Join us on The Guy Who Knows A Guy Podcast as Michael Whitehouse sits down with Jeff West, a renowned author and sales expert with decades of experience transforming the sales landscape. Dive into Jeff’s journey of authoring award-winning business parables and uncover the insights that have made him a pivotal figure in sales and entrepreneurship.
Transcript
Welcome back to the Guy Who Knows A Guy podcast. These are bonus episodes that did not fit into Season 6, which was a countdown to JV Connect. We hit JV Connect and we still had some great interviews to share with you. But don't worry, you haven't missed JV Connect. It's a quarterly event. You can learn more about it by sticking around to the end of this episode. We'll tell you all about it. But right now, check out this next awesome interview with one of the awesome people that the Guy Who Knows A Guy knows and is going to introduce to you now.
Jeff West:Welcome
Michael Whitehouse:to the guy who knows a guy podcast. I'm your host, Michael Whitehouse, the guy who knows a guy. And our guest today is Jeff West. Let me tell you about Jeff. After over 30 years in sales, sales, leadership, and entrepreneurship. Jeff West is now a best selling and award winning author, speaker, and leadership coach. His books, the unexpected tour guide and said the lady with the blue hair coauthored with direct sales legend, Lisa M Wilbur, who I. Thought I had her on my show, but maybe I had her on a different show. I don't know. We were talking about that beforehand, but I definitely have met her. Definitely know her. She's awesome. Anyway, those books have earned recognition from the Axiom Business Book Awards, the National Indie Excellence Awards, and the American Book Fest Awards. His latest book, Streetwise to Sales Wise Become Objection Proof and Beat the Sales Blues, co authored with Bob Berg, who you may remember from earlier this season, and is earning praise from business leaders around the U. S. He has been a guest on numerous sales leadership shows and is a member of the GoGiver Success Alliance created by Bob Berg and Kathy Tagenow.
Jeff West:Welcome to the show, Jeff. My honor. Thank you so much for having me on board, Michael. Awesome.
Michael Whitehouse:Yes. So, so we were talking earlier, cause you, you you talk about becoming objection proof and creating fusion points. And when I was going through the notes you sent me, I said, okay, objection proof. If I can. I don't know what that is exactly, but I can guess what that means. And you talk about the science of how people make decisions. Important. Can kind of figure out what that means. And then fusion points. What's that mean? So tell us, let's start with there. What, tell us about a fusion points
Jeff West:and what that means. You know, Fusion Points is actually a branding that I did, Michael, that grew out of my question that I had when I was leading a team of about 400 salespeople. And that was, I could get two people in the same room. Their resumes looked similar, their leadership skills looked right, everything about them told me they'll both be very successful out there in the field of sales. And then I would put them out there and one would decide to stick it out and be great, and the other would make the decision to quit. And it puzzled me why that happened. So I began to study the science of how people make decisions. And long story short, I ran across the works of a Dr. Antonio Damasio, who was a professor of neuroscience at USC and an associate professor at the Salk Institute. Long story short, the entire process is built around the idea that people make decisions. only when they can connect logic and emotion together. No one makes a purely logical decision. No one makes a purely emotional decision. It's that combination that happens. And if it's a negative emotion in our brain, two things happen. Number one, it sends a somatic marker into our chest. We start feeling funny. We have a physiological response that we don't like. We don't want to go forward. So whatever logically we were trying to do at the time, the decision is to get away from it. On the other hand, The use of positive emotional responses between our ears when that touches our chest and creates a physical, physical sensation for us, that is a sensation that people love. And so when you combine that with a logic that you're trying to accomplish at the time, it creates tenacity. It creates so many good things. So I basically, I define a fusion point is that moment in time. It's a unique point where logic and positive emotion merge and ignite, and it creates acceleration, it creates commitment, it creates energy, and it moves the process forward. And what I do is I teach salespeople how to do that in a sales process, but I teach entrepreneurs and small business owners how to create that in their market and with their team.
