Ep 160 - The Price Is Too High! Objection Live Training!

Hello, hello and welcome back Wednesday. I am pumped to be here, joe. How are you doing today, brother?

I'm doing really good. I've been pumped for today's episode.

Awesome men and we are an episode 160. The price is too high. Objection live training. And I'm hoping, joe, that this actually spills right over into tomorrow, when we typically do our live training, because today is my favorite day of the week Action Wednesday on electric printer secrets electricians podcast. We're helping electricians five days a week. Master sales, simplify pricing and deliver premium level electrical service man, I cannot wait to give this shit away today, I know, and go ahead Sorry.

I didn't mean to interrupt you. I was gonna say I love the cadence when it's on point. It's just like everything lines up and we're talking about a value subject I know people are gonna want. Like I'm sitting here clapping my hands, I'm excited to dig into it.

Nice man. Me too, I'm really excited for this episode. Monday was good, yesterday was great. I don't know what we're gonna take it to today, but I'm amped up for it, man, and I cannot wait to deliver. Let me start off with a little bit of a story. It's a value story because we've been really hammering this idea of this value and really trying to help electric electric pernures be more consistent in the delivery of their missions so they can deliver a consistent burger, like McDonald's, if you will. In that example we used. We've got to create this value. But if you're struggling at all with the belief that value is enough and how to create that value exchange so that people will actually pay three to four to $500 for a billable hour at your basic option, then this story can help. They did a placebo test with wine. You've heard this before, I'm sure, but there was three glasses of wine and they told the hundred participants that the glass on the left was low grade, the glass in the middle was mid grade and the glass on the right was high grade wine More expensive. Then they asked each person to taste said wine and leave notes about it and then interviewed each of these participants after. What was amazing is that every person there unanimously decided they preferred the high grade wine and made notes on how it lasted better on the palate, or they got extra ochre or tobacco or whatever the things that people do with their wine tasting. In the end, they were told they were all the same wine. Joe, that's a pretty awesome story, right.

Because what does that?

tell us about value and the exchange.

Well, the thing is, is that value is in perception? That's really what it comes down to. We need to make sure that we've connected with our client to an extent that they see it not just believe it, but they can see the value difference. This one on the left is low quality. This one on the right is your highest quality. It's almost I wonder if we're actually on to something when we offer the premium mineralage economy options by giving multiple choices, almost like we're trying to design something that way.

Yeah, man for sure. Of course, we dissected this yesterday and the value piece and the articulation piece. We're going to get more into the articulation finally today, but I really wanted to give that sort of transitionary story and that statement to this. I think it would be valuable for everyone to know. Then, you know, if we acknowledge that the value is important and we can build value, but we still need to articulate value, how does one go about? Or even from your personal experience, how did you go about, after building that value, then learning to articulate it so well, which we're, of course, going to demonstrate today?

And I have to admit it's not an easy conversation to have. But I want to explain where I was and why I drilled it. So the thing is is that for me, being someone who's on the spectrum, I had a lot of struggles with communication. So I did not trust myself to just say you know what, you're good, like a lot of people do, that they read a script a couple of times to say I've got it, I'm good, I could run it. I didn't have that confidence. So to the extent that I drilled, it was almost at all. I would say it was almost at an obsessive level. I needed to do it because, deep down, this was my way of saying I need to learn how to communicate and eventually I'm going to talk to everyone like this. This will be my only framework of communicating and that'll be what it is. So every car trip I was listening to training videos. Every time I was in the van I was listening to training videos. When I was doing options before actually presenting at the clients, I would pre-present. I would present as if they was right in front of me and I was doing a presentation. Yeah, I took a ton of time, but I knew that eventually it would turn into autopilot, like you'll eventually see today, where it just snaps on and I'm right back in front of the customer again, like nothing's changed and no time has passed.

And you were trying to articulate that before the show and in our many chats, of course, running in service of electrical. But I've heard you say before like I wish I could just tell people what this is like to be in this state of just knowing, yeah, Just being able to respond naturally to these objections. Can you speak to that at all? Yeah, I'd be happy to.

