If selling has ever made you think “Ugh, not again”, this episode will change everything!

How to sell more without being pushy…a feel good approach

Sales isn’t something you do to someone – it’s something you do with someone.

Sales strategist Nikki Rausch, founder of Sales Maven, breaks down how to sell more without being pushy and how women entrepreneurs can approach sales in a way that feels natural, respectful, and genuinely human.

If traditional sales tactics, hard pitching, and “bro marketing” have never felt like you, Nikki’s approach to sales for women offers a different way forward: conversations instead of pressure, curiosity instead of convincing, and invitations instead of manipulation…this is ethical selling.

In this sales tips for entrepreneurs podcast episode:

• Sales isn’t something you do to someone – it’s something you do with them.The episode’s biggest reframe is to think of sales as a conversation rather than an attempt to convince someone to buy. More invitation, more sales without pressure.

• Your job isn’t to convince someone to buy from you.If you’re trying to convince someone, you’ve probably already moved into the wrong dynamic. Instead, determine whether there’s a genuine fit.

• Permission changes the entire sales interaction.Before presenting an offer, you should have permission to put that offer in front of the person. This helps prevent the interaction from feeling intrusive or manipulative. It’s conversational selling that feels good for both parties.

• Create curiosity instead of dumping information on people.Nikki identifies curiosity as the second step in her Selling Staircase. The goal is to make someone think, “What is that? Tell me more.” When you do that, you’re following a more authentic selling style.

• Adapt your communication to the person.Nikki explains that she doesn’t give exactly the same presentation to everyone. She adjusts her message according to the person in front of her, including their motivational drivers…again it’s about conversational selling.

Listen For…

TIMESTAMPS

00:00 Why Sales Doesn’t Have to Feel Pushy

03:05 How to Sell Without Being Pushy: Sales as an Invitation

06:10 Sales for Introverts: Building a 25-Year Career Through Service

11:55 NLP for Sales: Toward vs. Away From Buyers

21:05 Permission-Based Selling & The Selling Staircase

MORE ABOUT THE GUEST

CONNECT WITH NIKKI RAUSCH

Website: https://yoursalesmaven.com/
Podcast: Sales Maven Podcast

LISTEN TO NEXT:
How to Sell Soulfully 

RESOURCES
Instagram:@chardetryel
Listen to the Secrets to Standing Out Private Podcast

MORE ABOUT THIS SALES TIPS FOR ENTREPRENEURS PODCAST EPISODE

“Your job is never to convince anybody to buy from you.” Nikki Rausch, Sales Strategist

• How to sell more without being pushy—or convincing anyone
• Permission based selling: why the invitation changes everything
• How to sell authentically without sounding scripted or salesy
• How to create curiosity in sales so people lean in
• Sales for business owners who want connection, not pressure

How to Sell More Without Being Pushy: A More Human Approach to Sales

What if the reason selling feels uncomfortable isn’t because you’re bad at sales—but because you’ve been taught a version of it that doesn’t fit you? For many business owners, the word itself brings up images of “hard persuasion,” awkward DMs, scripted calls and conversations where somebody is clearly trying to get you to say yes. No wonder so many thoughtful entrepreneurs quietly decide they’d rather avoid selling altogether.

That discomfort makes even more sense when you consider sales strategist Nikki Rausch’s observation that “we’ve all been on the receiving end” of sales that didn’t feel good. Those experiences teach us something: selling means convincing. Selling means pushing. Selling means somehow getting another human being across an invisible finish line. Yet that assumption may be exactly what makes selling harder than it needs to be.

The shift starts with one deceptively simple idea: “Sales is something you do with somebody.” Not to somebody. With them. That tiny change completely alters the relationship between buyer and seller—and it offers a much more useful starting point if you’ve been wondering how to sell more without being pushy.

Why Selling Can Feel So Uncomfortable

When you believe your job is to convince someone, every sales interaction becomes a performance. You need the right script. The perfect answer. The clever objection handler. The sentence that somehow makes the other person finally say yes. But as Nikki explains, “your job is never to convince anybody to buy from you.”

That matters because people aren’t formulas. You can’t reliably say X, wait for them to say Y, deliver your perfectly rehearsed Z and expect a sale. Nikki describes those expectations as unrealistic because “that’s just not how people work.” Real conversations move. People respond differently. Their motivations, priorities and communication styles vary.

