Winning the Staffing Sales Game with Tom Erb

If you’re struggling in this competitive landscape, then maybe it’s time to adjust your sales mindset. We are joined today by Tom Erb, the Founder and President of Tallann Resources, LLC – a national consulting firm specializing in the staffing and recruiting industry and corporate talent acquisition. We begin with Tom’s professional journey in staffing before discussing what is now one of the most influential books in the industry written six years ago by Tom, Winning the Staffing Sales Game. Then, our guest walks us through the current sales trends, the best practices to adopt, the sales framework that governs his work at Tallann, and how the company stays ahead of its competitors. We also unpack the value proposition challenge that plagues our industry, why sales is about having the right mindset first and foremost, the major industry changes that Tom has noticed in his career, his plans for the future, and more.

Listen Now

[0:01:14] DF: Hello, everyone. Thank you for joining us for another episode of The Staffing Show. Today, I am super excited to be joined by Tom Erb, who’s the president at Tallann Resources. Tom, very excited to have you on the show today and for our conversation diving into sales, sales frameworks, and all kinds of great education that I think our industry needs right now. Thanks so much for being here.

[0:01:34] TE: Yes. Thanks for having me, David.

[0:01:35] DF: To kick things off, could you tell us a little bit about your background and how you got into staffing? Then, we’ll jump into Tallann right after that?

[0:01:44] TE: Sure. It was very methodical as a small child. No, I got into staffing like everybody else did, which is just kind of like, oh, I fell into it. My background, went to West Virginia University, which by the way, is the number one party school in the US. Once I graduated, I thought I was going to get into maybe HR, or banking, or business, finance. Helped a friend of mine move to Columbus, Ohio from Morgantown, and applied to some jobs through there, and ended up getting a job as a recruiter working at Olsten, and that’s how my career started. So, been doing it for 30 years, been doing Tallann Resources for 14 years.

[0:02:25] DF: That’s awesome. I know you have one of the, I would say, one of the top more influential books in the staffing industry for best practices. I saw you speak recently, and giving out the book. Can you tell us a little bit about what the book is, what it’s about, any updates, or exciting things related to it?

[0:02:41] TE: Sure. So, it’s Winning the Staffing Sales Game, and it came out I think about six years ago now. So, 94-page book. I would never write a book that I wouldn’t read. Beyond 94 pages, my adult ADD starts to get the best of me. So, yes, it’s meant to be concise, and it talks about my sales methodology, and just kind of a step by step of how to sell in the staffing industry.

[0:03:07] DF: I know sales has been one of the top priorities for staffing agencies, talked about a lot on the podcast right now more than we did a couple of years ago. I think we’re like rounding like maybe over a year of sales being the number one challenge for staffing. It’s not actually finding candidates, and you got that book out. So, what are some of the things that trends you’re seeing, best practices, anything that you can share with the audience?

[0:03:30] TE: I think a good barometer for what’s going on in the industry is what people come and ask me to speak on. So, for several years, it was just not about recruiting. It was like, “I could talk about sales too.” “No, no, no. We just need recruiting.” Then, all of a sudden, it was like, “Can you talk about sales also? It’s starting to get tough out there.” So, yes. You said 12 months, I would say, that’s about right, that’s about what I’ve been seeing, 12 to 18 months of just getting back to sales.

As far as what we’re seeing out there, it’s just, we did it to ourselves. It was just a matter of, wow, the wave came in, and we were riding high, and we were having people call in, and place orders. All of a sudden, we thought we were great salespeople, and it’s like, sales isn’t supposed to be this easy. Then, we kind of came back down to earth.

The industry hit its highest number ever from a revenue standpoint in 2022. And 2023, we took a step back, but we still had one of the highest revenue years ever. So, it was one of those things like it’s kind of like you’re going 100 miles an hour and you slow down to 80, and everybody goes, “Whoa, what’s going on here?” But we had stopped selling, and you could see that across the industry, that we were not hiring salespeople. We had all sorts of people that were saying, “Why would I sell? I can’t fill the jobs that I have.” And you go, “That’s not the point. You got to keep selling. Some of your jobs aren’t that great.”

So, now we’re back to the point of people are selling, they’re hirings salespeople, they’re training salespeople. We’re starting to see some of the effects of that, we’re starting to see some results. It takes a while. You got to get the salespeople in, you got to get them trained up, you got to let them go through the sales process. It’s not something that happens overnight. We’re starting to see more of the results of that. I think we’re starting to see some loosening up of the market in general. We’re starting to see some bounce back across the industry, which is good.