Michael Whitehouse:Yeah, that's, that's powerful. And so it would not only be to make prospects move forward with the process, but to your team and yourself. move forward with the business and, and I imagine this would also probably help with some of the, the morning routine stuff, the getting from sleeping to working and. Absolutely. You know, bouncing back from a challenging situation, those, those sorts of things.
Jeff West:Yeah, absolutely. You know, and when it comes to building a business or growing a sales career, your success, your future isn't determined by the economy. It's not determined by the political landscape. It's not even determined by your competition. It's determined by how one simple question is answered by your prospects in the market, by your sales team by the, your support staff, the people that work for you. It's how they answer one simple question. And it's when it comes to their relationship with you. Will they persist or will they quit? If you learn how to work within the science of how we're naturally built anyway, what it does is it equips you to have some influence over those decisions that they want to stay with you and move forward in the process. Yep.
Michael Whitehouse:Yep. Very powerful. So we were talking earlier because the theme of the show is around networking. And of course you're part of the, the go getter success Alliance. So tell me a bit about you know, what, what that's done for you and you know, how networking has helped you build
Jeff West:your business. Well, that's a great question. You know, when I guess it was, I can remember exactly, it was in January of the year 2000. A sales mentor of mine, I was in the insurance industry at that time. I was in North Texas and I was a district manager for the insurance carrier that I was working with. Still self employed, but had, had overrides involved. And a sales mentor of mine gave me two books and it changed my world. One was John Maxwell's 21 Irrefutable Laws of Leadership, a great leadership book. But the second one. Was a book I had never heard of by an author. I had no clue who he was. And it was endless referrals by Bob Burke and reading those 2 books and applying what I learned from those, even though they didn't necessarily apply to my industry. I adapted them to my industry that made all the difference. And it's my career went from being an average district manager that would would. Make my numbers one time, miss them one time. And I wasn't in danger of getting fired, but I wasn't a superstar either. But two years after I implemented what I learned at Endless Referrals, which was basically built around the idea of what proper networking is, I, at that time, two years later, I was a regional manager. Two years after that, I was a state manager. And I was a state manager the last 10 years of my career in insurance till I decided to start writing and speaking and doing this for a living. But to me, networking is all about focusing on. How you can provide value to the other people in the network and how you can make those connections, you know and when I was reading in those referrals, one of the things that I saw in that book that just jumped out at me and I have implemented it in everything I've done since then, is asking the person that you're working with at the time, what do I need to know when I'm out there in the field? What do I need to know to it to make sure if someone I run into is a good referral for me to send your way? And you think about the magic in the networking process. If everyone is focused last like that and you start making those connections. Everybody wins. And Bob was talking about doing it in networking events and all that in the book and in other places too, but that was the primary focus. Talking about don't give your cards out and say, or have an elevator pitch or whatever ready. It was talking about really working on making the connections for people and providing that value. So how it directly applied and helped my career take off. I began to develop a network, a referral network of my existing clients. I, at that time I probably had 200 different clients that were employers and I was involved in their employee benefit program. I went in and I asked I told one of the owners, it was a place in downtown Dallas, Texas on the 23rd floor of a building. And I don't like heights all that much either, but I had a meeting with a. Owner of the, of a mortgage company, it was one of my clients and I had called him ahead of time saying, I want to pick your brain about a couple of things. And he said, sure. So we got there. And the first thing I did, I sat down with him and I said, you know, the first thing I want to do before I ask you what I'm going to ask you is tell you, thank you. He said, for what? And I said, I feed my family by providing, getting involved in employee benefits and providing the services that we offer. And I am, that's how I, that's how everything in my life outside of work works effectively. And I just want to thank you because you're a part of that. And I appreciate that. Of course it was true. And of course he appreciated the compliment. And I said, but I want to ask you a question. And he said, what? And I said, I am out there in the marketplace all the time. I'm contacting new companies. I've got existing clients. I need to ask you a question. What do I need to be looking for out there? What questions do I need to be asking people to know if they would be a good referral for me to send your way? I want to return the favor and help you too. And I'll tell you what he did, Michael. I'll never forget this. I actually wrote the scene into my first book, The Unexpected Tour Guide, but he said, He took off his glasses and he laid them on