The alternative is surprisingly human: “It’s a conversation.” Instead of entering an interaction thinking, How do I get this person to buy?, you begin by understanding the person in front of you. Selling becomes less like delivering a pitch from a stage and more like pulling up a chair.

That doesn’t mean becoming passive about sales for business owners. Nikki actually argues that you “should be issuing invitations.” The difference is that an invitation leaves room for another person to make a decision. Pressure tries to control the answer; an invitation creates an opportunity for one.

Permission Based Selling Changes the Power Dynamic

Think about inviting someone to dinner. As Nikki puts it, “an invitation is intentional.” You don’t drag somebody into the dining room, sit them down and demand they enjoy the risotto. You offer the invitation because you genuinely think they belong at the table.

There’s also respect built into that exchange because “whatever their answer is, is their answer.” They might say yes. They might say no. They might love the invitation but have another commitment. Your responsibility isn’t to decide for them—it’s to give them enough information and space to decide for themselves.

This is where Permission based selling becomes particularly powerful. Nikki argues that one of the most important conditions for a healthy sales interaction is simple: “I need permission to put my offer in front of them.” Without that permission, even a genuinely useful offer can land as intrusion.

You’ve probably experienced the opposite. An unsolicited message appears telling you everything wrong with your business, content or website before the sender graciously announces that—surprise!—they can fix it. Nikki’s reaction to that approach is wonderfully simple: “You don’t have my permission to critique my YouTube channel.” The issue isn’t necessarily the service. It’s the way the conversation began.

Authentic Selling Doesn’t Mean Avoiding the Sale

Here’s the trap: when you care deeply about respecting people, it’s easy to swing too far in the other direction. You don’t want to pressure anyone, so you barely mention your offer. You don’t want to sound salesy, so you hope potential clients somehow figure out that you can help them. You wait for them to make every move.

Yet “most of us like to be invited.” Someone can genuinely want what you offer and still need you to open the door. Refusing to invite them because you’re worried they might decline doesn’t necessarily serve either of you.

Understanding how to sell authentically therefore isn’t about removing selling from your business. It’s about changing the conditions around the sale. As Nikki says, “not everybody’s a client and that’s okay.” That belief alone removes an enormous amount of pressure.

You don’t need every conversation to become a transaction. Instead, you need enough awareness to recognize where there may be alignment—and enough confidence to explore it. Nikki describes her own early approach as “wanting to be of service,” which offers a useful filter: service asks whether there is a fit before assuming there is one.

The Three Conditions That Make Selling Feel More Natural

Nikki believes “three things need to exist” for a successful sale. Together, they create a simple framework for thinking about selling without turning every conversation into a pitch.

1. Awareness Before Persuasion

First, “the potential buyer needs to understand that they have a need or a want.” Trying to convince someone they desperately need something they neither recognize nor desire creates an uphill battle from the beginning.

This changes your role. Rather than manufacturing dissatisfaction, you can communicate clearly enough for the right person to recognize themselves. The goal isn’t I need to make you want this. It becomes Do you already want a change I may be able to help you create?

2. Alignment Before Offering

Next, Nikki says you need to understand whether “you have a solution” for that particular need. That sounds obvious, but it requires listening instead of rushing toward your offer.

This is also where strong sales conversations can feel surprisingly generous. You’re not looking for any reason to sell. You’re looking for genuine alignment. Remember:

“not everybody’s a client.” Sometimes discovering that there isn’t a fit is the successful outcome of the conversation.

3. Permission Before the Pitch

Finally comes the condition Nikki calls “the most important”: permission. Before moving into the offer, ask whether the other person actually wants to hear it.

That creates a different emotional experience because “we all get sold to all the time without our permission.” Permission gives agency back to the buyer. Ironically, taking away pressure can also make it easier for you to sell because you no longer need to wonder whether you’re crossing an invisible boundary.

Your Sales Messaging Needs More Than Pain Points

The same philosophy applies when you’re not talking directly to someone. A sales page, email or video can’t give you the immediate feedback of a conversation, so your language has to make room for different motivations. As Nikki explains, “different things motivate different people.”

