No Broke Months For Salespeople - Sell Yourself - How to Create, Live, and Sell a Powerful Personal Brand

Episode Date: March 28, 2024

Known across the globe as the First Lady of Sales, Dr. Cindy McGovernis an expert in sales, leadership, and communication. Author of the Wall Street Journal Best Seller Every Job is a Sales Job: How to Use the Art of Selling to Win at Work and Sell Yourself.Cindy will kick us off this week as she talks about Sell Yourself - How to Create, Live, and Sell a Powerful Personal Brand. To find out more about Dan Rochon and the CPI Community, you can check these links:Website: No Broke MonthsPodcast: No Broke Months for Salespeople PodcastInstagram: @donrochonxFacebook: Dan RochonLinkedIn: Dan Rochon

Literally everybody has a personal brand. We all have one, but to build a powerful one, it needs to be really intentional. Salespeople, we think about this, right? We're thinking about this on a daily basis, but it's also looking at the intention of the pieces of your brand that maybe aren't necessarily serving you.

And so I think it's really important for us to kind of take an inventory of our presence in the world, our presence in the universe, make sure it's in alignment to help you to reach your goals, which will in turn help you make more money. Welcome to the No Broke Months for Real Estate Agents podcast. Working as a real estate agent can be incredibly rewarding and fulfilling, but it can also be frustrating if you aren't making the money you deserve. So if you're ready to end the stressful

cycle of working hard for no results, then get started with a proven step-by-step system so that every month is No Broke Months. My name is Dan Groshine. I'm the host of the No Broke Months podcast, which is a show for real estate agents to help you have no broke months. Thanks for joining me. Enjoy the show. Known across the globe as the first lady of sales, Dr. Cindy McGovern is an expert in sales, leadership, and communication. Author of the Wall Street Journal bestseller, Every Job is a Sales Job, How to use the art of selling to win at work and sell yourself. Cindy will kick us off this week as she talks about sell yourself,

how to create, live, and sell a powerful personal brand. Today, I'm joined by Dr. Cindy McGovern, who is the first lady of sales, not the second lady, not the third lady, not even the fourth lady. She is the first lady in sales. Dr. Cindy, welcome. How are you? I am so good, Dan. It's nice to be here. Thanks for having me. My pleasure. Today, we're going to talk about how to be creative, live, and sell a powerful personal brand. So, Dr. Cindy, before we talk about living and selling a personal and powerful brand, tell us about you. Who are you?

Why the heck should somebody listen to you? Besides the accolades of years of success and authorship, et cetera, tell us more about Dr. Cindy. Well, I started not even wanting to be in sales. So, I thought it was pushy and manipulative and all these terrible things and realized I'd been selling my whole life and I just didn't call it sales. And then I started realizing we use sales every day, not just in our jobs. We use it to, you know, get kids to eat their vegetables and clean their rooms and persuade our family members to go for pizza instead of salad and all these things. And I started realizing that if sales is part of life and it's not just part of our day-to-day, especially if you're in

a sales capacity like a real estate agent or lender, why aren't we doing this more purposefully? And so that's what led me to write these books. That's what led me to start my consulting company and my online academy. I want people to do it more intentionally, shorten their sales cycle, make more money and have more fun in the process. More money and more fun. Sign me up. So talk to us about a personal brand. So how do you build a powerful personal brand? Great question. And we have to back up and talk about what a personal brand is, I think, because a lot of people think they either have one and they're like, oh, I'm doing good.

People know me online. I have a presence on social media platforms or they don't even realize that they already have a brand and maybe it's selling against you. So we all have one. That's the first place to start is literally everybody has a personal brand, but to build a powerful one,

it needs to be really intentional. And rarely do people think about that unless it's part of their job. Salespeople, we think about this, right? We're thinking about this on a daily basis with the way that we dress, your brand that maybe aren't necessarily serving you. And we're multifaceted people. And so I think it's really important for us to kind of take an inventory of our presence in the world, our presence in the universe, make sure it's in alignment to help you to reach your goals, which will in turn help you make more money. So take an assessment. Tell me more about that like so you went through you like some of us don't even realize that we have a personal brand some of us realize that we have a personal brand but maybe it's selling against us right like so if i want to be able to you know take a look at my

personal brand and understand first of all like, like, what is it? Secondly, is it serving me? What do I do first? Well, the first thing is look at how many people you know on social media and then look at how many people are actually advocating for you. You either have a net or you have a network. A network means they're actually doing something. So they don't know how to sell your brand. So that's one way to look at your personal brand is, are they not actually out there being raving fans? Another way to look at your personal brand is if you're around kids, that's the most honest inventory. Have them describe you in a couple of words, but really look at how your clients and your colleagues talk about you and refer to you.

