Binge Factor Media

Are your strategies effective enough to build a foundation and boost your sales? Nikki Rausch has been a guest on different podcasts, and people are bingeing on her podcast guesting. That’s why she decided to create her podcast called Sales Maven. She uses the platform to grow a community of like-minded individuals dedicated to building and sharpening their sales skills with input, guidance, and support. She also contributes and helps people by coaching them and teaching them what she learned from her 25+ years of experience in selling. In this episode, she emphasizes that there’s always a better way to have sales conversations.

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Watch the episode here

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Ultimate List On How To Sell Authentically In Your Podcast And Make Better Connections With Nikki Rausch Of Sales Maven Podcast

I am so excited to bring you the Sales Maven. She is the host of the Sales Maven Podcast. She has a community around it. The other part I love is that she is so super-connected into the community. I can’t believe I haven’t met her sooner. She was introduced to me by a great publicist who does an amazing job of sending me some great people that I absolutely have loved having on the show. She does such a good job. She has a direct link to send them to me and that is rare. Also, I mentioned on a coaching call that I had interviewed her and she dropped some amazing nuggets right on our show here which you are going to read shortly.

Someone else in the group said, “I love her group. I am a part of it.” I am finding all these threads of connection that we had already. I love when that happens. I have posted an episode and people are messaging you back and saying, “I am so glad you had her on. How could you not know her already?” That is the amazing part about it.

Now I know her and I am so glad I do. I am having Nikki Rausch, the CEO of Sales Maven on our show now. She has the unique ability to transform the misunderstood process of selling. With many years of selling experience, entrepreneurs and small business owners now hire Nikki to show them how to sell successfully and authentically. Nikki has written three books all available on Amazon and she has a podcast called Sales Maven, which you can find on your favorite podcast platform, which you are tuning in to.

Her community is called the Sales Maven Society, which I love that idea. It elevates what it is and she is going to talk about that time between her show, paid group, and how she uses the Sales Maven Podcast to promote all of her own selling within the community. Of course, she is going to give us some great selling tips. Let’s get to know Nikki Rausch Sales Maven.

Nikki, thanks so much for joining me. You are a Sales Maven. There are 100 episodes in your feed here that are chock-full of some of the best sales advice I have ever heard. It is nitty-gritty. That is what I love. I love it when we get deep and nitty-gritty into it. When I flipped through some of your topics, that is exactly what I am saying here. I am saying things like, “How not to lose customers by doing this. How to try this. How this is going to get you more.” I love those kinds of topics. You must spend a lot of time figuring out what your topic plan is going to be.

My process a lot of times is I choose my topics based on things that I am doing a lot of coaching around. Clients are bringing these issues up. I have a rule of thumb that if I talk about something, say something, teach something or give advice around something five times, I want to turn it into some content so now, it becomes a podcast episode.

That is Nikki’s five times rule. That is when it starts to feel like you have repeated yourself too many times.

I feel like if I share it with five different people then there are probably more people who will benefit in some way from it. It usually becomes a podcast episode but it probably has been already some part of a training or something I have coached multiple clients around.

That is great advice right there for building your own topic list. Why did you start the podcast? You are 100 episodes in. Congratulations.

The reason that I started the podcast was because in early 2018, I started getting asked randomly to guest on people’s podcasts. In 2019, people started telling me that they binge me on a podcast and I was like, “How can you binge me? I do not even have a podcast.” In 2019, I did a lot of guesting, and when people started saying, “I binge you on podcasts.” I was like, “I do not even know how you can do that. You go search my name and you listen to all these different podcasts I have been on, which is what people were doing.” I thought, “If somebody wants to binge me, they might want to listen to my own podcast, and then I can control the content and the pieces of what I am sharing.”

That is why I started the podcast. I was specific about what I wanted the podcast to do. It was not like, “I am going to put a podcast out.” I knew that the thing I wanted to drive the podcast specifically was to attract people who wanted to be a part of my monthly coaching program which is called the Sales Maven Society. Everything leads down that path and that was my ultimate outcome for the podcast. If people wanted to binge me, I am going to give them content but I want to drive them to something, which is the Sales Maven Society.

