Motivational sales keynote to inspire your next big team event.

As a motivational sales speaker, Marc has trained thousands of salespeople around the world, across industries. In his interactive motivational sales programs, audiences learn by doing—through in-depth role-plays, customized selling scenarios, and more.

Marc stays true to the fundamentals of his unique approach as a sales keynote speaker. He draws from the most up-to-date sales data available. And he shares a proven, step-by-step guide for selling more in today’s marketplace.

To get a sense of the selling fundamentals Marc teaches as a motivational sales speaker, dive into these top 13 ideas from Marc’s sales keynote speaker approach:

 

1. Data is king.

Motivational sales speakers don’t usually talk about sales data and statistics. That’s a huge mistake. Data is crucial to mastering how to sell anything in today’s marketplace.

As a sales keynote speaker, Marc Wayshak puts data front and center. He shares the latest sales research—and shows audiences exactly how to leverage hard data for tangible results in their own selling.

In reality, if salespeople today aren’t using strong data to help them sell, they’re effectively banging their heads against the wall, over and over again, expecting a different result.

An internal study at Marc’s firm, the Sales Insights Lab, found that, depending on the source of prospect data, sales calls had an answer rate of only 3%, or up to 40%. Data really is that crucial to success in sales. It can make or break a salesperson’s efforts in virtually every area of selling. And that’s why data is king.

 

2. Disqualify, disqualify, disqualify.

It’s common for sales keynote speakers to repeat the same old, tired ideas about persuading more prospects to buy more products. But one of the fundamentals of Marc’s approach as a motivational sales speaker is this: Disqualification is actually key to selling more.

Most salespeople today try to qualify every person they get in front of. But, as audiences learn in Marc’s sales keynote program, the point of sales is not to try to convince every prospect to buy. Rather, the goal is to take each prospect through a process to determine whether or not they’re a fit.

Disqualification means behaving more like a doctor than a traditional salesperson. It means taking the time to ask strategic, systematic questions to figure out whether a person is worth continuing the conversation with. This is a big departure from the way most salespeople think about selling.

As Marc shares in his sales keynote program, the data shows that top-performing salespeople today spend the majority of their time interacting with qualified prospects. That’s only possible because they quickly and confidently disqualify people who aren’t a fit, very early on.

As a motivational sales speaker, Marc brings audiences to the breakthrough realization that not everyone is going to be a fit for what they sell—and that’s perfectly fine. What matters is freeing up time and energy to focus on the right prospects who will actually buy.

 

3. Process is non-negotiable.

One of the most powerful ideas a motivational sales speaker can share is their process. Learning a proven sales process that really works can start to transform a salesperson’s life virtually right away.

When providing training as a keynote sales speaker, Marc makes clear that having a strong, proven sales process is non-negotiable. In fact, putting a process in place is one of the single best ways a salesperson can start to improve their numbers, fast.

Still, research shows that most salespeople today are just winging it. They don’t have a real process in place at all. That’s why Marc maps out a proven sales process that actually works, so his sales keynote program participants can actually implement it right away.

As Marc teaches, having a process that we trust is the only way we can improve. Only with a trusted sales process in place can salespeople troubleshoot where the sale might have gone wrong—and figure out how to do better next time.

 

4. Prospects can’t harm us.

Keynote sales speakers often skim over the topic of sales rejection. But nearly all salespeople have a strong fear of rejection in sales—they’re only human, after all. But choosing not to think deeply about how to deal with sales rejection can have disastrous consequences for selling.

As a result, showing participants how to overcome sales rejection is a key fundamental of Marc’s motivational sales speaker approach.

The central idea is that prospects cannot—and will not—hurt us. Marc has been in sales for over 20 years, and he has worked with thousands of sales reps around the globe. In all that time and experience, he’s never heard a single story about a prospect physically injuring a salesperson during the process of making a sale.

So what are we afraid of?