One person might move toward something: more confidence, recognition, growth or a desired result. Another may want to move away from something: frustration, uncertainty or an experience they no longer want. Nikki’s advice is to “have a mix” rather than assuming everyone buys because they’re hurting.

That’s an important challenge to the endless advice telling entrepreneurs to “hit on the pain points.” If every sentence pokes at what’s wrong with someone’s life, business or identity, your messaging may actually alienate people who are far more motivated by possibility.

How to Create Curiosity in Sales

There’s another ingredient that gets far less attention than persuasion: curiosity. Nikki says that when she asks business owners how to create curiosity in sales, she often gets “a blank stare.” We spend so much time learning how to explain our offers that we forget people first need a reason to keep listening.

“If you can’t create curiosity, it’s very hard to continue the conversation.” That doesn’t mean clickbait, withholding important information or deliberately confusing someone. Healthy curiosity simply creates enough interest for the person to think: Wait…tell me more.

Nikki gives a wonderfully memorable example from her dentist’s office: “You don’t have to brush all your teeth. Only the ones you want to keep.” It works because it interrupts the expected message. You already know dentists want you to brush your teeth. The unexpected framing makes you pay attention.

The same principle applies to your business. Instead of “word vomit my blah blah blah onto you,” as Nikki rather brilliantly describes the traditional pitch, consider what would make the right person lean closer. Curiosity gives a conversation somewhere to go.

You Don’t Need to Become a Different Person to Become Better at Sales

Perhaps the most reassuring part of Nikki’s story is that her success didn’t come from transforming herself into the stereotypical salesperson. She describes herself as “an introvert” who would happily sit in the corner at a party having an intimate conversation with one person.

What changed was her skill. Through studying communication and repeatedly practicing what she learned, she became more flexible. Instead of searching for “the perfect script,” she learned to notice cues, adjust her language and communicate in ways that other people could more easily receive.

That distinction matters. Confidence in sales doesn’t have to come from becoming louder, more dominant or more persuasive. Nikki found that “it needed to be conversational.” You can develop your ability to sell while still sounding—and feeling—like yourself.

Imagine what that could change in your business. Sales calls become conversations instead of performances. Emails become invitations instead of pressure campaigns. Your sales page speaks to possibility as well as pain. And hearing no doesn’t automatically mean you failed, because the goal was never to “convince anybody” in the first place.

The deeper question, then, isn’t simply how to make more sales. It’s how to build a way of selling that you’re willing to keep doing. Nikki believes “every single person can learn to be proficient at selling” while still leaving people feeling good about the interaction—even when they don’t buy.

And this is only part of the conversation. Nikki also shares her Selling Staircase, including why “create curiosity” is only one stage of a much bigger sales conversation. If selling has been the part of business you avoid, overthink or secretly wish someone could make feel more human, listen to the full episode of Her First Three Years. You may discover that you don’t need more persuasion at all—you need a different way to think about the conversation.

FAQ: Selling More Without Feeling Pushy

How can I sell more without being pushy?

Start by changing the goal from convincing to connecting. Nikki’s core principle is that “sales is something you do with somebody,” which means understanding their needs, establishing fit and gaining permission before presenting an offer.

What is Permission based selling?

Permission based selling means getting consent before moving into an offer or unsolicited advice. Nikki says, “I need permission to put my offer in front of them,” making respect and buyer agency part of the sales process.

How can I sell authentically?

If you want to learn how to sell authentically, stop trying to perform the role of the perfect salesperson. Nikki found that sales “needed to be conversational,” allowing her personality and communication strengths to become part of the process.

Why do I feel uncomfortable selling?

Many entrepreneurs associate sales with manipulation because “we’ve all been on the receiving end” of uncomfortable sales tactics. Your resistance may be less about selling itself and more about the version of selling you’ve experienced.

Do I need to persuade people to buy?

No. Nikki says, “your job is never to convince anybody to buy from you.” Effective selling focuses on recognizing existing needs, identifying genuine alignment and allowing the buyer to make their own decision.

How do I create curiosity in sales?

Curiosity comes from communicating your value in a way that makes the right person want to continue the conversation. As Nikki explains, the desired response is essentially “What is that? Tell me more.”

Should sales copy focus on pain points?

