How Smart Freight Brokers Turn Follow-Ups Into Revenue | Episode 330

SPEAKER_01: 0:19

Welcome back to another episode of the Freight 360 podcast. We're up to 330 here. If you're brand new, make sure to check out all the other content. We've got a full back catalog on our website and on YouTube. So make sure to check that out. You can just simply search on our YouTube channel or on our website for a keyword if you want to learn about prospecting or lead generation or fraud. Just type in those keywords and you're going to get all kinds of content, long form, short form, et cetera. Share us with your friends in the industry. There's a uh the Frey Broker basics course if you're looking for a full educational option. And leave us that review, like, comment, all the all the good stuff there. Um in this episode is brought to you by Ascend TMS, um, the recommended and preferred TMS for new and small to medium-sized brokers. Um, if you use the referral code and promo code down in the show notes, you'll get free access for an entire three months. So make sure to check that out. And uh today we're gonna talk about follow-up when it comes to prospecting. So we've done a lot of content on generating your leads and making that initial phone call and that cold outreach. But um, today we're gonna we're gonna dive into the the follow-up process, what it looks like, how it's different for each customer and each situation. Um, we'll get to that shortly. So uh Ben, how's uh you guys all warmed up down in Florida now? Got through the little cold spurt there?

SPEAKER_00: 1:43

It's gone warmer. I mean, like it's still 55 in the morning, 54, so it's a little chilly, but it's go up to the 70s every day. So I got no complaints.

SPEAKER_01: 1:51

Nice. It actually thawed out uh here in western New York this week, um, at least for a day. It got above freezing earlier this week. It was like, I think it was like 40, 45 degrees. Um, and then what sucks is like it got cold again. Um so now there's just like a layer of ice everywhere. But hey, it's February in Western New York. It is what it is. Uh sports, the Super Bowl, that was uh that was an interesting one with between Seattle and uh New England there. So any Patriots fans out there, um on the you know, if you want to hunt the good stuff and take a positive out of it, you have a second-year quarterback and a first-year coach, and you made it to the Super Bowl. Um did you watch the game?

SPEAKER_00: 2:35

Yeah, I watched all of it. I mean, it definitely wasn't super.

SPEAKER_01: 2:41

Field goal, field goal, and then finally you got some touchdowns in there. But uh yeah, that was uh that was an interesting one. The last couple years, you know, we had the the KC game last year where it wasn't really close, and then um Seattle pretty much ran away with it towards the the tail end of uh this year's game. So congrats to all the Seahawks fans.

SPEAKER_00: 3:02

My dad had a call me and he's like, Hey, do you know the Patriots got a Super Bowl record? Like, what? He goes, Yeah, they've now lost more Super Bowls than any other team. It's like fair point, but also you have to get there to lose.

SPEAKER_01: 3:17

That's true. They have the AFC title, even if they lose a Super Bowl. So you've been watching the Olympics at all?

SPEAKER_00: 3:23

A little bit. I watched the Lindsay Vaughn accident.

SPEAKER_01: 3:27

Yeah. Yeah, that was tough, Dan. So her getting like airlifted out with a helicopter and everything. I what I've been doing is I throw on USA in my office just as I'm working, and I kind of have like I get a little bit of everything because like they've had you know, they'll they'll do like the skiing, they'll do the um snowboarding, the aerials, um curling. I've watched more curling this week than I think I've ever watched in my entire life. So but men's hockey starts uh this week, and Team USA for women's has been just like dominating. So looking good. What's going on in the news? Honestly, nothing that I've seen. Same old, same old. So I I I will say I'll make a comment on we did our episode with Dean about you know the freight market and where rates are at and stuff like that. And it's I think it was a really good episode because it it gives people um a reminder to talk to your customers about what's coming. And um, you know, this could be like we're gonna talk about follow-ups today, right? These are points of discussion to have on setting expectations with what is what are we seeing in in the freight market, what are rates looking like overall, and then drill down to specific markets, equipment types, et cetera. But somebody commented on our YouTube version of the podcast last week and said, uh, the guy on the left, it was Dean. They're like, the guy on the left has no idea what he's talking about. I'm like, he's literally an like an analyst.

SPEAKER_00: 4:51

The guy who's been driving a truck for like 50 years, reads more analytics rates, talks to more shippers, carriers, and is actually on the road than probably anybody I've ever talked to.

SPEAKER_01: 5:00

And I I think it's a like there's a valid point to be made there that like um for anybody to think that they know everything, right, is a dangerous mindset to have in and really in any industry, but especially in freight.

SPEAKER_00: 5:15

Just throw that as a blanket statement.