his table and he said, I'm going to answer that question, but I have to tell you something first. And I said, what? And he said, I've been in business 30 years. I've had a lot of salespeople ask me for referrals. This is the first time ever a salesperson has ever asked me how they could refer business to me. Thank you. And of course, the discussion just got even better. And he told me what to look for. I had already kind of planned a couple of things in my head. And so I said, well, hang on just a second. And I picked up my cell phone and I called a client that I felt like would be a good referral for him. And I got him on the phone and I said, Hey, I just want to ask you a question. I've got another client who does, who owns a mortgage company. He's starting to do some things with employers and their employees. I think. He would be somebody you should talk to. I think somebody that, that it's a good connection there for you. Would you mind if I gave him your contact information? Person said, no, that'd be perfectly fine. And I said, I'll tell you, I know the guy I've known him for a while. I like him and I trust him. And I think you guys will get along well. And I said, he said, great. So I hung up the phone and I did that in front of the person that I was given the referral to. And so that worked out long story short, he and I keep saying long story short too many times. If I were writing, I would edit, I would edit that out, but he and I developed a referral network. We would have lunches where he would have, we'd have it at his place and his business and we'd invite some of his clients, some of my clients, and we just began to take it off from there. And I also began to teach that in my team. And it wasn't just that I did it and I was great at it, it was also I was pretty darn good at equipping the others around me to know how to do that too. So that's why when it really took off. So that's how networking for me made all the difference. Wow. Yeah. That's
Michael Whitehouse:it. What I love about that is there's nothing new to me in the basic principle that asks people how you can help them. But the way you did very intentionally with your clients, because we often think about this with our network or the people are meeting in. In networking, but to actually ask your client explicitly, you know, how can I refer? And even the, if you can, if you can make a referral, that's great. And even if you can't, maybe they say something and you're like I've never met anyone like that. That's yeah. Yeah. Well, well really I'm looking for a, you know, a one legged midget who's into basketball. Oh, that's interesting. I'll keep an eye out for the, you know, you don't have one, but just the fact that you asked, right. Cause that's, if I, you know, in, in networking events, I find to the extent that I, I catch people flat footed. I asked them like, so who are you here to meet? Who's your, if you can beat anyone in the County, who would you like to connect with? Oh, I don't know. I'm just looking to get out there and see who's there. Like, really, you do have a business, right? Like, do you know your customers really? But, but yeah, they're so not used to that because they're used to everyone coming up and being like, hi, I'm Michael. I do this. And you know, so and so hires me over this and whatever. But that idea of deepening the relationship with your client for that. And. That's such a better way than saying, who else do you know who I should talk to? Because like who else do I know for you to get a sales pitch to? I don't know. Versus how can I help you? Right. How can I refer to you? You don't even have to ask him for referrals. He's going to most people, once you've introduced them to one or two people, they're going to be like, okay, I really need to refer you to someone now, just so I can feel better. Like you're giving me so much. I, you haven't even asked for anything. I got to give something in return. So that, that's a really powerful concept. I
Jeff West:love it. Well, you know, the, an interesting thing too, and you touched on it there is when someone's asking for referrals in any context to, to just ask doesn't work very well, but if you get specific and you ask deeper questions that does the same process here, when you ask someone. What do I need to be asking people? What do I need to be looking for out there to know if they're a good referral that's in your way? It gets them thinking deeper. And so it works well. And it actually creates a fusion point, like I described earlier, because what I did at that point is I created a hugely positive emotional response in my client. And I had a, I had a positive emotional response with him anyway, but, but I created that. And then I combined it with a logic of getting, helping him do more business. And when I did that, it created a fusion points. And until I got promoted and moved away, we, we, we stayed in contact pretty well. Yeah, that's,
Michael Whitehouse:that's hugely powerful concept. And, and I love that idea of that. You're creating the, and then the other, and you mentioned specific. And one of the things that's important about specific is. You know, if it'd be an eye, which is where I, I started networking, I find B and I is often the training wheels of networking. Like everyone started there and then they sort of build up. And, and often it'd be, I, the, the, the, the ass are not very specific. They're like, Oh, anyone with a spine? I'm a chiropractor. Yeah. I'm like, okay, yes. Everyone has a spine. No, I'm not going to refer anyone. Cause that's not them. But if somebody, every once in a while, someone gets really specific and excessively specific. And. You know, if somebody says, yeah, so, so my the clients I'm really looking for are. You know, gray haired guys named Jeff with a Texas accent and a background in the insurance industry. aNd, and, you know, I want to talk to them so I can make an offer. If I was to reach out to him and be like, Jeff, you will not believe what the ask was of this BNI meeting I was at. He said, gray haired guys named Jeff with a Texas accent who worked in the insurance industry. You want to meet him? And he'd be like, sure. Yeah. Like that's me. Okay. I don't even I'm