Not exclusively. Some buyers move away from problems while others move toward desired outcomes. Because “different things motivate different people,” sales messaging can incorporate both pain and possibility.

Can introverts be good at sales?

Absolutely. Nikki describes herself as “an introvert,” yet built a successful career in sales by focusing on service, communication and one-to-one conversation rather than trying to become the loudest person in the room.

TRANSCRIPT WITH NIKKI RAUSCH

Chardét Ryel (00:00)
What is the number one thing that every business owner struggles with, is obsessed with, can’t figure out? If you said sales, you’re right. Now, this podcast has been around for more than two years, and I’ve never ever had someone come on as a guest to talk about sales because the way it’s done is so often hard DMing, hard persuasion.

Bro marketing, you know we don’t do that here. And so I finally found the perfect sales strategist, speaker, and founder to speak to you today. Her name is Nikki Roche, and she has more than 25 years of sales experience. So this is someone who has been doing it for most of her life. She’s an author. She’s also a master certified practitioner of NLP. You’re gonna find out more about that inside, but it is

One way in which you can make sales feel a lot more natural. Welcome to her first three years. From breakdowns to blenders, learn what worked and what didn’t. I’m your host Sardet, and whether you’re a new entrepreneur or you’re just starting something new, this is your space to learn and feel a little less alone. I’ll see you inside. I know you’re against the the bro marketing, the sleazy, like.

High persuasion. You know, it’s very bad out there, isn’t it?

Nikki Rausch (01:31)
Mm-hmm.

Can be. Yeah. I always say there’s a little bit of a misconception, I think, because we’ve all been on the receiving end of having sales done to us or done in a way that doesn’t feel right. And I think the biggest mistake or misconception is that people have this idea that sales is something you’re supposed to do to somebody. Like you’re gonna you gotta convince people to buy from you. And I think that is baloney.

I don’t think you should be doing something to someone because that feels manipulative. To me, sales is something you do with somebody. It’s a conversation. And when you when you start to look at it from, am I having a with conversation or am I just talking at somebody? Or am I being talked at? Right? Like none of that feels good. But conversations, those feel those feel lovely. Those are nice.

Right. And it takes a lot of the pressure off. I always say in sales, your job is never to convince anybody to buy from you. And if you’re in convince mode, you’ve probably already lost that deal.

Chardét Ryel (02:33)
I think that that’s such a powerful reframe because everything you just said, I’m sure for everyone listening is yep, I thought that. Yep, I thought that. I also thought that. And I think you’ve talked about before how it’s also kind of an invitation. And when you’re extending an invite, it’s not just to everyone or you want everyone to come. It’s very intentional.

Nikki Rausch (02:55)
Yeah, an invitation is intentional. And to me, it also shows a really high level of respect for the person that you’re inviting because there is no, you know, whatever their answer is, is their answer, right? So it’s okay to issue invitations and you should be in sales. You should be issuing invitations. But how somebody responds to that invitation, that’s you showing them respect and allowing them to make the decision that is best for them.

And that’s why I love the idea of invitation is because it lands so much softer. And I also think most of us like to be invited, right? You know, if you think about, I often give this analogy of like if you’re gonna have a dinner party, you invite like your favorite people to sit around the table with you. And let’s say that one time you decide not to send an invite to your best friend because you think you you think she might be going out of town. So you just don’t even send her the invite.

But then she finds out that you have this dinner party and she didn’t get invited to and she feels left out. And even though she might not have been able to come, she still would have liked the decision to tell you, like, thank you for the invite, we have another commitment or actually we’ll change our other commitment because we really want to be at your dinner party. I love

Chardét Ryel (04:10)
This part of the respect because it is it’s a total repositioning of the dynamic in sales from how maybe we interpret it. And I’m curious though, because I know before we hit record that I was saying, I’d love to see how you have arrived at this outlook with sales where you’re so focused on the conversation, on the relationship, on the invitation, and not just the hard, hard persuasion.

So can you start with like what was your first ever experience with sales?

Nikki Rausch (04:46)
Well, my first ever experience with sales was when I was a really young girl. My grandfather owned a tool store and I used to go and work in the tool store with him. And I got to work the register and make change. And that was like the first idea of exchanging a product for a service. So that was my very first experience of sales. Where I learned about commission sales. I will say this was a really exciting time, was while I was in college.