How did you find it when you were starting out? Did you find it difficult to get listeners in the beginning? Let’s do our three things here right away because it ties right in. How did you find it in terms of increasing listeners?

I did have a little bit of a listenership built-in because I did have people that were podcast guesting. It is the number one source of leads into my business. I know that people who listen to podcasts for whatever reason tend to resonate with my message. They like to hear it so they come and they want to hear from me.

I had my email list. When I launched the podcast, I had quite a few people on my email list that were willing to take that chance and listen. It slowly grew. No way has it grown as fast as I want it to grow but I am super honored that people listened to the podcast and that it is growing month over month. That has consistently done that since I started it in 2020.

Do you find that the members of your Sales Maven Society are all subscribers too?

It is interesting because even in the podcast episode that was aired, multiple people have gone into our private group and commented about listening to the podcast. I find it super flattering because in that program, they get a lot of me and they are still wanting to listen to the podcast, even though they get me live. There is a lot that they get from me. I feel honored that even my members still listen.

It probably also has to do with your recent guests being a Maven member too. There is probably a little cross-pollination there too.

That is strategic too. I knew that one of the things that I wanted to do with the podcast is I wanted to demonstrate what it is like to coach with me. I started the podcast doing on-air coaching calls with my Maven Society members. It is a way for them to get a free private coaching call. It is a podcast episode but for them, it is very specific and it gives people the opportunity to be the fly on the wall of like, “What is it like to coach with Nikki?”

It is such a great strategy for you because you do not know how is this coach going to work out for me. Coaching is one of those mystery things and when they can see you in action, they start to understand, “This could make a difference for me. This is what I was looking for.”

If you hear me on the podcast and you show up on a coaching call with me, I want it to be the same experience. You know what you are going to get, which is always super flattering. It is also funny to me when I get on a live coaching call with somebody who is a podcast listener and they are like, “It is so weird to see you live because you are the exact same as you are on the podcast.”

That was one thing. I wanted to be strategic about giving people the opportunity to be the fly on the wall. I also like to highlight my members in the Sales Maven Society. I also do sales success stories and let them come on and talk about something they have implemented into their business and they have gotten great results. One, that is a good demonstration of the work that I do but also, it is an opportunity for them to highlight and showcase their business. My members get business out of coming on my podcast, which was super exciting.

You have guests on your show and sometimes they are on-air coaching or outside guest on a show. How do you decide who is going to be worthwhile or the best subject here?

I started in 2021 bringing outside guests that weren’t coaching clients of mine onto the Sales Maven Podcast. I went back into my background. I have a pretty extensive background in neuro-linguistic programming. NLP for short if that is a new term to anybody reading. It is the study of communication. When you go into a master certified program or at least the program that I went through, you had to do this master level project.

The idea behind it was to understand the structure of excellence. You would ask a pretty structured set of questions to people that are getting exceptional results in their business or their life on a particular topic. When I decided to bring guests on, it was this idea of doing a mastering excellence series where I ask the same set of questions.

I find that my guests that come on and do the mastering excellent series, a lot of times, they leave going, “I did not even know that about myself. I feel like you pulled out the secret sauce for how I do what I do.” That is the objective of the on-air guest call so that the listener starts to understand, “What is the structure. What does this person do to achieve these exceptional results?” It has been fun to have these amazing people. Most of them I know really well so I have great rapport with them. There are people that I admire and I know that they have achieved some level of success in their business or their life. That is who I have been bringing on for guests.

It is always a tricky thing and you do that well. There needs to be this alignment with the way that you are authentic and in integrity with what advice you are bringing. Anyone that you bring in front of your Sales Maven Society community, in general, has to have that same level of integrity. It is not going to be a good fit. It is always a toss-up when you have someone as a guest on your show. Your show is educational as yours.

I have had a couple of those go off the rails but I have still aired the episodes. It is because I still think there is good quality content in there for people to get, like the topic that I thought we were going to talk about and the guest goes in their own direction like, “I do not want to talk about that.” I have still aired all of the episodes because I still think there is something that the audience member can take away and implement into their own life and that is always a priority for me.

