How a Mirror Created A 23% Increase in Sales

[0:00] I tell you what I did with a customer service team, and I did an A-B test. So what I did first was Team A, and they all set up in the normal way. Team B, what I did specifically, because they were just picking up the phones all day, I had mirrors in front of them. I had about 10 mirrors in each. And I said, what I'd like you to do, just notice yourself. Self and what i'd like you to do is just smile and i want you to notice your body language when you're speaking to someone and it was amazing to see the difference between the, up rates and the conversion rates between the two and it was significant it was like 23 percent more uh trust connection closes on the the the people that had the mirrors in front of them.

[1:02] Welcome to the full funnel freedom podcast if you are listening to this you are likely leading a team responsible for generating revenue purpose of full funnel freedom is to support people like yourself, and keep your funnels consistently, reliably full.

[1:20] Welcome to the Full Funnel Freedom Podcast. I'm your host, Hamish Knox. Today, I am delighted to have Jason Cooper on the show to talk about a number of things as it relates to more effective human-to-human interactions, and especially with our sellers. So Jason has over 25 years of experience in the corporate realm. He's co-founded two successful startups and has left his mark on numerous businesses and individuals fostering their growth and development. Jason's expertise lies in the transformation of salespeople, sales teams, CEOs, and businesses, propelling them toward unparalleled growth. Jason, welcome to Full Funnel Freedom. Thank you. I'm honored to be here. Always very excited to be on a podcast. So yeah, very much looking forward to it. Yeah, I'm really excited to have the audience hear your ideas and insights today. Before we get to that, I've given the audience the 30,000-foot view of Jason. Tell us your story. Where did you start? How did you get to where you are today?

[2:19] So I'm an Englishman living in Dublin, Ireland. I've been over here for around about 20 years now, so quite a considerable time. But I'm an Englishman I've been living and working in central London for many years I first started my sales career selling photocopies to the City of London very tough I was given a rolodex and off you go and I was packaged out into the street after a four-week training course but.

[2:54] The training course wasn't that great. The trainer would slam his hand on the table, insult you, embarrass you in front of all your peers, didn't really give you that much way of confidence. So when I was actually set out into the streets of London, metaphorically, I actually had to find a mentor. I had to find out someone within the organization that could teach me stuff that I wasn't being taught, which left a mark on my mind of what i should be doing in my life when i grew up and grew a little bit older a little bit wiser about how i can teach and how i can train so 20 years on live and work in dublin worked in various numerous companies co-founded two startups in ireland got revenue from a major company based in denmark and they were founders of an emir takeaway organization and they made lots of money and then they became vcs and then they started investing in other companies and we got investment from them sales director and roughly about 10 years ago i wanted I wanted to do something slightly different, midlife crisis, whatever it might be. So I wanted to give back. And I had a knack of teaching. I had a knack of coaching.

[4:19] So I thought I better get certifications under my belt and to teach in the way that it should be done and also to coach as well.

[4:30] So the passion started off there. So there's a lot more to it than that, but that's where the passion started of helping others to get better at what they do so they can get more revenue back into companies. So having been in corporate environments, having been in startup environments,

[4:54] I know what it needs to take to really get out there and to start adding value to your customers. I love that. What a great story. And I want to unpack this, this year, your sales training, early experience later, traumatic, it sounds like. So let's talk about that, because the audience of sales leaders listening around the world is going, Hey, Jason, I may not be in a startup, or maybe I am in a startup. What is that? What is that magic that we need to start to deliver? And you don't need to give away the whole secret. grit what what's something that you're comfortable sharing around how do we especially in early stage companies actually go out and deliver something that our buyers go yeah that's worth paying for i think there's a magic when you're in that startup mode there is curiosity curiosity.

[5:48] There is the magic of engaging with new. People like new. Our brain thrives new. So talking to people about something that is of value to them, but it's new from a different point of view. So the conversations can happen so quickly, I find, anyway, because I get very excited. I like shiny objects. I always like shiny objects. Around me, I've got shiny objects everywhere. but yeah if you get passionate about what you do and you have that belief that it's going to work it's amazing the transformation that you can have within your mindset to make a difference and a difference in other people and something else i did when i consulted with uh another company they were a russian company and i was helping them in startup we had to take the offering that we had with help from Enterprise Ireland. And we had to go to Silicon Valley and we had to present to VCs out there something new, something slightly different. And I remember standing up and presenting our value proposition. And we were taught from having this about 10 years ago, 50 slides of.