[0:05:28] DF: Yes. I was having conversation with somebody yesterday, and they’re saying that the last four weeks, it looks like things might – in healthcare at least, that there’s some optimism, more optimism that I’ve heard in a while. There’s pockets where things have been good. But I do think back to, it was just order taking there for a while, and nobody was investing in the sales side of it.

[0:05:46] TE: Yes, it was just writing out orders.

[0:05:49] DF: I hope everybody listening to this remembers this less than two years from now or five years from now. We’re back in order taking this, like, always be selling, and I think, focused on getting the right clients probably, and not just order taking. Because those can go away very rapidly as they have recently for some. When it comes to driving growth in sales, I think you had talked about a framework that you have. I would love if you just kind of explain that to the audience.

[0:06:16] TE: Sure. Yes. We essentially have just a methodology. It’s not rocket science, it’s really about doing the best practice things consistently, and having a process, and a structure for it that’s repeatable. Our process is based on six different phases, that starts from the very beginning of just identifying who are the ideal client profile, who are the companies in the contacts that we have the best chance to doing business with. And basically, just saying, “Clients we’d like working with look like this, let’s go out and find more of those.” Then, going through the sales process, qualifying, disqualifying through a multi-step process that we have. Then, putting opportunities in the pipeline, working those opportunities through closed out wins and losses.

But always, you’re feeding that pre pipeline, the pre funnel. You just got to keep people going in there, because if you don’t, you go through that roller coaster effect that anybody who’s done sales knows what the roller coaster effect is. It’s doing a bunch of prospecting and a bunch of stuff happens, so we stopped prospecting. Then, when we work that stuff through, then we go, “Oh, crap. We forgot to prospect.” Then, you start that. So, you go through these ups and downs. We’re trying to smooth that out at the top.

Then, that leads to the prospecting process, which is, we still do 10 weeks. We now used to be 12 touches, now we do 15 touches. We have variations of all that. I’ve got clients that have dozens and dozens of touches, and they carry it out for as long as a year. And you can, especially with the automation that’s in there. But it’s really about what is it that I do differently that is better than what my competitors do that provides value to my prospects and clients, or perceived value. Then, how do I articulate that and then reinforce that over, and over, and over again to give the prospects a chance to kind of absorb that, and kind of think through it, and say, “Yes. You know what that is different? They sound different than everybody else. Maybe I should talk to them.”

[0:08:16] DF: I kind of jumped the gun there. You’re talking about kind of what you know, and your expertise on the sales front. Tell us a little bit about Tallann. What are you doing at Tallann and what makes you different, and why do people work with you?

[0:08:30] TE: Yes. I don’t know. 

[0:08:34] DF: Coming from the number one party school.

[0:08:35] TE: So, for 14 years, I left – I was at Spherion for 10 years. For those of you who don’t remember Spherion, it was one of the largest staffing companies in the US, and got bought by Randstad. I left 14 years ago and started up Tallann Resources. We do consulting and training for the staffing and recruiting industry. So, we work with staffing and recruiting firms of all sizes from startups with zero revenue, all the way up to the largest publicly traded companies in the world. Then, everything in between, and all across every vertical. We’ve worked with over a thousand staffing companies in the last 14 years, and do everything from sales consulting, to recruitment consulting, tech stack evaluation, recommendations, strategic planning, operational analysis, all sorts of different things.

Then, we also have a training side where we have an online training platform that’s all staffing specific. And then, of course, live training, and then I do a lot of speaking as well throughout the year, both in person as well as a lot of webinars, a lot of these podcasts. So, in a nutshell, that’s what we do.

[0:09:46] DF: I know when companies come to you, the fact you’re doing sales consulting, that’s probably pretty straightforward. But what are the challenges, top three challenges people have when they’re saying, “Hey, I need to talk to Tallann.”

[0:09:57] TE: The number one is lack of accountability. A lot of times, when I talk about performance management, I talk about three levels of performance management. You’ve got visibility, which is, do I know what to look at and do I have it? Most ATSs now and CRMs have pretty good visibility, so we can track activities, and appointments and all that stuff. So, most companies at this point do have to do an okay to a pretty good job of visibility. Then, the next level is responsibility. Responsibility means, does my team know what success looks like, and do they understand how they’re being evaluated, are we tracking that. That’s where we talk about KPIs. We talk about metrics.