I am glad you did. Monetization is the third thing that we usually ask everyone who comes on the show. In your particular case, you are running ads for your Sales Maven Society for courses, bootcamps, programs, and things that you have going on. How is it doing? Have you seen growth in the Sales Maven Society? Have you seen less attrition? What are the measurements that you are looking for on that side of selling your own stuff?

Sales Maven: If somebody will come in and pay a little bit of money, they’re going to get such a great experience that their repeat rate or their opportunity to come back and do something else with you is really high.

We run dynamic ads on the podcast. I pick and choose. I have a setlist of ads that run that are specific for free downloads. That is to turn my listeners into subscribers. In those, we run when I do not have a masterclass going on, when I am not doing some promotion for the Sales Maven Society or something like that.

I get new subscribers to my list every single week from the podcasts, which feels good. When I do sell something, like the masterclass, the strategy session packages, or whatever it is, those do convert. Not huge but I will say that I almost always get 1 or 2 buyers that were not on my list that straight come from the podcast.

Those always more than pay for the ads whatever I am selling. It is always about how I increase the lifetime value of a client. I know in my business that if somebody will come in and pay me a little bit of money, they are going to get such a great experience that their repeat rate or their opportunity to come back and do something else with me is high. We pay attention to that.

I imagine you probably have a high referral rate.

I have a pretty good referral rate. It is this idea of, can you offer them something that they get a lot of value in and then they are ready for the next thing and what is the right next thing? That is something we are constantly playing with, studying, and looking at. I am serious about who buys and how many buyers on each email that I send. When somebody comes in and they buy that first thing, can I sell them the next thing? Do they take that and what does that look like from a lifetime value of the client? I am not a total numbers person but I do nerd out on those types of things. Anything that has to do with revenue, I am so excited about.

You wouldn’t be a Sales Maven without that. You got to be a little in-the-dollars.

I want my clients to be thinking about that stuff too. I talk about it a lot with my clients like, “What are you looking at? What is your lifetime value? How are people coming into your business? What does it take to convert them to the next thing?”

I find that when we do on-air coaching or any of our outreach through our guests, you would think of it like a guest funnel, not in a cheesy marketing way but in a good way. I have planned this in, like how am I going to talk with you, where are you going to go next, and how that path is going to go. When we do that, I find that we have a higher lifetime value through that touchpoint of it. Do you find that your on-air coaching clients become higher lifetime value clients overall?

I do not know that I have specific data about that but my gut is saying, “Absolutely.” I am noticing now that I have been in business for years. It is common for people to come study with me for however long and start to hone their sales skills. Go off, do whatever they are doing, and as they start to scale their business, they run into some new levels, challenges, and communication issues that they want some feedback on.

They come back into the fold for usually a couple of months or a year, they go off and do their thing and then they come back again. It is always interesting. You probably heard this thing. It is new level, new devil. I find in sales, as people are scaling their business, it is that same thing where they get comfortable and confident and they are rocking their business feeling good about their sales strategy and all the stuff that goes into building rapport and relationships.

They then decide they are going to put some new offer out and they start to go, “I need Nikki’s eyes on this. I want her feedback on how to structure the call or what questions I should be asking that lead people down that path to hiring me.” That has been great and most of those people have absolutely already done on-air coaching calls with me for sure on the podcast.

I can imagine that works. I see a lot of similarities in the way that you run your business to the way that we run ours as well. It is by providing this structure of support that allows for a lot of on-air and Q&A. They get a lot of touchpoints with you and with me as well. As we are doing those things, what we find is the people that take advantage of those touchpoints and/or come in and out, as you were pointing out, tend to stick with us for a lot longer. If they do not, for some reason, they feel bad about it. You are like, “Podcasting was not right for my business anymore but I love what you do. I love you guys and they refer a lot of people, even though they left us,” which is always nice.

Somebody will say, “I have decided to go back into corporate. I am closing my business,” but they are still great referrals for me. I love that you guys are doing that in your business too. That makes my heart happy.

It is and for us, we decided that we would make it so easy like they do not have to have a membership to something that they are paying for. They are already paying to keep their feet alive for podcasting. If you are keeping your feet alive, you have the ability to take on-air coaching, have lessons each week and consume that content in a live format. We made it so easy to do that they would never unsubscribe because why would you unsubscribe your feed if you have put that much time and effort into your podcast? One hundred episodes is a lot of episodes. You are not going to let it go anywhere or anytime soon.