[7:05] And that took half an hour. And then it shrunk it all the way down into one minute and one slide. And you had to pitch it. And it's just value, pure value from one slide. And that was in front of about 200 VCs and guests and a few other people. And it was terrifying, but it was also very exciting because it was value forward. And then some of the VCs had to give you feedback on how you pitched. And then I had to go and pitch to Bank of America.

[7:35] Uh cisco ibm and all of those people but again it's passion and it's having that right attitude especially when you're in that startup mode and you have to create that ripple effect going forward to everyone else and the more passionate that you are about something the better that other people are going to listen to you as long as it's in their best interests i'm glad you said that We're going to get back to passion in just a second because something that you shared about the brain,

[8:07] and you and I are both brain nerds, neuroscience nerds. We talked about that offline. And so, yes, our brains are always watching out for new because they're looking for threats, right? Our brain is wired to keep us safe, which usually means stuck. And I've had multiple clients here in Calgary, Alberta, Canada, say in Calgary, everyone's first to be second, right? They want to see that it's proven out. So, yes, it's great. you and I resonate on that newness and a lot of buyers go hey that's great come back when it's proven so how as a sales leader the founder of this new company how do we help our buyers get over that hump of hey it's new oh that sounds dangerous yes and it's actually going to deliver something that as you said is not not going to is going to be beneficial to you the buyer.

[8:59] Well, you have to test the market before you actually boast about how good something actually is. And the Robert Chowdhury's laws of influence and persuasion, I know you know about that, is social proof. One of the elements, it has to be tested and it has to be tested with a big company or bigger companies. And they have to bring in testimonials and case studies that it's proven to work. Work once you have those social proof elements from big bigger companies and it's affected their change and especially when you're in that new area yeah then you can actually impact thousands of others to make sure that this has worked this is proven this is proven to be true we'd love to work with you because other people have worked well with this product and service that we've had or have, so let's have a look at applying it to your business. Let's have a look at what and then ask the discovery questions, ask the who's the what's the whens the whys and the hows and ask them about them. Ask them about what how their clients buy from them and look at all of the areas and then let's work out about getting a solution.

[10:18] Right. Yes, this is super cool. It's that idea of it's not just, hey, this is awesome, you should buy it, because this ties back into passion. So we look at passion. I'm a very energetic individual. I love what I do. I get super excited. And then sometimes what I get back, and whether they say it or not, is like, slow down, slow down, fella. Dial it back just a little bit. So when you are working with sales leaders and

[10:47] founders who are super pumped and excited, we're going to change the world. How do you funnel that energy into something that is not off-putting to the buyer? Pause.

[11:00] Make sure that when the excitement and the enthusiasm, and it's great to have that, but make sure that you slow things down as well. And to make sure that how you're speaking has that passion but it also is quite precise in how you actually say things so when i hear the passion i go that's great i love that and that's really good so let's ask a few more questions to dig deeper about those passions and find out how we can control that passion to make it influential to make sure that you're You're credible and make sure that you're speaking with authority and you come across transparent to the listener. Because remember, when we speak, we speak in about 120, 160 words per minute. But the brain, as we know, you're talking to yourself in probably 600 words per minute. It so allowing to pause for the other person's brain to catch up is absolutely essential so make sure that when you do pitch with excitement and certainty.

[12:16] And credibility and animation with your body language and you're showing all the hands gestures and body language is absolutely essential in this process that you're doing it well and you're doing it with authority so there's lots of other elements that we can unpack as well yes absolutely uh so for the sales leaders who are listening who are going to be ultimately coaching their sellers right on this what does that look like in the real world now this is we are doing this podcast on video as well as audio. So we'll have to do a little bit of extra explanation for the audio listeners. How, how does that look in practice when you're pitching with confidence, credibility, passion, and leveraging, what does the body look like in that case? Because I'm, I'm a very big believer in body language as well. We communicate mostly that way. And we all know that the hands clasped in front of our crotch, you know, while we're presenting is not the best way of conveying confidence or anything else. So what do you coach your clients and their sellers on doing with their bodies to convey passion, credibility, et cetera?

[13:25] I'll tell you what I did with a customer service team. And I did an A-B test.

[13:33] So what I did first was Team A, and they all set up in the normal way. Team B, what I did specifically, because they were just picking up the phones all day, I had mirrors in front of them. I had about 10 mirrors in each. And I said, what I'd like you to do, just notice yourself. Yourself and what i'd like you to do is just smile and i want you to notice your body language when you're speaking to someone and i want you to notice the adjustments that you will make just to make yourself sound better and it was amazing to see the difference between the.

