[00:00:00] Darryl Praill: My name is Darryl Praill. I'm your host and you, my friend, well, you and I we're gonna go on a journey every single week, talking to the industry's most accomplished sales legends, as they share with us, their tips, their tricks, their techniques, and their tactics to becomes sales rockstars. You simply need to do what they're doing and you will achieve similar nirvana. If you like to laugh, you like to be entertained, if you'd like to go off on tangents and tell stories, you're going to love what you're going to hear next. Sit back, relax, it's going to get real.

How's everybody doing? Oh my goodness folks, it's another, it's another day. It's another day in the adventure, man. It's like every day I wake up and I'm like, I have so much to do. I have so much to do.

And I, and I started instantly thinking about meeting one meeting to meeting three. This person is going to be full of shit. This person is going to be conflict. This this person's going to be whiny. This person's going to want to deal. Ah, then I got to go talk to the boss. I got to set the stage. I'm going to ask for more money or more time or more, whatever. And it's going to, it's going to be a pain in the ass and I'm tired already. Where's my coffee. And I haven't gotten. That's how my day starts.

And it's interesting because some of what I just described, I mean, all what I describe as real, right? I mean, our jobs are our jobs, right? Hopefully you're, you're working to live and not living to work, but if you're working to live, you know, this is what I got to do, this pays the bills.

And hopefully, hopefully you like what you do. I love what I do as much as I bitch and moan and whine with that said, though, it's amazing how much of our mental wellbeing. And how we approach our job approach our profession. It's amazing how much of that is influenced and dictated by our physical wellbeing.

Not, I've never had this conversation on the show before I've talked about mindset. You gotta have the right mindset. You gotta be able to handle rejection. You gotta be able to have the right positivity. You gotta believe that what you're selling is going to make an impact and it's going to make people's lives better is you you're behind it. You got to realize that if they're yelling at you, they're just having a bad day and it's nothing personal it's mindset.

But I've never talked about how our physical wellbeing impacts our emotional, our mental relationships, attitude, ability to get shit done. That's a technical term. You can look it up, get shit done. GSD. There you go.

You may not know this folks. I am a proud lifetime member of weight Watchers. All right. Now there's a qualifier. I'm going to say here. So wouldn't mean a weight one. I don't know if this is still the case, but when I got my lifetime man, The criteria was you had to, you know, meet your goal weight as specified when you started the program.

And then you had a sustained that for you. I don't know, six months or something. And if you, if you did that, you became a lifetime member. And what that meant at the time was that you never had to pay. If you decide to come back to the program, you never had to pay the admission fee to start again. You still have to pay the weekly fees, but he never had to pay that one-time startup fee.

And so for me to be a lifetime member, I had to, I had to be over. And then I had to lose the weight and I did exactly that and I've got up and down. Usually I'm not making this up 40 pounds, 40 pounds. I go up and down oh five and right now I'm up. And the funny part is, if you look at what I eat, I don't drink a lot. The ongoing joke is if I, if I order a beer, if I finish the beer, that's remarkable and that's noteworthy. All right. That's the joke there. So I don't drink a lot. I like, I like drink. I just don't drink a lot. I don't eat a lot. My wife thinks I'm a fricking bird. I don't eat a lot. I fill up quickly. Yet I'm 40 pounds overweight.

For me, a lot of my week is gained through stress. So that's been proven if you have too much stress in your life for some people, they, the consequence of that is they gain weight for other people. They lose their hair for other people. They have other manifestations. Our physical body is a statement of where we are often and our journey in our job and how it rolls over to our personal life as well.

I know when I'm overweight, like I am. I get winded faster. I don't have the same energy, you know, someplace three quarters for the day. I'm like, I'm ready to take a nap. You know, that's that's me. And how do I compensate for that? I compensate for that with more coffee. I said, is he here drinking coffee from my wonderful Ember cup that a former employee got me because they just thought I was a great boss. Isn't that a great thing? It's my coffee. I need that.

Anyway. Why do I bring. I bring this up because it's not January, so I'm not going to, there's nothing theme-based here. I'm not saying it's back to school or it's, it's a new year. It's resolution time. It is neither back to school, nor is it January. I bring this up because of two reasons.

One. I know I'm 40 pounds overweight and I need to lose the weight. And it's been on my mind for a long time too. I have been seeing these annoying posts on LinkedIn and Twitter from this guy. If you know who I'm talking about, this guy who is on this journey, apparently I think he's doing this for attention, he was diagnosed with diabetes and decided I should probably get my shit together and lose some weight because that's, you know, that's pretty. It's got some serious consequences.