I am not planning to. I enjoy the podcast experience. I do not know about you and your business but for me, my best clients are podcast listeners. They are the biggest subscribers to my list as far as new leads come in but the people who come in from my podcast specifically are such great clients. They already feel comfortable with me. At least they feel like they know me in some way and know what to expect. When you deliver on those expectations and they feel that personalized touch, they are in.

Are you a podcast listener?

Yes. I love podcasts. I have been listening to podcasts for so long.

I can tell the difference when I listen to the host. That’s how many shows I have listened to over the years but I can tell the difference between someone who listens to podcasts. I can tell that you listen to podcasts by the way you approach your show. It has to do with some more of the flow and the way that you like to consume content. You are presenting your own content in that similar way and that tends to work. You can tell people who have that skillset. What is interesting is that your show doesn’t have a specific time slot. Sometimes you are 20, 30, or 40. I love that that has that fluidity because sometimes the subject is where the guest demands it.

Thank you for noticing that. I sometimes worry about that. I did an episode with somebody and we went over an hour, which I do not normally do. That podcast has gotten so many downloads. The guest on it is a rockstar. She is an amazing guest. She is sharing a peek behind the curtain of what she does in her business and how she is making decisions. It is a great episode and especially she has a huge fan base too so that helps. I was like, “Her people are going to freak out. I can’t listen to an hour-long podcast,” but they are listening. Every single day, we are getting downloads to that episode.

Because you do not do it as often, whereas if you did it all the time, it is formulaic and it is working for you because everyone is saying, “If Nikki did this for an hour, it must be worth it.” It makes them want to check it out like it is a special-length episode. You might want to do that strategically and drop it again.

Thank you. I feel like you gave me such a great golden nugget there. I appreciate it.

That is what I want to talk about. You touched on the thing that is going to tip over to your binge factor here. You are a binge factor and the binge factor of the Sales Maven Podcast is the fact that there are golden nuggets in every single episode. You can tell because you have some fabulous titles to your episode that are giving you hints at what is going to be a part of that golden nugget.

You start out your very first episode with How to Pivot Your Business Without Losing Clients. Why wouldn’t you want to listen to that? Everybody is in a shift and a pivot at some point in their business but did it ever occur to me that, “I could lose clients. I must listen to this episode.” Those types of naming and topics of things and the nitty-gritty golden nuggets that you are dropping into every single episode are why people are bingeing on you. There is no question in my mind. I could tell from the titling before I even picked it. It was hard for me because you have got 100 amazing episodes for me to even pick three to check out to prep for our interview.

You totally made my day. I love that. Thank you so much because my ultimate goal in life is that if you are going to spend time listening to me that you walk away going, “I got something that I can immediately implement and I feel good about it.” That is the goal.

Sales Maven: As you scale your business, there will always be those people who were with you in the beginning, but really are not a fit as your business grows.

I wrote an inspirational quote for something that came from Jeff Bezos and it says, “Your brand is what people say about you when you are not in the room.” The highest compliment to a podcaster is that somewhere out there someone is quoting you to someone else. You do not know it but that is what is happening. The highest compliment to a podcaster is they are repeating your advice. Hopefully, they are giving you credit for it. At least your podcast credit for it. I bet you they are because your show is growing so listeners are growing.

They are quoting you. It happened to me three times in 2021 where someone quoted me back to me like When Harry met Sally if you have ever seen that old movie. I got quoted me back to me and I was like, “I do not know where I heard this. I think that might have been on my show.” I bet you that is going to happen to you at some point. I can’t wait for it. You are going to write me back and you are going to say, “You were right.”

You called it big time. I will be super thrilled. I will say my clients often say, “I hear your voice in my head all the time,” which sometimes I feel like, “Should I be apologizing for that? They hear my voice constantly.” I feel flattered by it that they feel like, “I am taking Nikki with me and I know that she would give me some advice here on what to say or what to do.” That brings that confidence to them.

Tell all of us a little bit more about the Sales Maven Society, what level of client base is in there and what they are focusing on.