[14:13] Up rates and the conversion rates between the two and it was significant it was like 23 23 percent more uh trust connection closes on the the the people that had the mirrors in front of them just those small adjustments to the body language and that to me speaks volume because we know that our body language is around about 55 percent and we have to make sure that we do it correctly and i did notice when you were speaking you using this similar gestures of what i would do like open body language and showing your hands and all of that but when you're on the phone we do the same thing if we're standing up we're more engaged our body and our diaphragm is more engaged and we can actually speak a lot better i know apparently we're 10 more intelligent when we stand up because there's blood flows straight through to the body let me just hold on Let me just elevate a little bit. I want to get up to your level.

[15:17] And there's other elements. So it's amazing how some adjustments... Can make a big difference and especially when you're seeing yourself and i go back to just that ab test that i did in that call center and it's amazing how it can impact, so we know when we open up and we know when we open our hands up it's a sign of trust we're not hiding anything totally which is when other people see you you're showing a lot of there's nothing nothing behind me there's nothing around me so there's just slight things that you can do and also your breathing when you shallow breathe from the chest it's almost like you're panicking but when you breathe from the diaphragm and you breathe out there's certain things you can do just to adjust so when i coach i i'm looking for something quite specific number one i'm looking for the physiology i'm looking for the change in the body language i'm looking for those.

[16:17] Then i'm looking for asking some really good questions to dive into the neocortex which is the the area of the brain that our emotions actually are situated so i'm looking for certain signs within that but i'm also looking for uh the limbic system as well which is the thinking brain and when you ask some really good questions the brain will just go in and you're deep in thought and allow the other person to think change can happen when you ask some really good questions as we know when you're selling and as a seller if you ask some really good questions and we have the Pareto principle is the seller should be speaking 20% of the time the buyer your client your customer should be speaking more of the time 80 of the time so when i teach sales leaders when i teach sales people we're using and utilizing the Pareto principle to help what a brilliant idea what a brilliant idea because that really puts all those cliches about you have two ears and one mouth and all those kinds of things it puts it on this real great display

[17:33] and it's very simple pull to, to, to capture. And I know for the sellers and the sales, even sales leaders, where we've talked about, you know, use the Pareto principle, 20 80, and they go.

[17:44] Well, 20, 80, that doesn't sound like very much. And then you actually, if you divide like what's 20% of an hour and someone's doing the calculations in their head because they're better at math than I am, it's still like, you know, 12 and a half minutes, something like that of an hour long conversation. That's a lot of time. That's a lot of questions. That's several stories that you can get out in a team meeting or with a buyer. So, sales leaders, as you're listening to Jason share, think about that. How often are you violating the Pareto principle? And then how often do you watch your sellers violate that principle when they're with their buyers? And also, this A-B test Jason talked about happened in a call center. They were not in front of a buyer physically, yet that mirror allowed them to adapt their body language. And as Jason clearly said, the results were fairly dramatic. So, Jason, I appreciate you sharing all of that with us, and we could nerd out about all this stuff all day long. I do want to circle back on your initial training experience. We'll refer to it that way.

[18:53] And then also, you know, clearly that left some scar tissue. Fair. I have similar experiences in my past. What have you noticed? What have you seen work really effectively? Because everybody who is listening knows that doesn't work, what you experience. So from your experience, what are some of the things that when our sales leaders are training their team internally, What can they say or do that is not the thing you experience to actually have the training resonate with their people? Oh, that's a big question. And there is lots of ways of doing it. Number one is probably a bit of a buzzword nowadays, psychological safety within the workplace, meaning that it's OK to speak up and you do get inferiority complex as a seller and you've got the leader there and go, oh, what's going to happen? And they're measuring me and whatever. But, you know, it's OK to speak up.

[19:54] This is a bit of a cliche. There's no such thing as a bad question. But allow the person to speak. Allow the person to be self-accountable for their own actions. Allow the sellers to actually be autonomous and having those agilities to actually go, well, I read some really good books. I did this. I'm actually thinking about my future. I'm actually thinking about stuff I can do. As a leader if you can allow those areas of being autonomous accountable for their own actions and they're actually actively doing stuff to impact what they do on a day-to-day basis so having a transparent organization and as a leader to show your vulnerabilities not all the time but show that i've been through the situations that you've been i'm not perfect i'd like to have input from you because feedback helps us to feed forward to actually change what we do.

