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Mental Selling: The Sales Performance Podcast is a show for motivated problem solvers in sales, leadership and customer service. Each episode features a conversation with sales leaders and industry experts who understand the importance of the mindset and skill set needed to be exceptional at building trusted customer relationships. In this podcast, we get below the surface, tapping into the emotional and psychological drivers of lasting sales and service success. You’ll hear stories and insights about overcoming the self-limiting beliefs that hold salespeople back, how to unlock the full potential in every salesperson, the complexities of today’s B2B buying cycles, and the rise of today’s virtual selling environment. We help you understand the mental and emotional aspects of sales performance that will empower you to deliver amazing customer experiences and get the results you want.
Welcome to Mental Selling!
[00:00:00] Jacob Hicks: People just have this mindset around I must be bothering them. And the truth is that you are bothering them. Only if you are calling them to say, “Hey, do you want to buy my stuff now? Do you want to buy my stuff now? Do you want to buy my stuff now?” That’s annoying. That’s not really serving that potential client. So what I really like to coach people on is yes, you want to follow up consistently a lot of times, a lot of the time, and you want to follow from a place of value.
[00:00:25] Hayley Parr: This is Mental Selling, the sales podcast for people who are dedicated to making a difference in customers’ lives. We’re here to help you unlock sales talent, win more relationships, and transform your business with integrity. I’m your host, Hayley Parr. Let’s get right into it. Welcome to the Mental Selling Podcast, brought to you by Integrity Solutions, where we explore what it really takes to win in today’s complex purpose-driven sales world. I’m your host, Hayley Parr. In today I’m joined by sales success coach and leadership mentor Jacob Hicks. Jacob has dedicated his career to empowering leaders in both the corporate and nonprofit sectors. While inspiring the next generation on college campuses across the country, he works with entrepreneurs and sales professionals to break through comfort zones, master time management, and build systems that create sustainable success. In our conversation, we’ll dive into how to balance sales goals with personal growth, the power of intentionality in work, play, and rest, and why staying true to yourself might just be your greatest competitive advantage. Whether you’re an entrepreneur looking to scale or a sales leader aiming to elevate your team, you’ll walk away with practical tools and a fresh mindset for thriving in any market. So let’s get started. Jacob, welcome to the Mental Selling podcast. How are you?
[01:54] Jacob Hicks: I’m doing great, Hayley. Thanks so much for having me. Been looking forward to this.
[01:57] Hayley Parr: So it’s so great to have you. Are you having a good summer so far?
[02:01] Jacob Hicks: Yeah, so far. I mean, being in Iowa, it’s generally pretty hot and sticky in the summer, so we’re making it through as best we can.
[02:08] Hayley Parr: As a fellow native Iowan, I know how that goes. And I also know that you kind of have to take the summer months because those are some of the best ones we get in the Midwest.
[02:20] Jacob Hicks: Yeah. And then we get those two days in the spring that are really nice and the two days in the fall that are really nice. So looking forward to those.
[02:26] Hayley Parr: Absolutely. Absolutely. Well, I hope you get some relief from the humidity soon. Jacob, again, just thrilled to have you on the Mental Selling podcast. I was really excited when you reached out about the opportunity to come on when I learned a little bit more about your origin story and your core philosophy. But I’d like to hear it from you so the audience can hear it. In your own words, you work with leaders across corporate and nonprofit entrepreneurial spaces. What really was that turning point for you that led you to explore the space of coaching and sales success?
[02:58] Jacob Hicks: Well, honestly, looking back now, and I feel like, I dunno, maybe everybody says this I guess, but I feel like this has kind of been where I’ve been led the whole time. When I first got into sales, what I realized I really loved doing was helping people navigate that difficult or murky or maybe just unfamiliar situation. I mean, I did that when I was selling suits. I mean, a lot of guys, they’re just not as familiar with men’s formula wear as we think they maybe should be. But then also in my outside sales roles where it was so interesting where I was selling, obviously, right? But I was also doing, I mean a lot of business coaching too in that sense. Where originally when I was outside sales, I was selling eyeglass frames and I was helping doctors kind of manage their boards. Like, Hey, how do you manage your boards?