SPEAKER_01: 5:17

If if you think you're so smart that your, you know, your method of predicting rates, for example, is is you know, flawless, is dangerous. Or because if you do a bid and then it goes upside down, um, it's a bad place to be. The same thing goes with like if you think that your process for anything is perfect and you know can never be improved upon, um, it's a dangerous place to be. So funny.

SPEAKER_00: 5:40

I had this conversation with Ava the other day because she was like, she asked me some question that like didn't have an answer. I can't remember what it was, you know, like a six-year-old question that like literally doesn't like why's fire fire or something. And I'm like, yeah, I'm like, I I don't know. And she's like, Well, you know everything, Daddy. Like, how do you not know that? You're like so old. And I started laughing. I was like, I was like, honey, I'm like, there's this weird thing, and I was thinking about it. I'm like, because in my teenage years and early 20s, like I was so confident in everything that I knew that I thought I knew more than I did, right? But as you get older, I'm like, that percentage moves in the other direction. Meaning, like in my 30s, I realized I didn't know 40% of what I thought I knew. And then in my late 30s, I'm like, I don't know 70% of what I thought I knew. And in my 40s, I'm like, I think 90 to 99% of what I thought I've known in my life is probably wrong to some degree, right? And it's like the more you're curious and the more you learn, I'm like, the way I explained to Ava is I'm like, for every time you have a question or you're curious and you want to learn something and you learn it, you should end up with more questions, like two or three more questions. So as you learn, what you're aware of that you don't know should also get bigger and exponentially larger. And Einstein used a balloon as an analogy. He's like, if a balloon is everything you know and you blow air into it, is more what you know. The outside surface of that balloon that gets bigger, he's like, is always bigger than the inside surface of the balloon. So as you learn, your ignorance also should grow with your knowledge. Meaning, like you learn more, but also realize you become more humble as you learn more because you're like, wow, I just don't know half the things I thought I knew and was extremely confident in when I was younger. Yeah.

SPEAKER_01: 7:19

Yeah. No, that's a uh that's a that's a pretty good point there. So um, oh, I will I will say uh news. Um, and this went out in our newsletter earlier this week. The stats for I don't I forgot the time of my head, how many basically the the the enforcement um numbers came out for January and how many how many carriers or drivers were pulled off or basically removed from capacity through just in general enforcement. And it was like it was actually like a pretty sizable um number. Um so I think you know that just kind of adds to our conversation last week with with Dean about where the market's been going and and where it where we expected to be headed. So um it's interesting because when this all was first like just discussion points last year, so like Sean Duffy got um nominated and then um you know officially started as the secretary of transportation, and that you know, there was a lot of talk about we're gonna do this and that, and people are like, What is this? Like, who is this guy? Like he was on road rules, like what is he gonna do with transportation? Um, but it kind of feels like between you know, just just the things that have been enacted in the last year, and then you know the FMCSA now has a a new um a new chairman um who came from, I believe, like uh Florida Highway say or highway patrol or whatever.

SPEAKER_00: 8:51

He was like 25 years overseeing like the Florida Department or Florida, I don't remember State Patrol because I can't remember.

SPEAKER_01: 8:59

Um but yeah, like it's I guess I guess if I try to like find some positive news, um if you look back from a year till now, like there really has been it, it has felt like a long, a long, like grueling handful of years for a lot of us in brokerage, but I feel like I I can look back and say that things are better in a better place and heading in a better place now than I think they were 12 months ago. So that's my take on it. All right, I'll let you take it away, Ben, for follow-up.

SPEAKER_00: 9:28

So we are going to dig into follow-ups. This is a question we get all the time. It's like, well, what do I say on a follow-up? What'll when do I follow up? How often do I follow up? Right. And like they're all really good questions. So we want to take some time to kind of walk through. I think it's important to walk through like a process on how at least I look at it, how you look at it, and just things we've seen that are best practices, because it all kind of comes together. One is like when, the other is like, what do you talk about? The third is like how frequently do you do this? And four is probably like how long do you expect to do this before you're gonna start to see some, we'll call them results. Either lanes to quote, you're getting documents to review to get onboarded, or you're actually moving loads. Like, not really the finish line, but it's the finish line between prospect and their customer, right?