One of the ways I put myself through college was I worked for this leather goods company and it was a holiday kiosk that they would put in the mall. I think it was less than five dollars an hour. I think it was like four twenty-five an hour. And, you know, I had bills to pay. I was on my own working and going to school. And so this idea of making commission, I loved it. And so a lot of times I was doubling and tripling, you know, what I was making an hour just by

having conversations with people that would come over and start to look at these leather goods. And they ended up making me their sales manager because they were like, who is this girl that like she’s just crushing it? So I didn’t really understand this concept of like that I had a skill set around it, but it was more around like, I like the idea of being able to control my income. Like that was really the thing that was interesting to me. I grew up in a pretty like fairly low income

you know, family and never had a lot of extras. So to be making my money and being able to control it, that was always very interesting. And then I said, you know, I got my first professional sales job through a college project. It was kind of back when it was like a dialing for dollars kind of position where we were making all these outbound calls. What I learned there, there was a lot of this really aggressive sales mentality. It was like

the go out and hunt the big game kind of thing. And that just didn’t really ever fit my personality. Like I’m not I I am an introvert. We some people are kind of surprised. And I also can be quite shy. I am the person that if I can just sit in the corner and have a conversation with one person, I’m so happy at a party or at a big function. Like I just wanna have a an intimate conversation with somebody and that feels good to me. I never am the life of the party or

Any of those things. But I am competitive. I like to control my income.

Chardét Ryel (07:11)
This is just in the back of my head the whole time. I’m thinking as you who’s someone who naturally started getting promoted because of how good you were at sales, but also being someone who’s introverted, how did you manage that? I know that it’s conversations, of course, and it’s one on one, but did you ever feel I don’t know, you know, like nervous talking to these strangers or unsure? I mean, what were some of the things that helped you with

with that aspect of it, because I’m just thinking as an introvert, that’s a whole nother dimension to this.

Nikki Rausch (07:45)
Yeah. I think for me it was always wanting to be of service. And maybe I learned that, you know, working in the tool store, right? Is that you were there to help people, show them where the wrenches were or the sockets or the, you know, the lathe or whatever. I guess really you could say there was a a real customer service aspect to my take on it. I ended up

at some point transitioning to the manufacturing side. So I went to work for a large manufacturer, one of the largest manufacturers in the world at the time, became one of their regional sales managers. And I was working pretty large territory. So I became a a road warrior is what they referred to us as. This was the person who, you know, I was traveling covering I think at one point I had like twelve states, which is a huge territory. And what I learned was that I needed to up my skills.

needed to learn how to connect with people pretty quickly. And that is really what led me to start to study neurolinguistic programming. And if that’s a new term to anybody listening, it’s really the study of communication. It sounds very scientific, but so neuro is the way we process information in our brains and language it, you know, is the lingu the linguistics piece. And then there’s programming, which is about habits and patterns. And NLP taught me how to be a much better communicator.

Not just in the things that I would say or the way that I would say them, but being able to pick up cues from the other person and adjust, make adjustments to how I might phrase things or how I might ask a question in some way or how I would deliver information to somebody based on what their style of communication was. So I learned how

through studying in LP, I learned how to be more flexible because it isn’t about having the perfect script or always being perfect and never having a misstep and, you know, having these unrealistic expectations of like I’m gonna say this and then they’re gonna say that and then I’ll say this other perfect thing and they’ll buy from me. But that’s just not how people work. And so when you learn to add flexibility, when you learn how to pick up cues, when you learn how to phrase things in a way that somebody is more open to receiving it.

you find that it takes all that pressure of selling away. Not and not that, you know, there still can’t be nerves or any of that. Cause you know, like that’s that’s normal in a sales conversation. But that you’re more resilient. Like you you know how to bob and weave to ensure that the conversation kind of stays on track and that you’re moving in that certain direction. And and so that’s really what NLP brought to me because again, I was selling in a very male dominated

industry and mostly selling to men and stand in my place of authority and be able to talk about my product as an expert without in any way jeopardizing or diminishing their contribution or who they were or how intellectual they were. And so it was a really great learning like laboratory.

Chardét Ryel (10:42)
To balance egos a little bit. I think it definitely it definitely forces you to to be more nimble, more flexible, as you said. Was it then so you saw initially there was this aggressive style because you weren’t very male dominated. Not that there’s always the correlation, but often, especially then.