It does run the gamut. We have people that are close to a year into their business. For me, most people need to be about a year into their business because they are starting to realize you can’t put up a website and people are going to flock to it and buy from you. You have to do some selling. People who are that year into the business have figured that they need some selling skills.

I have people that are rocking their business. Seven-figure businesses in there too. Realistically, I think where the people get the most value is it is in that place where you are ready to scale to whatever your next level is. You are doing some things right because, obviously, you have a business. You are still not feeling comfortable or confident around how you have those strategic conversations with clients that have scope creep with you.

I saw that title. I was like, “That is my next listen.”

Not paying for things and all of a sudden, you are like, “I am going to go out of business if I keep doing this.” There are a lot of that. There are also a lot of people who are ready to scale that are doing a lot of business development. They know they have got to be having strategic conversations, generating leads, and what is the messaging around that.

You do not want to sound like everybody else where you are sending out these messages like, “You need me and if you do not hire me, your business is going to fail.” We are all getting so sick of all these messages. I spend a lot of time on language with clients. One of the things they do in the Sales Maven Society is they will post, “Here’s what I am about to send out. Will you take a look at it?” I look at it and then I tweak it for them. I make it so it is very reader-friendly and increases their chances of people responding. I do not think I answered your question very specifically.

It is that scale level like wherever you are in your business, you are ready to move to the next level. You probably would benefit in some way from having somebody peel away and show you some of your blind spots and help you get to that next level. Guide you in a way that you feel comfortable and confident to initiate conversations that might feel a little difficult.

Do you hear a common thread across the different stages of business about the challenges that people face? Is there some commonality like is it always language, confidence, or something? Do you see that occur across the different levels?

People will sometimes be like, “People that have seven-figure businesses should be paying you at a much higher level.” The thing is, they are asking me a lot of times the same questions that people are getting to that six-figure level. A lot of it is language. It is like, “I am not sure how to have this particular conversation with this particular client. My discovery calls are taking too long and they are not converting. I do not know how to tell people that want to get on calls with me that they are not a good fit.”

All of these sometimes feel like awkward conversations but I can give language that feels easy and keeps the rapport intact. It doesn’t make anybody leave feeling pinched or offended by anything you say or do. It is about that confidence and then earning more money, frankly because a lot of it is like, “How do I increase my prices? How do I communicate the price increase?”

I did a whole lesson because we are running a certified strategist program for those who’d like to take podcasting and turn it into a complete business for themselves. Not your podcast as a business but the business of podcasting, helping other people set up their shows, or do all of that. I gave them a whole module on how to make price increases palatable or acceptable. It is a hard conversation to have. I agree with you. That is a topic I could hear again and again.

It is one of those things where people are like, “I got to tell everybody.” Oftentimes, I am like, “I do not know that you need to tell everybody. Let’s dig into who needs this information and how we can communicate it in a way that doesn’t sound like you are one defending your price because that is not a good place to be that puts you on the back foot. How can you do it in a way that you do not come off sounding defensive about making a price increase? Are you increasing enough to where it makes sense for your business? Are you shying away from like, ‘I do not want to tell this person that the price went up a couple of hundred or thousand dollars,’ depending on what you are doing? How do you then bless and release clients that are no longer a good fit?”

As you scale your business, there will always be those people who were with you in the beginning but are not a fit as your business grows because either they can’t afford you or they haven’t grown with you on that same level. It is okay to bless and release clients but do it in a way that feels good because, at some point, they may come back to you because they aren’t ready for wherever you are.

We will have to have some more. I could see two of us swapping stories for hours on end. I still look forward to the fact that this is a start of a great relationship between you and I. That is one of my favorite things about podcasting. You mentioned before that you liked podcasting. What is it that you love the most?

For me, it is a way to connect or put my message out into the world where people can consume it at their own pace. That is for me as far as the way that I podcast and a listener goes. I learned so much from podcasts. I learned about things that I would have never been able to find on my own and people’s stories. I love people’s stories. Any story about someone how they have reached whatever level of success they have reached or whatever trial or tribulation they have been through. I love the people aspect of it. Touching and making an impact to me feels like you are making a difference in the world.