[20:59] So when we're looking at training is if the leader is training or they get an outside resource they're going to find out all of the areas that the sellers are actually having uh challenges with whether it's the open questions whether it's um uh storytelling or whether it's objection handling or or whatever it might be so let's work out all the areas and then let's bring it all in and then let's design something that can impact them as the sales team inadvertently help more people buy from them increase revenue for the organization but also transparency within the organization just to show where the organization is going in the future so there are lots of different facets around that to make an impact and what you're doing right now is to listen i think that's a massive skill to learn get the stuff out out of our heads especially when we're actually with a seller or when we're actually with a client not that we're thinking about oh god what's for dinner tonight and you missed exactly what the the person has actually said.

[22:17] And because i brought as we know as i've already suggested we get so many thoughts going and it takes a lot of practice to really focus in on the other person and as you so rightly did earlier is to summarize and paraphrase back to the client just also nodding your head that you actually heard what's being said so all of these areas I always believe that is so good to keep on practicing.

[22:46] Get them done really well so you can empathetically really listen to the to the customer and again that preto principle works really well and i approved it i was out with a customer yesterday and i hardly did any of the talking i prepped in advance i did everything that i would normally do i set the deck well in advance of the meeting and we had a really good conversation and again i didn't do as much talking they gave me all the information brilliant i i really love Love that. And it also ties into, you said it, Jason, vulnerability, right? And so if you're audio listening, I'm actually opening my jacket and exposing my stomach.

[23:26] And that is to become woundable, right? The origins of vulnerability to become woundable. And if we talk about the soft underbelly, for those of you who are in the military history, and that's exactly it, as a leader, when we can become woundable, when we can be vulnerable, to your point, within some frameworks, uh, with, uh, with our team and demonstrating those behaviors. Our adults learn from imitation and repetition. So as the leader, we have to be the ones who are nodding, listening, being fully present with our seller. It's something that you didn't say specifically, but you, you, you, you said it, um, in a different way about all just being completely present and taking in what they're saying, not so you can spit back out the next line of dialogue, but so you can actually consider and then go, oh.

[24:17] Well, what do you mean by that, Jason? Like when you say that you, you know, you can't get past gatekeepers, like tell me, tell me more about that. Like what, what, what's preventing you? And then we can actually get to the real issue because I don't know, from my experience, uh, sellers, when they come for coaching, they're often looking for band-aids, right? Cause they're like, I have a cut on my hand and yes, they do.

[24:39] However, if we just put a band-aid on it, we're not actually solving the real problem. And the and we need to leverage those questioning techniques as you mentioned to actually uncover what's really going on so we can not only bandage the cut on their hand also prevent them from hopefully ever getting that cut on their hand again is that from your experience similar yeah ironically enough i was coaching some senior leaders uh this time last week and we were talking about the difference between coaching and mentoring okay and they didn't know the difference which i found quite interesting to know and i was saying well what is the difference and.

[25:17] Some of them got it around the wrong way some of them really didn't know the difference and it is a specific difference and i think all leaders should know need to know this is when you're coaching you're working with some questions and actively listening and helping someone achieve a goal and helping them think of the idea as opposed to when you're mentoring them you're working with them to partake knowledge and to give them the gift and i think you can balance between the both of them when you're as a leader you can coach ideally is to help them think enough that they They come up with that eureka moment themselves and lots of good questions. And again, you can challenge people as well. And you can also challenge people on making them visualize in a good way of the answer, but not giving it and holding back. So leaders are so eager to give them the answer and just walk away. But nothing's happened. No change has actually happened within the seller. They're not actively going to learn from that. Maybe they will, but probably not.

[26:35] And I think in today's world, every leader should be a good coach. One of their core skills that they should have, as well as being data-driven, critical thinking, and all the other aspects of a really good exceptional leader.

[26:54] But coaching is one of those foundational things that every leader should have now.

[27:00] Amen. I am 1,000% on side with you on that. And really, you know, when we as leaders just tell instead of coach, we do actually create a change in our sellers, which is we've created learned helplessness. And all we've done is they go, oh, if I run into this, go back and talk to my boss. And they don't own the solution, right? So if they go out and they try what we told them to do and it doesn't work, well, that's not their fault. It's our fault because my boss told me to do it and it didn't work. And, you know, now we've started to lose some credibility and trust with our seller. Now, Jason, we could, again, nerd out about this stuff all day long. It is later in your day for you, and it is early in the day for me. So I've got a few questions to tie up today's session.

