This week’s guest has to be my favourite of all. He’s my Cuban coffee in the morning that gets me going.

We invited Steve Nudelberg back onto the show to talk to us about his new book, “Confessions of a Serial Salesman: Rules of Engagement for Leaders and Influencers,” and what we can learn from it.

Steve Nudelberg is a serial salesman & entrepreneur. As a product of his entrepreneurial spirit, he developed On the Ball – a company that focuses exclusively on sales & business development. Inspiration for the company name was derived from the feedback Steve received from business associates, claiming that he was always ‘on the ball’.

Super excited for what we can learn from Steve this week, so let’s dive right in.

In this week’s show:

* The importance of relationships to success in sales

* “Growing to Greatness”

* How to build relationships

* Rule number 1 from Steve Nudelberg’s book

* What other rule in the book gets the most traction?

* What are people going to learn from reading “Confessions of a Serial Salesman”?

* Where to get “Confessions of a Serial Salesman” on presale

Links:

* Nudelberg.com

Steve describes “Confessions of a Serial Salesman” is a way to live your life. He is a student of the game and has been in sales for 40 years, and in putting together this book he gathered the best of the best from the industry to create the ultimate process for successful people.

Steve is proud to have had his son write the foreword for the book – who has lived his life by this process and has seen tremendous success in his career as a college football coach.

The importance of relationships to success in sales

What is the difference between a good business relationship and a good relationship? None.

People who focus on specific aspects of the process of selling are generally the least successful, observes Steve. Especially today when everything is so transparent – people buy you long before they buy your product or service.

If you don’t get along well with a prospect in your first interaction, you’re going to struggle to do business together. But when you do make those good connections, sales is a lot of fun – because the richness is not just the sale, it’s the long term relationship and opportunity to help other people to be successful.

In many relationships, you may not end up getting a direct sale, you may just be a friend or a resource to them. And that can lead indirectly to a sale down the line through referrals. Strong relationships are central to that.

“Growing to Greatness”

In this era of many young people struggling with self-confidence, how do men and women grow great as Steve talks about in the book?

In a world where so much of our work life and even personal life is online, young people aren’t getting hands-on, face-to-face sales experience with retail or sales veterans.

The president of Steve’s company is 30 years old and started in the company at the age of 23 as an intern to learn on the job. That form of training is critical, practical learning that takes time and patience and can’t be replicated with any form of online training.

It is a slow path to mastering the craft.

The way people are being trained now – both young and old – is often in a transactional mentality. The relationships method of selling requires a different kind of training, the basics of which are discussed in Steve’s book.

If you are targeting the C-suite, not having those relationship skills is going to stifle your career progression as those soft skills that have to be learned through experience, are critical to success.

How to build relationships

Learning about people before you meet them gives you the opportunity to find common ground that can be a topi...