What it sounds like when you know your buyer’s reason.
“Great. I’ll send over the proposal.”
“Before I send pricing: here’s who on our side owns your setup, and the date you’ll be live.”
- What we sawOn the demo, the buyer asked twice how long setup takes.
- What it told usNobody asks the same question twice unless the first answer missed something. The first time, they wanted your timeline. The second time, they wanted to know who takes the blame if setup runs late.
- Their reason to say yesThe buyer won’t sign until they know who on your team owns getting setup done on time.
- What’s underneath itIf setup goes badly, they’re the one who vouched for you, and everyone at work will remember it.
“Quality roofing you can trust since 2009.”
“You’ll know what it costs before we touch a shingle. In writing.”
- What we sawMost of the roofer’s five-star reviews thank him for sticking to his quote.
- What it told usNobody thanks a roofer for keeping his word unless they expected him to break it. Those homeowners hired him braced for a surprise bill, and the review is their relief.
- Their reason to say yesHomeowners won’t sign until the price is in writing and can’t grow once the old roof comes off.
- What’s underneath itNobody wants to be the homeowner a contractor took advantage of, then tell their family what it cost.
“Voted best med spa three years running.”
“You’ll look rested, and nobody will know why.”
- What we sawReview after review says some version of “nobody could tell.”
- What it told usNobody praises a result for going unnoticed unless they were afraid of being found out. Those clients are scared someone will guess they paid to look this way, so an ad promising ten years younger scares them off.
- Their reason to say yesClients won’t book until they believe the result will look so natural that nobody asks.
- What’s underneath itThey’re afraid people will see them as vain, and talk about them when they’re not in the room.
“Hi, I’m Dan, and I’ve been a financial adviser for twenty years.”
“If you’re fifty-five and you’ve never added up what retirement will cost you, give me four minutes.”
- What we sawOn first calls, the question he hears most is “Am I behind?”
- What it told usPeople who ask “Am I behind?” are comparing themselves to someone: the brother who retired at sixty, the neighbor with the lake house. The question comes from shame more than math, so they want the answer in private first.
- Their reason to say yesPeople near retirement won’t call an adviser until they can check where they stand in private.
- What’s underneath itThey’re afraid of finding out they let their family down, and of an expert seeing it first.
We built these four examples from situations we see every month. Send us what your buyer sees, and we’ll show you what yours should say.
Find my buyer’s reasonNobody buys because they agree with you.
They buy when waiting starts to cost them something.
Everything else is bullshit you tell yourself on the drive home.
Most agencies, trainers and designers work to impress. The deck impressed the buyers. The video won compliments. People liked the ad. Your reps loved the training. Impressing a buyer and getting a yes are two different jobs, and almost all of that work did the first one.
Your investors agreed with every slide. Nobody wired money.
Why? Agreeing costs them nothing. Wiring money does, and most decks never give them a reason to do it this month.
People said your video looked great. Not one of them called.
Whoever made it wanted it to look great, and it does. Nobody built it to make your phone ring.
People visit your website every week. The form stays empty.
Most pages give the seller’s reason for buying. Your buyer has a different one, and it’s in your reviews, your lost deals and what your best customer tells people about you.
Your competitors haven’t found it either. They found something that works well enough, and it works a little better than what you have. That small gap is why they’re ahead of you, and it’s why you can pass them.
We hunt down your buyer’s reason so you say it first. Once your buyer hears it from you, it’s yours. Anyone who says it after you sounds like a copycat.
We had one night to build the deck for a founder’s biggest meeting, and the deal of his life depended on it.
It’s the night before the kind of meeting most founders spend years trying to get, and most never do. In the morning he sits down with two buyers who can turn his small fintech startup into an established business with serious partners. If it goes badly, he doesn’t get another.
He’s on a call with Zach Paul, our founder, clicking through his deck. He’s proud of it, and to his credit, it looks good. But the two people he’s pitching have sat through that same deck more times than they can count. Every slide is about his company. None of them starts from the problems those two buyers deal with every day.
We have one night, so we start the deck over. We build it to do one job: get him a second meeting. We figure that buys us time to work out the whole strategy. We were wrong. He never needs the second meeting.
Before he makes an offer or shows a proposal, both buyers ask to buy. One of them tells him where they want his software installed first.
He went in to ask for a second meeting. They offered him Boeing.
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Tap to enlargeClose ×What most decks do, and what we did that night.
Nothing about him or his company changed that night. The deck changed, and so did what he said over it. The first version was about him. The second was about the two people deciding.
Chase Hughes had trained Zach in behavior profiling, and that night was the first time he used it on a pitch. Sales Team Six started there.
Most sales pages fail the way his first deck did. So do most videos, ads, proposals and emails. They look like all the others and they talk about the seller, so the buyer ignores them like the rest.
Before anyone buys, three things have to be true.
The right person.
This is the person who signs, and often it isn’t the one you’ve been talking to. We learn who it is and what they care about. Then everything you send is about them.
The right reason.
Your buyer has something they secretly want and something they’re secretly afraid of. They’d never say either one out loud. And when someone asks why they signed, they’ll need an answer that person agrees with, so saying yes doesn’t start a fight. We find all three, and you say them before your competitor does.
The right moment.