That's the brand that's out there. Is it the right one? Is it the one that you want out there? And I see this a lot, especially with real estate agents that we work with where they're still newer, right? So we'll call newer less than 10 years in the business of this stage of the world. So newer, and they're still known as the newer realtor. Is that serving you? Or do you want to be known as the aggressive one? Do you want to be known as the new idea guy or gal? I remember when I was first consulting, I was known as the young one because I was the younger of the consultants.

I'm like, don't say that. I'd rather be new than young because- Dr. Siddon, let me make sure I interject here. I'll take that today, by the way. Sorry. Right, same the way. Sorry. Right, same. Today I will. That was decades ago.

I got you. But you have to think about how it's working for or against your brand. And you've built this reputation, but the brand is what the reputation is built on. So see how you're being referred to and what are people saying when you're not in the room. And ask. Solicit that feedback. What if you're not in the room and ask, solicit that feedback. What if you don't like the feedback? What if you don't like the results? What do you do? You got to change. You got to rebrand. And that's one of them. Yeah, that's one of the most like pivotal moments for a lot of people is they think they have this brand out there and they're like, well, of course they know this.

And then they'll hear things like, well, I didn't know you wanted more business. You're busy all the time. You always look like your hair is on fire when I talk to you. What do you mean you want more real estate clients? You want to do more of this? Your brand is selling against you. So you've got to think about what it is you're putting out in the universe that makes them think that because you're reinforcing an idea that they've got. So knowing what the message is and then knowing how to rewind that and figure out how to then send a different message out there. You are continually looking for clients. You are seeking more people to help. Yeah, you're busy, but busy is a good thing.

You've got to repackage that. So we're talking like specifically, you know, most people brands, you know, social media is just phenomenal, right? Because we all now today have our own media company, you know, like we have the ability today to be able to communicate to the world that would have cost us hundreds of thousands of dollars to do 15 years ago, maybe even 10 years ago. And we all have the ability to be able to do that at just basically time. I mean, you can put some money into it as well, right? But even if you do put money into it, it's not the hundreds of thousands of dollars that once upon a time you had to do. So we have the vehicle. And now that we understand we have the vehicle,

and we understand that there's like a personal brand message, right? But we also don't want to, what we know is it doesn't work if you just, if you're, you know, let's say you're using, you know, whatever Facebook, Instagram, whatever you're using, Twitter, and you're consistently asking for business. We know that doesn't work, right? So that makes it a little bit. So there's like this yin and this yang of like, what works, what doesn't work? Talk to us about that. Like, how do we, how do we figure out how to maximize this amazing tool that we have available to us that we didn't in the past? Well, the first thing is you're

probably not maximizing it because you're not clear on what your brand is because that's a vehicle. It's not the thing. It's the vehicle to get the thing out there. And I think that people confuse them. Right. So I hear this from people all the time. They're like, oh, well, I need you to help me with social media. I don't do social media. That's the vehicle. I do branding. It's a different thing.

I'm helping you with the product that you're actually going to sell on that vehicle, on that media. But to your point, people confuse them. And that's why they sit there and they do the pitch, right? It's the, I'm never too busy for your referrals. I want to make sure that I'm here for you when you're ready to buy a home. Here's my just listed. Here's my just sold. How are you educating people on who you are by simply posting that? What information are they getting? And the way that I look at it is a personal brand, a really good one, makes you a person of interest. If you're a person of interest, people talk about you. Let me talk about celebrities because we're interested in what

they do. So what story are you giving them to tell in those posts? How are you inviting them into the discussion of your life so they want to go tell somebody else about it? Time out, Dr. Cindy. If you're a real estate agent, you're listening to this right now. I want to make sure I get my personal brand out there. You got a referral for Northern Virginia? Accept referrals. I just want to, you know what, you just prompted me to say GreetingsVirginia.com. Hey, you gotta ask. GreetingsVirginia.com. Thank you, Dr. Cindy, for engaging and encouraging for me to do that on my personal brand. Sorry, I got distracted. What were we talking about? No, but that becomes part of you, right? Like everybody knows you want that business, but give me something to talk about.