I would say, most staffing companies struggle at that level. Some do okay, not many are proficient at it. There are some, and if you are, then you are ahead of the curve. Then, that last level is accountability, which is kind of, what happens if somebody’s just not doing what they’re supposed to be doing, and how do we handle that, what are the results of it, are we holding people accountable. So, it’s not just about if they haven’t done it, but do we have the structure in place where people not only know what’s expected, but they know that they need to do it. There’s reporting mechanisms, there are one-on-one meetings, there is coaching, and counseling, and feedback, and all of those things that go into it.

So, the number one thing is accountability. That’s why companies struggle with a lot. The other thing I would say is process, just having certain things in place, just fundamental stuff in place. What is our value prop? What are our differentiators? What’s our sales process? How does that integrate into our ATS or our CRM? Are we utilizing that the right way? So, that would be the second piece. 

Then, I think the third one is probably internal selection. We find the staffing companies, it’s kind of like the cobbler’s kid’s shoes, make shoes for everybody else, but they run around without any shoes. We are really good at recruiting for our clients, but a lot of times, we don’t pay as much attention internally. So, understanding really what a successful sales rep, or recruiter, or account manager, or branch manager, or whatever, what success looks like, and what are the attributes that lead to that success, give people the best chance of success? Then, how do we actually go out and source people based on that? How do we select them? What’s our criteria for evaluating them? How do we onboard them? All of that stuff. So, those are three large, overarching areas, but that’s what we see pretty frequently.

[0:12:50] DF: As a marketer, I’ve always been excited about the value prop stuff. Are you going in and helping to kind of facilitate the creation of the differentiated value props? I feel when I look at staffing agencies and knowing that there’s – because I don’t remember the exact number, but like, 27,000 in North America or something crazy. It is, and everybody’s putting people to work. Do you have a methodical process where you’re going and saying, “Hey, here’s what we’re going to do to get you to a spot where you can talk about this differently”? Or, how do you interpret that?

[0:13:20] TE: Yes, we do a lot of that, because you really – that’s the first step to creating the whole sales process. And the whole sales methodology is a lot easier to sell if you sound different and better than others. We have some clients that when we first come in, they have a strong value proposition, they have – maybe they specialize in a niche, maybe they have the type of experience internally or with the owner that really resonates with their prospects. There’s a lot of different things that can lead to a value prop and differentiators.

So, you’ve got some that have, it’s very obvious. Then, others, they feel that the area they’re strong in really isn’t necessarily what differentiates them. And the things that do differentiate them, they’re kind of discounting. So, we uncover those and we talk through those. Then, you do have some staffing companies where it’s just really hard to see what does make them different. They really are kind of that me too staffing company where, yeah, we fill jobs. And so, then we got to really work on that. In some cases, it’s not who we are today, it’s who we need to be. Then, we start to work on that. Then, we go, “Well, you know what? You’re trying to be all things to all people, for instance. That’s watering down everything. So, let’s take a look. Well, did you realize that 60% of your business is in this area? you have a specialization you don’t even know you have.”

Then, we start to get into talking about that, and then we say, “Well, how do we really capitalize on them? What does it look like?” So, you get into that, you say, “What makes us different? How do we quantify? What’s the benefits to the prospect? What’s our proof?” All of that stuff.

[0:15:04] DF: I know, having talked to staffing agencies, that there’s a lot of people who think that they have them, and then you go read their About Us page and you’re like, “Well, that sound inherently like so many others.” Do you have any good examples or any guidance that you’d be open to give the audience on what a good one looks like? 

[0:15:21] TE: It’s in my book.

[0:15:24] DF: It’s in your book.

[0:15:26] TE: I would tell you, the number one thing that we see, and this doesn’t just apply to staffing companies, it applies in life, if you think about it. Specialization. If you have a specialization, if you can show that you have a specialization, and you can show that you are committed to it, that you have experience in that, maybe that’s where the owner or leaders came from. Let’s say, healthcare, which healthcare by itself isn’t a specialization, it’s a very broad vertical. But if you are placing RNs, and the owner of the company is as a former RN, that gives you some additional credibility. If in addition, you are bringing in former RNs to do recruiting, and things like that, then that’s another thing. So, that would be an example of one.