SPEAKER_01: 10:17

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00: 10:18

The first thing that I think is really important related to this is that like your follow-up call should not be like a standalone situation. And here's what I mean by that: like a prospecting uh like sales cycle, right? Which is like I call you, you don't know me. We know each other, we connect, we learn about each other, you trust me a little more, I trust you a little more, we exchange information, yada, yada, yada, over two to three months, then we're doing business, right? But most people look at these as like individual situations where it's like, okay, I'm just gonna follow up with this company today and then figure out what I'm going to say or ask them, right? Uh, which is a lot more work than it needs to be, right? The second thing is like, what and how do you say what you're gonna say? But the the I guess the analogy that I've been using in trainings recently that I think really makes a lot of sense is like, think about a TV series you watch on Netflix, okay? So, or any streaming service or any TV show ever, right? If it's a 30-minute show, you see episode one, when you get to episode two, at the end of episode one, there's like a teaser for number two. Like it's either a cliffhanger in the episode to make you want to watch the next one, or like the story kind of almost ends, but like you want to see what happens next. Like the last five to 10 minutes are to hook you to get you to the next one, right? Then in the next episode, the first five minutes of basically every series is a recap of the last one.

SPEAKER_01: 11:46

Yeah.

SPEAKER_00: 11:47

Hey, this is what you saw, this is what you remembered, and it brings you back into that place, and then it kind of starts that story from there, right? That is really, I think, very similar to what the sales process or follow-ups look like. They should not be like standalone, disjointed conversations, meaning, like, would you ever watch a TV series? There's like one episode that talks about some character, and then the next episode has nothing to do with what you saw in the first one. It's completely on a different topic with a different storyline. Then the third one is another one. By the second episode, you'd be like, I don't, I can't even follow what's going on here, right? But it's very similar if you think about it from a prospect's point of view versus the salesperson's point of view, of like what follow-ups should look like, right? They should basically be like, the way I picture it is one like hour and a half to two hour conversation broken up into five to seven minute phone calls, right? Just like a TV series. So you're not going to watch a seven-hour movie, but you'll watch a seven-hour series and you'll keep going back to it. It's very similar to the way the sales process I feel should work, even like almost from like a psychological and emotional point, meaning, like, I should be able to talk to you, get a little bit familiar with you, you get a little familiar with me. And then I should learn at least one or two things about you that go into my CRM because I need to remember what was in episode one.

SPEAKER_01: 13:07

Can I add a note there? Yeah. So like I I do this in a in like the real world when I'm talking to brokers in our company, and I've got the, you know, we get the question of like, you know, which what do I say when I follow up? And it's like, well, what happened in your last conversation? Correct. Who did you talk to? What did you talk to them about? And if you're not making those notes, if you're not entering those notes into a CRM, you're doing yourself a disservice. And I just wanted to add that in there because one of the things I've always done is when I go into a uh a record in the CRM, either a note that's pinned at the top or my last note, it should be very clear and obvious, some sort of big takeaway or discussion point or something to just jog my memory. So I wanted to add that in there because every every fault is going to be different based on what happened in the last call. Did you did you have a good conversation? Did you end up talking to someone that wasn't necessarily the decision maker, but you learned something? Um, was it did the call end abruptly because the person got busy? Or did they leave you with a um something that you had to work on, like you know, taking a look at a quote for a specific upcoming lane or something like that?

SPEAKER_00: 15:22

Correct. Right. So the first thing is like, this is why we talk about a CRM being so valuable, because like it is absolutely impossible to remember all these things from all these people you talk to every single day, every single week when you're making a hundred phone calls a day and speaking to 15 to 20 people someday. Like you're just never gonna be able to keep all of that in your head, right? And also, like the thing you said, I think is super important. So, like, again, just really simple. It's like, hey, I connected with you. If I can get you to share anything personal about yourself in that call, like that is a huge win. I'm focusing like 90% on you as a person, 10% on logistics and operations stuff, right? So if I call you, I mean like say it was Monday this week, like, hey, Nate, hey, just out of curiosity, you guys catch the Super Bowl. What'd you think of the game? And if I can get you to share any thoughts, you'll probably mention in there that, like, hey, you watch the game, but you're not really a Patriots fan because you're a Bills fan, but you watch it anyway. And I'm like, oh, so he's a Bills fan. He definitely likes football. This is something that I'm gonna put in my CRM, right? Because when I follow up with you, I want to be able, if it's in the football season, to be able to loop that into conversations because you care about it. I might not know anything about football. I might have never played football, watched football, or have anything to do with it. But I can just ask you a question every week that gets you to talk about something you care about, right? Like that's where I feel like is core, super important. Anything you can talk about over the weekend, do you have kids, what you're doing after work, how your week's coming along, any personal, like the other way too, I think is that kind of question in your first couple of calls is like very surface level. People always laugh when like two people meet each other. They're like, well, how's the weather going? Like, oh, it's pretty cold out here. Oh, it's been super freezing. Like, and everyone goes, like, what's the point of this? Like, there's real psychological like value. And people study this a lot on how human beings interact to determine, like, is this somebody I want to keep connecting with and have a friendship with or a relationship and business with, right? So those are like just getting to know each other and getting comfortable with who you are. So, like, they're important. And you don't want to ask somebody like a super intrusive question the first time you meet them. So, like, I'll use a metaphor analogy of like dating. Like, if you just met somebody and you introduce your friend to someone else you knew and they go for coffee, like the first question you're probably not gonna ask somebody when you just met them is like, so tell me about your last relationship. Um, did you have any traumatic issues in your childhood? And do you want kids and to get married? Like, you'd be like, whoa, like I don't know you at all. Like, maybe we start with like the weather, how your week's going. Do you like music? Have you seen any TV shows? Like surface level things that people are comfortable sharing, right?