I can see the underpinning of why you probably won’t quit podcasting anytime soon. One hundred episodes and more is that point of a pivot. Am I happy with the show? Do I want to make some changes? Keep it exciting for me but if the excitement is in the doing, connecting, human aspect, or human touch side of it then that is not going to change. You are still going to keep that no matter how the format slightly shifts for you.

The other thing I love about podcasts is some nuggets that I gave. Years ago so many could find and apply it to their business and it will mean something to them. That is the same about guesting on podcasts too. I still have subscribers that are coming to my list from a podcast that I was on a few years ago. That feels so awesome. There is no other marketing medium that I can think of that happens with.

Because you are an expert in selling, let’s talk about this. There are lots of podcast models which we are selling to our guests on the show. Probably one of the more dominant ways in which my clients make money off their podcasts is that they sell during the relationship-building or the connection of the podcast guest to them. What are great ways to have that post-interview sales entry conversation? How do we approach that? What is some advice there that you could give?

One thing is, it is always important to ask permission before you launch into any type of pitch. One of the ways I might frame that is I would say, “Based on some of the things you shared in the podcast, I wonder if there might be an opportunity for us to work together. Would you be interested in talking a little bit more about that?” That little prepping and asking that permission. If you say to me like, “Something you shared in the podcast made me think about a way we might work together.” My answer is going to be yes. The guest is going to be like, “Tell me more about that.” Once you have their permission, now they are in a mode where they are prepared for what is going to come. That is super important.

I would be careful about not doing a bunch of coaching and giving advice but doing like, “One of the things you had mentioned was this. It made me think of this program that one of the things we focus on is this and this. I am wondering if that is something you find value in.” That is like a trial close. They are probably going to say yes to that. If they say, “No, I do not think so,” leave the door open and be like, “I would absolutely love to earn your business at some point. When something changes in the future, please think of me. How can we stay connected?” Mean it like stay connected because people have a convincer strategy.

It is a certain number of times they have to say no to something before they say yes. You do not know the person that you are in conversation with because it is context-specific. You do not know what their particular convincer strategy is. You might present something to them as a way to work with you. They may say no to it because that is their first tick on the convincer strategy. They are like, “I have to say no.” Let’s make sure that we keep the relationship intact and keep in touch with them. Especially if you know they are an ideal client for you because chances are you are going to have an opportunity to put another offer in front of them and that may be their convincer strategy.

Sales Maven: You can learn a lot from podcasts and stories from people.

That may be the thing that tips them that says yes or they say, “Still not feeling like the right time for me.” “When something changes in the future, I’d love for us to continue our conversation or continue to work together.” Keep putting it in front of them until they give you the straight-up like, “I am never going to buy from you.” The hard no. It is a full sentence when it is like, “That is absolutely not something I would ever do.” Fine but if they are like, “It is not the right time for me.” That is still leaving the door open.

I want to touch on repurposing. You mentioned when we were prepping up and I mentioned how great your titles were that you are working on a keyword strategy. I can tell that you have good topics and you are working on a keyword strategy. Are you using them as blogs? Are you using them on social? How are you repurposing your podcast? What do you find that is working for you?

I try to repurpose, recycle and reuse everything that I do in whatever way. We know that every podcast episode gets turned into a version of a newsletter that goes out to the list. Multiple touches happen each week about the podcast on social media. The way to repurpose, we take little snippets of the podcast, and then we also take the full podcast and repurpose it onto YouTube.

I am always surprised every month when it is like, “This is how many minutes people spend on YouTube on your content.” I do have some videos on there but mostly it is podcast content. We also repurpose great episodes for the on-air coaching calls and the client success stories and we put them in the training center for Sales Maven Society members. If they are looking for something in particular, the podcast episode will pop up for them to listen to as well. That is another way that we repurpose the content.

We are doing some keyword things. I have written over 200 blogs. The person who is SEO is always going in and making some updates to the blog from the SEO standpoint. A lot of times, she will reach out to me and say, “This particular blog is doing well. We need a podcast that is a complementary podcast to it.” That will be another way that we repurpose.