And it's once again so. It's a hard thing to really try to articulate, but I'll do my best to make it understandable. So when you feel that an objection is beyond what you're able to handle, it causes almost an intrinsic level of fear where it's like a center in your chest where everything becomes tight and uncomfortable, like for all those of us who suffer with anxiety. You know the feeling I'm talking about where, like it just feels like you're in a constricting suit. Yeah, none of us want to be like that. So for me, I said I want to do everything in my power to not be there. Only way to do that actually comes from military study I found now not in the service or wasn't in service, but I love reading about all different sorts of things.

Yeah, value them, then please share.

And one thing that I learned was that people will default to their base programming while in the heat of combat. So in high stress situations, you default to what's known as your autopilot. So what I needed to do was I needed to create such a level of repetition that this is now something that I can do intrinsically, without thinking about it. I'm just going to slip into it and I'm going to talk naturally and, yeah, there might be some areas where it's got gaps, but I know that gone to your head, try to get this done. I'm more likely going to be able to do it then than I would have before. This level of training. Now there's one other way of conceptualizing it to make it a little easier for people, sure, and that is if you actually analyze how the brain works. So, if you think about this, all the brains are one particular function Find the quickest path from A to B. We naturally want to do that. That's why people fall into addictions. That's why there's a lot of things that happen as far as the chemical reactions are happening. But I looked at it almost as if you're trying to create a path, if you're walking through the woods and you have two choices a cleared path or a brush path, you would take the clear path. Now what that is is that's you falling back into your default programming. What we're trying to suggest is change the path Eventually. As you continually start clearing the brush path, the other path will become overgrown and the other old way they used to do things will feel wrong, whereas the new way of doing things feels natural. So if you train yourself to create this habit and this autopilot and it's a consistent effort, with intentional effort behind it your autopilot becomes established, and then you can have a level of confidence that I don't know how to best describe, other than just freeing and liberating.

That muscle memory. It reminds me of playing guitar Not that I was ever great at it I took a few lessons but I've known many great players and when you watch them truly play up and down the neck in a crazy solo, you recognize that you can't actually even think that fast. That's not what's happening. It's just that literal muscle memory which comes from repetition, and what I'm taking from everything you said about your trials and learning this and developing these skills a lot of this was repetition and constantly filling your head with the right material, and so if you weren't doing it, preparing to do it, listening to it, writing it, speaking it, watching yourself in recordings, then you were with family. That's what it sounds like.

Yeah, it really. I only had two goals it was become the best at what I was trying to do so that I could grow my company better. And in any time that I wasn't doing that, I was with a wife who is way out of my league and trying to have the best family that I have, and I'm grateful for the life I live now because I focused on health, family and business, which is exactly what we teach here.

I love that. And what's happening here, guys to relate this to something simple, like the kitchen is we're giving you the recipe. We're not just showing you how to cook. This isn't a one time in the kitchen. Come see it. Now that you've seen it, taste it. Now that you've tasted it, move on. This is giving you the recipe and sending you home with the confidence that you can create this level of dish and confidence on your own as well and teach it to your staff and train it and pass it down. And the only things that are in the way here, from everything we've dissected so far this week, is getting your offer articulated right so that you know exactly what you do when your whole team does Sticking to that offer, having a vision and a passion for serving your customers and leading with that and training with it. All of those things, as I asked you yesterday, I believe that anyone who believes in this can do it.

That's the thing they have to believe in it. That belief is the core value there. Where, if you can have all the skills like imagine I took my brain and all the knowledge that I had and I put it into someone who didn't believe in the thing they were doing, they would not be successful, even with all the skills. Skills follow belief. You need to believe that what you're doing is the right thing for both you and your client. And then, naturally, if you are a good person, if you feel that you're doing the right thing for someone, wouldn't you naturally have that urge to want to get it solved?

100% without a doubt. Listen, I can say this over and over and over again the best success we've seen in the electrical industry even our own, where we are when I look around. None of this was possible without first imagining and believing in it and having a vision. The first backflip, the first four-minute mile, the first 900 on a skateboard choose any sport there's a first, and we continue to push these thresholds because we saw someone do something that made us believe we could do it too. And then we saw something a little bit beyond and we pushed and pushed, and pushed, and what that means is great news for everyone, because what we're talking about here, this doesn't have to be a. I look up to the salesbot for long. This can be a. I looked up to the salesbot Joseph Lucania listen to the electricpreneur's secrets for about 160 episodes, and then I took manners into my own hands and then I truly got it and took action on it and decided with certain self-discipline that I was going to take those actions consistently. And what happened next was I exceeded them and I became an interview subject for them to display how much I did right.