SPEAKER_01: 18:04

Yeah. I'll and I'll add to like um I think our podcast does a great job at showing a lot of podcasts do this if there's more than one person on it. Is how does the conversation start? Because you know, eventually in every single episode that we do, there is a, you know, there's a core topic and discussion that we have, and we tend to ease into it. So if you listen to um really any podcast where someone's either interviewing somebody else, or maybe it's a a group of people that are that do the show together, um there's usually a slow warm-up period in that conversation to get everybody really synced up. Um, you know, you you go down the psychology path of it, but the same thing applies with any kind of phone call and you know, any kind of phone call with a prospective shipper for that matter. And I think this is where like your CRM notes, like we kind of alluded to, like, they don't have to just be operational or the customer specific with their business, it could be about their life. Like it's one of the common things I've always done is whenever I get like a little tidbit of knowledge about somebody on a call, like that's personal, like you mentioned, like I'm gonna log that in there. If they say their age or something about their family or something that they're passionate about that's not work-related, it's good to just jot that down and you can weave that into your conversation moving forward. So I think um another point too is when you every call that you make, you know, when you when you end that call, I typically, if you can, unless it's ended abruptly, like if someone's like, hey, I gotta go, let's catch up on our time, got it, right? We didn't have a have a chance to kind of like set up what the next call is gonna be about. But if you can have a rough idea of when the next follow-up will be, what it's gonna be about, and what each person may um typically might be you, needs to bring to the table on that next call, that takes a lot of the the thought process out of it, right? That's most of the work. Hands down. Yep.

SPEAKER_00: 20:01

Yeah, most of the work is sitting there staring at a phone number, going, what am I gonna talk to these people about? I've talked to them three times. I don't even know what to say, right? But if you don't have your notes on what you learned and how it went, like you kind of don't even know how you got to where you are, let alone know where you're gonna go from here, right? So you're just wandering in the woods, going, like, I don't know how I got here and I don't know where I'm going, but like I'm just gonna try to figure it out. That'd be super hard, right? Yeah. So the other thing you said, and I wanted to bring this back, is like, I always will put my follow-up topic or questions or info, whatever information, right? As soon as I'm done with that call, I just got done talking to you for four or five minutes. I can kind of feel what I would have liked to ask you next and where I think the conversation was headed and what was important to you. So I'm literally putting my notes when I schedule my next task and deciding when, literally at that same time. I just got off the phone with you. I got a pretty good feeling on when would be the right amount of time to wait to call you back. At the very least, that's the point in time I have the most information. So you might as well just do it then. Then I put my notes in my follow-up task, like, oh, hey, Nate was a Bills fan, he's got three kids, um, lives in Buffalo, travels to Florida a couple of times a year, and they they probably are a good fit, need to learn their weekly load volume and a little bit more about their operations, ask this and this, right? So, like when I go to call you back and say eight to eleven days, like I kind of use general. If I speak to you, somewhere between eight and eleven days is probably when I'm gonna follow up. If I don't, I'm gonna call you in three days if I miss you, right? So I just try to keep it simple and repetitive. So now in 11 days, when I call you back, this is the next part. It's the beginning of the second episode. I start and recap what we talked about in the first call. So now I call you in 11 days and I'm like, oh, hey, so I see that you're a football fan. I'm gonna ask you, like, hey, what do you think about the Pro Bowl? You guys gonna take a you guys gonna watch it? Just curious if you're excited for uh the final four coming around the corner and just see what you say, right? You bite on basketball, tell me you're excited about you're a huge Duke fan. I'm writing that down. You don't care about the Pro Bowl, great. So I'm recapping and reminding you of the conversation interaction, which gets you to talk more. I'm getting you to talk more by talking about things you care about, or at least I made a pretty good guess at what you cared about to start this conversation. Now we're in like an actual conversation, like the pattern. Like I talk, you talk, back and forth, right? We're comfortable again. Then I'm gonna ask one or two things about your operations, maybe that I didn't know last time. Like, hey, you know what? I was kind of curious, Nate. Is this like a busy time of year for you guys? Like, where's your like weekly volume this time of year? You guys like 20, 40 loads a week, 40, 60, beyond 60. I'm just curious how your year kind of shapes up seasonally. Oh, hey, we're kind of on the low end of that ben, because you're not gonna share specific details. You've only talked to me twice. You'll give me a range. Oh, we're like 20 to 40 this time of year. We get a lot busier in July, writing that down.

