Episode 45: Scott Webb – Conversations Equal Conversions
In this episode, the Social Sales Link team are joined by Scott Webb aka “The Refluencer.” Find out why Scott thinks conversations are key to social selling and why it’s important to get out of sales mode to be a resource for potential clients.
So tune in and listen to how his past experience with his restaurant business inspired him to create a framework on how we can have more sales.
View Transcript
Scott Webb 00:00
I am an extrovert and social means just engaging, being conversational. It’s not about trying to position yourself as an authority or an expert. It’s about making friends and relationships. That’s like walking into your relationship with your wife and never talking to her or only talking to her but never listening. So social and selling is about listening. It’s about conversations.
Bob Woods 00:26
Welcome to the Making Sales Social Podcast! Featuring the top voices in sales and marketing. Join hosts, Brynne Tillman and Bill McCormick as they discuss the best tips and strategies they are teaching their clients so you can leverage them for your own virtual and social selling. You can also listen to us on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, Stitcher, and Google Play. Here are your hosts Brynne Tillman and Bill McCormick.
Bill McCormick 01:04
Hey, everyone, welcome to Making Sales Social! I’m Bill McCormick.
Brynne Tillman 01:07
I’m Brynne Tillman.
Bill McCormick 01:08
So Brynne, who’s our guest today?
Brynne Tillman 01:11
We have Scott Webb today and I’m really excited. Apparently, we have been connected for a long time on LinkedIn and he’s been following some of the stuff we’ve done. But recently, he engaged on some content that he put out there, and I had some amazing “Aha” moments, I went, “Man, this guy brings some really good insights to sales and marketing.” So we thought we would bring him on and share it with all of you. Hi, Scott, welcome to the show!
Scott Webb
Awesome. Thanks, Brynne. Thanks, Bob. Appreciate it.
Bill McCormick 01:44
Bob’s the other guy in our team but that’s ok
Brynne Tillman 01:47
We do have a Bob, we have one and I do it all the time. So I wonder if I had to do with it but either way we’re thrilled to have you. Tell everyone a little bit about you, and Kitchen Traffic.
Scott Webb 01:57
So I’ve been in the lead gen digital marketing game for 20 years. Built my first website in 1997 and just realize that the internet was where everything was going to happen eventually. Kitchen Traffic is a newer entity. I started it about two and a half years ago, the only way I can explain it is I wanted something better than just lead gen and I wanted to be able to create a company. A place in the market where people actually treat their customers like they want them to hang around and I was in the restaurant business for 10 years and there’s no harder industry out there than running a restaurant but that hospitality factor, you know, inviting people into your business to stay and linger and bring other people. I just didn’t see it and at least all the companies that I was working with, everything was about fresh meat, new leads, next. And so, Kitchen Traffic is more of a metaphor and a symbol than it is, you know, anything else. And so, now we focus on the retention, the referral, and the relationship side of selling verse– So we call it the other side of the transaction. And we’ve been able to prove some theories that if you just actually act like you care about your customers just a little bit, there’s a ton of money there. So now we have a system and a framework called “Apple orchard” and now we just teach it to industries of all kinds.
Bill McCormick 03:34
Wow. So who would think that if you actually care for people, it would pay off. A noble concept that we’re going to talk about, we’re gonna dive into that right now. So, Scott, the question we ask everyone right out of the gate is What does making sales social mean to you?
Scott Webb 03:52
So first and foremost, I am an extrovert and social means just engaging, being conversational. It’s not about trying to position yourself as an authority or an expert. It’s about making friends and relationships. One thing that pisses me off most about the companies I deal with is they use social media strictly as a pound and hound mechanism. And they’re like, “Man, we need to buy more ads and we need to get better content out there because we’re not getting any conversions.” And I’m like, “Well, listen, I looked at your social media feed, you have like 12 people who responded to you, but you didn’t respond back.” That’s like walking into your relationship with your wife and never talking to her or only talking to her but never listening. So social and selling is about listening. It’s about conversations.
Brynne Tillman 04:46
I love that.
Bill McCormick 04:48
And so I’m going to just start asking people so, “Hey, are you a pound hound?”
Scott Webb 04:52
pound hound (Bill: A pound down?) A pounder. I just put a post up about pounding chicken is like how people treat their customer’s inboxes (Brynne: Oh my god.)