Nikki Rausch (11:03)
There was in my in my industry, yeah.

Chardét Ryel (11:05)
When you saw that that wasn’t necessarily the way that you wanted to do it, was NLP the first thing that you went and sought? You know, you heard someone talk about it and you said, Okay, let me go and do this, or was it you were already kind of trying to figure out maybe it’s something I can do with language, or maybe it’s something I can do with behavior? You know, how did you come into that discovery? Because as you said, it opened up so many doors for you in really difficult sales situations.

Nikki Rausch (11:31)
think you know nobody’s actually asked me this question before and so here’s the answer that comes to mind is I think I have learned that I have a little bit of a different way of approaching things often. And I think I learned this about myself in high school when I was trying out for the dance team. I didn’t have I didn’t have formal training. I loved loved to dance. I used to like spend hours I would come from from school

And I would turn on the music and I would dance for hours in my living room. Just like sometimes I would make up routines, sometimes I would just let the music take me. Like and so I when I was trying out for dance team, I was amongst these, you know, these other girls that had been in training sometimes for ten, thirteen years of training, formal training, and they were just so good at what they did. And then we would go and we’d learn choreography and it didn’t come easy to me learning choreography.

And as a matter of fact, oftentimes I would be like always put in the back, like in the back, like outer, you know, when we were dancing because like that’s where they put the girls that weren’t as good because they didn’t attract as many eyeballs, right? And so that’s what would happen at the beginning. A few weeks in, I would start they would start replacing and like moving me up and then pretty soon I was in the center, you know, and that’s where the like the girls that

really got the routine and was like good at what they were doing. And I think it was just a lesson to realize like, Nikki, you don’t you don’t have the training that other people have and you’re not initially as good as other people are, but you work hard and you’re consistent and that gets recognized. And so when I went into this sales, very male dominated industry, I realized like, I’m not like all these other dudes, right? That are

Totally fine saying to somebody like, You if you don’t buy this, like you’re making a huge mistake. Like that’s just not the way I would talk or or be. And so I just realized like you gotta find your own way. And you know, and it it wasn’t easy and it it’s not like overnight I figured this out or had this recognition, but to have had that experience of knowing that things don’t often come really easy to me or quickly, like I have to like

work at it. And so once a month I would get on a plane. I would go and spend the weekend studying NLP in a course. That Monday, I would fly home Sunday night. Monday I was on a plane and all week I got to kind of practice what I was learning in these different types of presentations and different meetings that I was going into. Sometimes it was five different demonstrations in a day at five different institutions. And so I just got to practice. And so I knew that about myself like, I could

Practice and I’ll get better. It needed to be conversational. And that’s where I found my success. And that’s now what I teach in my business.

Chardét Ryel (14:24)
Can I ask you a question about because I was gonna ask you this anyway, but you’ve phrased it in such a way that now it makes the most sense for me to ask it now versus later. I know there’s so much that can be seen in body language and tone of voice and all of this when you especially if you’re if you’re someone who’s listening who’s doing, for example, sales calls, right, and you get to see someone on Zoom or you’re in the room. How

Do you think about the evolution and also with your clients to sales where sometimes you’re not on a call with someone, you’re not in the room with them. They are maybe watching a video of yours or they’re maybe going to your sales page or they’re just getting your program and you don’t have those cues anymore that you can just watch. And it in some ways it’s hard to know the specific person you’re talking to unless obviously you’ve done it a lot.

Nikki Rausch (15:19)
On a sales page, for instance, you don’t necessarily know who’s gonna look at the sales page, when they’re gonna look at it, what their motivational traits are. Different things motivate different people and it’s context specific. But one motivational trait is and this is on a spectrum too, by the way. So on one side of the spectrum, you have people that are towards, and I’ll explain what that means. And then on the very opposite side of the spectrum is what’s known as away from. So towards

language and people who are motivated towards things. They want to accomplish things. They want to win. They want things to change. They want recognition. They want confidence. They want like that’s that’s toward type language. And then on the other side of the spectrum is this away from language. This is like I no longer want to feel bad about myself. I no longer want to stumble through conversations. I am

ready to let go of. That’s all away from type language. Okay. So when you’re writing out your sales page, you should actually be incorporating some toward and some away from language in there because you don’t know who the person is that look that’s looking at the page. So you want to at least touch on you have a way to increase your chances of hitting something that will resonate. If I go to a sales page as a buyer,