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[00:05:59] Darryl Praill: So we're going to go on a journey together with this guy. He works for the small little firm you may have heard of called John Barrows, J Barrows, J Barrows Selling. This is not John Barrows. This is not John Barrows. This is not Morgan Ingram. This is better. This is James "SayWhatSales" Buckley.

Welcome to the show, my friend, how are you?

[00:06:24] James Buckley: Oh, man, I'm happy to be here. It's long overdue. I was feeling left out. When you invited me, I was like, oh, finally, finally, I'm there.

[00:06:33] Darryl Praill: You know, it's funny cause I get these uh, the reason I invited you, the reason I remembered to extend the invite to you is because I'm watching your posts and all of a sudden you have that moment you're like, what the hell? I've not had him on this show? Like Praill what the hell is your issue, dude? Because I try to get all the cool cats on. So I'm so glad you're here.

Now for those who don't know John Barrows I was just going to J Barrows, B A R R O W S .com. jbarrows.com. Phenomenal site, sales training, coaching resources galore, videos, live events. They work with the who's who of the industry. Check them out. That's the sole pitch I'll make for John Barrows.

I've been on his show multiple times. John and I, total sidebar, but I don't know if you've noticed this, James, you may have, John and I don't always agree. We often butt heads on points of view. You may find that shocking, but we often often do.

And that's the beauty of our industries that you're going to have different points of view and still sit back, kicked out, kicked back and laugh. It's okay.

[00:07:34] James Buckley: It's supposed to be that way.

[00:07:35] Darryl Praill: I agree. James is epic on LinkedIn and on Twitter. So dude, I've got two different Twitter handles here for you. I probably should have gone to my actual Twitter app.

I use what you had on your LinkedIn, what do you want? Is it, is it Buckley 10 30 or does it say what sales?

[00:07:50] James Buckley: It started as Buckley 10 30? And then I changed it to at say what sales to be more branded, more on point, but LinkedIn, for some reason will not allow me to change the handle and edit my profile. So shout out LinkedIn, let me know how to make that happen. I've tried a couple of times now.

[00:08:09] Darryl Praill: So which one do you prefer?

[00:08:12] James Buckley: @SayWhatSales is where you can find me. It's the same account. Even if you, even if you type in Buckley 10 30, it'll find @SayWhatSales.

[00:08:21] Darryl Praill: I think you need to talk to Elon apparently there's a request here for an edit feature. I'm feeling, I'm just feeling it.

[00:08:27] James Buckley: It's a big deal. So at say what sales on Twitter on Instagram and now on Tik Tok. And then if you want to see the latest and greatest content you want to go to the Sell Better channel on YouTube. That is the newest channel we are really excited about and it's great.

[00:08:41] Darryl Praill: And they don't spare the expense. And I'll give John credit. He hires the best people out there to produce the content. It's really good.

Now we have to have fun with this before we get into the topic at hand. For those who don't know, because , hey, we're a sales show. This Chief Revenue Officer of J Barrows is Chris Merrill. And James, can we just agree that both you and I are way better looking and smarter than Chris Merrill?

[00:09:03] James Buckley: You know, you know, I want to say that yes, we can agree on that. I am better looking than Christopher. But I will say that I probably learn more in a 20 minute conversation with Chris than I do than I did it for any professor that I had in college save one or two.

[00:09:19] Darryl Praill: I had to drill down to find them on the website that Chris and I go back. But he's like under the, you know, go under team, and then there's another button you got to click for about the team way below the fold.

[00:09:30] James Buckley: It's true. He is a Wizard of Oz guy, the guy behind the counter pulling all the strings. We have several of those Meghan Forgione our COO is one of those, you know, you don't see these people often, but without them, the things we do are far less impact.

[00:09:46] Darryl Praill: It's true. There's always a good team behind the, the, the front man and James and Morgan and John are definitely the front man of J Barrows, but they're just part of a bigger team, just like you guys are in your organization folks. Now with that said it was bad. James and I were like halfway through a conversation about his journey and I'll make what the hell hadn't started, you know, truly recording this show and getting it on the show.

So we stopped and now we're back. So we may backtrack a little bit and cover some of the topics that he and I had already covered. And then we'll go off in tangents. So folks sit back relaxes. We are, I want to be clear kids. We're not telling you what to do. What we're going to share with you is James's journey.

And if you get some value out of this, God bless you. Share the episode, run with it. Be inspired by it. If nothing else, it'll be a fun conversation. So if you're out running, you're doing whatever you want to do. You're in the shower, you're in the car. Kick back, relax, turn it up loud. We're going to have some fun.

