom Hopkins guy? I look up Tom Hopkins. I read a couple of his books. He mentions, like, Dick Gardner and P.E.

i can't remember the other guy's name right now, but he mentions all these other folks, and I go and get their books, and I read. And I think what's really important about that for me is once you can find those threads. Before, they were gurus, but before this was a big thing.

It was, like, super niche.

It was like, these guys are out here testing all of these phrases, these words, these scripts, and the building these stories, and that just makes the methodology that much stickier. So I love that. But I mentioned Tom Hopkins specifically on your point there, because he says if the prospect says it, it's true.

So everything that you've worked with them on the board, it's like, here's what you said. And what I love about that is it unlocks urgency.

And I think where a lot of folks get it wrong in sales is they want to establish urgency, which you can't. They have to feel it themselves, and you have to be able to come.

Freddy D: 00:16:03

Up with their whole Mindset themselves.

Stephen Steers: 00:16:05

Correct.

Freddy D: 00:16:05

And that's going to be buying, not you selling.

Stephen Steers: 00:16:09

Exactly. So sales is really about opening doors and it's asking the right questions that create the space for you to help them build a story.

So why do you tell a story? The whole point of telling a story is to better help your prospect tell their own story.

And if you're doing that the right way, like you do with outlining it on the board, they're going to not be able to see it any other way except, you know what, I got to do something about this.

And that way you are a partner with a long term vision for their business and that's how they become a super fan because you've asked them the right questions.

Freddy D: 00:16:39

I would go one other step is they would have the guys from the shop floor come in, they would have management come in. I made sure I got everybody's name. Then I sent them all a thank you letter through the mail that said, okay, Stephen, thank you for your time.

I appreciate your input in today's meeting. I hope you got a lot out of it, et cetera. We look forward to working with your company, blah, blah, blah.

But everybody got a letter tweaked a little bit for each individual. We would win the sale and I would ask what was the decision that helped finalize everything and go with us.

The answer always was, we felt after the sale you would provide us with the best support.

Stephen Steers: 00:17:19

Yes.

Freddy D: 00:17:20

That was really the seed was planted with the thank you because Johnny in a shop floor, nobody ever acknowledges Johnny.

And for him to get a letter that says thank you so much for your time and participation in our meet, that when they had a meeting to discuss which vendor they were going with, he'd say, I like these guys.

Stephen Steers: 00:17:36

That's how I got my first sales job. I interviewed, I sent every single person I talked to a personalized handwritten thank you note in the mail with a piece of candy or something.

Freddy D: 00:17:45

Yep.

Stephen Steers: 00:17:46

Then I'm remembering one of the larger software deals I sold with Gartner. I'll give you the quick story on that one. That one's a fun one.

So when I was working at the software company, I was on the phone with Gartner and I started that deal when I was in sdr. So I met them at an event, I qualified them, they went dead.

I got promoted in that time and the whole sales cycle took 524 days from qualified opportunity to close. So it was a slog, right? My first six figure deal, four business lines of Gartner, which Felt great when it closed, but it was a slog on the way.

But we, we get back into conversations after maybe a year of me nurturing them. And they're a big company, so they move really slow. And they said, hey, we want to test this software out.

Can you give us a license for a month to play with? So I go to my manager and I was like, hey, they're looking for this. We might lose the deal if they can't do this because it's competitive.

And he said, we can't do that. You gotta find another way. So thought about it and I was like, hey, I'll be down in D.C. on such and such date.

If you guys want, I can come in and bring anybody you want into the meeting and we could play around with the platform. You can ask me all the questions you want. That'll be better than you just figuring it out on your own. And they're like, yeah, come do that.

So I booked a two hour, three hour meeting with them. They invited maybe like 30, 40 people. And I'm also a Scrum master. So I'm super curious about how you build tech.

So I would always join the early morning scrums with the tech team. I'd come in early and just sit with them because I want to know about how this product's built, if I'm selling it.

I love to be able to say, actually no, that's not a feature on our roadmap because of X, Y and Z or that's going to take this. And those guys appreciated it.

So I made friends with a guy named Dimitri and he was the sales engineer, so he would assist on sales if we needed certain things. So I said, demetri, I'm going down for this big meeting. Can you be available for 30 minutes after this time? He's yep, I got you, Steven, no problem.

So we go through the meeting and I make sure to mention, I said, hey, if there's some technology related questions I can't answer, I have Demetri standing by from 5 to 5:30. And we'll call him with any questions I can't answer, go through. There's only two questions I can't answer.