And they write all of their language in away from language, which some people do. And we hear this a lot in marketing because they’re like, you know, hit on the pain points. It’s all about pain points. And pain points are often are the things that people want to get rid of, right? The things they they don’t want to experience anymore that away from language. But I tend to be somebody who’s highly motivated towards. And so if I go to sales page and it’s written all in a way from language, I just go, they’re not, they’re not speaking to me.

So it’s so important that you have a mix.

Chardét Ryel (17:18)
It was in the beginning a bit funny because when you said towards I was picturing T O U R D and I was like, What does that stand for? And then you started explaining that it’s towards something and it it hit then and it was like So if I look on the video for anyone who watches like, What is she saying?

Nikki Rausch (17:33)
This is Nikki’s inability to articulate properly.

Chardét Ryel (17:37)
So interesting to ask you as kind of a follow-up around that is there any relationship correlation, etc., between stage of buying awareness? Because so many people are taught around that, right? Like you, you it’s easier theoretically to get someone who’s problem aware and you are providing your solution, is easier than someone who’s not problem aware, for example. Is there any sort of correlation relationship?

Between this and the away and towards people or is it they could be at any stage?

Nikki Rausch (18:09)
Yeah, they really could be at any stage. The thing I will say, and I I do teach this and I I have a real strong belief around it, that three things need to exist in order to sell to somebody successfully. Now, as I mentioned, these three things, and the third, by the way, is the most critical. Like without the third, you can really like damage relationship. But these three things need to be in place and it takes all the pressure off of selling and you

as the seller when these three things are in place. The first is the potential buyer needs to understand that they have a need or a want. Because trying to again convince somebody that they need something that they have no awareness or even acknowledgement that they need or want is a really hard sale. The second thing is you you need to have asked enough questions to understand whether or not you have a solution.

To meet the need or the want that they they are aware of, right? Because not everybody’s a client and that’s okay. The second thing again, I need to understand that I have a solution that meets that need. And then the third I mentioned is the most important is I need permission to put my offer in front of them because we all get sold to all the time without our permission. And this is why sales get such a bad rap. This is why.

We go like, sales. It just feels gross to get these emails from people saying, like, hey, I looked at your YouTube channel and you you are doing such a terrible job at YouTube that you should really hire my company. And I always just go, Dealy, like you don’t have my permission to critique my YouTube channel. Like, how about if you reach out and say, Nikki, are you are you open to some feedback about your YouTube channel? And then I could say yes or no. But until you ask my permission

If you go right into sales mode, that feels gross. And this is why I think a lot of women in particular hold themselves back from selling is because they don’t want to leave people with that impression. They don’t want to be the person that the person goes like, gross. You can sell effectively. Every single person can learn to be proficient at selling and do it in a way

That leaves the other person feeling good about the interaction, whether they buy from you or not, and not going like, ooh, gross. They’ll be like,

Chardét Ryel (20:37)
It makes so much sense why women in particular feel this resistance to sales because already we have to deal with so much where there’s not permission with our space, with our voice, with all these things. And then to say, Well, I’m gonna be the person who’s also gonna invade another woman’s space or another person’s space just feels so contrary to your identity, right? Like to the lived experience you have.

I’m t same with you. Like if you go in there and say my Instagram sucks and you have a screen share of all the posts I did wrong, I don’t even like it goes to delete, right?

Nikki Rausch (21:14)
Having my own podcast and you having your podcast, you know, we get pitched constantly, right? Pitches show up in our email. And the problem with pitches is that they’re either too focused on the pitcher, right? Like this is another thing that I teach all the time is like how to write a message in a way that the reader wants to actually read and engage with.