All right, James, you're on this journey. I alluded to a little bit of kind of type two diabetes. If I recall correct me. If I get that wrong. What you're on this journey you've been on for roughly six months now, what was the catalyst to start this? And have you done this before?

[00:10:54] James Buckley: Yeah, so, so I'll get, I'll do the short version in one year ago exactly. Memorial day, weekend of last year. So a little over a year ago. I was. Sitting in the backyard, we had just had dinner with my family and my father-in-law who is typed up type diabetic. I think he's type one diabetic. He, he has a tester and my wife had been on me for months. Oh, you know, you might be diabetic.

I was having a hard. Going like making it through the night without having to get up to pee. I was having, I was like constantly thirsty, no matter how much water I drank, both of those are signs of diabetes. But if I'm thirsty and drinking, a lot of water, my brain immediately is like, well, yeah, I got to pee, I'll look at all this water I'm drinking. Like I got to pee. Right.

And then as a husband, our wives tell us things and you know, we tune you out. Like, that's just what we do. So when they're like, you're probably type two diabetic, we're like, oh, I wasn't even a doctor. Like you don't know, like, so you move on with your life and you go about it.

Well, here comes my father-in-law with his testing kit and he's like, you know what? Let's find out right now. Take your finger. Let's prick your finger and let's find out what your blood sugar is. So I was like, all right, well, let's do it. Let's figure it out. So he tested my sugar and it was a 467. Now, for those of you that don't have the context here, a normal person, their pancreas works like this.

Their blood sugar is anywhere from 90 to 120 and that's healthy. That's considered a healthy insulin, creating pancreas. 467 means my pancreas stopped creating insulin to process sugar. Just straight up was like, James, you don't need me anymore. I'm all set.

So, so I freaked out, right? Because apparently I need my pancreas. I only get one. I quickly changed my diet and I lost like 20 pounds quickly. Like within 30, 40 days I lost like 15, 20 pounds just changing my diet and testing all the time. Like pricking my finger, like six, seven times a day, like, oh gosh, like, how is it? How's it going? Is it going by that? Am I seeing a drop?

And then it hit me about three, four weeks before Christmas, about a month before Christmas. That was like, I learned that. The amount of lean mass that you have on your body, it helps to dictate how much insulin your pancreas creates. So once I learned this, I thought to myself, well, I guess I'm going to become a weight lifter. That's the way to go.

So here I go, I go to the gym. Now, most people would go to the gym on new year's and they would set a new year's resolution that they know is bullshit, and they probably will not go through with it. I did not wait. I woke up, I put an hour on my calendar and I drove to the gym and I said, I want the I want a personal trainer twice a week, and I want an annual membership and I want to pay for it. All right now upfront.

This is something that most personal trainers, most gyms never hear from candidates walking through the door. So after some negotiation, we managed to find a price in a package that worked for me, I'm a sales professional so negotiation was a must.

We landed on twice a week, personal training and an annual membership. And I am in there five days a week, Monday through Friday, and I use the weekends to rest my body so that I can come back strong on front, on Mondays.

In less than six months, I've dropped about, it's still about 30 pounds. I'm only about 30 pounds down. I am up eight, I'm up eight to 12% in lean mass. I got to do a new scan coming up. We use a for this really interesting. And I'm down anywhere from 20 to 30% in things like visceral fat, which is the fat that jiggles when you shake your arm. Right. So I'm watching it.

[00:14:29] Darryl Praill: I don't know what you're talking about, but yeah, I've heard about it. Yeah.

[00:14:31] James Buckley: I'm watching these data points on these scans and I'm getting addicted to the data aspect of it because it'll break down all these different percentages and where you're fitting out and where building up. And I'm saying to myself, I wonder how big I can make my chest by next month. I wonder how small I can get my lower waist by next month. And that's the data point I'm getting addicted.

So I went from type two diabetic to now, recently diagnosed as pre-diabetic in less than six months with just consistency and a personal trainer twice a week. And I'm eating mostly plants at this point. I do have chicken, white meat, chicken, but it's mostly plants at this point.

[00:15:09] Darryl Praill: Okay. So stupid questions because. Folks I'm totally ripping off this episode because I am selfishly interested. So I apologize. So I'm going to ask stuff that you don't care about. Just go with me. Yeah. Are eggs, part of that?

[00:15:21] James Buckley: Eggs are part of it, but I learned that. If you try to replace your protein intake with just eggs, you'll end up with high cholesterol. They freaked me out. They freaked me. Yeah, because you eat like six a day, you know, you're like two eggs in the morning, plus whatever veggies you have in your eggs. And then, you know, you're going to have eggs in the afternoon if he can, because it's a light, easy lunch. It takes no time at all. Before, you know it, your cholesterol is through the roof and your hypertension is like epic.