The more niche you can get, the better. What I always say is, how many degrees can you drill down? Light industrial is not a specialization. Manufacturing is not a specialization. Plastics, manufacturing, then you start to get in a little bit of specialization. Medical equipment plastics manufacturing is another level down. Engineers that – you can keep going down, and down, and down. The other thing I tell people too. A lot of times they’re hesitant to say, “Well, I specialize in this.” They go, “Well, yes, but we do other things.” A specialization does not mean exclusivity. Now, if you do it exclusively, then that’s something you talk about. I talk about it all the time, I go, “We are 98% exclusive to the staffing recruiting industry. Two percent of the time, we’ll get a referral and do something else.”

So, if you are exclusive, or almost exclusive, that’s another level of specialization. But I can specialize in five or six things. I was working in one of the largest staffing companies in the US when I was a sales rep. and I was selling nothing but call centers. I talked about our specialization. We were a generalist company, we did everything. But I talked about how we – one of our specializations was call centers, and here’s all the things that we did around that. So, specialization is a big one, expertise, just a record of success. There’s a lot of different things that we can focus on.

[0:17:39] DF: As you’re talking about that, the things that I consistently see at staffing agencies, not only looking at specialization from the perspective of who is it we’re replacing or what type of placement. I think there’s a behavioral segmentation. I’ve talked about this on the podcast a couple times, like going, and inhale. If you’re going to be a travel nurse staffing firm, and that’s what you’re going to do, are you the high touch, high like call us at any point when you have a problem? Or are you the high pay or the most jobs? Like there’s other variations of that within the…that can be valuable too.

[0:18:09] TE: Yes.

[0:18:11] DF: That’s really great. Now, one of the other is, I know you and I talked about a little bit, it was just kind of the shifting to – avoiding the transactional component of sales and having that be part of your mindset. Could you dig into that a little bit?

[0:18:24] TE: Yes. It goes back to when I first started doing the 12-step, 10-week process. What we looked at is that, most salespeople really approach sales as a series of unrelated transactions. It’s kind of shot gunning. It’s throwing spaghetti up against the wall. We hear it a lot of times with sales reps, where, I’ll call somebody, I’d do a cold call. I may have sent them an email; I may have sent them a series of emails. I don’t reference any of that. Then, I call them three months later, because they told me to call back, and I call up as if I’m doing it all over again. 

We also – what we’re trying to basically do when we do that is just get our timing right, just get lucky with timing. When I call up, they had a bad day with their current staffing provider, and I get a chance. But the reality of it is, is that, they’ve got to get to know us, it’s not a transactional buy on their end, they’re going to vet this out. This is an important decision for them. This is not a cheap decision to get staffing. Even our smallest clients in staffing, they’re spending tens of thousands of dollars. So, it is not an insignificant purchase for them. 

So, the fact that you’re going to call up and they’re going to go, “Hey, it’s your lucky day. I’m going to give you five orders.” It just doesn’t happen, but that’s how we approach it. We approach it very transactionally. So, instead, what we’re going to do is build on our messaging. So, we have that value prop, and then we start to go, “Okay. How do I reach out to people with different communication methods?” Because I don’t know which way they’re going to communicate the best. I don’t know if they like emails, if they like phone calls, if they like texting, social media, whatever it is. But I’m going to reach out to them different ways to find out what’s the best way of communicating. Then, you’re just trying to get over the course of time to build out your message, and to grow some demand, and some interest on their side.

[0:20:21] DF: With that, so I mean, you mentioned earlier going from 10 messages to 15, and the more touchpoints. But throughout that, it sounds like you’re changing what you were asking for, and making sure you’re kind of tying it all into the story and the value prop as well. It’s not just, “Hey, get on the call with me” 15 times. They…about how you’re approaching that. 

[0:20:39] TE: Yes. It’s about providing value to them. It’s not about just saying, “Hey, do you have any jobs we can fill?” [Inaudible 0:20:48]

[0:20:50] DF: I have a software company and the podcasts; I get so many emails. They’re like, “Hey, we’ve got developers for you.”

[0:20:57] TE: That’s right. It’s the same thing. On the staffing side, it’s like we act like we’re the only salesperson out there. It’s like, “Oh, geez, I haven’t heard that 10 times already today, that somebody wants to know if we’re happy with our current provider, or if we have a job that we can help with.” So, it is about how do we create credibility, how do we provide value. It doesn’t have to be all about just sell, sell, sell. It can also be thought leadership, it can be about, “Hey, here’s some areas that reinforce the fact that were positioned as experts in this particular space.”

[0:21:34] DF: What are some of the steps that people can take to make it so that they don’t feel like that they’re just selling and selling? I feel like that is, I think especially in this market, I even hear it from the software vendors who are like, “Man, I’m just reaching out so much, and trying to get momentum because of the work market conditions.” What are some steps people can take?