Otherwise, you're branded as the guy or gal that just has the handout. And that's not who you are. You're adding value. You're sharing client stories. You're branding that out there in the world, that's what's going to make people become more attracted to following you, to commenting on your things, and then also ultimately hiring you to represent them. Excuse me for interrupting my own show. You are freaking amazing. And because you're amazing, I'm going to ask for a quick favor. We'll just take you 30 seconds for you to leave a favorable five-star rating or review

on your favorite platform. Then what I'll do is I'll enter you into a raffle where we can meet 45 minutes for a free coaching session. And I'll also give you a copy of the book, Real Estate Evolution, which is the 10-step guide to CPI, consistent and predictable income. Oh, by the way, I'm the author of that book. So if you'd like for me to coach you, give you some nuggets and help you in your business, go ahead and leave a review and you can enter into the monthly raffle to win. All right. So part of that brand, so we're talking like there's a vehicle and then there's a brand right but there's a little bit of a crossover in that right because using the vehicle properly

allows for you to brand effectively am i correct on that because if you're not using the vehicle properly then you're sort of screwing up your brand is that right absolutely 100 they're very intertwined all right and so then it's about you you know, I was just being cheeky. Not really sort of when I just made that call to action there. Right. I was being cheeky. Right. But, but it's, it's like give, give, give, give, give, ask, you know, that that's a piece of it. But besides that concept, what makes a powerful personal brand? What are the components of it? So it depends on what your goals are, truthfully.

So if your goal is to be known as the biggest jerk out there, your powerful brand is going to be very different than if you want to be known as like the kindness guru, right? So it really starts with whatever your goal is and the impact you're trying to make. And I think it's kind of three things. right? So it really starts with whatever your goal is and the impact that you're trying to make. And I think it's kind of three things. I think that it's your influence creates impact, which creates your income. And so when you start with, okay, what influence do you want to have over other people? How do you want to leverage that? How do you want to start bringing this out there and to help make an impact in their lives, whether it's buying or selling a home, whether it's being an advocate for them, being a resource, being the best dad or mom, and then that's going to lead to the income

piece. But backing it up to your point of, you know, the vehicle affects the brand. You could be the best product out there, literally in a box. If you're on the bottom shelf, that's going to affect your brand. Nobody knows you, right? Yeah. Right. So you want to be a top shelf brand. You've got to think about what is going to attract people to you. So is it packaging? Okay. What do you look like? We sell to the five, but the five senses all day.

How are you putting that out there? What is the story that you're telling that is creating that influence to make the impact? And then finally, that will lead to the income with the call to action. And by the way, I loved your call to action. Thank you. So influence, impact, income in that order. You mentioned about, I think, I don't think you used the word jerk, but you use something that's an agonist to jerk right like is there a time when being not cool like being a jerk is there a time that that works if it works for your brand sure it's really up to your well you know brands that that works for yeah i do i mean and you do too

stand-up comedians that are known for that that's kind of their thing there are restaurants where they yell at you when you come in the door because it's their shtick, right? It's their pitch. And it does, but that's the reputation. So they're attracting people that want to go to that restaurant and dine there because they want that experience of that friction. Fine. If you want to go there, go there. But you have to think about what you're trying to attract. And what I find is a lot of people think that their experience is what's going to attract people. So, well, I've been a real estate agent for 25 years. Okay, great for you. Does that actually mean anything? Not in today's society. It really doesn't. And I'm not coming down on realtors out there, but I do want to just be

honest about if I don't have a story of what that 25 years is going to do to influence me to make a decision that you're going to have impact on my life, I'm not going to give you my money. So packaging is key. Yeah. And what I recognize in real estate sales specifically. So let's take a look at what the consumer wants. So there's two different consumers. Well, there's three really, but let's just talk about two buyer buyers, sellers, and the third one would be investors. And so when you're looking at the buyers and the sellers, they want something different. The buyers, what do they want? They want a home. They don't care about your experience. They don't care about you at all. They don't even think they need you. The sellers, what do they want? They do want your experience, but like Dr. Cindy mentioned, if I was to sit there and say, I've been doing this

since 2007, you should hire me. That's okay, but it's really, really insufficient. If I sit there and I share with a potential seller and say, listen, I know of the problems that you may encounter because I've encountered them all before, right? And I can be able to prevent those predictable problems of the transaction in a way that will allow for you to be able to seamlessly and easily achieve the goals that you want to achieve. Now we can expand on that, but that's a basic, you know, like pulling out what does that experience mean? And then sharing that with the consumer so they can understand that. Would you align with what I'm saying, Dr. Cindy? A hundred percent. You just said what the impact is that you want to make on their life. That's exactly it. And, and I should go back and

say why I wrote this second book. So I wrote the, the sell yourself book because of all the changes the world went through, right? We went through the great resignation, the great remorse, the great reset. I think we are in the great rebrand because like you said in a second ago, they don't think they need a realtor. They don't think they need a real estate agent because there's this thing called the internet and I can go on there and I can see what listings are available and I can find my own lenders and all these things. So if we're not rebranding us, that 25 years experience actually may be selling against you because the mindset may be that, well, you've been doing this too long. You don't know how business is done now. I'm just being honest, right?