So you're like, why is this happening? It's the cholesterol and the salt intake. That's, that's creating this. That's why I went to mostly plants. So now I went from eating six eggs a day to eating two eggs a day. And then my lunch is like just one vegetable. Just pick a vegetable, asparagus, broccoli, peppers, whatever your vegetable is, just eat that for lunch. It's just a veggie lunch. Have a salad if you want to, you know

But, but then I have a nice healthy dinner with all the food groups represented. I'm not cutting out carbs. Let me be clear. Exclusion diets are not what my trainer believes in. So I have a very smooth portion control guide that uses my hand and I'm going by that.

But the side hustle here, the thing I did not expect, and the real test that was surprising to me was I've seen a legit correlation. I can't prove causation, but I can prove correlation between my physical wellbeing, my health and wellness focus and my professional development and growth. I am easily five times more productive now going to the gym every day and exerting that energy in the mornings throughout my workday than I ever thought about being before I started on this journey.

The activity levels are up, the results the response rates are up, the engagement is up. I do more posts now than ever before. My energy level is through the roof and it was that way before, but now it's like twice as much. So it's really been amazing to see that up into the right hockey stick as I've progressed through this fitness journey.

[00:17:18] Darryl Praill: Okay. So I want to explore that. I have a few more questions about your regimen or that I'm sure others are wondering too. And then we'll go into what you just, what you just ended on. So Are you doing this smoothie thing as part of your, your meals? Cause it doesn't sound like I heard you. You're you're doing veggies. You're doing meal. You're doing,

[00:17:36] James Buckley: I just purchased a protein shake last week, but I haven't opened it yet. So I have not started doing protein shakes or smoothies. But I'm getting involved in that now I'm to understand it helps with repair and recovery so that, so that you can rebuild and tear and rebuild.

[00:17:52] Darryl Praill: Yeah. And would that be like a morning meal thing or would that be

[00:17:55] James Buckley: I don't know. I'm going to, I'm going to talk to Carrie, my trainer, and I'm going to ask her what the best time to do it is. I'm assuming that she's going to say this assumption of. Right after your workout, it makes a lot of sense. Does it replace a meal or is it complimentary to a meal?

I'm trying to go heavy protein on my breakfast anyway, because I know that that protein helps to recover and repair learning a lot about nutrition has been a good portion of this journey because I didn't know anything about it. I've been eating like trash for 40 years. Like I eat like an American eats Burger King and Wendy's like,

That's one of the four core groups I thought?

[00:18:29] Darryl Praill: Are you doing much in the way of cardio? Cause you mentioned that the pancreas likes lean muscle mass, you know, so are you doing much in the way of cardio?

[00:18:38] James Buckley: I do a lot of cardio. I do about 10 to 15 minutes of cardio on ellipticals and treadmills. Sometimes I do things like burpees to get my cardio going.

And all of that is because you need your heart rate. I'll again, big learning curve for me. I've learned a lot lately. You need your heart rate to be at its peak to be high before you start lifting, because it's the way your metabolism works. It's the way your body processes, all of this strain that you're about to go through.

There's also a stretching point before I start the cardio. I do about five, 10 minutes of stretching. So yeah, I might only work with. I might only lift for 30 to 45 minutes, but the strength and conditioning, the cardio and the stretching is at least another 45 minutes. So you spend a little bit of time getting ready to do the actual work. I'm amazed at the difference this is all made.

[00:19:29] Darryl Praill: And have you thought about doing something beyond that, such as yoga for stretching flexibility?

[00:19:35] James Buckley: Yeah. So Renegade yoga is in Knoxville, Tennessee, and it's about 30 minutes away from me. And I did a session there and. You think, you know, that yoga is going to be easy because you see people do it.

This was one of the toughest things that I've done here in a long time, but it let me know just how out of shape I was, number one. Number two, it let me know that I'm not ready for that step yet. I need to drop a few more pounds. I need to get familiar with the stretching and the moving before you just dive into it.

The other part of it is, is that. Like most humans, I'm comparing myself to everyone else in this room and they've been coming here for years. This is my first class. So I can't move the way they move, but I'm watching them all going, man, this is so amazing. Like I bet these people are never in. Like, there's just so many different things that we could do for our health and wellness.

It doesn't have to be lifting weights. It doesn't have to be dieting. It can be yoga, it can be cardio, it can be stretching. It can be all these things, whatever it is that you need it to be, do it consistently. And you're going to see that same uptick in all of your life aspects, up into the right.