Jeff West:your guy, and I know you like
Michael Whitehouse:you're interesting, but that's you need me. Awesome. And so there's such power in that because you feel special. Right. Whereas be like, Hey, yeah, anyone who needs insurance send them. Oh yeah, you need insurance. Right. But if it's right, if it's yeah, this week, I'm focused on people who have a ordinal directions in their name. Jeff, you won't believe this. I would just ask for it to be an eye group. That makes it easy. Cause cause then it's, it's you. It's not just, it's not just right. Right. Absolutely. Yep. So that has been being very powerful. Yeah. And so, so you're, you're telling about the actually, yeah, you're telling me the story about, about Lisa Wilbur. I think that was an interesting one too, how you ended up co authoring the book with her. Cause it's funny, I, I met her a few years ago. I think I may have, may have had her on my Power Launch Live show. I swear I had her on one of these shows. I don't know. Once you get to 200 something episodes, it all starts to blur together. But I think it was interesting when you were sharing the story of how you ended up co authoring that book with her. Said the lady with the blue hair. Tell us a little bit about that.
Jeff West:Lisa and I were both in a group that Bob Berg has, Bob Berg and Kathy Tejanil, the Goal Giver Success Alliance, and we were on one of the first Zoom calls for that group, and it's a mentoring community great group of people. It's, it's literally my favorite hour every week, but the, the first meeting Lisa was on there too, and people don't know this about Lisa when you first see her, first meet her, she's Avon's Fifth highest earner in history. She's huge in direct sales and she was only, and she had blue hair. And she was a little bit self conscious about it because even though she's been super, super successful, she just a little bit self conscious about it. And so she felt the need to get on the call. And so she got the screen and she was telling the story of why she got blue hair and she had. She told the reason she had made the decision to do that, but then she added a little thing. She said, you know, if you ever want to stop being less judgmental, I'm gonna do this in Lisa's accent best I can. If you ever want to, you ever want to stop being less or start being less judgmental in your life, dye your hair blue. This is working for me. He says, I can be in a grocery store and see a young lady who her skirt's a little too tight, her skirt's a little too short. And I can think, wow, skirt is just too short and tight, said the lady with the blue hair. And so she said that I'm listening and I'm cracking up. And I type in the chat, Hey, Lisa said the lady with the blue hair would make an awesome book title. Cause at this point I had been writing and speaking for a while and I had not done any coauthorships and so long story, I said it again. I'm going to stop. I'm going to start saying short story long, but what happened is about a year, year and a half later, I guess it was when I decided to change my business model a little bit. And instead of just writing my own books, go ahead and do some co authorships, kind of like what Bob Berg and John David Mann did with The Go Giver. And I reached out to her and we, that's what we did with The Lady with the Blue Hair. And it's, it's, that book too also led into my co authorship with Bob. Bob and I've actually known each other for, 20 plus years now. We met in 2003, I think it was. And so when, and if there's enough story, I'll tell you that how we met, it's hilarious. But, and just that relationship, we've become friends over the years. He approached me about doing speaking gigs with Aflac, which was the insurance carrier that I was with. And so I helped him as much as I could. And then, as I became a state manager, I had him come in and speak with our group. I, I literally wrote letters of referral to every single state office with Aflac because Bob's that great. And, so as, as the time went on and everything Bob does, I tend to tend to jump in there and get involved with it. And so having that successful collaboration with Lisa is kind of what led into the collaboration with Bob on street wise to sales wise. We were. It was about fourth quarter last year, I guess it was, and Bob was sending me an email about something he was going to do, and he wanted to know my thoughts on it. It was a publication he was about to do about objections. And I said and just as a comment in there, that it wasn't even something he was really thinking about, but he said, by the way, keep this because when we do our parable, this will be something we might want to refer back to. So I replied to his email and I put a little PS and said, by the way, If you're serious, that answer is yes. And so we began talking about he, he had this objection proof manuscript that he'd had for years. And he was thinking about doing something with it. He never, he never published the, the actual work and he, it was a how to book. And so when it comes to, he decided he really would rather do it as a parable. So he approached me last year and It kind of went from there. It's set in New Orleans, and I'll, we'll get into more of that if you'd like.