[0:21:50] TE: So, I think the first step is you got, it’s a couple of things. One is, sales reps really need to have the mindset that this prospect would be better off knowing me, knowing my company, using our service, using our product. I am not inconveniencing them or interrupting them. I should not be apologizing for reaching out to them. I am providing them with an opportunity to solve a problem, because they are an ideal client profile of mine. So, I know that this type of company, this type of size, this type of person in that organization at this certain level. That if they have those areas, odds are they need our help, and odds are they’re not happy.

Most companies are not particularly happy with their current staffing solution. Most of them, it’s not really a staffing solution. It’s just kind of a Band-Aid on it. It’s just, “Oh, I have three staffing companies, they’re not getting it done, so let me add a fourth. Now, let me add a fifth.” It’s just slapping Band-Aids that aren’t doing anything. So, we kind of know that going into it, that if I’ve got these criteria, odds are they probably are having some challenges. That if I really truly believe our company does a better job, they’re better off talking to us. If we change that mindset, then that’s the very first step, and that’s the biggest step. Is to go in there at a peer level, and you’re not coming in arrogant, but you’re coming in confident, and you’re coming in as another professional, saying, “I believe that I can help you solve a problem.”

[0:23:29] DF: You’re leaving money on the table by not working with us, here’s how.

[0:23:35] TE: You’re working extra hours, you’re having sleepless nights, you’re getting grief from your boss, because you’re not working with us.

[0:23:42] DF: Yes. “I’m so sorry to bother you today.” That’s the email format I’ve seen so many of. “I’m sorry to bother you.”

[0:23:52] TE: I’m so sorry to bother you. Which indicates, that person, oh, here comes a sales pitch or something I don’t need.

[0:24:00] DF: Yes. Yes. They don’t believe on what they’re telling.

[0:24:03] TE: Rather than they’re trying to provide me with something of value.

[0:24:07] DF: Yes. So, the mindset is something that we’ve talked about as having the sales mindset. So, you’re going in training on that, and then getting leadership to buy into it as well, in terms of, here’s the components that need to exist for our organization. 

[0:24:21] TE: Yes. Absolutely.

[0:24:23] DF: I know you talked about helping out on the identifying and selecting talent side of things as well. What are some best practices in today’s market? Have things changed with where things are at? Is it same as always? What are some areas that you recommend?

[0:24:34] TE: I think, things are always changing, so yes, there’s definitely some things that have changed. One of the pieces of advice that I give my clients all the time is, a lot of times we tend to over value experience, over value, say, industry experience. Not to say the people with staffing experience and staffing sales experience don’t provide value. Some of them provide tremendous value, but some of them don’t. And yet, we tend to overvalue it when we’re selecting people. I just had a conversation with one of my clients a couple days ago, we were going through evaluating a couple of candidates. I said, “Well, let’s take out the fact that they have – both of them have about eight years of staffing experience. If you took that out of the equation, would you hire them?” And they go, “No.” I go, “Then, why would you hire him if they do?”

So, that could be the things we really look at is, I’m looking for people, particularly in sales, I’m looking for, are they likable, credible, and coachable. Those are like the foundational things. With likeable, there’s two sides of that. Are they personally likable? Are people attracted to them? But also, are they sociable? Do they like interacting with people all day. We found this with both recruiters and salespeople, is that, sociability is just as important or even more important as likability, is friendliness, right? Because sociability is what gets you to pick up the phone over and over again. If I don’t like talking to people, or if I am drained by interaction all day, I’m not going to want to pick up phone all day. So, I’m not going to want to go to networking events in the evenings. I want to go home and do nothing and not talk to anybody. I want to turn my phone off and all that.

So, I’m not saying that you need people that are off the charts, sociable, social butterflies, but they need to have a certain level of sociability. So, that’s one of the things we really look at. Likability, both on friendliness and sociability. Are they credible? Do they come across as somebody that is trustworthy and that is telling the truth? That’s something a lot of times you can pick up fairly quick. Then, are they coachable? That may be the biggest piece of it. Are they willing to do processes? Are they willing to learn? Are they willing to get better? Or, are they, “No, I just – I don’t want to do anything.” It worked 10 years ago, and I’m just going to keep doing it. You can’t tell me what to do.” So likable, credible, and coachable to me are the biggest, biggest things. If we can have that, then we’re going to have success. So, we’ve seen it over and over again.