[03:41] Jacob Hicks: What should it look like? What frames should I always be having on the boards and why? And then also when I got into the lens design too, where it was fun because obviously again, I was selling, but then I was also coming in a lot of the time, probably two thirds of my time was spent more in the training role where I was training their staff on, “Hey, what are these new products we have? Why do we have them? What does it matter? And what is it really going to do for our patients? Then how do we discuss them? How do we kind of pitch our patients on why they should be getting this frame versus this frame? And what are the trade-offs one versus the other?” I mean, a couple of years has been just in training exclusively, and that’s really what I’ve loved doing. We’re helping people drive towards their goals and their ultimate vision for their life.
[04:19] Hayley Parr: So it’s clear that some of those really early sales experiences have shaped your approach to leadership and coaching, but you also work with college students in young leaders. How did that come about?
[04:34] Jacob Hicks: So I mean, I’ve been really lucky. I’ve realized that being a sales guy, people, I mean, we have this stereotype as I’m sure where well all we care about is money. And I realized that at some point, especially in my twenties, earning money was just kind of a scorecard, I guess. Whereas it is just like, this is fun. Obviously commission checks are fun, but ultimately what I realized is that if assuming that my bills are paid for which I don’t live an extravagant lifestyle, then I don’t really care about the money. It was just kind of sitting there. So I started as crazy, as weird as it might sound, I started giving a lot of it away, and that got me involved in different charitable organizations, and that’s kind of where it ultimately led where I get to have some influence on the life of these college students. It’s a lot of fun.
[05:17] Hayley Parr: That’s really incredible. I went through an undergrad program in lacrosse and then I went through grad school, but I remember some of the most impactful speakers were folks that weren’t decades older than me, but maybe just a few years, but doing something that I really looked up to because they were taking the time out of their day to come and speak. And there’s just something about a mentor that you look up to and they can really help bridge the gap between where you’re at now and where you want to be because it doesn’t seem so far off. What are some other ways that you, in your coaching and your speaking opportunities had been able to bridge that gap between those timeless and the needs of a new generation?
[06:00] Jacob Hicks: So I think mean, at least in my own approach, it’s always be learning. I like to find new and better ways to do things. That’s kind of always how I’ve been. I mean, it’s kind of funny. You’re talking about going through your own undergrad program and stuff, and you find these people that are I kind of mentors in a way where maybe you only have that one interaction with them where you met them or saw them speak at some class or other. And I remember having very similar experiences where somebody came in, spoke on something that I thought, oh, that’s really cool. That’s something I would like to do and explore more. And for me, the fun, really fun part, particularly in sales is obviously like you said, there’s some very true fundamental foundational things in sales. You got to follow up, you got to know your product, some of those kind of skill sets you have to have in that world. But then when you interact with, especially the newer generation, they’re very curious, they’re very outgoing, they’re willing to try new things and fail some of the time, and you get to learn about some of these new experiences. So I mean, just getting to share in some of that has been a real highlight lately.
[07:00] Hayley Parr: I bet. I bet. Well, and speaking of the fundamentals of sales, which at Integrity Solutions we live in that space, sales screening is kind of our bread and butter. One thing that you and I talked about at length before we met to record today was how to break through comfort zones. Do you have any personal examples or examples of how you’ve had to do that, maybe in sales or otherwise?
[07:30] Jacob Hicks: Yeah, so whenever people talk about comfort zone, I always go back to a training that I had probably six, seven years ago now, sales training. And the speaker was, I mean, talking about a variety of different things because more of a workshops, we had a lot of different topics going on, but they were talking about comfort zone especially.