[00:20:45] Darryl Praill: Okay. So folks, I'm going to say what he just said differently. All right. If you're new to sales or you're still evolving in sales, you can appreciate the fact that you are not the world's best salesperson. And you're looking around you and using all these other people who are knocking out of the park, hitting quota, quota president's club, you're thinking I'm a total loser.

No, it's a journey. Listen to what James is saying. He's saying it's a journey. Six months later. Look at the difference it's already had on me, but what's he doing? James is investing in himself a, he put his own money on the line. He wasn't looking for his employer to pay for and own his success. He put his own money the lime and then see, he was gave himself a mindset that this is a process and it will take time. All right. Sales, same way. These are the same.

Last question that I want to go back to where you wrapped up on the impact it's had on you, which is, so you say you go five days a week. What's your time. Are you there from like 9- 11? You know, 5:00 AM to 7:00 AM. Like,

[00:21:49] James Buckley: Yeah. So, so for the last five or six years, I get up at like five in the morning. My body just naturally gets me up. Now. I don't have to set an alarm 5, 5 30 at the latest my body just goes, hey, get up and go. So I get up within 30 minutes, I got my gym clothes on. They live by the front door so I can throw them on before I walk out the door. And I'm at the gym.

By the time I'm at the gym. I do my stretch. I do my cardio, I get my heartbeat up and then I hit it. I'm there for a grand total of an hour, hour and 10 minutes at the maximum. And I go from session to session. So exercise to exercise, active rest is what I call it. If I just did chest, I'm going to pump out my rep of 10 and then I'm going to hop over and I'm going to do squats, holding a 50 pound dumbbell while my arms were.

Then I'm going to jump back on the bench and do the next set. And I'm going to do both of those back and forth three sets. And then I choose two more things and I'll do that. Sometimes it sets of three things, right? I do this for as long as I can until I just can't stand it anymore. It's usually about 45 minutes or so.

And then I leave, I come home, I throw in my veggies and my 10 inch pan, a little bit of olive oil cook all the veggies up. I put it in a bowl, do my two eggs over medium, put them right on top. I'm sitting right next to my computer. I hop over and I start my day, but it's only like 7:00 AM, 7:30 AM.

So then for the next hour and a half, I'm working, I'm, I'm clearing out my inbox. I'm clearing out my inbox. I'm responding to the LinkedIn messages. I miss last night, I'm talking to people internationally that have, you know, they're in the middle of their afternoon. I'm using that time to my advantage because no one is awake yet. I'm not getting pinged from 10,000 things distracting me from my goals at that moment. So I can use that hour and a half to really push. And because I'm jazzed up from the exercise, man, I get a lot done in that hour and a half.

And then I go hop in the shower when everybody gets out of bed and comes to, to, to, to the, to the table. And I, I I've been the game for the rest of the day and usually I'm live two or three times a day.

So. You know, it's a lot of engagement and stuff like that, but my energy level is just so high throughout the rest of the day, because of that workout, it like sets the tone for how the day is going to go. And I find that no matter what comes my way, I've got this incredibly positive response almost every time now.

[00:24:25] Darryl Praill: So let's, let's talk about that. Why do you think this journey, this health journey you've been on has changed your. Oh, look, your attitude, your energy levels. Like why do you think that?

[00:24:40] James Buckley: I think because I'm seeing the results that I want, number one, number two, I think it's, it's literally changing the way my body processes energy.

I had a high energy level before, when I went to the doctor for the first time after being diagnosed, that was the first thing he said was people with type two diabetes, typically struggle with energy levels. They have a hard time getting up and getting going. They need a lot of coffee to get going. And I said, dude, I don't know who you're talking to.

That ain't me. Yep. I get up at five in the morning and I'm talking to people in Ireland. Like, I don't know what, that's not me, man. I get up amped up to be alive, you know, but that's because of my background I have a whole different life.

[00:25:22] Darryl Praill: You're not an older gentlemen. I'm an older gentleman, but carry on. Yeah, exactly. Degrees of old.

[00:25:27] James Buckley: There's something happening to the way that my body carries that energy through the rest of the day. Now I will say this and here's the, here's the crux of it all. As an older gentlemen, I'm 40, as an older gentlemen, I have a typical, I typically, I typically. I must carry on. I understand there's older people out there than me.

You know, I remember, I remember when I was 20 and could go until three in the morning. My evening didn't start till 11:30. You know, I remember that. And now I am lucky to make it to 9:30 before I am asleep on the couch because I've exerted this incredible amount of emotional and intellectual and emphatic energy throughout the entire day.