[0:27:19] DF: That’s great. There’s so many people that look at, well, they have this experience at this company. I mean, another mistake I see is, they worked at this huge brand that we all know and love, so let’s bring them to our tiny business.

[0:27:34] TE: By the way, we have no infrastructure, we have none of the resources that they had at that place, and we don’t have the name recognition. So yes, it’s like hiring somebody from Microsoft and saying, “Well, you can sell my product because you had success in Microsoft.” If somebody comes from Microsoft, you’re probably going to pick up felt.

[0:27:51] DF: What are some other kind of examples? I mean, you kind of gave the foundation for, I guess, the characteristics of a salesperson. But are there any other examples of top sales performers, people that you’ve witnessed kind of excel in the industry and any other aspects or kind of characteristics that you’ve seen about them? 

[0:28:07] TE: Yes. One of the greatest things about VoiceOver IP, is that we now have so much access to recorded calls. We can listen like never before to as many sales calls as we want to. So, I listened to a lot of sales calls, of cold calls. One of the biggest things that I see that differentiates salespeople is just the ability that when you do get a live person, which doesn’t happen very often, but one out of every 25 calls, on average, that when we do get a live person, do we have a good conversation with them? Are we able to engage them at a certain level? What I always tell my sales team, my sales reps that I work with is, when we get somebody live on the phone, our number one goal should be that that’s the last time we ever cold call them, last time we ever do it.

What I mean by that is, I want to create enough rapport, enough credibility. Then, I’m also going to have follow up to reinforce that, that I want to do that enough to where the next time I call them, I don’t have to remind them who I am. I don’t have to cold call again. It’s hard enough to do one cold call. It’s hard enough when you pick it up. Last thing I want to do is, three months from now go, “Yes. I was talking to you three months ago and you said you didn’t have any needs, but to call you three months. So, here I am. Do you have any needs? I don’t know if you remember me.” That’s the number one thing we get. “I don’t know if you remember me.” That’s another cold call.

The sales reps that do really well are able to do that easier. They’re able to – one of the biggest things we need to do is get that person’s defenses down a little bit. Because the split second they realize this is a sales call, they’re not thinking, “Oh, great. Sales call.” They’re thinking, “Oh, crap. I didn’t mean to pick up this phone. How fast can I get them off of the phone? They’re going to ask me for an appointment they’re going to keep me.” So, how do we bring those defenses back down? We can do that through humor. We can do that through being maybe a little self-deprecating. “Hey, I’m sure I’m not the first person to call you today.” Sure, that when you answer the phone, you probably weren’t expecting to talk to a sales rep. That’s not the favorite thing you want to talk to. Something to that effect to kind of break the ice a little bit.

Also, what I found too is what works really, really well is giving them a finite number amount of time, and asking them if that’s okay. Like, “I know we’re both busy, I just wanted to introduce myself, I wanted to get on your radar, let you know that we exist. Talk to you for just a couple minutes. Do you have five minutes to talk?” 

Here’s the interesting thing about that, I’m going down a little tangent here a little. But here’s the thing we found about that. So, I’ve been doing this for 30 years, and I was taught sales 29 years ago by a sales consultant. She would have absolutely fallen out of her chair if she knew that we were asking a question, “Do you have five minutes?” Because her whole thing, and this was how old school sales methodology that still goes on is, don’t give them a chance to say no. Don’t ask them if they have time. Don’t ask them if this is a good time. And you go, “Okay.” Do any of us like that? Do any of us like it when that happens to us?

DF: I hang up on people. I get so angry. If I’m like, “I don’t have time right now” and it might even be something of interest, like I would be open to talking to. But like, “Hey, I need to jump onto a meeting, ” and then they just plow through. And I’m like, “They’re dead to me now.” 

[0:31:43] TE: That’s how they’ve been trained, that’s how they’ve been conditioned. The interesting thing is, we listen to all these live recorded calls, and we asked for a few minutes. Do you have three to five minutes to talk? Ninety-five percent say yes.

[0:31:57] DF: That’s crazy.

[0:31:58] TE: Ninety-five percent say yes. In fact, we have had just recently in the last couple of weeks, we’ve had prospects, that their response was, “Wow, nobody ever asks me that.” Yes, you have five minutes. If we just treat people with respect, if we kind of zig when other sales reps are zagging, the other sales reps are doing pushy stuff, and they’re just barreling through. If we act different, that lets their defenses down, brings it down, we can have a regular conversation, and then that’s the last cold call we ever have with them.