[07:47] Jacob Hicks: And the analogy that they used was you kind of think of your comfort zone as in between two different pillars, and then there’s kind of a line going up in between. And either you are getting outside your comfort zone and growing, or you’re getting out of your comfort zone and regressing, and you are always kind of in a tension between the two. And I was like, well, I obviously don’t want to regress as much as I possibly can. So if I’m going to get out of my comfort zone and do things that I don’t like very much or are uncomfortable for me, then I want to be growing in some form or fashion. And I remember a first really good example for me when I was selling and was I was doing a lot of door knocking. I like talking to people. I liked talking to people face to face as much as I possibly can. And gosh, I couldn’t tell you how many doors I’ve knocked on, but I mean, it’s probably well into the thousands at this point.
[08:33] Hayley Parr: Could I ask what you were selling? Was it vacuums or knives?
[08:36] Jacob Hicks: It wasn’t vacuum door knives. Nope. I was in real estate at the time. Yes,
[08:43] Hayley Parr: Sorry to feed into the spirit.
[08:44] Jacob Hicks: Yeah, no, I get it. I get it. And I remember people would come up to me because I did it a lot because I moved to a new area, I didn’t know anybody, so I didn’t have a big of people I could just like, “Hey, can I sell your house?” So I had to get out and prospect somehow. I had to get out there and do it. And I remember people coming up and talked to me in my similar role. They came up and talked to me, was like, man, I can’t believe how much you’re doing it. You just seem so easy and good at it and stuff. And I remember the funniest part about it is that especially early on, and that’s what they were talking about with the comfort zone, if you’re growing, then your comfort zone is going to shift with you.
[09:19] Jacob Hicks: And I remember early on when I was starting to do some door knocking, I would get so nervous, I would get just so, so nervous about just going up and knocking on somebody’s door. And I mean, you know how it is most of the time when it comes to that or cold calling or whatever else, you’re not going to get somebody, you’re just hoping that somebody will come to the door or somebody will answer the phone. And I think when it kind of comes down to it, you kind of just have to do it a little bit. I don’t think there’s any really good way around it. You just kind of have to suck it up and do it. And I think if you’re not doing any cold calling, for example, not to say that you have to go out and do a hundred of it tomorrow when you’re super uncomfortable with it, but maybe you do it in smaller increments where maybe like, “Hey, I think cold calling is going to be a good way for me to grow my business or grow my portfolio, or whatever you’re doing. So maybe you do like, “Hey, I’m going to do five tomorrow or I’m going to do one tomorrow.” And just build that muscle to the point where you’re like, okay, I can do this more consistently and start to grow it from there as opposed to go from zero to a hundred.
[10:16] Hayley Parr: Yeah, it was really interesting how you mentioned as you grow your comfort zone shifts, or I guess you could say it grows with you, so the only way to move that forward is to do the thing. And I can see how cold calling or door knocking are activities, typical sales activities that could be very much outside of the average person’s comfort zone. What are some other comfort zones you see often see salespeople or even entrepreneurs getting stuck in?
[10:47] Jacob Hicks: I think it needs, the example again, is going to be the follow-up piece, particularly when we’re talking about entrepreneurs. Because in my experience when I’m working with entrepreneurs, the way I always say is they want the business to do the business, meaning that you started a marketing firm because you want to do marketing for people. You don’t want to be a salesperson for a marketing firm. It’s kind of a different thing necessarily. So a lot of the time people think like, well, I met somebody at this network event. I think we hit it off. I called them once. I left them a message, didn’t hear anything. I texted them, didn’t hear anything, so they must not want what the thing is that I have to offer. And I mean, the true statistics are four times out of five times that isn’t the case. Meaning that as long as you’re following up consistently from a place of value, then you are going to earn business. I’ve seen stats where, I mean, across industries, if you follow up at least five times, and usually it’s in that seven to 12 ish touches,
[11:38] Hayley Parr: Wow, as
[11:39] Jacob Hicks: Long as you’re following
[11:39] Hayley Parr: Up, that’s paying more than,
[11:41] Jacob Hicks: But if you’re following it at least five times, then you’re going to earn 80% of your business. And most times, and I’ve seen stats too, where, and not even just salespeople, but entrepreneurs too where they won’t follow up more than once. And if you expect to earn business on that first touch, then you’re going to close business 2% at a time. So I mean, again, the stats are crazy when it comes to this kind of thing, and people just have this mindset around I must be bothering them. And the truth is that you are bothering them. Only if you are calling them to say, “Hey, I’ve got the marketing firm still. Do you want to buy my stuff now? Do you want to buy my stuff now? Do you want to buy my stuff?” Now that’s annoying. That’s not really serving that potential client. So what I really like to coach people on is yes, you want to follow up consistently a lot of times a lot of the time, and you want to follow up from a place of value.