Bill McCormick 05:05
So True! So this is like my third call of the day with different people in tune with clients. And we were talking about email. And I said to him, like, as we’ve been talking 10 messages have come in, and I’m going to read one of them. The rest, I’m going to, I’m going to delete because I know they’re just garbage. They’re just–So one of the things that you wrote in some of your writings that I read, that you have a saying there that “Conversations equal conversions.” Let’s talk about that for a moment.
Scott Webb 05:37
So going back to your restaurant days, you know, you have a server, they come to your table, and they take your order. Beyond that, if that’s all they do, what kind of tip do you think they can expect? Or if you were ever in the restaurant business, and you never engaged your customers basically just brought in the food from the kitchen, anybody can do that. Well, when you start and strike up conversations with your guests, your clients, your customers, I’ll call it your relationships and your network. Every single time a conversation equals a sale every time. Here’s the number one saying I get every week. I have a framework in which I reach out to a certain amount of people every month and inevitably, they will say I was just thinking about you. I was just talking about you. I was at breakfast this morning with this developer in the mountains, and he’s building this $25 million condo, I was just talking about you, he wants to hear from you. And so, the more conversations you can have with those, you know, call it your list, call it your network, whatever you want to call it, your CRM, I don’t care, the more conversations you start and try and sustain always equal sales every single time.
Brynne Tillman 06:56
So, I’d love to ask a question because, you know, traditional sales, we’ve always gone to our clients and said, you know, “We’re so glad we’ve been able to help you do X, Y, and Z and solve all these problems and that now we love each other. Who do you know, that you can refer us to?” And we have a little LinkedIn program that we run with them to help them proactively get referrals. But how do you help your clients get more referrals from their happy clients?
Scott Webb 07:25
So this is something I learned a long time ago. When you –And this comes from the restaurant business too. When you have a good customer, we call them “regulars” in the industry but when you have a regular they come in every Friday, whatever and you are as a management team, work with your staff to comp certain people. So whether it’s a glass of wine, an appetizer, dessert, maybe even an entire meal. So you’re giving, you’re giving in to your profits in order to build the relationship to build on that relationship. So when it comes to referrals, I comp my clients with an amazing amount of, call it “goodwill and ideas.” So I’m always feeding my customers things that are working for me, and I don’t charge them for it. I don’t go well, “Hey, if you join my group this month for $19.95, I’ll show you the fastest way to get five new referrals.” Nope, “Here’s the fastest way I found this week to get five new referrals.” And I’ll give you the framework step by step you don’t even have to guess and it’s yours. But would you do me a favor, if you know somebody that’s also struggling right now with finding leads and new clients, give them this framework, this, you know, cheat sheet workbook, piece of content, whatever you want to call it. And that share now becomes the lead into every referral I possibly could want. And so now instead of going, “Hey, do you know anybody that could use my service, because, you know, obviously, you know, we work well together.” which is kind of an old referral style. (Brynne: Right, right, that’s tradition way), I’m just giving them something to share. And then I asked him who they shared that with, boom! I usually get an email or I’ll even… They will be like this, like, “Hang on, I just texted it to my list.” And then they carbon copied me on like 40 different text messages.
Brynne Tillman 09:28
Wow! Do you even go proactively? So one of the things we talk about is proactively go through their LinkedIn and identify them to people they know and just run the list by them. See how well they know some of those folks.
Scott Webb 09:40
Right, and listen, not everybody in your list is going to be, I won’t call it worthy but you know, the alignment won’t be there. And so you’re not trying to force yourself to work with people that you know don’t need your services or can’t use your services. But I teach my clients to become – Get out of sales mode and embrace educator and guide. So when you become an educator and a guide, you now become a resource versus just an end, and a vendor or an end to a service. Right? Yeah. And so anytime that you can teach something, anytime you can teach something, anytime you can help somebody avoid a landmine, like, “Hey, guys, here are the five things I learned in 2021 that have sucked a ton of energy, and resources and profit out of my business, maybe you should avoid these too.” And that little trinket will go out and somebody’s like, “Oh, my God, yes. You know, my inbox is killing me right now I spend more time in my inbox.” than I do, trying to run my business, just something simple. Don’t have to be world-renowned, don’t have to be you know, otherworldly. It’s just something simple that’s working for you. And then that makes number one, you relatable, and relevant. Which are all part of the “Re’s” that’s why I call myself “The Refluencer.” Everything’s on the other side, where you are re-engaging your clients, you’re recommending, you’re asking for referrals, you’re building relationships, you’re real. All of the “Re’s” right? And I just embrace them all. So if you can educate your clients and your prospects and your list, and guide them to whatever they’re looking for even if you’re not the solution, that’s why you have a list. I have so many people, I used to design websites, I built over 1500 websites in my career. Now I just refer people that do the websites because I don’t touch them anymore. And guess what they do? They send me all kinds of people that are looking for more sales and customers.