Nothing would bring me more joy than knowing that we've inspired someone to the point that they became better than us, and then we get to interview them. It's one of the things that I consistently talk about. I don't call myself the salesbot because I consider myself some apex level player. I do it because this was a name that stuck with me forever and I just want everyone I come in contact with to become better than me, because I feel that that's something they can all achieve with the right training.

For sure I love it. Man, I'm obviously sold, but I'm biased. The thing I'm trying to sell right here, right now is the only thing we ever try to sell with any amount of pressure. This is the most pressure people ever feel from us. It's on this podcast where we're preaching and saying please take this and run with it and just do the activity. Success is actually so predictable If we look at the definition of success for just a moment, by the way, let's really refine this and say to set a goal and to meet that goal, to realize that goal, that's success. So it doesn't matter if it's health, family, business, but right here, right now, if your goal is to handle this price objection and defeat it once and for all in a way that's sustainable. So the next time it comes up, you're just like oh yeah, no, no, we got training for that, that's easy. Where did it go wrong? Let's see your post-call facts. What happened that spun you on this one? And you're working on a detail instead of the whole piece and trying to uncover everything we're talking about all week. Does that make sense?

It does. And I got to admit, guys, whoever is listening to this, if you haven't done a post-call evaluation, self-diagnostic yet, you're missing out. You're missing out because these things are awesome, because being able to say it's everything, everything's wrong, it's a place of overwhelming. You can't fix anything, but being able to say this is what's wrong and it's fact-driven. Now you have the confidence to say, okay, I can spin this gear, this one will turn, this one will turn and that'll get me to the solution I need. Now I know next time what to do.

Exactly so. Do me a favor and visualize this. If you're listening, if you're watching us right now, what does your company look like? If eight out of 10 of these objections were the price, the basement, the bottom basic price was too high? You were able to just like water off a duck's back, just roll right through it. Can we give an example of what that might look like, Joe Sure?

You saying that you want to do some testing.

I want to role play it. Let's do it.

Let's role, play it.

Okay, I'm a client Okay, you can handle my value price objection, okay, okay. So do you want me to be nice, or I don't?

really care. I mean you can be you and give me what you feel I deserve at the time, like if I'm being in common, you can be mean. If I'm handling it nice, then treat me like you would someone in your home.

You know what I am a bit of. I'm a bit what's the word? I'm a highly Confident person in my own home, so I'm gonna give you that. Okay, you're gonna get me in reality. Here we go. Yeah, joe, I appreciate the options. Man, I'm a little confused though this bottom price, the basic option that I'm looking at to get my GFI fixed today. What is this? 385 bucks, are you serious?

Well, actually it's 385 and 90 cents included as well. So you're sure, the 90 cents, but let's get into a little bit more of what that looks like. So I know I designed a range of choices for you. Why are you focusing on that one?

Well, I'm kind of pricing or shot shopping price, I guess. Excuse me, I just wanted what I called for, and what I called for is a GFI. I'm just having trouble because you know what? I've got a bit of a construction background. I feel like I can see the moving parts here and I'm not able to really Understand why it would be so much for your 20 minutes of time.

I completely understand where you're coming from and I'd like to back up a couple moments because I know earlier, when we were Standing in front of the main electrical system, we went through and we talked to you about that, because the last thing I ever want you to feel is that we're pressuring you to do something that you feel you can do by yourself. So when I asked because you mentioned you had a construction background why you didn't want to do it yourself, what did you say?

Well, I'm still not an electrician. Would like a licensed person to actually work on my electrical system.

Why is a license valid? I?

Mean. Shouldn't you have permits or something to do this stuff?

I mean by law, yes, but I mean you can go as a cowboy and do without it. So what's stopping you from just going and doing yourself?

I guess I'm worried about doing it wrong.

Okay, fair enough with that being said, doing it wrong leads to what. Why even have me here at all?

Well, if I mess it up, then I might have to call someone anyway.