As Marc shares in his keynote program, the fear that we associate with sales rejection is all in our heads. Participants will learn Marc’s unique, proven approach to avoiding common sales objections in the first place. And they’ll see exactly how to put the most strategic contingencies in place to deal with objections that inevitably come up from time to time, despite their best efforts.

 

5. Get scripted.

Getting salespeople to realize the incredible benefits of scripts is one of Marc’s passions as a sales keynote speaker. Scripts are nothing short of transformative when it comes to the sales process.

Even though scripts are a proven, easy, efficient way of improving sales conversations, very few salespeople today follow scripts when they sell. As Marc shares in his motivational sales program…this is crazy! Why wing a sales conversation every time when you could follow the script for a tried-and-true, successful sales conversation that guides you to say and ask the right things at the right times?

Many salespeople push back on the idea of scripts because they “don’t want to sound scripted.” To that, Marc is quick to point out that they will only sound scripted if they don’t use the script well. Practice makes perfect. Using a script is not what makes people sound scripted; using it poorly, and failing to practice until it becomes second nature, is to blame.

In all his years in sales, Marc has never come across a top-performing salesperson who is successful over the phone without using a script.

 

6. The hard close is dead.

Old-school sales is all about going for the close. But one of the fundamentals of Marc’s approach as a keynote sales speaker is the idea that the hard close is dead. And it has been for a long time.

The truth is, selling today is not all about closing. Instead, it’s all about the process.

With the right process, salespeople are actually achieving many tiny “closes” throughout the sale so that they never have to worry about a singular “closing moment” at the end.

As Marc shares with sales keynote participants, if prospects see tremendous value in what salespeople have to offer, and if they’ve been taken through a strong sales process, then the “close” will just come naturally at the end. It’s not some big, persuasive moment where you hold your breath. You already know the answer—and whether it’s yes or no, it’s OK either way.

 

7. Ditch the pitch.

When people think of motivational sales, they tend to think of enthusiastic, salesy pitching. One of the things that makes Marc’s approach to motivational sales speaking so distinct is that he firmly believes salespeople must stop pitching altogether. Why? Because pitching simply doesn’t work anymore, no matter what you sell.

A fundamental part of Marc’s sales keynote program is all about making the switch from pitching to engaging in conversation. When salespeople start conversations with prospects, most of them are talking about themselves, their organizations, and what products or services they offer. This can all be categorized as pitching.

Marc’s audiences learn that the main goal of a selling interaction is not to pitch prospects, but rather to engage them in a real, two-way, dynamic conversation. By focusing on creating an engaging dialogue with prospects, salespeople can demonstrate insights and earn the trust of their prospects early on. At no point in the sale should they ever be giving a fancy pitch.

 

8. Solve.

The shift from “present” to “solve” is another fundamental mental switch that audiences make when learning from Marc’s sales keynote speaker approach. As Marc puts it, the key to closing more deals is not a sleeker presentation or a more enthusiastic pitch, but rather the “solve” phase of the sale.

The solve phase comes after the insight and disqualification phases of the sale. Keynote participants will learn that the insight phase is all about establishing authority, and then demonstrating that they have useful insight into the prospect’s world. If this has been done correctly, then questions should be asked to understand to disqualify the prospect and determine whether it’s a fit to continue the conversation. Assuming this goes well and it’s a fit, it’s time to solve—which is another way of saying that it’s time to demonstrate that we can solve their challenges.

The solve phase does not require a 40-slide PowerPoint or some kind of fancy presentation. It simply requires the salesperson to clearly demonstrate that they can solve the prospect’s key challenges.

The solve phase should be short and sweet. The shorter it is, the more likely the deal is to close. Most salespeople spend way too much time making their presentations look pretty and they try to cover as much ground as possible. In fact, all they need to do is solve: demonstrate that they understand the prospect’s challenges and can solve them.

 

9. Hyper-personalize everything.

Data might be king, but it’s powerless without personalization. Modern prospecting is totally dependent on the ability of the salesperson to hyper-personalize outreach at every step. The more personalized the outreach, the more effective it’s going to be.