SPEAKER_01: 22:58

Also, you know, think about what's going on in the environment around you at the current period of time. So, like we just we just went through a a pretty crazy storm and weather situation that impacted a large chunk of the United States, right? And a lot of uh conversations in the last couple weeks probably revolved around what the impact of the winter weather was for a lot of. These customers, right? Like there was a customer that we had a situation with the last, I think it was two weeks ago, where um everybody that promised them a certain, you know, range of rates on the a certain lanes, they're like, Went out the lane. We can't get a truck in. Like you, you guys say you can get a truck, but like everyone's been saying that they can't. It's like, well, yeah, we're not gonna promise you that we can get you uh a truck at this rate. And um, we can work the market for you, but the reality is there's been a huge whiplash of rates and and capacity availability because drivers don't want to drive in this area right now. And now, if you've got backlog shipments, like there's gonna be, you know, so to kind of wrap that off, like look at what impacts in the in the industry might have um brought up a point of discussion for them. And it could be, you know, what rates are doing overall in the market, it could be driver enforcement or loads getting double brokered. Like I was talking to you off air about one earlier, but what do you got?

SPEAKER_00: 24:26

So there's two or three things, and I want to kind of put a bow on that in segue, right? Because that's a really good point. Anything that is likely to affect them, like I'm gonna write that on my desk in front of me because I can use that in every call, right? That's not unique to the person I'm calling. I don't need to put that in HubSpot, right? Or my CRM. I'll literally write that on a piece of paper, right? Like, here's an issue they're probably all facing today. Loop that into the conversation, right? The other really good call, like bucket of topics that you can use is I do this with everybody. So I'm like, okay, how is your book of business now? Where are you having the most issues? Right. And like I did one yesterday, and they're like, oh, we can't get Nigales to, you know, Ontario, California covered, can't get Nogales to Jersey covered, rates are through the roof, customers got loads backing up. It's a nightmare. I'm like, that problem you face, right, with your current customers is your ammunition for your follow-ups. Yeah. Right. Like you don't got to find it. You don't gotta spend all day in the news. Just ask your dispatchers and the carrier side, or look at yourself if you're the one covering your loads, like, what is the hardest thing I've had to do this week that keeps happening? That's what I'm gonna loop into my follow-ups. So now I got you to tell me your load volume. Like, hey, Nate, just out of curiosity, and I there's a really effective way to do this. It's a third party story. But all that means is this problem I'm going to get you to talk about. I don't make it about you and me. I make it about another person or another customer. Hey, Nate, hey, I'm just curious, are you guys running any issues with stuff coming out of Negales to SoCal or up to Jersey? I know you guys ship a lot of similar commodities as my other customer, Acme Produce. They've been having a hell of a time over the past 10 days getting any of their capacity secured and paying like way inflated rates. Have you guys experienced any of that? Right. So, like I'm not telling you, I'm sharing a story about someone else that sits in the same seat as you running into something. And maybe you experienced it. But even if you haven't, that information is valuable to you, right? Because you don't know what your other competitors are running into. You don't see the market. So even if you don't ship that lane, it shows kind of your resume without bragging. I do this job, I do it well enough to notice when things aren't going well, and I'm good enough at this to know this information could be helpful to you. That's why I'm sharing it. All of that is just implied in taking the problems you deal with in one part of your job and using them as an advantage in the other part of your job to get you to tell me. Because what you're gonna say is, you know what? We don't really move a lot into Gallas this time of year, but I'll tell you what, everything coming out of SoCal has been a nightmare. Ding, ding, ding. I didn't ask you a question. I told you something and you gave me the answer to the question that I really wanted to ask is where do you need help? I got, I was able to elicit the information without interrogating you, going, so Nate, which lanes are you having service issues on and where are you having a hard time getting capacity? Like nobody wants to answer that question, but you will answer if I suggest a problem someone else has.