You are getting so much value out of it. A lot of times, we use our episodes as blogs. Transcript episode blogs but we also then repurpose them as articles rather than publishing them in our own blog because we have both. I could see this future strategy where you are seeding out articles and these great publications because your advice is so universal. It doesn’t matter what industry you are in, your selling advice works. I could see that being a great little future outreach for you. It is going to get you more listeners in the long run. It is a little bit of ideas there. You mentioned that you have a lot of downloads and free offers that you make. What do you find works best in terms of both? What it is that works and how do you present that on air to your podcast listeners to get people to download it?

I keep a section on my website that you have to opt-in. You can’t find it on your own but that is where all the resources are for the podcast listeners. I never say, “I have this resource center for you. That has got 4 or 5 resources in it. Go grab them.” I always do an ad that is for one specific thing and resource. It still drives them. They go to the page and they are going to get to see all the other resources there but the objective is to convert them to subscribers to the list.

I try to make sure that it is somewhat related to the podcast episode but it is not specific to the podcast episode because I have full-length training, which is something that I pulled out of the Sales Maven Society. It is something people pay for that only my listeners can get. Only when they hear that ad, can they go and get it? I have something else that is a PDF that is about buying signals because that is something I talk about all the time. I do not know if I am answering your question very well but that is the strategy from that.

You are totally answering that. What I would love to do is make sure that people can connect with you over the blog post for this episode and be able to go to that area. What PDF do you think would be the most useful to podcasters trying to sell over their show? What is in your downloads? What is in your resource library?

I have an eBook called Closing The Sale and it talks about the three secrets of the close. I find that people think that they are selling and closing but oftentimes they are missing these three key things. If you are not doing these three key things, you aren’t closing. Even if you are reaching out or looking for sponsors, if you do not do these three things in your close, you haven’t closed.

If you do not do a good close with somebody, oftentimes they won’t say yes or no. They won’t make a decision. Your job is always to make the decision super easy for them to make and this is why I give this Closing The Sale eBook. It is going to give you some confidence and real strategy that is needed in that close process. I am always so surprised at how people think like, “I put an offer in front of them.” Did you close? Did you attempt to close the sale? They are like, “I told them I’d follow up next week.” I am like, “You then did not close. You missed something big there. We got to make sure that you close because if you start learning how to close better, you absolutely will close more deals. You’ll have better sponsors for your podcast. You’ll have better clients. It is so important.”

They will get to go check out your resource area and see what one looks like. They are going to get such a useful eBook in the end. Three keys to the close. Thank you for sharing that. Before we go, I want to know what is the future of the podcast. You hit 100 episodes. What is next for you? Are you going to change some things up or are you going to keep going?

As far as the podcast goes, I am going to keep going as I am and I am probably going to do more of the Mastering Excellence series because I am finding that people love them and they are getting great takeaways. It is a way for me to highlight some expert guests that aren’t necessarily clients, which is exciting. I am going to do a little bit more of that.

The other thing in my business that I am excited about is I am working on taking all of my superpowers around language and putting a package together for people who are doing launches. Even though you can hire out people to write your copy and you can work with somebody who is going to manage your launch, there are these key things that are happening in your communication, in the sale of whatever it is that you are pitching and launching, that are some real big missteps for people. I am working on a launch package to do some sales consulting for people who are doing six-figure launches.

There is so much value in that. You buy these launch programs. We did one because we are doing a crowdfund. We are doing equity crowdfund through Republic. We hired their marketing firm to come in and they give you the language of all of the emails and they are terrible. I am reading them and thinking to myself, “Why would anybody want to invest in reading that?” They are like, “No but this works.” I know better than that. I am a writer at the heart of everything so I am like, “No. I still need to make it me at the end of the day.” I messed with them but then they weren’t working.

We launched them and they weren’t working. I was convinced because the subject lines were all wrong. I sent everybody back to the drawing boards and we redid the subject lines before we sent it out to the larger list. I am glad we did that because I can so see that as being extremely valuable. I thought that as I was reading some of these subject lines, it is like, “They are not clickable. Email open is so bad. Why would I open them?” If you are already hurting your sale before you even open an email, what good is it?

I have somebody who did one where she is in the Sales Maven Society and she is like, “I did an AB test. I used one of Nikki’s subject lines. I used my normal subject line. I got a 50% more open on Nikki’s subject line.” It is because I always look at it from the reader’s perspective and make sure there is a sales component to it but that feels good. There are a lot of languages out there. I always say it is super cringy when I get people’s promotional stuff. I am always like, “They probably paid somebody a lot of money for that and it reads less.” It makes me cringe. I feel nauseous when I read them. I am like, “They are a waste in my email.”