The dream. Is very real, but here's the good part about that? I sleep like a baby. I am out and I get the most restful sleep. You couldn't wake me up if you try it.

[00:26:25] Darryl Praill: Even with your wife hovering over you with the pillow. You still sleep?

[00:26:29] James Buckley: I do. Yeah, that doesn't scare me. She's only four 11. She's tiny.

[00:26:35] Darryl Praill: You totally take her

[00:26:36] James Buckley: I could, I could.

[00:26:40] Darryl Praill: So have your clients or your colleagues, without prompting from you, I observed a difference in you and commented on it?

[00:26:49] James Buckley: I believe that all of them have made some level of comment about either my physical appearance or the dramatic shift that they've seen in my work. Yeah. I've had a lot of commentary from the team internally. And John said that if I can beat this diabetes thing, he'll throw me a big party. So I'm in.

[00:27:08] Darryl Praill: A big party full of sugar, baby.

[00:27:10] James Buckley: Yeah. Well, it'll probably be whiskey whiskey. I'm told as okay.

[00:27:16] Darryl Praill: The different kinds of sugar. So, I mean, folks, we know this is a sales show, but I mean, the reality is for you to do what you do every single day, it's a grind, it takes skills, it takes an investment in yourself and your talents. It takes a commitment to the craft.

And I think what we forget is that it's more than just listening or taking or applying the lessons from the crew at J Barrows. It's about investing in yourself, investing in your skills, investing in your gear, investing in your schedules, investing in your discipline to be successful at what you do.

And the upside is if you do that, you see it in other areas of your life. Like James has talked about his relationship with his family, his relationship with his clients, you know, just as general positivity, how it's changed. Not to mention, we didn't talk about this. We talked about this in the green room.

The, when you went from being diagnosed to going, pre-diabetic now your latest diagnosis, you're not take, you don't have to take the meds anymore, which means you're saving some money there to,

[00:28:23] James Buckley: Yeah, that's right. And, and, you know, your insurance requires, if you are diagnosed with type two diabetes that you take medications, But if you're diagnosed pre-diabetic then they don't require you to take medication anymore.

Obviously that saves you a lot of money because medication is expensive, but let's talk about sales for just a moment. If I can, when I went live

[00:28:41] Darryl Praill: Let's do that.

[00:28:42] James Buckley: When I went live and started talking about this journey of mine, what I immediately noticed is the amount of personal trainers that came out of the woodwork to try to sell me on their programs. And let me just harp on the fact that they went about this in the worst possible way.

Number one. They had no idea, no clue who I was or what I did for a living. So they came at me really fast and strong, hard, and a lot of their messaging hinges on one basic premise you should be, and probably are miserable because you don't look like me.

And when I tell you that is the worst possible response approach that you can have with somebody that's out of shape, they will never respect respond to you positively, if that is your approach.

Personal trainers out there that are listening to this and wondering how you can improve your sales process, stop judging people and assuming that you know who they are and what they want, by the way that they look, that is the worst approach that you could have.

I probably chewed out 150 personal trainers, and I would ask them, what do you know about what I do for a living? They don't even care. They would just move on to the next thing. What are your weight loss goals? You know, and you're like, dude, are you going to acknowledge the fact that I just asked you a question?

Well, what's stopping you from hitting those goals, right? They don't acknowledge the fact that I'm speaking to them. And you want me to think you're going to give a shit about my health. It's unlikely that that's going to be the conclusion that I draw.

Salespeople in SAAS and technology do the same thing. I send you an email and I say, oh, I see you went to the university of Maryland and then immediately pivot to my shit. That's not relevant to the university of Maryland. John tells that story a lot.

We have to acknowledge what people are saying back to us. When they said, what are your fitness goals? They were expecting me to throw out a number. They wanted a weight loss number. What I said was I need my pancreas to work. Think you can help me with that. Every single one of them never responded. Cause they don't know shit about.

So you've got to know your prospect and you have to care about what it is they do and what they're going through and acknowledge the fact that they're speaking to them and personal trainers out there, hear me: stop telling people they should be miserable because they don't have a six pack. Like you that's bullshit. I am the happiest dude you'll ever meet. And I don't appreciate that approach in any way, shape or form.

[00:30:59] Darryl Praill: On behalf of every single buyer out there. I want to applaud loudly. What James just said, I've had so many people come and tell me what I'd likely want you to kind of basically the same point.

Assume you want to have a six pack, right. Or tell me that you want to, you know, achieve a certain goal. And all it takes is them to ask a question and engage in a conversation. I mean, for frig sake, Relationship 101, that's that's discovery 101, that's qualification 101 this? I mean, we teach at length about this guys and there's too many people trying to take shortcuts because it's a numbers game. It's bullshit.