Michael Whitehouse:Yeah, yeah, tell me about it. Actually, my next question is going to be tell me about the book. Oh, okay, cool.
Jeff West:It's called Streetwise to Saleswise. Become objection proof and beat the sales blues. And it's a sales parable, or a business parable. It's what I like to write the most. I will write non fiction. And I've been technically a parable is nonfiction, but it, but across it, it's like, it's it saddles over fiction on one side and business on the other side, but it's set in new Orleans. It's the story about a young salesperson who grew up on the streets of new Orleans and he lets his mouth get ahead of him a little bit. And I won't go into too much because I loved, I love the story. Don't you guys to read it, but it's yeah. He, he, he finds himself out of that job and then he gets a job in sales and he had no clue he was going to do that. It wasn't something he intended. And so what we do in the story we, we take him through his growth. From a brand new person who knows nothing about sales all the way through a year where he's really doing well And we weave in the fabric of new orleans when I write a parable. I'm john david man who was bob's co author on the go giver he is my writing coach. He is someone who's been a mentor to me a friend As a matter of fact, in the new book, he's somebody I mentioned in the dedication because he's, he's just been that awesome for helping my craft and I, I wasn't a slouch before, but I'm several levels better now that I've worked with John because he's awesome, but it's like 30 something books, nine New York Times bestsellers anyway. In the process of doing this, one thing I learned from John is I like to write the geography of a location almost as if it's part of a character. So in New Orleans, I've, I've got a music background myself, so I love the music of New Orleans. I love the Food of New Orleans. So it's, it's just what been one of the places that I'll go. And I was sitting there with my wife and I believe it was on new Year's Eve, maybe the day before New Year's Eve going from 2022 into 2023. And I knew the material we were going to use in the book. We're going to use some of my sales training, which we did, my leadership training, which we did, and the same with Bob, some of his sales and leadership training as well. But I didn't really have the story idea yet. And we were sitting in New Orleans mid to late afternoon, and we're on a balcony of a restaurant, and we're just enjoying the day, having a glass of wine, and a street performer started performing out there and I love street performers in New Orleans. I just do. I can't help myself. I sat there and literally, Michael, the story came to me and I knew the entire story arc with major and minor characters. From the get go now, it evolved over the year that when I'd write a book, and that's not, I don't turn it down in 30 days. I say here, buy this. I don't do that. I'll make it. I try to do a really great job with it, but it, we work in the flavors of New Orleans. We work in secondary characters that people. Have told me they can kind of fall in love with and we do some unusual things that I did in the audible version. I actually I throw a surprise in there. I'll just leave it at that. It's a musical surprise that I throw in for everybody,
Michael Whitehouse:but nice. So, so, so audible is where I should go listen to that.
Jeff West:Yeah. I'm one of these people, I buy a book that I like in every, in every format. I tell people, if you want the hardback, go to Barnes and Noble, their delivery times are so fast and it's the best for the hardback. If you want the ebook or even the audio book, you can go to Amazon because it's immediate delivery on both of those. But I tend to have it at all because I like having my entire library on my phone. Every book that I have, I've got on my phone. I can be on a plane. I can read. I also, I like, I like holding up a hard book in my hand. I'll just, I like having that there so I can take notes, but I have so fallen in love with audio books over the last few years. One of my favorite writers in fiction is Michael Connolly and I'll listen to the Bosch series or the Lincoln Lawyer series and I'll, I'll just, I can, I can do it for hours. I really can.