[27:41] And I certainly look forward to our conversations offline and possibly again on the podcast. So question one, if you could go back and talk to younger Jason and go back as far as you like and say, hey, younger Jason, in the future, you're going to be working with all these amazing companies. You'll be a successful startup founder. You're also going to have a lot of scar tissue and bumps and bruises. What would you coach younger Jason to say or do differently to get to the same spot with a little less scar tissue fewer? Bumps and bruises I would Read more books as a younger Jason. Okay, I would get a mentor or coach to get me through the system, Make me understand a little bit better on how to connect easier with people, push myself out of my comfort zone and.

[28:28] Make sure that my leader supports me and question them as well. So, so very important. Question my leaders on them to help me further because I want to progress. Yeah. And I want to invest into my future so I can actually sell more. So older Jason, I would be partaking knowledge as a mentor, but i'd also be asking some really good valuable questions to help me think about my future love it what great advice i haven't heard that before jason thank you for sharing that with us uh now speaking of reading that's my next question for you what have you read watched or listened to whether recently or in the past you would recommend the audience of sales leaders check out to further their own ironically enough i have one here called persuasion oh by james burke it's really good actually um i'm halfway through it at the moment and and it talks about the area of listening remembering people's names body language other elements of how the subtle art of influence people in the right way not manipulation nothing like that but how to to stand out with better influencing skills that people resonate with you and i hate that word.

[29:51] Manipulation because that goes back in awful times of double glazing sales people and second-hand car dealers and all that sort of stuff but sales people are excellent at what they do they're curious so that's one of the books i'm reading at the moment one of the other books that i've always say that's very much on the top of my agenda is the book influence by Robert Cialdini and also a legendary book think and grow rich by Napoleon Hill.

[30:24] Over 100 years old the certain elements of the study of success is absolutely fascinating it has been modernized a little bit anyone that's into sales anyone that's into leadership anyone's in the study of success or want to develop themselves foundational napoleon hill think rich and grow rich is one of those books that you should be reading again and again and again Again, I have loads of other books.

[30:55] Those are the three that I'd highly recommend anyone that's in sales to read, understand. I'm also on an audio audible on Joe Navarro on body language. Second book. Great one. And I actually messaged him the other day on LinkedIn and said, loved it. I loved your book. Where's the download? I couldn't find the download anywhere. So another thing I would suggest for all of those people out there that are curious, open-minded, they have that intrinsic motivation to want to learn more. Find people on LinkedIn that may be better than you. Connect with them. Ask them questions. Can I have a five-minute chat with you? Can I have a 15-minute chat? I'm just curious about whatever is stopping you from moving forward or you just want to be educated. I do that all the time I find that so impactful for me because it really helps me number one I've asked their advice and they've given it and it's so amazing people are more open than you actually think as long as you frame it in the right way how do you frame it not the wrong way but you have to frame it well.

[32:11] Fair, because otherwise it starts to look parasitic, right? It's like you're just sucking away from them. So we'll definitely put those links to the books in the show notes. And I really like that idea about, you know, and Agent Navarro, I've read all of his books. I recommend them regularly. So I love that idea of reaching out to people who have been influential to you and asking for some additional support. Now, speaking of that, Jason, you've given us already some incredible ideas and insights around how to support our sellers with their body language and training them and coaching them. What do you have as a final bit of wisdom, a closing thought, or something to plug? The floor is yours.

[32:47] I'd love people to connect with me on LinkedIn. You can look at Jason Cooper. I'm all over the place on LinkedIn. You'll be able to find me. I'm on Instagram. I'm also on YouTube. youtube do not get confused with jason cooper who is the drummer from the cure ah so don't get confused with that uh happy to reach out happy to uh give value forward love it jason i've had a blast hanging out with you today thank you for being a guest on full funnel freedom thank you thanks for listening to today's episode of the full funnel freedom podcast you can continue to to support us by leaving us a review and a rating, sharing this episode with a couple of sales leaders in your network who you care about. I'd love to connect with you. I'm easy to find Hamish Knox on LinkedIn. Also, if you'd like a free 15 minute call with me, go to www.hamish.sandler.com forward slash how to Sandler. Until we connect on the next episode, go create full funnel freedom.

[33:54] Music.