Okay. So the thing is, there's a second thing I want to talk to you about, because you're very right in that statement. Our goal is to serve you before, during and after. So let's say, sake of argument, you did do it yourself. Now you need to take more time, more investment. You have a busy schedule as it is and I want to respect that as much as possible. So what we do is we made it a point of saying, when you called the office, we respected your time and got you on the calendar as soon as possible, because we were staffed 24 7 and we had someone literally at the desk not a robot, not answering service, not a high school kid to give you that level of service, to respect your time. Now we could have lowered the price in order to just get some robot and then you could have gotten service whenever it was convenient. Would it be wrong of us to offer you that level of service, even if it means that it's gonna cost a little bit more?

Well, no, I guess I still had, just like I don't know, 150 bucks Like can you do anything on this price? Or it's almost $400 for someone to answer the phone and you to come out.

Well, I can go even further than that, because we've only covered the before. Now, the during was you mentioned earlier. I've only been here for 20 minutes, which I think you context. We've actually been here a little bit longer than that. The reason being is that we're not here to just treat a symptom of a problem here at service or blaster. Well, we look for the root cause. So that's why I remember when I first got to the door, we mentioned the first year we had to see with the main electrical control system, because what I wanted to do was ensure that if I'm giving you one price for something, I'm not disrespecting you by having to come back later to fix another related problem. So not only did we do that, but we also checked all the wiring connecting this one point, as well as how it functions as a system in a hole. That's why we were able to design a range of choices for you, because you mentioned it's only one, gfi, but it's part of a larger system that is doing a job of keeping you and your family safe. So can you blame us for that, for wanting to ensure that we did a thorough diagnosis, to ensure that we had everything under control?

No, I can't blame you for that, joe.

Okay, but we can go even further. That's only before and during. The after is imagine this clay. Let's say I change this one point right, whatever, it is $99 like you're mentioning, right, and then something goes wrong. What kind of warranty you're expecting for a $99 guy? I?

Don't know, does anyone even honor warranty anyway?

Believe it or not, we do. What we've decided to do was there's only two choices that we can offer, which is one I Can offer you a quality product, something that I personally would believe in and put in my own family's home, but it's gonna cost a little bit more than if you were to get someone else to come and do it. We may be lower quality or willing to cut corners, or what we could do is we could start with a really cheap thing, start with price only and try to build everything around the price and, as a result, it usually drops off things with customer service, quality, reliability warranty. So we made the choice of saying I would rather give you a quality product that I know I can stand behind, even if it costs more. Was I wrong to do that?

No, no, I don't think so. Listen, it's nothing against you, I just I didn't expect this much of a price. And I don't blame you, I mean, if you think about it.

You've been in construction for a long period of time. I think you have a huge advantage over the average person that you would probably expect to see on these kinds of calls. But the thing is, you mentioned yourself that you're not an electrician. So if you don't do electrical work on a daily basis and you're not exposed to it all the time, with all the modern safety standards as well as this particular situation, how could you come with a reasonable understanding of what it was going to cost? I can't blame you for not knowing what's going to cost. The only question I have for you was was it wrong of me to care enough about your family to refuse to cut corners on anything I touch in your home to ensure that it's to the level of standard that we believe here at Service Oblactical?

No, I appreciate that.

Okay, so with that being said, how would you like to proceed?

Platinum. Okay, I was clearly being a dick in the beginning and trying to be pretty hard, but you did well. Thank you for that.

Thank you, so can. A question I have for you is this I know you were trying to be rough at the beginning, yeah, but as we were making the case, what did you, as the customer feel?

Trying to stay in character. I felt like I had misbehaved and that everything that I had risen as a red flag for me was validated and ultimately made me feel like I lashed out.

The another big thing that happens is it's in your control of the conversation, but it's not in how you're controlling the words. It's how you control how you're delivering them. There has to be a compassionate undertone behind it. It has to be an I understand where you're coming from. I don't blame you for doing what you're doing. In fact, how many times did I compliment you for being in construction?

Yeah, a few. I think I counted three.