Michael Whitehouse:Yeah. Yeah. And they're, they're really well done. Yeah. Or some of them are really well done in terms of the, the voice actors and the performances and, and just really has a, it's funny sometimes I listen to an audio book and the, the reader will read it in a certain way. I'm like, there's no way that's written in the book. You know, like they'll make a sound like, there's no way it says, ah, in the book or, you know, that sound or or, or it'll say, you know, you know, he choked out and they actually say, you know The way they, they say it, it's just really, it's more of a performance, just like somebody reading you a book and it's very powerful, but, but the other, I love the business parable format and there's not a lot of them out there, but yeah, the go giver of course is a great one. And, and I think the great thing about a, a business parable is it makes you want to read the whole thing. Most business books. Most people tell you they, they, and I've heard people say, this is actually how they read them on purpose. They read the first quarter. That's kind of the main part of the book. And then the rest of this application, they skip that part. Cause they've already got the, the nugget of it. And then, you know, they move on. But with the business parable, you know, you listen to the go giver, you want to get to the end. I listened to a one minute millionaire and I was actually really surprised because oftentimes the business parable, it's, it's a story structure. In order to give structure to what they're teaching, but they're still, you know, teaching something unless they want to be a millionaire and I'm like, wait, there's actually like a story arc and tension and, and conflict among minor characters and twists. And like, this is actually a real story that's also a pair of like, wow, this is the next level, you know, next level stuff. So, and it sounds like that's what you're doing with, with your book as well as streetwise sales wise that, that it's even if you're not learning to sell. It's an interesting story about a guy in New Orleans and, and like visiting a city and all that, which is, is a really cool way to learn. And that's what's really going to draw people through books. It did if, if I had a. If I had a nickel for every time I read part of a book, I'd have a lot
Jeff West:of nickels. You know, you make such a great point there, Michael. If a book can't grab me or grab you or grab anybody pretty darn quickly you can, you can lose interest in it and then you want to go do something else. And one of the things that is one of my favorite compliments I ever get when someone tells me if, especially my, I have friends that will read my books and they're not in sales. And when they tell me the story was so good, I couldn't put it down. I read it. Cover to cover on one sitting. That's a big deal to me. Yep But the audio book one of the things I love about that and you'll appreciate this It's audio is a good format and it what happens is Whether someone's an entrepreneur or just in a corporate world and they're leading a team that the leadership lessons that are in the book And the sales lessons in the book, it is so much like you're literally sitting side by side with your mentor in a live selling situation or in a live conflict situation. If you're in a business and someone is showing you, okay, this is how you'd handle this. And it's, it's, it brings a lot of value that way. Yeah. But, and it
Michael Whitehouse:makes it very, very clear you know, what this actually means to me, because often they go through. thAt's one of the things I found in one minute people have explained to me the concept of you can buy real estate with No with no cash a bunch of times and people try to explain how and i'm like, okay, I think I did you did I think you did that It's only when I heard it told in a narrative format and they're like and then she talked to this person and this person explained This is what our money is and then they did like Oh, that's how it works. Okay, because you're doing it in theory, then it is very dry. You're like, okay, wait, hold on and go, go back. What was that thinking? But when you're listening to the story narratively, then it gives you that framework because that's, you know, humans are built to exchange knowledge and stories. We're not built to exchange, you know, just dry, like, here's a list of technical terms and then apply that in this way. And then at step 14, you will find this result. You need. You need stories to provide a structural framework for your, your ancient human brain to understand
Jeff West:it. You know, it loops right back around to a fusion point because what happens in a parable? Or in a good narrative, even teaching a how to book like that. It connects an emotional part of your brain with the logical part of your brain. And just like in a fusion board where it moves things forward, people get comfortable taking the next step. People also retain what they're trying to learn so much better that way.