[12:27] Jacob Hicks: And a lot of times the way you follow up from a place of value is saying like, “Hey, what are the two or three questions that I get all the time from my clients? What are the pain points that people struggle with when they’re trying to hire this kind of person, when they’re trying to buy this kind of product? What are some of the struggles that they have a lot of the time? And provide that information upfront. And again, if you do that, then you’re not going to be bothering them. And if you are and they don’t really want your thing, then they’re going to opt out eventually.
[12:51] Hayley Parr: Yep, absolutely. And that’s coming from a place of providing value. Absolutely. Hi there. If you’re listening to this show, it means you believe in making a difference in your customer’s lives and are looking for tools to grow in your career. At the same time, at Integrity Solutions, we’re changing the stereotypes about sales training in ways your customers will feel and experience every day. If you want to learn more about how we could help you and your team go to integritysolutions.com. The volume of activities though, that’s obviously something that takes time out of a day and with that requires really stringent time management. Another thing you and I talked about at length was that in sales, chaos is inevitable, but within your time management strategy, you actually plan for
[13:50] Jacob Hicks: That. Yes.
[13:51] Hayley Parr: Could you walk me through that approach a little bit?
[13:53] Jacob Hicks: Yeah. So I’m a big fan of time blocking, especially where, like I said, from nine to 10, I’m prospecting from 10 to 11, I’m following up on emails from 11, 12, whatever the tasks are, you actually time block for those specific things, and you have to be true to it. It’s funny when I start coaching people on this because they’re like, I get caught up on stuff, all these kind of things, and it’s like, okay, but if you had a potential client or potential customer or a current customer reach out to you and set up some time for an hour, you would show up on time. So why is it that you can only honor appointments with other people and you can’t honor appointments with yourself? Actually finding those times and setting up that time blocking is really, really critical. But I remember, again, I learned this seven or eight years ago.
[14:36] Jacob Hicks: I was time blocking. I really liked it. I still really liked it. But then the inevitable, John Smith, which we all have these kind of people that call us with their hair on fire, the house is burning down. We’re the only person that can put out the fire for them. They call us once a month, a couple of times a month, whatever, and we just have to with their problems. And I realized that when they called me my whole time blocking system would get thrown out the window because I had to deal with their thing. Usually there’s some urgency around that where you have to get back to ‘em that same day or the next day, so you can’t get back to the stuff you really wanted to get to, right?
[15:07] Jacob Hicks: So I started doing, from the way I do, it’s from two to three. I have a time block called Chaos Time where if I get those calls where it’s something super urgent or I have to get back to ‘em right away, then that’s where those tasks end up falling, and that protects the rest of my calendar, so I’m not time blocking for no reason. Now, the more advanced version of this is once you’re doing that and you’re scheduling from two to three or from 11 to 12 or whatever works for you at your chaos time to deal with those issues that come up, then do what I call an audit. So after a few weeks of doing this, then take about a week, maybe two weeks to do an audit where you sit down and you write down each of the things that come up in your chaos time, and you’ll start to notice some patterns, meaning that John Smith calls you once a week, a couple times a month, but he’s coming up fairly regularly, and you can actually time block for the John Smiths of the world as opposed to, again, allocating your chaos time to it.
[16:02] Jacob Hicks: And then if John’s on vacation for a month or whatever, then you can just have some free time back to get some other things done.
[16:08] Hayley Parr: So I have to ask, is our podcast right now in your time block or is this chaos?