Bill McCormick 11:50
Alright, alright, so everyone that’s listening, we’re going to do another reword. I want you to stop here, I want you to rewind. (Scott Webb: Love it) and go back and listen to this and think of it in terms of this, that you are a waiter or waitress. And your client is at the table. Would they leave you a tip with how you’re treating them? Are you coming to them and just pushing them and think of it in these terms. Are you coming to them and saying, “Okay, yeah, no, you don’t want that menu. Here’s my menu, which is my sales process and this is what you have to choose from. And this is how –And not only you’re going to get it the way I cook it for you.” What kind of tip do you think you’d get? So what Scott’s telling us here is, how are you going to come to that table? How are you going to bring that table around to want to become a regular? This is, This is gold?
Brynne Tillman 12:41
it’s awesome and, you know, I’m rethinking another “re”, but I’m rethinking how, you know, a step in our referral process instead of there are times where we can assume the call. But if– There are times where it’s not the strongest referral, but a recommendation, all “Re’s”, right? So that point, there’s a step between which is, you know, “Hey, Scott, I was talking with Bill, had helped him on a couple of things, thought I might be able to bring some value in an e-book that I’d love to share with you. If you’re interested, let me know, I’ll send you a link.” So we do a lot of name-dropping with permission, if there are large lists, right. But I think this just added sort of a buffer step in there that can glean interest before assuming the call. So you just really got us to rethink how we’re doing things a little bit. And I think that’s awesome.
Bill McCormick 13:43
So good. So good. All right. So let’s, re-adjust and let’s, let’s mix the metaphors a little bit. Let’s get away from the restaurant. Let’s talk about “Apple orchards and apple trees.” One of the things I read is that you think of every person as an apple tree.
Scott Webb 14:03
Correct! So, I live in metaphors my entire world is painted in words, are painted in pictures. And one of the things that I was taught by a mentor of mine, Jay Abraham, maybe you’ve heard of him. But Jay is the king of referrals and he’s built a legacy on embracing your clients and your prospects and instead of just treating them like a transaction. And so, as I was working in trying to create this metaphor, how do people look at their customers, right? Are they stats in a CRM or, you know, sales figures at the end of a report? But what if you looked at your customers and not just your customers, people in general as trees, and an apple tree has what in it? More apples. And if you are in trying to generate leads and new customers and new clients. You’re constantly looking for a source of fresh people to do business with, well, let’s say I have a tree over here. And now maybe that tree doesn’t necessarily, we’re not even, they’re not even a client but they’re a friend, they’re a relationship, they’re somebody that embraces what I do, they support my success. But all of a sudden, with a little bit of deeper inspection, you realize that that one person actually sells software to 35,000 dentists nationwide. And my relationship with the tree now gives me access if I nurture and cultivate it, to those 35,000 dentists. And this is a true story.
Brynne Tillman 15:44
I had a feeling that was a little exact. It was a little particular.
Scott Webb 15:47
So now I asked my tree, “Hey, tree, I have this program that I can teach dentists how to find new referrals and new clients through the customers, or the hard-won customers and patients they already have. Would I be able to provide that to them through you?” And of course, the tree goes, “Hell yeah!” Coz I don’t do anything like that. So what does it make the tree look like? Well makes the little tree look like a resource to his clients. And so now with a little collaboration and a little cultivation, I have access now to 35,000 plus dentists nationwide. Am I going to do business with all 35,000? of them? No, of course not. But could I convert those into 350? new clients? Hell yeah! (Brynne: I love that!) And then think about the dentist, the dentist is now its own tree. And that dentist wife will say she’s a business banker at Bank of America, and she has 13,000 business clients. And all of a sudden, her tree equals all these apples and it just grows and grows and grows from there until now you have a huge orchard that you’re connected to. And now you’re out serving and trying to be a guide versus a salesperson and now you have access to more apples.
Brynne Tillman 17:14
We’re getting a little bit of… it sounds like you’re at the ocean.
Bill McCormick 17:18
Yeah, some feedback from your back.
Brynne Tillman 17:21
But that was powerful! And you know, it’s interesting. I mean, we talk a lot about how do you build those networking partners? And I just want to kind of throw in one way, because now people go, Okay, how do I find the trees? And one of the ways you can do this is go to your clients and find out who else are they buying from that are selling to more people like them? And you know, not only is it easy to get a conversation with another vendor who shares a customer with you feel comfortable introducing them because they’re already been vetted by your shared client.