Now, does it work every single time? No, but some people just, you’re never going to develop a rapport with them anyways, that’s their personality, not you. But if we do that consistently, we’re going to have better conversations. We may not get an appointment, we may not get a next step, or anything like that. But now, we’ve got them into our network, we send them an invite to connect on LinkedIn. We send them follow up information, we keep in touch with them. But now, they’re part of our network, not just somebody we’re going to cold call again in three months.

[0:32:57] DF: That’s great. I haven’t even thought about that. I’ve probably been – not probably. I’ve been the person who’s, “Hey, it’s been three months. Remember me?”

[0:33:05] TE: We all do, right? I don’t know if you remember me, but we talked a few months ago. Well, that’s cold call. That’s another cold call. That’s like, “Geez. Do I really want to go through that again. Did I do all this work to not have to cold call again?” 

[0:33:20] DF: Yes. That’s also, I had not thought about the kind of opening to cold calls and how it was. I think about that all the time, about people are calling, and just barreling through. Are there any other kind of major shifts that you’ve seen in sales process or sales approach over the years? Because I know you’ve been at this for a bit, and I didn’t realize you listen to as many cold calls as you do as well.

[0:33:39] TE: Yes. I think the other thing that – I’ll tell you the other thing that has been eye opening as I’ve listened to so many calls, is, 90% of the time, it’s the salesperson that is rushing through the call not the prospect. When you listen to it as a third party, you can hear that that sales rep is uncomfortable, they feel like they’re wasting that person’s time. So, they’re rushing through, they’re missing some verbal cues, they’re missing opportunities to have more of a conversation. It’s usually not the prospect.

Now, there are times when you’re calling in and the prospect’s in the middle of something. But usually, that’s pretty quick and they’re going to go, “Hey, listen. I’ve got somebody in my office right now, I thought you were somebody else, then I answered the call” or whatever. But in most cases, we put that pressure on ourselves to get off call real quick when they’re actually open to a little bit more conversation. Now, we can’t abuse that, we can have a 30-minute conversation usually, because like you said, you’ll get hung up on. So, that’s something else that we see with that.

The other thing that we’re seeing now to answer a question I get a lot is, is it okay to call somebody’s cell phone? The answer is sometimes. The reason why I say that is because I think we’re in a real transition period of communication code that accelerated this move to cell phones. We’re already seeing. I wrote about it in my book six years ago about Coca-Cola getting rid of voicemail at their corporate office, and about more, and more companies were shifting to bring your own device and that kind of stuff. COVID really accelerated that because people were working remote, and they were using their cell phones. 

So, I think it’s appropriate now to use cell phones. I think if somebody gets bent out of shape, which happens every once in a while, then you just are respectful and you apologize, and say, “Apologize, didn’t realize this was your cell phone” or just say, “Hey, I didn’t realize that this was unacceptable. This is how we’re able to communicate with most of our clients, is via cell phone. That’s how we got in.” If they asked, “How did you get my number?” My response is going to be, “We’re good at what we do. Our whole job is to find people.” Kind of make a little joke and see how they respond.

[0:35:58] DF: Great advice. Also, I mean, I’m just thinking about the mentality or mindset of people when they’re caught in that hole of rushing. I mean, I think that’s something I’ve done as well, where you’re like rushing the conversation. I can go back to the mindset of, do you believe that you’re making them better and there to help them, and making sure that they understand? So, that all ties back together.

I remember, you presented at the sales summit, and brought up some report. I cannot remember the name of it for the life of me, but it was about the future of staffing, and the gap. I think, the natural gap that exists, and I think it’s a nice positive story and way that maybe a close out the conversation from an industry perspective and where we’re going. I don’t know if you wanted to –

[0:36:40] TE: Was that The Demographic Drought one?

[0:36:44] DF: Yes. I’m trying to find it, actually, and I couldn’t find. After I left, I think I even shared that with my team. I’ve said, that was impactful to see that and also see that the industry will return to normal.

[0:36:54] TE: Yes. So. Ron Hetrick is the chief economist for Lightcast. He wrote The Demographic Drought a couple years ago. Then has since then written two other white papers, they’re all white papers that you can download for free off the internet. It is Bridging the Gap, which is the follow-up to Demographic Drought, Bridging the Talent Gap, or something like that. Then, the other one is, Who is going to do the work? That talks more about service industry. So, you’re talking like blue collar stuff, but also getting into all different types of services, including healthcare, emergency services, police officers, and firefighters, and all those. It’s a really fascinating, scary overview of just on a macro level what’s going on in the US and around the world.