So we've got to think about the audience that you're trying to impact and who you want to influence to make that decision to work with you, how they're reading all those signals that you're putting out into the world. And I also think that people make a big mistake that they think their experience and their service speaks for itself. Oh, my clients all love me. We had a great time. We got them in their house. So I was able to list their house and sell it for over asking. You're expecting that they are now walking little minions telling all these wonderful things about you at cocktail parties. And maybe they are if somebody brings up the conversation about real estate directly. But if not, that's not going to come up. I mean, think about how we often we talk about our dry cleaners or our dentist, only when someone brings it up. Yeah. So thinking about the impact of how you help them with their goals, what it was that you did to make their life easier. That gives me a story to tell that has nothing to do with real estate. And then it's like, oh, who's this guy you worked with?

Oh, this guy, Dan. Yeah, he happens to be my real estate agent. Yeah. And that goes back into like I mentioned to you that the sellers do they do consider the experience, but it's not time on task. It's what that experience means. And then the buyers, when I say what they're looking for is a home, right? But it gets past that because when you become an expert in the community, rather than necessarily real estate, it's about being that flag in the stone of, if you want to know anything about the community, about where do you take a first date? Where do you take your family? What's the biggest ripoff place in town that I should avoid, whatever the case may be? And now that's an option.

It doesn't mean you have to communicate that, but that's an example of a brand, one that can be really, really impactful for the buyer consumer. You already know 87% of all real estate agents fail in this business. And you also know it doesn't have to be that way. If you're a real estate agent and you're looking for consistent and predictable income, I invite for you to get your free copy of Real Estate Evolution, The 10-Step Guide to CPI,

Consistent and Predictable Income for Real Estate Agents. And you can do so when you visit visit www.therealestateevolution.com. I'll share with you your book that I authored to show you the way. Thanks. Something else that I think people struggle with that is they want to be that person. They want people to come to them for that. They want to be that resource.

What you have to remember is we live in this unbelievably distracted world now. Likeirrel is everywhere. It's not like it was 20 years ago or even 10 years ago. And so we're competing not only for their decision-making moment where they say, I'm going to choose this real estate agent versus that real estate agent or this lender versus that lender. You're competing for the 30 seconds of attention for them to even listen to whatever it is to want to seek more information. And this is where I think people miss the mark too with branding is it's not once, it's not twice, it's 25 little drops before they're going to remember.

I call that Coca-Cola marketing. Yeah, and I got that Coca-Cola marketing. Yeah. And I got that. I think I was first discovered. I mean, I was aware of it, but I think I first noticed I was aware of it when I was in Italy sitting on an outside cafe and they had these little ashtrays, the ashtrays were Coca-Cola ashtrays and these little table tents were Coca-Cola table tents. And I was like, huh, they're everywhere they're everywhere yep right you know and and that's where you get that you know like if coca-cola came up right now and they said hey drink coke and you

only heard them one time you will never even you know but the entire world i would be surprised of you know i would say the population i don't know the brand coca-cola is it's a it's got to be a small small population whatever it is i don't know i would think soCola is it's a, it's gotta be a small, small population, whatever it is. I don't know. I would think so too, but, but here's, what's interesting about that. And this is something that I think is really important when we're talking about humans being the product, not a product being the product. Coca-Cola, you tasted it and then you told other people about it. So you became a salesperson for that product. Right.

Who's selling you? As the real estate agent, who's your walking commercial? Who is saying the things that you want them to say about you? Because we don't have the Coca-Cola ad budget, most of us. We can't sponsor every ashtray and every table dead, right? But what we can do is make sure that at least the people that are out there who know about us, who have experienced us, they have an impactful story to tell and they're willing to tell it and they're willing to evangelize it out there. Also, it's not just when asked, it's giving them something to talk about.

And that's really the biggest difference. And it's going to be a huge differentiator. How do you teach somebody to do that, though? Because it seems to me like, from my experience, that even people who want to, you know, be that spokesperson for you, that they don't, most people, the majority of people don't have the skill set to understand how to communicate in that manner. So if that's a truism, then how do you make an impact on the people that don't have the skill to be able to speak your message so that they do speak your message? Can you help us fill that gap?

Absolutely. And I'm going to challenge what you just said. They absolutely have the skill set because think about kids. Everybody was five years old at one point. Five-year-olds are the best salespeople on the planet. Would you agree? I would say when my daughter was five, I certainly as hell bought her a bunch of candy. Everything is a negotiation, right? But we all have that skill set. So what our job is, is to tap back into that with that person, to remind them they do know how to do this. Because we start to compartmentalize people. We say, oh, well, this person's an engineer, and this person's an attorney, this person's a teacher. No, no, no. They're all salespeople. Every job is a sales job. Every person is a salesperson.