Scott Webb 18:02
It’s the perfect formula. Yes!
Brynne Tillman 18:05
So, I love this. This has been outstanding, Scott, I knew it was gonna be good. But this is really good.
Scott Webb 18:09
Yeah, just real quick. The key is, are you just have to think of your clients and the people around you in the relationships you have as more than just a transaction. And when you can make that switch and that mindset switch and you start treating people with the dignity they deserve and, you know, in looking to serve more than sell, the sales will come. They always do.
Brynne Tillman 18:33
When the time is right. That’s right out of our playbooks Scott. Right out of our playbook. I love it.
Bill McCormick 18:38
So, so good. You know, we’ve been saying this now, for the last few weeks, if you’ve been listening, it’s been a theme. And listen, we’re not priming this. The people that we’re bringing (Brynne: We’re attracting these people) Right, there’s a synergy that’s happening, and there’s an alignment that’s happening because there’s a movement now in the sales world to get away from this idea that every person is just a number. It’s just a number of my call sheet and it’s $1 amount in my quota (Brynne: A lead) Right a lead but they’re are people on the other side of the screen, on the other side of the table, on the other side of the phone. And if we’ll just serve them if we’ll come with our notepad ready to take the order for exactly what they want. And listen, if you’re not able to do it, go find a kitchen that can. Right? So that you’re actually serving. This is so so good. I’ve got like a ton of notes that I took so I’m sure…
Brynne Tillman 19:38
And I just want to add take the order that we have to ask them. Do you like beef or chicken or pasta? Like, they don’t always know what’s on our menu. And right. I could play in this all the time all day long. So a lot of it is helping them understand what they really want and what they really need, and then figuring out if we’re the ones to help them or if there’s someone else to do that. So all these metaphors are so fun. And by the way, my degree is from Johnson and Wales in Hospitality Management and so I grew up in the restaurant world.
Scott Webb 20:17
I love it. I can tell. You’re so hospitable.
Brynne Tillman 20:21
Oh, thank you, Yeah. It only took me four years of training to get there. But all right. Back to you, Bill.
Bill McCormick 20:27
Thank you for much this was so great, Scott. So, just tell everyone a little bit about how they can connect with you, how they can find you and I guess you’ve got an offer for them from your website about some in-depth training they can look at.
Brynne Tillman 20:42
A gift that they can have and give to others.
Scott Webb 20:44
Yeah. So kitchentraffic.co, and I’m on LinkedIn, almost 10,000 followers on LinkedIn. So just type Scott Webb, I usually pop up. Google me, you can email me Scott Webb or Scott@kitchentraffic.co But if you go to kitchentraffic.co right now, there’s a download for “Apple orchard” and it’s yours. It’s an in-depth training worksheet, workbook. It shows you exactly the framework I use to generate 200,000 leads last year alone. And it is, which sounds absurd and It absolutely is. But when you implement the framework, as I’ve laid it out, you’re going to find that one person is connected to 35,000 potential business opportunities for you just as I use the example with the dentist. And then, compound that because now you have one person that has 85,000 subscribers to their SAS software. And that relationship now opened the door to 85,000 entrepreneurs that uses SAS software. So you can see how two relationships over 100,000 new business opportunities. It is absurd! But when you use the framework, and if you just need five, you can use it for five but the frameworks there for you, it’s free to download and we have a bunch of new trainings because we’re rolled out apple orchard 2.0.
Bill McCormick 22:14
But make sure you check out that apple orchard and download that we’ll have the list of resources right in the show notes so that you can download and go visit those sites. So, Scott, thank you so much for imparting your wisdom. Like I said, this was for me more than anyone else. I got so much out of it. So thank you so much.
Brynne Tillman 22:35
Yeah, thank you for training us.
Bill McCormick 22:37
Yes, for sure. For sure. So and thank you all for watching and for tuning in every week. Don’t forget this week as you’re out and about don’t forget to make your sales social.
Bob Woods 22:48
Thanks for watching, and join us again for more special guest instructors bringing you marketing, sales, training, and social selling strategies that will set you apart. Hit the subscribe button below to get the latest episodes from the Making Sales Social Podcast! Give this video a thumbs up and comment down below on what you want to hear from us next. You can also listen to us on Apple Podcast, Spotify, Stitcher, and Google Play. Visit our website socialsaleslink.com for more information.