SPEAKER_01: 27:21

And we so we talk about, you know, prospecting with a purpose, grouping your leads together to call on because they have similar things in common. And the same methodology can apply with follow-up too. Um it can get a little bit more difficult because just based on the timing of when you're gonna follow up and who you actually um have in your where they're at in your pipeline and whatnot. But if you can group your follow-ups into common and if they have something in common, whether it's location or things that are impacting them, um, those those tend to be some of the most productive call sessions that you can have. Like if you you just mentioned it's funny you brought up like stuff coming up through cross-border from Mexico. I had like probably three or four conversations in the last week about reefer freight, usually produce things like that, going north, either into Canada or Chicago or various places in the US, and they're all dealing with the same kinds of issues right now. Like you're seeing spikes in rates. And a lot of times, like, you know, this kind of goes back to our news discussion. Like, customers got really comfortable with things being, you know, less volatile than they're starting to be right now. And it take kind of takes me back to like the the 2020, 2021 era when like any customer would answer would take your call and will take your follow-up call because they're all having very, very similar issues with finding capacity.

SPEAKER_00: 28:44

So I wanna I wanna I wanna like pause on that too, because that's really important, right? One is it like all the shippers are kind of experiencing the same things, they all access the market and it's all tied together, even if they're contract versus spot. But the thing I want to share with everybody to really kind of think about is like, think about the dynamic between you and the shipper, right? That shipper that is having the most problems also is probably the same shipper that wasn't willing to give you that same load every week for that rate. They weren't willing to commit to you and say, hey, I'll give you this business every week. You give me this rate at whatever you're running it at, right? Because they just keep thinking it's gonna be cheaper. So they give you nothing and you go, well, then I'll just quote it every week and I'll tell you where it is. So that works for them until it doesn't. And then all of a sudden, when it doesn't, they want to blame you, the broker, and go, Well, wait a minute, why is your rate that high? Well, it's like, well, I would have held the cheaper rate if you would have given me in something in return, like dedicated business, and I will take more of the loss. But you said you wanted to operate on a spot basis to get the cheapest truck every week. So don't get mad at me when it's not in your favor, right? And for the past three years, to your point, it's been in the shipper's favor. So they're just running so much more on the spot freight because they think it's gonna be cheaper every day. Well, as soon as it's not, which it is looks like it's gonna be for a good part of this year, is like, now they've got to go tell their bosses why their budgets are going up. And their boss is going, Well, I thought you liked working with this broker. Well, yeah, because for the past three years, they just got you the cheapest rate and nobody cared. But once the rates start going up, now all of a sudden they start looking at their brokers and going, Who's really helping me? Who's cherry picking the good freight? Who's willing to help me with the harder loads? Because as their problems build up with their existing brokers, that creates a big door for you to get new customers. That is the door that we don't control. Like sales in our industry is like, we're not selling a service or product to any shipper that one, they don't already have access to and they aren't already working with probably another broker or a few. So the job isn't to convince you that I have something that you don't have. It's that I need you to trust that I do a better job than who you're currently using. And in order to do that, it's not me manipulating you. It's honestly me following up consistently enough that one of the people you already use screws up, lies to you, drops the ball, takes advantage of you. Their mistakes create the door that I'm gonna walk through to do business with you. So you can't make them. You got to kind of be patient and like wait under the rim for the rebound because someone's gonna miss and you're gonna get the ball. You just gotta talk to more and more people. So the odds of that happening happen more and more frequently.

SPEAKER_01: 33:07

Yeah, and I go back to like your, I'll give an example with a customer that um I think back to like our basic principles of like the eight to twelve conversations and whatnot. There's a customer years ago that as we started developing doing business with them, every conversation or meeting, they happened to be local. So a lot of times we were able to meet in person or go to their facility or they came to us. Um, but we were able to get like one more piece of information. And it wasn't just like little tidbits, it was like good discussion points. So, like, you know, one conversation we're finding out that they're having a really big issue with tender rejection because their annual bid that they did, CH Robinson basically just if they don't like, you know, if they're if they get tendered the load and the market doesn't, you know, really take for that load, they could get back. And it's like, okay, but what and then you have to think to yourself, well, what does that mean for the customer? Well, now my customer, their job when when they're just trying to make sure trucks are coming in and out and products moving to their, you know, to their receivers and to their customers, now they have more work to do. They're not getting paid anymore, right? They're out if they're on a salary or hourly, like they they now have more to figure out.

SPEAKER_00: 34:18

And that's just and they might have no experience doing it because if they've only been in the job a year and a half, six months, or a year, the only thing they've done is what you said send loads, make sure the trucks are there, send bills, send invoicing. Now they've got to negotiate, they've got to change these things, they've got they don't even know why this is occurring, let alone have experience and actually solving this, which is what creates a huge opportunity for us.