I watch it every day. James, I see our own reps and reps at other clients I've I've helped or that I've worked with have these activity numbers. And they're saying, well, we can't hit our activity numbers. If we hit our activity numbers, we're not hitting the number of conversations. Right.

So sure. I put the a hundred dollars in, but I didn't have the conversations I wanted to because, well it's because your pitch was brutal. There was no personalization. There's no context. There's no relevance. And they said, well, we don't have time to do that. I'm like, what are we measuring? Are we measuring activity? We measure outcomes because I don't care if you do 10 calls or a hundred calls. I do care. If you have like two or three conversations a day.

[00:32:18] James Buckley: I'll say, I'll say. I'll say this about what you're saying here, and I'll say it to every SDR and AE out there. I, it doesn't matter if you schedule 25 meetings this week if none of them have any potential of closing. It doesn't matter. You get paid good for you, but it doesn't do anything for your company and let's not make any bones about it. That's what you're going to be truly measured on.

Setting a meeting that is unqualified might as well not set that meeting. Just skip. It's an important factoid. I use that word a lot these days, that it's the responsibility of SDRs to qualify opportunities. That's what you should be getting paid on and leaders out there. I'll say this to you. You should be qualifying these demos that are scheduled by SDRs and they should not be paid on SDR scheduled demos that have not been qualified and don't yield an opportunity I believe.

And I've thought this for a very long. An SDR should be paid on the number of opportunities created, not the number of meetings set though. Leadership should still provide a set target for the number of meetings set, but they should all be qualified and yield to opportunities no?

[00:33:30] Darryl Praill: So I agree with you 95%.

[00:33:33] James Buckley: Okay.

[00:33:33] Darryl Praill: When, when, when you stay the fight. So the course we're gonna talk about the other 5%. That's what happens we do, right? So when you say SDRs should be measured by the number of opportunities they create.

[00:33:43] James Buckley: That's right.

[00:33:44] Darryl Praill: I partially could review. Who's defining it as an opportunity created, is the SDR doing the qualification and handing it off to the IE who then says, yes, I further qualified and now it's an opportunity. If that's the case, you're dependent upon the AE and their skills. And I don't want to be held prisoner because they suck at their skills.

[00:34:05] James Buckley: Ah, so this is why process. I agree. Yes. I agree. I want to agree with you. I have to agree. And it's not fair to put an account executive in charge of whether or not this SDR is paid for a demo set. That's unfair. However, there are

[00:34:23] Darryl Praill: Agreed, agreed.

[00:34:24] James Buckley: There are specific processes you can put in place, check boxes. You can put in place to cover that SDR is rear end so that the AE isn't in control of that. For example, if your criteria is they have a certain level of ARR.

If your criteria is they have a certain headcount. If your criteria is they're located in a certain region and sell to a specific vertical, those could be your qualifications. And if an SDR covers those basis, check, check, check that decision on whether or not it's qualified to yield. An opportunity is no longer in the, in the, in the hands of the AE, but

[00:35:02] Darryl Praill: Right.

[00:35:02] James Buckley: Creating that opportunity effective is in the hands of the AE and they potentially could

[00:35:09] Darryl Praill: Totally agree.

[00:35:09] James Buckley: And they could potentially not create that opportunity because of a folly process because they don't, they're not very good at discovery. So you can still, as leadership have a process that's beneficial for an SDR, but has a requirement, but it's not contingent on an account executive making an administrative decision.

[00:35:28] Darryl Praill: So I would say using terminology, that's probably. I dunno, eight years old now, maybe maybe 10, going back to the serious decisions, demand waterfall days. The SDR is going to take the MQL all right. And they're going to take the lead. They're going to basically going to MQL it. That's what they're already doing, which is a virtue he just said.

[00:35:47] James Buckley: And then they, and then they qualify. It becomes an SQL

[00:35:49] Darryl Praill: And they qualify it. And then it becomes in sales looks at that. And then their due diligence, they say, yep, I can confirm it's the right number of employees. It's at a right MRR or ARR targets. In other words, it fits my definition of a lead. Therefore it's sales accepted SAL.

[00:36:05] James Buckley: So no, it's not sales accepted. It's not. It's sales qualified.

[00:36:09] Darryl Praill: SQL is next, sales qualified as next I would argue it's sales accepted. Now, if it's sales qualified, it becomes an opportunity.