Yeah. So the fact was is I'm boosting you up, making you feel better about yourself. I'm bringing up previous commitments, not throwing them in your face. I'm simply saying, when we talked about this, what did you say? Yeah. And then, only when I truly felt that you had the value understood did I ask how did you want to proceed? And if you wanted to go further, there was more we could have gone down. But it really comes down to the thought of when you start feeling you're acting out. Did it take a lot of fire out?

Yeah, yeah, for sure, I was actually getting fatigued pretending to be that person and to be transparent I'm not that mean in my home to service providers. I am the word I was looking for is I am assertive and that throws people off. But that's an archetype that we have to face and that also just gives background to why we wouldn't want to come on here and just arm a bunch of people with one liners of how to pivot in an objection, when really it comes down to a conversation and an understanding of what you're trying to help someone accomplish.

And you said something that is probably the most important part of this entire lesson, and I don't think either one of us were prepared for it, so I want to touch on it. You mentioned that you were exhausted. Yeah, now, I've always considered sales to be an endurance race. The reason why is remember how focused on psychology and on understanding the brain and connective tissues that we are in our process. Like everything seems to be rooted in that it's the same thing as known as mental load. There's only so much your brain can absorb and fill before it hits that overload point, and usually that overload equals mental exhaustion. Now the thing is, you need to train your brain no differently than you would train any other muscle in your body. Doing the repetition so it's autopilot uses less energy. I use less energy than you do. Who can stay in the fight longer?

Yeah.

Good, that's good If I'm more rehearsed, more practiced. All these things come from that mental endurance. So one of the benefits of this is that if you can focus on the routine and get it to a point where you can do it through muscle memory, you will outlast any other client who is not a professional salesperson or who does not have that same level of mental discipline.

I love that man. You did not disappoint today. I think we just provided a ton of value. I would love to explore that endurance race a bit more on tomorrow's episode of Electric Printer Secrets. For now we've got to get a couple of action items out and sign off of this, because we get other calls coming up. Joe, the business day has just begun, so let's rock it. Do you have a couple of action items you're thinking today?

Yes.

Or do you want my assistance with one?

I would love to take both of them if you're willing.

You got it, man. You're the old star of this show. The sales bot live in action with a couple of action items. Here's number one.

Well, I appreciate that. And you know what? Once again, I am no better than anyone else. I'm just grateful to serve the cause. So, with that being said, let's get into this. The basic action really comes down to not what you say. It's how you say it, because I could tell you all the lines in the world, but if you deliver them in the wrong tone, it's like imagine, clay, I'm so sorry your grandpa passed away. Like what? Like a robot coming out. Like I am so sorry that your grandpa passed away. Now I don't know anything about your grandparents, I just picked that particular example, but the fact was saying it, two different tones communicated two very different things. So the most basic action is can you control your tone? The all-star action is how how can you do it? I did a lot of mirror work. I loved looking in front of the mirror, not because I like how I look there's a lot of issues I have there but the thought of saying I'm going to watch and see how I'm delivering things, because being someone on the spectrum of facial body language is always available to me. So if I learned how we were supposed to look and eventually I could replicate that, it became part of the process. In addition, getting it recorded and hearing it and saying, okay, hearing this, what am I taking away from it? Okay, I should change that inflection. So if the bare minimum basic action is simply know to control your tone, the all-star action is saying get yourself recorded while you're doing your process and listen to it yourself until you can do the perfect recording and then save that one to be your default setting.

Love it, man, really good. Well, you guys, I'm winding up here for a big, strong finish for 28 minutes into this one. Joe, I can't thank you enough for all of that share, man. I feel like we could just keep interviewing you for another 160 episodes, bringing all the value forward on Electric Pernier Secrets guys, the Electricians Podcast, episode 160 of us showing up five days a week to help you master sales, simplify pricing and deliver premium level electrical service. Remember that phrase If we get on a call, there is a test. I'm going to ask you what we say and that's it. I can't wait to see you guys again tomorrow and don't forget to grab that Wednesday value piece. Barely even touched on it. We're giving away our lesson guide for objection handling, level one to help you with this, and listen to this on repeat if it helps. But this whole week is designed to serve you and your objections and your training and your value and their value and everything else we've talked about here. What would be wrong of us to do that for them, joe? No, it wouldn't be wrong, and I love.

You throw that in there.

Cheers, guys. We'll see you tomorrow, thank you.