Michael Whitehouse:Yeah, it makes a lot of sense. And, and I think also, you know, if you're coming along with the, you know, think about like with the go giver. There's the, the emotional arc of, of I can't remember the main character's name. But the main character who's, you know. Who's struggling, huh? Joe, his name is Joe. It's Joe. Okay. Yeah, I think I was thinking it was Joe. Like, it can't be Joe. That's too obvious. I remember the chairman's Pindar, but I can't remember Joe. Right, right. But yeah, so, you know, Joe, you, like, you feel his struggle. And then every time he learns something, you feel that, like, hit of dopamine, like, ooh. And you're coming along with him in that. Whereas if you were just reading. The five points, you know, the five steps of being a go giver, you wouldn't have that same pop what you like. Okay. Oh, this is interesting. Yeah, this might work. Whereas you just watch Joe get one step closer to solving his problem and feeding his family and and doing what he needs to do. And. yeAh, so that's I'd never thought about that way, but but it's. It creates that association and makes it more, you know, when you encounter that, I think I might do this. Right. You've got that, you've already got that positive mental like, I feel good about doing this.
Jeff West:You know, I don't know what, I don't know what your age is. I'm, I'm in my early 60s and I used to read business parables a lot. You know, it was it was like augment Dino and things of that nature I loved the books and they kind of seemed to die off The go getter began that journey back with it and then who moved my cheese out of the maze. There's a lot of them but They're coming of age again, but what's happening now with this with the audience that we have? So many of them had never experienced the parable. So I'll get people that are sending me messages saying, Oh my God, I love that story. I learned things. And then they're going, it's a new experience for them. And that, that's actually very rewarding. It really is.
Michael Whitehouse:Yeah. No, that's pretty great. And, and especially now in, you know, cause everyone's written a book. So there's, you know, you could read books every minute for the rest of your life and not begin to keep up with even the good ones and not all of them are good ones. So the, the parables, they could, and the thing is too, the things we're teaching I recently ran a, a summit called the breakthrough summit, and we had all kinds of people signing up for it to speak at it because every coach can teach us some kind of breakthrough mindset shift, whatever it's what they all do. So it was, it was a great event. But I, I commented at one point, like nothing that's been taught here is less than a few thousand years old. We repackage it. We change the way we say it. We have a different concept to it, but It's all, you know, it's all in the Bible and the Quran and the you know, Confucius taught it and Taoism teaches it and Asian Greeks taught. It's all the same. Like we're all human. The basic human truths don't change. And how you apply those human truths don't change. It's simply, how do you teach it and get that information across? Right. So as everyone's writing their book about, you know, how to overcome objections, sales, mindset, focus, motivation, whatever. It's all the same old stuff, repackaged in different ways and maybe it's a little tweak here, a little tweak there, but so putting it into a story is actually the oldest way of sharing information, but also very helpful because it makes it stand out and then give you something you can talk about. You say, Oh yeah, I remember in this book where the character did this as opposed to, yeah, I think this book teaches that in some way. It makes it feel more, feel more real, feel like something you can attach more to, which is, which is a really cool concept. So.
Jeff West:Well, you know, my background is actually in music. I have a bachelor's degree in music education and a master's degree in music composition. And those two degrees and a 10 bill will buy me a cup of coffee at Starbucks. And when I was doing my student teaching, I had a great guy that I was mentored by and worked with him for about six weeks on. learning how to be a better teacher. And he was he, one of the things that he taught me was when you're working with a beginner, whether you're working with someone at any level, sometimes it's not so much as you're teaching, teaching something new, but you're having to find different ways to say the same thing to deliver the message because sooner or later, one of those ways is going to resonate and it's going to work. Yeah,
Michael Whitehouse:so Yeah, so yeah, I love this concept with the pair. I'm definitely gonna check out Streetwise to Saleswise and get that on, get that on Audible. I've got a another road trip coming up, so that's a great time to listen through. It's a 19 hour trip. It's probably the entire book fits into a couple states. It's about a four hour, about a four hour. Yeah, so that's like the length of North Carolina. I love it. oR, you know, Dallas to Houston, I think. So, yeah. Or, or that's a regular, regular commuting in Texas.