[16:16] Jacob Hicks: No, this is time blocked out.
[16:19] Hayley Parr: Yes, I’m honored. I’m honored. So I can see how that can make for a much more efficient day. But I would imagine this helps just protect your mental space and your mental clarity too as well, right?
[16:31] Jacob Hicks: Yeah, because you know what the things are that are going to come up as opposed to the way that I always kind of liken it to is in broad strokes, if you’re an entrepreneur, you have a business doing these kind of things are helping you to work on your business as opposed to just in your business, meaning we get caught up just a person that’s living. There’s always 1,000,001 things that we have to get to, and we can’t not get to all of them. So that way we make sure we are prioritizing the actual priorities and not making everything a priority, which makes nothing a priority.
[17:00] Hayley Parr: So working in the business versus working on the business, what are some other common system gaps that might keep entrepreneurs from being able to scale?
[17:09] Jacob Hicks: So especially when it comes to scaling, I highly recommend people schedule time again in your time blocks, like once a week for an hour. If you can manage it as consistently as possible to actually work on your business, meaning that you actually take a step back, maybe you get out of the office if you need to take a step back to say, okay, are these things actually working the way that I want them to? Are we actually getting the results? And a lot of this kind of comes down to, I mean, some of the other gaps that I see, particularly in the sales world, I’m sure you’ve seen these things too, is where people aren’t necessarily measuring the right things, meaning they aren’t tracking the right things. For example, it’s super common where in the sales world, we’re tracking revenue or total sales or total quarters sold or something like that.
[17:54] Jacob Hicks: Now that’s all well and good. You do want to track those things. But the reason I recommend people track other things is that that is what I’ve often heard called a lag measure, meaning that after all of the activity I do as a salesperson, this is the result where a lot of times what I always recommend people track is your lead measures, meaning that let’s say you are tracking converted calls, for example, and for every five people you get on the phone or on the email or whatever, for every five people you talk to, you get maybe one call out of it. And then for every five calls, you generally make you get one person on the phone to make that conversion, which means you have to make 25 calls in order to get that one conversion, which means you should be tracking the 25 calls.
[18:37] Jacob Hicks: And that’s where you can figure out where the bottlenecks are, where you’re saying, “Hey, is my list really as good a quality as it is or as it should be? Am I actually targeting the right people Once I get ‘em on the phone, what kind of conversations am I having? Am I shutting down right away when they tell me no? Am I willing to push back on them a little bit?” And then you can start to tweak things here and there to go from maybe from five calls to four calls. So you’re dramatically decreasing and improving your ultimate results, which is the things you really want to track.
[19:04] Hayley Parr: And I think there’s probably a time and place for both, but getting stuck in one or the other, you might lose sight of the big picture, or to your point, being able to spot the actual problem of what’s happening.
[19:18] Jacob Hicks: But again, it comes down to spending the time to work on your business. So if you’re caught up in the whirlwind where you hope John Smith is actually still selling for you, or your team person is doing whatever the things are they need to be doing, you’re just hoping that’s happening, then you’re caught up in the whirlwind and you’re not really getting things done to the ultimate vision that you’re hopefully driving to.
[19:38] Hayley Parr: And if you’re not taking the time to take care of yourself, then that becomes very difficult. Which leads me to the next topic that I love to discuss, because you and I had a great conversation about this before, and that’s really personal growth and in intentional living, because you talk a lot about work and play and rest, all with intentionality, and you’re a big systems guy. How do you personally ensure that each of those areas of your life get their due share?
[20:07] Jacob Hicks: So for me, again, you’re absolutely right. I’m a huge systems guy. I’m a really big believer. James Clear’s got a great quote on this where he says, “We don’t rise to our goals, we fall to our systems,” which I think is absolutely true. I’ve seen that. I mean time and again in my own life and my clients and everything else. So when it comes to the real intentionality piece of it, it’s like I’m a huge believer in my calendar, so I like to have mean obviously any work things, podcasts, all that kind of stuff, meetings are all going to be on my calendar. But then I also have dates with my girlfriend. I have time hanging out with my friends, I have lunch with my mom. All of that kind of stuff is also going to be on my calendar. And then it’s really kind of just being honest with who I am when it comes to the rest piece.