SPEAKER_01: 34:41

Exactly. And then, so what else did that lead to? Was then we started to realize that they're having issues with the amount of available storage space in their facility because when a tender gets rejected and a load doesn't move that day, you only have a finite amount of space in your facility, right? So then if that continues to happen over and over and over, now we've got a storage issue and a backlog issue with getting our product moved. Um, and then there was another, you know, another conversation later on. Um, he had hinted at uh an upcoming, like I think it was a quarterly review with their um logistics department to talk about everything from you know storage to freight spend to you, you know, fill in the blank on what it what you know what what it could be. And a great discussion point was hey, how did that go with your, you know, when you guys had that meeting, you know, what was what were the points of discussion? And we tend to find out like for certain, because you know, just like all of our customers are different, our customers' customers are different, right? And in some of the lanes, for some of their customers, um, price was one of the most important things. In other lanes, for other customers and other products of theirs, it happened to be um service. Because if that service was not, you know, superb, they risked losing that customer to a competitor and losing that business altogether. So these are things I think a lot of brokers need to get them. You need to put yourself in your in the prospect's shoes and think about what matters to them and what impact does it have on their job, their you know, their career track at their company, right? And the business overall, depending on who you're meeting with, like for that same exact company. At one time we met with their, he was like the director of something in like he handled like transportation and something else, but like he didn't care about the day-to-day and the trench stuff about you know who what broker or carrier was getting, you know, getting used. It was just that like the customers were being serviced. That was like all that mattered to him, right? And then you have another guy who like all he cares about is the spend. Like his his job revolves around keeping the budget um in a good spot because when it comes time for his review, he's got to make sure that he's you know, his salary and his bonus is is worth what he his impact on the company is. So um, that's why I like when people say, like, what do I say in a fall off? I'm like, it depends. Like, who are you talking with? What is it about? What was what happened the last time that you guys had a discussion and um and all that stuff? So it's uh I can't emphasize enough how important it is to like think think of this as like the long game, right? Like you you really want to get to build that rapport with with the people that you're talking with and have them like you and trust you and all that stuff. But eventually, like you've you've got to have a long roadmap of like where do we want this relationship to go to and how can I get just one step closer each time I talk to that person? Because it could be in one in one phase, you're just trying to give them a chance, give you want them to give you a chance to quote a spot lane, right? Whereas if you're moving a couple things for them now, and that happened with that customer, we our next goal was how do I get invited to take part in the bid next year, right? Versus how do we now take on other verticals within that company? So it just all really depends on where you're at and and what the the goal is for the next step.

SPEAKER_00: 38:01

So you said a bunch of things too, right? So the first thing is like I want to go back to the thing you said a minute ago where it was like one, there's different people and there's different questions you ask them, right? The other thing is like every phone call, you're not trying to learn everything. Like to me, I'm like, I'm trying to learn one or two personal things and one thing about your business, maybe two, right? Always a little more on the personal than the business side because the more you talk to them as a person and the more they trust you, the more they'll just share about the business and you can be a little more confident that it's true, right? The second, I think, is like a very general group of questions is like, what do I want to know in every sales call? Is like, who am I talking to? Okay, what does their day look like? Or what are their procedures? How do they go about their job all day, right? Or all week. And what are the penalties when things don't go wrong? And what are the benefits when things go really well? What are their incentives, bonuses if they do really well? What happens when things don't go well? The other side of that. And just what does it look like what they're doing all day? Because to your point, if they're tendering loads, that's different than the manager. The manager is different than the head of procurement, the head of procurement might be different than the director of logistics. They all report to different people, have different responsibilities, different day-to-day jobs, and care about different things. So you want to learn about those from each person, ideally, is like your ultimate goal, right? Because the more that happens, like the ultimate, ultimate goal is that like you and I trust us so much each other so much that when you need help, you just tell me which loads you need help on, send them to me, and I throw a margin on it because you trust me enough, right? That is like the holy grail of customer relationships. There's so much trust that we're not even looking at the numbers. You know, I'll do my best job to get you the right truck at the best price I can on any given day, and you're okay with whatever I charge you. Like that's where you're trying to get to, right? But to your point, you build it like brick by brick. Like you're not building a house like one wall, one wall, one wall roof. Like you literally have to put this together over time because trust, there was another funny thing I heard in a movie the other day. There was, I think it was a mob movie, but the guy was like talking to the other mob boss. He's like, trust occurs in miles and minutes, basically. The longer we walk together in time and the distance, the more we're gonna trust each other. Like we just met each other, we kind of like each other, we think we will trust each other, but we don't know if ultimately when things get difficult, can you rely on this person? Because that's the thing I also wanted to kind of segue into is that like as this progress happens over phone calls and weeks and months, is like, I need you to be able to trust me even when it's hard. Not when it's an easy-to-cover load, but when no one else will cover a load you have and you really need that picked up, that I will come and help you, right? Or even when something goes wrong and I'm supposed to have a truck there in an hour and that truck breaks down, that I call you immediately to make your life easier. So you can let your doc know, let your manager know, or let your customer know that it won't be picked up on time. You'll get angry at me the first time. You might even yell and swear at me because you know you're gonna get yelled at. But usually an hour or two later the next day, you trust me a lot more because you know intuitively, like or instinctively, that like even when shit doesn't go the way we hoped it would, which you know, because you're a shipper and things don't always go the way you want, you know problems will happen. What you absolutely don't ever find acceptable is that you're unaware that there's a problem. I know it. You trust me, and I didn't tell you, right? Like that is by far the worst thing that you're trying to avoid. Because the more you do that, the more you'll trust me when you actually need help. That's working towards this real relationship where we're actually working back and forth. Not just me offering you a cheap truck today to get a load, and then you just give it to the next cheapest guy tomorrow. Like to me, that's not a customer. Like that's a transaction. And you can't build, you can't build a career on that for sure. You can't even build like an annual income on that because you're just constantly a revolving door for who wants the next cheapest truck. Like you have no relationships. Your business is only as good as your ability to find a cheap truck on any given day. You need to get to the place where you're willing to do what other people aren't, work a little harder, ask a few more questions, get involved a little bit more so that little by little you're just creating a big difference between you as a broker and everybody else that you talk to that you were working with, right?