[00:36:18] James Buckley: I believe that discovery has to be there before you create the opportunity. And that's a step beyond that. Qualification is the, is the responsibility of the. Are you qualified to buy from me? I need to know that. Okay.

[00:36:31] Darryl Praill: Where does the SDR live in marketing or sales. If you live in market, the SDR.

[00:36:36] James Buckley: Depends on your model. Yeah, that depends on your model and

[00:36:39] Darryl Praill: We've not agreed. And we totally agree.

[00:36:43] James Buckley: We agree and disagree at the same time.

[00:36:47] Darryl Praill: What I love about this is what we're getting caught up on here. Folks are are, are semantics relative to the model. James said it brilliantly, but you know, what's really cool about this conversation. We just had a, we don't have to agree on it right now because it truly

[00:36:59] James Buckley: No right answer.

[00:37:00] Darryl Praill: There's no right answer. It depends on your model. Right. But if you don't have these conversations, because going back to the essence of what James is talking about, it was about when is that SDR comped?

Is it about activities or is it about, you know, qualified opera? He used the term qualified opportunities, but it's gotta be something that is. At the end of the day, it's all we care about. We don't care about the vanity metrics. We care about how much pipeline do I have. That's what we care about.

[00:37:31] James Buckley: Yeah, it's true. I want to say something else controversial. Can I switch gears and say something else controversial?

[00:37:36] Darryl Praill: Because I hate controversy

[00:37:38] James Buckley: Everybody has SDRs that have been at their company for six months, eight months. They'd been there for six months. They'd been there for eight months and they feel like they are ready for that next step. And you don't.

[00:37:53] Darryl Praill: I have never experienced this, James.

[00:37:56] James Buckley: Yes, you have, because we all have. Every SDR comes in, every SDR comes in and they're super amped, $40, $50,000 a year. It's more money than they've ever made in their lives. They're so excited to be a part of the team. Thank you so much for having me all this stuff. Five, six months later, you could talk to that same rep and they're like, if I'm not in AE by the end of the month, I'm going to quit. And you're like, wait, what happened? Right.

So here's my, here's my challenge to leaders. And this is what I think people should start doing. Allow that rep to close two or three small deals. Okay. Don't coach them. They think they're ready. They believe that they can take that step with ease. So go ahead and give them the green light on accounts that are very specific and small.

When they fail you can now justify keeping them in the SDR role, but continuing them on a path of learning so that when they really are ready, they won't doubt it ever again. And they'll believe more in your leadership.

[00:38:59] Darryl Praill: So if I can paraphrase let them fail.

[00:39:02] James Buckley: You have to

[00:39:03] Darryl Praill: Tough love is a wonderful thing. And it often results in a healthy dose of humility combined with a follow-on and strong desire to get better at their craft. And if they wash out at any step along the way, The sooner, the better are you doing them a favor? You're doing yourself a favor.

[00:39:21] James Buckley: That's right. It takes training and practice to get good at something and get good at it means you have to dedicate the time. You can't be an SDR for six months. Focus on SDR related activities for that entire six months. Focus, not at all on becoming an a E and then magically be good at closing. That's not the way it works. It takes exposure, time, training, special niche conversations, know the product, know the vertical. It takes a year just for an SDR to learn those things, but they think they're ready to be an AE six months in this is unrealistic. You've been off ramp for two months.

[00:39:58] Darryl Praill: James. I guarantee you there's people listening to this show right now and they're calling, they're yelling at you and calling you a boomer.

[00:40:04] James Buckley: Good, come at me.

[00:40:08] Darryl Praill: That's right, because you don't get it. You're old school. You don't understand.

[00:40:14] James Buckley: Right. Yeah. I, I remember, I remember when I knew everything too quick, move out of your mom's house while you still know everything.

[00:40:22] Darryl Praill: Yes. Yes. It's so, so, so true.

Folks, we are way over. I want to have James back in the future. We're not going to wait nearly as long and next time we'll talk true sales. But the beauty of James is he is a wealth of knowledge. You just, you just at the tail end there, you just started to hear a smidge of this man,

J Barrows, that's where you want to go check them out. Follow him on LinkedIn, follow him on Twitter. You heard him say he's live two and three times a day, consume his content. You didn't need to consume that content today. Today, we were focused on sharing his journey and the impact is made on him. And you want to share it with you as did I, because we care about you.

So hopefully this helps hopefully somebody, maybe, you know, that needs to hear this episode. This is real. This is approachable. This is life. It's all cool.

Commit to yourself the same way you commit to your craft to send me commit to your loved ones and you will be a success.

That's James I'm Daryl. We'll see you next week. Take care.

This episode was digitally transcribed.