Call up Dimitri at 5, picks up on the second ring. Hey, what's up, Steven? How you doing? And I said, hey, I'm here with XYZ's name. They have a couple of questions for you.

They run through Demetri, answers them flawlessly. We hang up with Demetri and then it's me and my main contact and I said, hey, what did. How did it go today? What did you think? Any feedback?

He said, oh, I think very good. We're going to have some things to consider. We're going to get back to you and stuff. I was like, great, that makes sense.

And I said, just to clarify, this is a competitive situation, right? You're looking at our competitors, our top two or three. And they're like, yep, absolutely, we are.

And I said, hey, at the end of the day, whoever you choose, they're going to have a great product that's going to serve your needs, but we're going to come down and see you. And Demetri is available on the line if you have questions. And I saw his eyes flicker and I was like, I know I got it. And of course, I won the deal.

It came in Christmas Eve that year, which was a fun one.

But I certainly echo with you that personal touch, that taking the time, that showing who you are before there's a dollar exchanged is the thing that most salespeople, most organizations don't bother doing. And so I think it's actually pretty easy to build those fans if you just think about the other person a little bit more.

Freddy D: 00:21:00

You remind me of a similar kind of a story, but a little bit different. Again, selling in the manufacturing space. I had a reseller in Germany and we did a presentation to a Bosch location. They really liked the technology.

The tagline they came up with was Mach Intelligence. Decades later, now we got artificial intelligence, but it was a relational database. They had some smarts.

Based upon metric shapes, it would automatically create toolpaths and stuff like that. So it was state of the art stuff. And this division of Bosch was interested and they liked it, but they didn't have the authority to buy it.

It had to be done by corporate. So I flew back to the United States. My reseller set up an appointment at corporate. So now I'm flying back out. And this is only a $10,000 sales.

Cause they're only gonna buy one license. Initially, we're in corporate and we're doing a demo and the software crashes and how fun that is.

So it came up to lunchtime and they invited us to lunch. I said, no. I was in charge of global sales at the time. And I said, we're gonna talk our tech team and find out what's going on.

We call and we find out it's a repeatable bug. During lunchtime, we could repeat it multiple times.

Once everyone returned from lunch, I said, first off, we found a software bug and we can repeat it we showed the bug and the softer crashes came clean. We have an issue. We identified it. We'll take care of it.

But I also noticed that throughout the whole presentation, because this was brand new technology of some artificial intelligence in the machining, some of the eyes were glassed over because they didn't understand it. We were going too fast. So I says, you know what?

We're going to restart this whole presentation all over and go step by step and make sure that you understand it. That whole afternoon there was a transformation because they were more interested now, because one, we came clean.

Who usually comes clean saying that we have a software bug? Usually you try to hide it. We admitted it. Hey, it's software. There's going to be some challenges.

And we went through and all of a sudden the dynamics of the room changed because I acknowledged and recognized that they were being glossed over and they were not paying attention anymore because they weren't understanding what was going on. The fact that I recognized it and started the whole thing over by the end of the day, everybody was happy.

They were thanking us, smiles and conversation. And we got the order a few weeks later. I remember the owner of the company tells me, you've spent more money than we made on this.

I replied, you don't understand the big picture. We got Bosch.

Stephen Steers: 00:23:44

Yeah, we're in. Yeah.

Freddy D: 00:23:47

Now we can go market to all the suppliers of Bosch and say, bosch is using this technology. Maybe you guys should look at it.

Stephen Steers: 00:23:56

And sure enough, exactly what happened. Yeah. Can't see the forest for the trees. A lot of people. That's great. Congratulations on that, man. Principles always apply, right? Like the same.

There's a quote I love it says, we need to be reminded more than we need to be taught. I think that's part and parlance why sales training is so important, because a lot of people just tend to forget small things.

But also the stuff that worked in the old school way with being in a room with people, being a person of integrity, walking people through things, admitting your mistakes and sharing that value. That's the game. That is the entire game of sales. And I think people forget it. It's still the same.

Freddy D: 00:24:29

It hasn't changed.

Stephen Steers: 00:24:30

Has not changed.

Freddy D: 00:24:31

Yeah.

Stephen Steers: 00:24:32

People solving humans, solving human problems in a business context, it hasn't changed.

Freddy D: 00:24:36

No.

I would always in when we would do a presentation, I would go around the room before we even started and say, stephen, what's your objective of today's meeting? What are you looking to get out of it? And then you circle back and says, okay, did we Address what you're looking out of it.

So it's either a yes or no. And if it's a no, you go back and clarify whatever till it becomes a yes. But if it's a yes, then that's a first buy sign too.

