Speaker 1: Four things you have to have in place in order to have an effective meeting, and if you don't have these four things in place, you're going to have an issue and a problem. When I say an issue and a problem, I'm talking about the prospect or a customer, if you're looking to upsell or cross-sell, isn't going to see value in your conversation. There's going to be lack of direction. The sales cycle is going to be too long. You're going to reach back out to them after the meeting, and they're not going to return your phone call, or they're not going to answer your call. You're going to call, communicate with them by email, and they won't return your emails. Sound familiar? Well, if it does, it's probably because you don't have these four things implemented in your meetings, okay? Before we start with the meeting, I want to back up a couple steps, because you have to, in preparation for the meeting, done your homework on the individual or individuals, the company, and you could do that through Facebook, LinkedIn, Google. There's a myriad of options today, if I could talk, to do research on who you're meeting with, all right? That's essential, so you could come to the meeting prepared with intelligent information, okay? Now, when the meeting starts, they've accepted the meeting, the invitation. So, obviously, there's a reason they want to meet with you. So, what you need to do is ask them, first and foremost, is there anything that you would like to discuss today? This has to do with their agenda. So, ask them. Most salespeople will miss this, and they regurgitate a lot of information, and they get down a track where you're just being a pest, not bringing value to the conversation, and by the way, you bring value to the conversation when you ask intelligent questions, and then listen. Listen to understand, very important. So, get their agenda. Next, obviously, you come with a plan, a goal, and you should have some good open-ended questions prepared. So, you talk about your agenda. You talk with the prospect. Okay, this is what I'd like to discuss today. I'm really interested in finding out about A, B, and C, all right? So, they understand and know this is what they said they need to discuss. You incorporate it in your agenda, and so you have an agreement. This gives you direction for your meeting, gives clarity, and also brings a lot of value, and they see you as a true professional just by doing those first two things. The third thing you need to have is talk about the duration. How long is the meeting going to be? You know, even if you discussed before about the meeting, make sure you talk about it at the beginning of the meeting. John, we talked about having an hour for this meeting. Is that still going to work for you? If you don't do this, many things may have changed, or many things can change, between the time you scheduled the meeting and the actual meeting. So, you want to make sure, yes, you still have that hour. Otherwise, you can get into a great conversation and really start to uncover good information, and then they could turn to you. You know, Chaz, I have a hard stop here in about five minutes. We're going to need to finish this another time. So, don't fall into that trap. Don't let that happen to you. And then fourth, at the beginning of the conversation, let them know. Now, very important, when you come to a meeting, you know, you either need to be the authority, not authoritarian, but the authority, because you are the expert in your field, and you understand how to solve their problems, but you need to go through a process to help them understand that, and you should know the process to go through to help them understand that, okay? So, talk to them up front about how to end the meeting. My brain stopped for a second, but, you know, John, at the end of the meeting, can we have an understanding of what we do next? The last thing I want to do is leave the meeting and then, you know, play phone tag. I want to be respectful of our time. So, authority, as you're the expert, but always an equal. I want to be respectful of our time. Never inferior. Oh, I'm so glad to meet with you, okay? You don't want to do that, because you are, this is a business meeting, okay? And you're a true professional, and so you need to come with that confidence, understanding that you're the expert, the authority, but you're also their equal. You're not inferior, all right? So, you establish that by asking, you know, at the end of this conversation, is it okay to agree that, well, you know, maybe we may not have, or the timing may be bad, so we don't take a next step, and we could talk maybe further, or I may need to do something, or you may need to do something. In order to save us both time, is it okay to have a time and a date for our next discussion? So, you get that up front. Then, you go through your meeting. You have clarity on what's going to be discussed. You ask good open-ended questions, and at the end of the meeting, you have a time, you talk about a time, it's a clear future, which is a time and a date for what's going to happen next. Never end a communication, a conversation, a meeting, without getting a clear future. That, in and of itself, is going to reduce your sales cycle dramatically, okay? So, implement those four things in your meetings with prospects and customers, and it's amazing what's going to happen next. You're going to get so much, or they're going to see you as the true authority. They're going to see you as a professional and the expert. Do this and get results. Go rock this day.