A buyer who said no six months ago can say yes today. Your offer stayed the same. Their situation changed, and now your offer solves the problem in front of them. Six months ago, that problem was small enough to live with. We find out what they need to hear this month, so they say yes now, before the problem costs them six more months.
We find out who signs, and why.We go through your reviews, your lost deals and your call recordings. We learn who makes the decision, what would make them say yes, and what’s happening for them this month. So you know who you’re talking to, and what gets a yes, before you spend a dollar.
We write everything for that buyer.Your pitch, your website, your videos, your ads and your messages all give that buyer the same reason to say yes. So a buyer who finds you in three places gets one story, and it’s about them.
We track which piece made the sale.Every page, video, ad and message gets its own count of replies, calls, bookings and sales. So your money goes only to what’s selling, and you never have to wonder what’s working.
Veteran-owned. Operated to military standards.
The military teaches three things better than anyone:
- Pick the right target.Precision
- Hit what you aim at.Accuracy
- Account for every shot you take.Integrity
We brought all three into sales and marketing. That’s where the name comes from.
For more than a century, advertisers have run one version of an ad, a letter or a page against another and counted which one sold more. They wrote down what won: which opening lines, which offers, which order. None of it is secret. It sits in old books and campaign records for anyone willing to dig through them. Almost nobody does. We did.
Chase Hughes built the behavior profiling method we use, and he trained our founder, Zach Paul, in it. Zach works with him on Decision Design, our deal work.
You can see Chase’s work on his website.
I’m Zach Paul.
I went through Navy SEAL training until a brain injury ended that path. I spent the years after watching what people do in the seconds before they commit: at the fire station, teaching combat medics, and on sales floors with founders and Fortune 500 teams. For the last several years I’ve worked alongside Chase Hughes, and I run Station One, our studio in Virginia Beach.
A VP at a tech company had tried everything to stop drinking. He had a reason to quit, and nothing he tried worked, because none of it was about that reason. In one hour, I found that reason and showed it to him. He went home and poured out every bottle in the house. That was years ago. He hasn’t had a drink since.
His company brought me in to speak at their sales kickoff, and I stayed six months to train their four sales teams. They kept their sales process. I changed what their reps said inside it.
- Their sales process, step for step
- Their reps and their managers
- The opening: the first thing a rep says on a call
- Prospecting: how a rep first contacts someone new
- The approach: what a rep says at each step of the sale
It was an eight-figure company when I started, and a unicorn when I finished.
A team leader at Apple had twelve people who worked as twelve individuals. Their numbers were fine, and they weren’t the numbers he wanted. I worked on how he thought about the job first, and then on how the team worked together. They went on to open a new territory in a new country.
A client’s raise we worked on.
A client’s international energy agreement had stalled. After our work, the talks started again.
A smoker quit on stage, in front of the audience. Two years later, still not one cigarette.
Where do you want more buyers saying yes?
You need something that isn’t here? Tell us what you need.
You should be skeptical.
You’ve paid for impressive work before. That’s why The Read exists. For $285, you find out what we see in your own material before either of us decides anything.
If one customer is worth $30,000 or more to you, The Read costs less than 1% of one lost sale. It happens within 48 hours. You leave knowing the thing in your material most likely to make your buyer say no, which is rarely what you’d guess, and what to change first. You keep both whether or not you ever hire us.
After the call you have three choices, and each one leaves you better off.
You fix it yourself.
You keep everything Zach found, including one thing you can fix today. It’s yours to use with or without us.
We do the work.
If more work would pay off, Zach shows you what we’d do and what it costs, and you decide after the call. The $285 goes toward the work.
You ask for your money back.
If you don’t leave the call with something you can use right away, tell Zach and he refunds the $285. We still part as friends.
The one way to lose is to change nothing. Then your next buyer goes quiet for the same reason the last one did.
Before you lose another deal you should have won.
Send us what your buyer will see.
Any of these works: a deck, a website, an ad, a video, a proposal or a call recording. If you have nothing yet, tell us what you sell and who has to say yes.
You pay $285 and book a call within the next 48 hours. Zach goes through what you sent before the call. On the call, he shows you what’s working and what’s losing your buyer, and why. You leave with one change you can make right away, and he answers your questions.
A pitch or a website starts with that $285 call. A team or a talk starts with twenty minutes on the phone. For anything else, tell us what you need and we’ll write back within 48 hours.
We have it, {{firstName}}. Now pick your time.
On the next screen, you pick a time in the next 48 hours and pay $285 to book it. Zach goes through what you sent before the call. On the call, he walks you through what he found and answers your questions. The $285 goes toward any work after.
Pick a timeYou pay on the same screen when you book. The confirmation goes to the email you enter there.
We have it, {{firstName}}. Now pick your twenty minutes.
Choose a time on the next screen and we’ll call you then. We’ll have read what you sent, so we can start with your questions.
Pick a timeThe confirmation goes to the email you enter there.
It’s with us, {{firstName}}.
Zach reads it himself and writes back to {{email}} within 48 hours with your next step. If you have a deadline, tell him when he writes.
Press send, {{firstName}}.
Your email app should have opened with the message ready to go. Send it, and we’ll write back within 48 hours. If it didn’t open, write to zach@salesteamsix.com.