Stephen Steers: 00:25:00

Yes. Oh, I love it, man. When it works and the strategies are aligned, man, it's a beautiful.

Freddy D: 00:25:05

It's such a blast. I try not to smile sometimes in those events because I know what's happening and you just gotta.

Stephen Steers: 00:25:13

Blue steel face.

Freddy D: 00:25:15

Yes. It's just a domino effect. And yeah, it's fun. I love it.

Stephen Steers: 00:25:20

What is your favorite part about sales?

Freddy D: 00:25:22

My favorite part about sales, it's an excellent question. Is when everybody's happy that they made the right decision, when they're excited that they bought and they're excited to utilize the service.

So as example, I landed a very large government agency. The story was they wanted a partner that could deliver, that would be there if they had any issues.

We've been there whenever they've had any issues, which is infrequent. And they're my super fan. Usually we have a monthly meeting and we spend maybe five minutes on business and 15 minutes on personal stuff.

Stephen Steers: 00:26:03

Real friends.

Freddy D: 00:26:04

Yeah. What about you?

Stephen Steers: 00:26:05

There's a couple things, but I think I echo what you said, but I think it's the person you have to become when you're selling and you're selling with integrity. I think that's. It's knowing what tasks you need to to complete.

It's following up with people and it's just being the person that is resilient when things go wrong and knowing how to handle it. And I think, like just being resourceful. I think the sales is one of the only things that.

I don't say forces is the right word, but I'm going to say forces you to have to be resourceful with the way you interact with people, the way you garner resources, how you make your arguments for certain things, and how you help people see stuff. I think it incorporates every part of your brain, and that's my favorite part about it.

Freddy D: 00:26:47

I agree because like my story with Bosch, I had to pivot and make some adjustments in a small window of time. Lunchtime, very small. And that was it. I had to regroup and turn this thing around because it was going south. It was tanking.

So it's also being observed and watching body language, watching how people are reacting to what's going on. You've got to be on game.

Stephen Steers: 00:27:17

You have to be the person the room needs and be able to move the room, if you need to move the room. And yeah, it's just. There's nothing like it. I don't think there's any profession that requires that much of people to be on that's fun.

Freddy D: 00:27:29

Yep.

Like to have another show to really deep dive into phone conversations, because that's your specialty, which can be very beneficial to our audience as people overlook the importance of phone sales. And you have to really establish a relationship with somebody that you can't see.

Stephen Steers: 00:27:46

Yes.

Freddy D: 00:27:47

It's creating out of that person over the phone. And that takes an art.

Stephen Steers: 00:27:52

It is. But I'd say it's the biggest thing you can do there is just do your research on people before you get on the phone with them.

And that's something I don't see people do enough of.

Spend 10 minutes, study their company, study the person's LinkedIn profile, see what they're about, be able to talk to them and come with a potential solution for them before they even get on the phone to show you're like, hey, it looks like you're doing X. Folks that typically do X, who we work with are usually experiencing Z. Is that consistent with you? Yes, I have some ideas. Right.

Freddy D: 00:28:21

Just do your job and learn personality types. That's another one that we can have a long conversation on because you. You take a soft personality versus a driver personality.

Someone that makes things happen. They're oil and water.

Stephen Steers: 00:28:38

Do you prefer the Brian Tracy or are you doing Myers Briggs? What personality tests do you like?

Freddy D: 00:28:43

I don't remember the name of it, but it was basically there was four quadrants and there was four quadrants within those four quadrants. So you had driver, expressive, amiable and analytical. And then you get the same squares into each group because everybody has a secondary aspect.

And this is way back when they first started doing that stuff.

And it's a lot of fun because if personality types and you can tweak yourself and share the story to their tonality that they need, you shortcut the whole process.

Stephen Steers: 00:29:15

Yes, yes. It's a beautiful game. It's a beautiful science.

Freddy D: 00:29:19

All right, Stephen, so how can people get a hold of you?

Stephen Steers: 00:29:22

I'm easy to find them on all your social medias at Stephen. With a P H S T E P H E N steers S T R S S underscore. I would love to say hi to you and meet you. LinkedIn's probably where you'll find me the most.

If you like any resources about storytelling, about call scripts, or if you even want me to review one of your calls.

You can find information on that@stevensteres.com podcast where I'll have every bit of information for you there and plenty of things to download that you can use and put in your business today.

Freddy D: 00:29:54

Excellent, Stephen. Well, it was a pleasure having you on a business Superfam podcast.

Great conversation and to all our listeners, thank you much for listening and let's go out there and become superfan superstars.

Stephen Steers: 00:30:06

Thank you for having me.