To just paraphrase it real quick, we have not had enough kids for the last 50 years, to be able to make up for the baby boomers that are retiring en masse, and other people that are exiting the traditional workforce to do other things, nontraditional work and all that. And. we also have a huge disparity between people with college degrees, and work that doesn’t require or need a college degree. We’ve got a huge demand for that type of work, and that’s increasing. And yet, we’ve got this huge increase in college educated employees, and there’s just a gap between there. To me, and you said it was a positive thing. To me, the positive piece of it is that, it is job security for the staffing industry for the rest of our lives. 

[0:38:38] DF: I mean, I guess, as you were saying, and I’m like, this isn’t necessarily sound great. I’m like, it means people are going to have jobs.

[0:38:47] TE: Yes. It’s like the Marines. Let me tear you down before we build you back up. I mean, from a society standpoint, is going to create a lot of problems. From a profession, career standpoint, the staffing industry is going to be more relevant than ever for decades. We’re going through this where sales is a bigger issue right now. We’ve gone back to sales, is really hard, but that pendulum is going to swing back here pretty hard who knows when. Probably after the presidential election, but it’s going to swing back. That’s where we’re going to be. There’s just a shortage of talent.

Doing this for 30 years, I’d much rather be in the market, in the profession when there’s a shortage of talent than a shortage of jobs any day. I would take that. I’ve been in both and shortage of talents much better, because that means there’s demand for our services.

[0:39:40] DF: Exactly, and I second that. With that, we’re going to jump over to the speed round. So. we’ve got a few last questions for you. What advice do you wish you were given before entering the staffing industry?

[0:39:50] TE: I wasn’t given the advice, but I figured it out fairly soon, which is, try and do as many different things as you can in the industry. I just wrote an article about this. I’m blowing up to speed round here right now. But I wrote an article about, is this a profession or is this a job? It did take me a little while to go, “Okay. This can be just a job or I can make this a profession.” It changed my approach to things for the better. So, that’s my advice.

[0:40:18] DF: Great advice. In the last five years, what new belief, behavior, or habit has most improved your life?

[0:40:24] TE: So, I would say, it is role playing., and it is just practicing things over and over again, until we get to the point of just knowing it. So that when we put it in practice, it’s just automatic. Don’t practice on your prospects, don’t practice in the middle of things, know what you’re going to say. So, we’ve really had a much more intensive focus in the last few years on role playing, practicing, just getting proficient in all aspects of the sales process. 

[0:40:56] DF: That’s great. What book or books have you given most as a gift? I bet I know the answer to this one.

[0:41:01] TE: I do have lots of copies of my book.

[0:41:05] DF: My brain went there immediately, and I was like –

[0:41:07] TE: It is, but the other book that I really like, and there’s tons of them. But To Sell Is Human is a great book by Daniel Pink. It’s a great book for anybody, not just salespeople. Daniel Pink is my favorite business author; all of his stuff is great. So, I would say that that’s a great book to get.

[0:41:26] DF: And if you guys are listening to this and don’t have it also, Winning the Staffing Sales Game is another book you should have.

[0:41:32] TE: Yes. That’s not a bad book. Yes. I endorse that book. 

[0:41:34] DF: Awesome. Well, that’s it for the questions. Are there any closing comments or thoughts for the audience?

[0:41:40] TE: I think a lot of people are feeling that sales is hard right now. I hear that, sales is really hard. Sales is supposed to be hard. We went through a period where sales wasn’t that hard. That’s the anomaly. This is the norm. When things are hard, that’s when there’s huge opportunity, because most of your competitors just kind of give up. I use the analogy all the time about the Tour de France, everybody’s all bunched up when it’s flat. When they’re going up the mountain is when the best ones separate themselves. The best ones aren’t looking forward to the flat areas. The best ones are looking forward to the mountain. That’s what we need to look at is, whenever there’s adversity, there’s opportunity. Right now, there’s adversity, and you’ve got some of your competitors that are lagging behind, and now is the time to shoot ahead of them.

[0:42:28] DF: I love that. I think that’s a great way to close out. Well, Tom, thanks so much for the conversation. Thanks for joining today. It was great talking to you.

[0:42:34] TE: Thanks for having me, David.

Want to keep up with the latest staffing industry news? Sign up for our weekly newsletter!