Jeff West:It's around the corner here.
Michael Whitehouse:Yep. Yeah. So it's been great having you on here. I love this, the fusion point concept that you have linking the, the emotions. You know, the emotions to the, the logic and, and that connection. And, oh, you were going to tell the story about how you met Bob and you said it was a good one. So,
Jeff West:well, not, not long after my career first began to take off in great part to endless referrals, I began to come into the sales organization training school in the, with the insurance company I was with every month, the state manager would have me come in. I would tell them my personal story. It was motivational. And then I would finish up by telling them a little bit about those two books, endless referrals and, and 21 irrefutable laws of leadership. I had been telling everybody about this book so much and I was always promoting it inside my sales team everywhere. Well, I was a regional manager for the company in Plano, Texas. And then my administrator buzzes in one day and she says, you've got a phone call and I said, who is it? And she said, some guy named Bob Berg. And I thought, yeah, one of my buddies is playing a joke on me right now because I'm such a big fan of what I've learned in the book. And so I get on the phone. And as you know, Bob has this. Definite distinctive voice that we call it positive vocal velocity. It just carries, you know. He gets on the phone. He says hi, Jeff, this is Bob Berg. And I said, sure. It is fella exact quote. And he said excuse me. I said. Is this really Bob Berg? And he said, yeah, this is really Bob Berg. And so then I told him the story and how much Endless Referrals had meant to me. And he was flattered. He was actually calling me to prospect to get in to speak with Aflac. And so it was funny. That's how we met. And we just became friends. And it stayed that way. We had no
Michael Whitehouse:idea who you were. You were just on his call list to get in. I was,
Jeff West:I was a, I was a cold call for him.
Michael Whitehouse:Yeah. Yeah. You know, you got some personal brain going on when that happens. Right. That's exactly correct. That that's amazing. That's fantastic. Well, I think that's a great note to end it on. That was a great story. Love it. So people obviously people can look up streetwise to sales wise wherever they streetwise to sales wise become objection proof and beat the sales blues coauthored between Jeff West and Bob Berg. How else can people get in touch with
Jeff West:Jeff West? Oh, thank you so much for asking that. The 1st thing I'll tell you is on street wise to sales wise, just go to street wise to sales wise dot com and all the links to go to all the retailers are there anyway. And you can read about the book and see what some people are saying. They can also, if they're interested, anyone in your audience is interested in having me work with you on. developing the kind of relationship in your team that keeps them there or your sales process for your, your business, go to fusionpoints. com. That's plural on fusion points. And, or if you lose track of anything else, just go to jeffcwest. com. You'll find everything there.
Michael Whitehouse:I love it. Great hierarchy of websites. Well done. Yeah, very well organized. I like it. So this has been great. It's been a lot of fun talking to you. It's funny, I was telling you at the beginning of the show yeah, I, I, pretty much at the end of 2023, I, I was like, hey, I'm done recording season 6 episodes. And then I got the reminder about today, and I'm like, what? I have another interview on my calendar in late January? Alright, well, what the heck, let's do it. I guess it's already here. Sure. And I'm so glad we did because this has been a great conversation. That's why I like having a podcast. Meet cool people. So thank you. It's an honor to be here with you. Yes. Thank you so much for being on. And once again, that's street wise to sales wise. com fusion points. com and jeffcwest. com is the, the center point, the nexus of it all. So thank you so much, Jeff, for being on the show.
Jeff West:My pleasure, Michael. Thank you so much for having me on.
Michael Whitehouse:Thank you so much for joining us on the Guy Who Knows A Guy podcast. I'm your host, Michael Whitehouse. Be sure to join us for the next JV Connect. Learn all about it at jv connect. com. You can also get my Five Steps to Profitable Networking course for free right there on that site. Our goal is that in two days, you're going to get over 100, 000 of value from the connections you made. And this applies whether you are brand new in business or well established. So be sure to join us, jv connect. com in March, June, September, and December. All the dates and details are right there on the website.