Noob School - Episode 49: Breaking Into Sales

Episode Date: October 24, 2022

In this episode of the Noob School podcast, John’s brother Jack Sterling comes back to talk about his journey from the Navy Seals to sales. Jack recounts the discomfort that he experienced during his first attempts at selling, the mentors who helped him along the way, and the skills he acquired to find success in the field. Now an entrepreneur, Jack recognizes the necessity of knowing how to sell in starting a business, even if you’ll be hiring sellers down the road.  HIGHLIGHTS'Uncomfortable' transition from the Navy Seals to sales All founders need to be good with sales No such thing as the "right" path to success A blueprint for success is helpful, but not essential  QUOTESJack on why all founders need to be adept sellers: "It doesn't matter what the business is. When you start something, if you're the founder, you have to be good at sales. Like Facebook. Zuckerberg. He had to sell that to some people at some point, right? To get people to buy in, to get some momentum and start gaining customers."Jack's opinion on what would have made learning sales a little easier for him: "I had a lot of leash. I was just there, just freewheeling on my own. And I appreciated it and I still do. But I think if I had a little bit more marching orders and a little bit less free time to do whatever I wanted with, I think I would have been a little more [successful] early on." Connect with Jack and his work through the link below: LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/jacksterling/ Connect with Noob School and John by visiting the following links:LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/johnsterling1/Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/johnsterlingsalesInstagram: https://www.instagram.com/johnsterling_/Twitter: https://twitter.com/johnsterling_TikTok: https://twitter.com/johnsterling_Website: http://salestrainingfornoobs.com/

Welcome back to Noob School. This is where we interview sales pros that can help you get off to a great start in sales. All right, welcome back to Noob School. Today I've got Jack Sterling with me. Jack is my oldest son, and he is the first person we've had, I think, 55 or so podcast so far on the Nob School. Jack is the first repeat customer. Right. How about that?

First? Yeah. No nepotism, though. None. No. Just natural. Earned it. You earned it. That's right. So just a quick, quick bit today. We're just circling back with Jack

to get his feedback on what it was like going from, let's say, no sales experience. He had almost 10 years in the service after he got out of college to starting a business, which required mostly sales, right? So tell us about what that was like, and then we're going to go into what you would have liked to have had his training. Yeah. It was, I mean, one word, uncomfortable, right? I mean, this is coming from a SEAL team background. So coming out of that environment into a world where you're just getting a lot of rejection.

No. No, not interested, not interested. Kind of a dismisses attitude. And that was new, right? There isn't really an analog in the military for sales. There is no sales function within the military, right? You're not selling anything. It's orders, right?

You get orders. You go do the thing and you kind of get done with it. But there's no, I need to come present to you in a slick fashion so you can receive what I have to say. It's a complete alien concept. And the personal, you know, the feelings that I had about getting rejected was it was new, right? You're getting constantly told no, you know, cold prospecting. Your hit rates like 1, 2, 3% or something like that. So you make 100 phone calls in a week and, you know, three people were not dismissive or, you know, ignored you. So that took a while for me to get over the mental hurdle of, you know, I suck at this.

You know, people don't like what I'm saying. That really kind of took me a little bit to adjust to and kind of not take it personally. And then just generally being disoriented about business, sales, all of those things were net new kind of at the same time. So what made a big difference was having kind of a team of mentors, both at Clemson and outside of the network, you being kind of prime among them. You know, Dan being among them. People that had been there before and could offer helpful advice and help me make fewer mistakes along the way. Huge. Yeah.

So you had, yeah, you did. That's a good point. So Jack started a business reselling kind of telecom and security equipment or services from scan source. And so when you say I started a business, you think, gosh, I'm an entrepreneur. But really, you're kind of a salesperson. Yeah. And I understand that it doesn't matter what the business is. When you start something, if you're the founder.

you have to be good at sales, right? I mean, like Facebook, Zuckerberg, you had to sell that to some people at some point, right? Yeah, to get people to buy in to get some momentum and get, start gaining customers. And then you can start hiring people later down the road. But when it's just your kind of baby, you got to sell it. You got to do everything else too. But if you're not selling it, then who is?

Right. So, yeah, I agree. But you're, I didn't think about it, but your mentors, besides me, you had my brother Dan, who's the best mentor ever in the telecom space. That's all he's ever done. And then we had another consulting company we worked with. And those two ladies had been doing it for 20 years, right? Yep.

And then the ScanSource representative assigned to us, he helped at least four people. The whole, not even just, I mean, the one guy from ScanSource, but the whole team at ScanSource, that's all they do. I mean, they exist to support businesses like ours with engineering and sales support and troubleshooting. and they're really, they helped accelerate the timeline to getting to success. So that's how you overcame going to cold start in sales. So what would have been a better or easier way to do it?

Probably having a shorter leash, honestly. I had a lot of leash because they're just freewheeling on my own. And I appreciated it and I still do. But I think if I had a little bit more marching orders and a little bit less just free time to do whatever I wanted with, I think it would have been a little more success early on. Yeah. You know, I was just out there kind of, I got the kit, I got the tools. I just got to go try and build a house now, right?

It was, you know. Listen, I didn't do it the normal way either in my career, and you didn't do it the normal way. But I know it's the normal way. It's the better way, I think, is you start with Verizon. Right. You know, and then you work for Verizon for a little while. You kind of learn the business.

Yeah. And then you get your MBA. And then maybe you work for AT&M. and T, and then all of a sudden you're 30, and then you opened up your own business. Maybe. And I was dead set on not working for somebody else when I got out of the Navy. I'd work for the Department of Defense, this world's biggest bureaucracy, and I'd imagine that every company out there was going to have some flavor of that.

So going to work for somebody else was really kind of distasteful. So maybe if you go through the path, you just described something similar or how you go to Verizon, you're like, I'm done with this corporate world. I want to go do something else, start my own thing, but I probably need an NBA to get there. So mentality is probably the same for what you're calling the normal path. But yeah, that's probably true. There is no such thing as a one-size-fits-all normal path for everybody, right? Everyone comes to do it in a different way. Yes, I agree. I think people ought to make every effort to have a strategy to make it as

easy as possible to have a good arc in your field. I think they should. Having said that, you know, Most people don't. Right. You just kind of jump in there and you figure it out. Yeah. You know, the downside of doing it the normal way is you might get stuck. Right. You might get at Verizon and start making a lot of money.

And all of a sudden, you're, you know, you're doing TPS reports the rest of your life. Yeah. You know, you're in the break room, you know, talking about the game this weekend. And it's scary. I mean, any form of entrepreneurship, whether it's, you know, sales or something else, it's scary, right? You're on your own. You know, there's some certainty and some predictability working for either the military, or for Verizon or whoever else, that you're good, right?

I mean, even now, we've got some success, but one of our big customers doesn't pay their bill that month, we don't get paid either. So it's like there's a little bit of a tradeoff for that freedom you get with entrepreneurship versus working for someone else. But definitely having a blueprint for success

is very helpful, not just making it up as you go. Yeah. Well, whatever you did, and it was hard to go from the Navy to having your own business and selling and all that stuff. But you've done it. You've done a really good job over the last couple years and your business is growing and doing well.

And I appreciate you coming back on the Noob School and helping out the younger folks. Absolutely. Look forward to number three. Thank you. All right.