But connecting with them in a way that they can tell the story that feels comfortable and empowering to them. There's not a single person on the planet that hasn't evangelized for some brand or product out there. And the reason is because they got excited about it, they liked it, and they had a story to tell. So are we doing those things for the people we want out telling our story? Well, okay, so there's the component of giving them an experience so that they can feel good about that, right? And then there's, so now I gave them the experience. Now what? Now, how do I get them to tell that story? That is the most commonly skipped step,

which is why I love the fact that you actually asked for business here on the podcast, because most people think, oh, well, they had a great experience with me. Of course, they'll tell everybody. Don't assume that distracted society. How are you staying in front of them? How are you reminding them of that experience? How are you continuing to drip additional experiences on them? Your Salesforce is your community. Your Salesforce as a real estate agent is the people that you have worked with and it's the people you haven't worked with. It truly is. If you've encountered them, they are now a walking commercial for you in some regard. And I would also venture to say that as a real estate agent, your biggest portion of your sales team are people that have never actually directly worked with you. So what are they doing to tell the story?

So this, in your words, takes the ick out of sales to empower people to, you know, to embrace that inner five-year-old that they have within themselves. Because we all, like you mentioned, as long as you're older than five, we've all been five. And if you're younger than five, I appreciate you listening to this podcast. Tell your parents. And so how do we, you know, how do we, you know, embrace that inner child of ourselves? It's about connecting the dots in between, giving them a great experience,

and then communicating with them in a manner that they understand that, that it, that it is impactful for them to share your story. Am I, am I following along at this point with you? You are. And there's one more piece in there, Dan, which is think about how you're asking because most real estate agents that I've encountered, and I've worked with a lot of realtors and done a lot of speeches at real estate conferences too. You guys ask in ways like, well, if you know any friends or family that are buying or selling a home, mention my name. Okay. So how many people in a regular person, not a real estate agent, but in a regular person's life are actively buying or selling a home at that moment? 1%. Not at that moment.

Yeah, at some point, maybe in the next year or two, but not at that moment, yeah. That's the thing. So you've now actually decreased your chances of them going and evangelizing for you because of the way you asked. But if you start talking about the fact that, hey, this is a great market,

which I actually believe there's a lot of opportunity in this market right now, and you start sharing stories with them that they can share when it is not that absolute perfect intersection of, I need a home, you have a realtor, yay. It changes the way they evangelize for you. Tell me about Sell Yourself, the second book that you authored. So I think that we sell ourselves short because we are not our best advocates. We think that people's experience will tell the story for us. We think that we have this brand because we have all these years of experience or we have a lovely website or

good social media or really nice business cards, but that's all marketing. That's literally all marketing. Marketing is the product. sales is the encounter with other humans. And so it's the way that you create that connection with other people and the way that you solicit their support, their advocacy, and their kindness in wanting to go and help you as well. And I think that a lot of people want to help each other. I think that's just kind of human nature. We want to help other people, but we don't know how. So if you've got a powerful personal brand and you solicit that support, you'll find that most people actually do want to help you. They just need to know exactly how to. How can someone get a copy of your book?

They can buy it at any bestseller bookstore near them. Truthfully, they're everywhere online and probably at your corner bookstore as well. I love to they're everywhere online and probably at your corner bookstore as well. I love to support a local business and also through our, my website, drcindy.com. I can take you to all of those links. Dr. Sidney, thank you for your time today. I appreciate you sharing with us. You are a blessing and I wish you much continued success. Consistent predictable income community. Thank you for listening. I wish that you had the best day of your life. You be grateful, make good choices, go help somebody, and go position yourself so that you can find another listing. God bless you. Thanks so much for listening to the No Broke Months podcast today. Until the next show,

I invite for you to be grateful, make good choices, help someone, have the best day of your life, and go find a listing. Dan, you are such a fascinating man. I mean, he has this purpose in life to help people achieve their dreams, their greatness,

and he doesn't just say it. He actually has steps and mythologies in order for them to follow. Our very special guest in Featured Time Every Day. I cannot even sit in my chair. I'm so excited. Dan Rochon, all the way from beautiful Virginia. Dan, it's an honor to have you on the show. Thank you so much for taking the time. And what I'm encouraging for you is to focus on who you're being because that's your foundation. And when you focus on that, you're going to find that you do activities that are going to lead to the outcome of having whatever it is in this life that you're looking for.