And talking just about yourself when you’re pitching somebody is never interesting to a reader who doesn’t already know and like you. And I just think people go, Well, that’s how other people do it. So I’m just gonna do it this way. Well, that is another way of you just blending into the crowd. So when you learn how to do things in a way that catches someone’s attention, that allows them to be more open to hearing your message and be more communicative with you.

you know, have a real conversation, selling just gets so much easier. So trying to do it because somebody else has done it that way, like that’s not the answer. If that email showed up in your inbox, how would you respond? And it’s a serious question. This is my serious question to them. And nine out of ten times people are like, I would delete it. It’s like, well then what we gotta do it better. We have to do it differently. And we need to be able to create curiosity. You know, I teach a

five step process for a successful sales conversation. It’s called the selling staircase. And step two of my selling staircase is create curiosity. And when I ask people, do you know how to create curiosity when you’re talking about your product, your service, like who you are, what your business is, most people get a blank stare of like, what? What do you mean create curiosity? And I always go, well, if you can’t create curiosity, it’s very hard to continue

The conversation. I love this. In my dentist’s office, there was this big sign that said, You don’t have to brush all your teeth. Only the ones you want to keep. And that’s how I think about creating curiosity is like you don’t have to create curiosity with every single person you come into contact with. Yet you do have to create curiosity with people who you would like to earn their business. Let’s do something that is more impactful. Let’s do something that

not just feels good to you that you know your confidence grows, but that is engaging to the other person that that allows the other person to go, What is that? Tell me more. Real conversation with somebody versus like, Hey, let me word vomit my blah blah blah onto you and just hope that you decide that I’m I have value and that you want to buy from me. There

Chardét Ryel (23:47)
There’s

four other steps, right, that are involved in this. Yeah. Is there as kind of a final question for people who are listening, like I wanna know the other four, I wanna connect with Nikki, I wanna be able to really go into this because I know that sales is my weak point. Where can they do that? How can they work with you? I know you’ve got something special for them too, for everyone listening.

Nikki Rausch (24:07)
Here’s the first way that I want to offer a gift to your listener because I feel really honored that they think they made it this far into the episode with me, of mostly me talking about myself, which is not the norm for me, but I I think I’ve shared stories I’ve never shared before. But here’s what I wanna offer is I have a follow-up made easy guide where I actually give you scripts, not necessarily that you need to use my script, but at least

It gives you an outline, a place to start of what types of things should be included in that message and when and how long to wait to send it. Right. So it’s the follow-up made easy guide. You can get it by going to your salesmaven.com forward slash easy follow up. So super simple, easy follow up. If you’re just like, I just want to know what the other dang four steps are, Nikki, then I have a book on it. It’s the third book I wrote. It’s actually called The Selling Staircase. You can get it pretty much

anywhere books are sold or you can get it on Kindle, you can get it on Audible, the selling staircase, and or come listen to the podcast because I do a ton of solo episodes and I teach. I see how easy sales is. I see how I can be successful in in this part of the conversation. So come listen to the Sales Maven podcast.

Chardét Ryel (25:20)
I love it. So I’m definitely going to say that again for everyone. It’ll be in the show notes. But I think if you really want to do the follow-up, which I agree is such a big part, where sometimes it wasn’t no, it was just not yet, or they didn’t see it, or like you need to frame it differently. I think that’s a super valuable next step for anyone that is really struggling here. And then also for Nikki’s podcast, it’s like very different when you listen to her episodes. I was on there as a guest, and when she

talks to you or when she gives the episodes, you feel like you’re in this kind of master class. And I think for so many people listening, that’s where we get stuck. It’s just sales teaching has been so boring. And you do it differently. So thank you. Right after this, listen.

Nikki Rausch (26:04)
Thank you. I’m honored to get to do this work.

Chardét Ryel (26:07)
And thank you so much for listening. We all know sales is one of the hardest things about business, but it doesn’t have to be. So I truly hope that you listened, you took notes, you’ll re-listen, you’ll go find Nikki because we can make this a lot easier. Everything she’s talking about, I wish that I had learned so much earlier in my journey because it just would have made this feel more like a real, genuine connection. So if you felt that this episode was helpful.

Please share it with other entrepreneurs in your life, even people who are in corporate that are selling, because this just might be the way that they feel better about it and can see more results that feel good. I’ll see you always in the next one. Your story is your SEO. It is as powerful as those words people are searching for. Go to the her first three years website or go to my Instagram, chardetryel

Both of those links are in the show notes and get the private podcast series, How to Stand Out Online. You will listen to that series. You will probably binge it and you will find your way.

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