[20:49] Jacob Hicks: So I am a big fan of Simon Sinek’s kind of version of introverted versus extroversion where he says that the introvert gets energy from some solitude, like hanging out at home, chilling a little bit, whereas the extrovert can get energy from going out, hanging out with friends, being around a lot of people. So you have to figure out what those things are that actually give you energy so you can again, attack the way that you really want to. And for me, I figured out that I need to have at least a good afternoon, like three, four or five hours, where even though I’m a sales guy, I think I’m fairly extroverted where I can go and talk to people. I still consider myself an introvert where I like to kind of chill by myself. So spending some quality time by myself I think is really, really critical. But then again, planning around those things so you don’t, again, get caught up in the world into life.
[21:35] Hayley Parr: And being able to recognize that in yourself and be intentional about it, I think is key. I like the fact that you have it in the calendar too. I kind of live and die by my Outlook calendar. Same. I just got back from a vacation and my mom was giving me the hardest time about it, so I can relate. I’m a little more on the extroverted side, and this podcast gives me energy, so thank you for that.
[22:00] Jacob Hicks: Yeah. Well, thank you.
[22:02] Hayley Parr: That’s fantastic. We are coming up on time. I’d love to close with a little rapid fire.
[22:09] Jacob Hicks: Let’s do
[22:09] Hayley Parr: It if you’re ready.
[22:11] Jacob Hicks: Yep.
[22:11] Hayley Parr: What is one sales lesson you wish you’d learned sooner?
[22:16] Jacob Hicks: Gosh, one lesson that I wish I learned sooner is probably just how critical follow up is and following up from a place of value, doing it consistently too.
[22:23] Hayley Parr: Okay. You learned that the hard way?
[22:26] Jacob Hicks: I did.
[22:28] Hayley Parr: Okay. I think that’s probably the way most folks
[22:31] Jacob Hicks: Learn. Yes. Yep.
[22:32] Hayley Parr: Okay. What’s one non-negotiable in your daily routine?
22:37] Jacob Hicks: I’ve got two, I guess. Right. When I wake up, I kind of a rule where before I do these things, I can’t get on my phone, so I write down three things I’m grateful for, and then I’m a faith guy, so I get into scripture too.
[22:49] Hayley Parr: Excellent. Last one, and then I’ll give you a chance to plug anything before we wrap. If you could give one sentence of advice to every entrepreneur, sales professional, listening, what would that be?
[23:02] Jacob Hicks: One sentence. Don’t chase everything. Shiny.
[23:05] Hayley Parr: I like that. All right, Jacob, it’s been an absolute pleasure. Where can everyone find you? Anything you’ve got going on, you want to tell our listeners at Mental Selling by Integrity Solutions?
[23:14] Jacob Hicks: Yeah, so needs to be to find me is just through my website. It’s just Jacob Hicks coach.com. And if you go on there, I’ve got a tab called the Growth Hub where I’ve got some of the books that I mentioned, but also I have some free tools on there for you too. So if you’re an entrepreneur that wants to dive into more sales stuff, I do have an entrepreneurial sales toolkit that you guys can download for free. And then these other easy way to find me if you want to connect more directly is on LinkedIn or Instagram. You can find me on both.
[23:40] Hayley Parr: Excellent. Well, thank you so much. It’s been a pleasure. Come back anytime.
[23:44] Jacob Hicks: Oh, thank you so much for having This has been a lot of fun.
[23:46] Hayley Parr: Talk soon. Thanks. Bye bye. Thank you for joining us on Mental Selling. If today’s conversation resonated with you, be sure to subscribe, leave a review, and share it with your network. For more insights on how to go beyond winning deals and build real customer relationships, visit integritysolutions.com. See you next time.