In his motivational sales keynote, Marc dives into the many ways in which personalization can catapult salespeople to a new level of success with getting in front of ideal prospects. One way to hyper-personalize prospecting outreach is to utilize personalization fields.

Salespeople can use their research systems to get accurate prospect data, and then insert strategic pieces of information into messages that make prospects say, “Hey, this person has really done their homework on me.” This gets prospects to open up and let their guard down. As a result, the number of scheduled appointments increases dramatically.

Marc is an expert on leveraging data to create hyper-personalized prospecting campaigns that “warm up” ideal prospects and increase the likelihood of a positive response —virtually eliminating cold outreach altogether.

 

10. Be relentlessly NSO.

Marc is committed to analyzing the best available sales research across industries. As a sales keynote speaker, one of the powerful data points he shares has to do with a common habit of top-performing salespeople today: they’re always scheduling next steps. That is to say, research shows that top-performing salespeople are hyper-focused on scheduling next steps.

Or, as Marc puts it, top performers are relentlessly Next-Step-Obsessed—NSO.

NSO is just a fun way of saying that top sales performers are militant about getting next steps scheduled in the calendar, while they’re in front of prospects, at every step in the sale. They never hang up the phone, leave the meeting, or end the Zoom with an unclear outcome. They always schedule that next step. Always.

That’s why next steps are a core part of Marc’s program as a motivational sales speaker. He teaches keynote participants exactly how to build the NSO approach into their sales process, so they’re never left with a wishy-washy outcome. What’s more, audiences learn how to avoid ever “following up” ever again with a disappearing prospect.

 

11. Earn the discovery phase.

In his keynote program, Marc shares hard-hitting research that shows salespeople today must first earn the discovery phase before jumping into that conversation with prospects. Otherwise, they’re starting out with a severe disadvantage.

The key is to demonstrate expertise and establish authority up front. Otherwise, prospects today are often unwilling to answer questions and will try everything in their power to disappear.

When training teams as a motivational sales speaker, always emphasizes the importance of establishing authority as early as possible in the sales interaction. If salespeople fail to demonstrate expertise before jumping into the discovery conversation, they’re likely to get a response like this: “Can you just stop with all the questions? Just tell me your offer already. I don’t have time to listen to all that other stuff.”

To avoid a deal-stopping reply like that, salespeople must learn how to earn the discovery phase so that prospects engage deeply with this key step of the sale.

 

12. Listen more. Talk less.

The data is unequivocal that when prospects talk a lot, deals are more likely to close. Marc pulls from a ton of hard data on talk-to-listen ratios in sales to show audiences just how powerful it can be when salespeople talk less, and listen more.

Top performers are simply better at getting their prospects talking. While it’s important, of course, for salespeople to guide the conversation and say what needs to be said, they shouldn’t totally dominate the conversation.

If prospects are talking, it means that they’re engaged and interested. And the more prospects talk, the more they feel like they’re actively participating in defining the offering you’re going to present to them. This is an important concept in the psychology of selling in today’s market.

 

13. Dig deep. Then keep digging.

Throughout his sales keynote program, Marc shares key data and statistics that explain exactly how to engage prospects today in the most effective ways. One of those important areas is “feedback loops,” which are the most efficient way to dig deep to learn more about prospects and keep re-engaging them in conversation throughout the sales interaction.

Feedback loops are small questions that pull prospects back into the conversation to keep the momentum of a two-way dialogue going strong. As Marc shares in his program as a motivational sales speaker, the data shows that these tiny questions re-engage prospects in the sales conversation, while also creating small moments of buy-in throughout.

Think of feedback loops as “mini-closes.” There is no hard close when salespeople are using feedback loops throughout the sales process. All they have to do is simply establish a next step.

Now that you’ve learned the top 13 fundamentals of Marc’s sales keynote speaker approach, it’s time to connect with Marc about inspiring your next sales event. Fill out the form below to get started!