You are inspiring me because I get so many people pitching themselves as a guest on my show with the cringiest emails ever. I have been meaning to gather them together and do a read-through on-air and a critique of them on-air. I am going to do it now because you inspired me. They are so bad some of them.

I do that in my group in the Sales Maven Society. I am not trying to shame anybody but I will. I will take out anything that is revealing about who it is. I will post it in the group and I will go, “How could they have made this better? I want them to be learning.” I will share like, “Here’s how they could have rewritten this.” It is like, “It feels so nice when you get that,” versus this person is like, “I am such a big deal and this is why you need me on your show.” It is like, “I do not know who you are. First of all. Telling me what I need is probably not in your best interest.”

I am so glad somebody reached out to me and got you on my show because this has been such a joy and so educational for me and listening to your show. There aren’t a lot of shows I say this. I listened to a ton of shows as I am previewing here but there is only a handful that I go back and listen to again. Some I go back because they are too much fun to not pass up and not check in with them and hear how they are doing.

With yours, there are some that I go back to because I need some education and I need something. I might need it quick. A quick little hit of something like, “I got to help someone with this. Is Nikki the right person? She has got a podcast for this. I can refer them.” That is how I use it as a resource and you are now one of my podcast resources. You are going to make my top list for my next 100th anniversary.

Thank you so much. I appreciate that.

Keep going. Another hundred, at least if not more. Sales Maven Podcast is such a great listen. Thank you so much for being on my show.

Thanks for having me.

Sales Maven: There are key things happening in your communication in the sale of whatever you’re pitching and launching that are real big missteps for people.

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I warned you it was going to be packed with some great things. I love when I can come away with notes. I have notes right here. I wrote about the five times rule and authenticity. I wrote about some of the episodes I want to go back to and check out. How to Pivot Your Business Without Losing Clients sounds great. I could refer that episode to a lot of my clients as well.

I love all the things that she is working on but I still love that she was so willing to share with all of you and she has got a great eBook for you. That is going to be available right at the episode blog post at TheBingeFactor.com. Navigate right to the most recent episode because you are probably reading to this and real-time, Nikki Rausch and finding all about Sales Maven.

You’ll be able to go right down there and there is going to be a big call-out. Also, down at the bottom, we’ll put bullet points with the eBook link right there. You can connect right through and we’ll check out all the messaging and the way that she does things. Here’s one of the things I learned. When you could put together a swipe file in addition to getting a great resource like the Sales Maven Society, you should take advantage of it.

I have people that I never unsubscribed from their email list because I always want to see what they are putting out and doing. I may drop in and out of their community like Nikki mentioned that people do in the Sales Maven Society. Staying connected through their newsletters, emails and all of those sequences give me an idea of what is going on. This is going to be one of those people that you want to stay connected to.

Go find Nikki Rausch. Go to the blog post for this episode at TheBingeFactor.com. Go connect up with her and be sure to download, read, subscribe, rate, and review the Sales Maven Podcast because it is fantastic and you are going to get a lot out of it personally. I know I have and I have a whole bunch of my playlist ready to listen on this next upcoming weekend.

Do not miss the Sales Maven Podcast Nikki Rausch. I am so glad she was here. I am so grateful that everyone has connected us in the universe here. I am going to be bringing you more back. I am very sure we are going to do some more things together. I am sure she’ll be back on with some more trainings and other things because who doesn’t want to learn how to sell authentically from your podcast. That is a great way to monetize your show. I will be back next time with another podcaster, another great binge factor. I am also looking for your input. Make sure you tell me who you’d like me to feature next.

Important Links

• Sales Maven Podcast
• Sales Maven
• Sales Maven Society
• How to Pivot Your Business Without Losing Clients – Sales Maven Podcast Past Episode
• Closing The Sale
• https://www.Facebook.com/YourSalesMaven/
• https://www.Instagram.com/Your_Sales_Maven/
• https://www.LinkedIn.com/in/NicoleRausch/