SPEAKER_01: 42:26

Yeah. So I want to give some um some practical, you know, basically like categories of the things you can do on a follow-up call. So we we made it very clear and obvious that, you know, it what do you say on a follow-up or what do you ask on a follow-up um depends on the customer and depends on where you're at in that conversation. But we can at least kind of categorize some of the basic things that you want to get to know over time. And we've you know, we've said this in other content about you know prospecting, but uh, and we alluded to a lot of it today. Like, so you you want to understand about their operation. So um asking about you know, general questions and uh obviously if you can find out where there's potential issues or pain points. Um, so things like you know, are they having issues covering any specific lane right now? Um, are they struggling to have consistent rates or consistent service from any of their existing uh carriers or brokers that they're using right now? Um it could be um, you know, finding out if you know if specific lanes, and they could be different, like I mentioned before, are, you know, what's the most important? Is it price? Is it service? Is it something else? Um it could be about current volumes versus past volumes versus projected future volumes. It could be changes in their customer base and how that's gonna impact them long term. Um it could be understanding like if there's a if there's growth going on in that company, is there gonna be a change in personnel and how does that impact how their transportation process and their and their tendering process is gonna work? Is it maybe it's uh like we had one where they all of a sudden they knew that the next year they were hiring basically a 4 PL to handle all of their um pricing, bidding, invoicing, all of the above. And what does that mean for things overall? So just you know, there's there's like almost an endless amount of things that you can ask about, but um, you know, try to have like this is why I recommend like when you're when you're wrapping up a call, have like two or three things you want to find out on the next call that, like you said, it you know, it could be personal, it could be you know operational or business focused, but um, those are those are general like categories of like, you know, it's volume of business, it's what's the you know, current issues that they're having, how is service with their existing providers, um, any other any other things there you could think of off the top of your head?

SPEAKER_00: 44:51

I'll even I'll just even dumb it down to like I want to know what, when and where you're having issues that I could help, right? The thing I would also say is if I ask you where you need help, okay, that implies in some way you're not good at your job or not as good at other people's.

SPEAKER_01: 45:07

Yeah, there's a psychological thing there. You want to phrase it in a more tactful way.

SPEAKER_00: 45:11

So that's why asking them directly, I feel like isn't the most effective way to do it. It you can do it that way. It's just harder, I feel, where like eliciting the answer is far easier when I tell you one of your peers is having an issue with the market, the weather, a lane capacity, whatever it is. You're more inclined to share with me where you need help when you know that I'm not implying it's your fault, right? Hey, Nate, all four other shippers I work with in your area have been having this issue, right? I'm just curious if you guys have seen anything similar out there. You might not have had that problem, but you are more likely to share where you are having an issue because your peers are experiencing, which means it's not isolated to you. So you'll tell me more just by me sharing the problems other folks have that you might have, right? Because that's gonna get me far more information than just interrogating you under like a spot, like tell me where your carriers you chose aren't very good and your service is terrible and nobody's calling you back because ultimately you chose those people at one point in time anyway. So I'm implying you made poor choices in the past and that you should work with me, which is not the best way to build rapport with somebody.

SPEAKER_01: 46:23

Let me give you an example. You and I talked about this off air before, but this is a real a real one from this morning that you can you could use a similar situation in it with a different customer. Is one of the guys on our team had asked, um, he's he's trying to bring an old customer of his from a previous company over to our company. And he's you know, he's he's going through like this this, you know, his follow up process with them, right? He's been having conversations for a while. And um the customer had asked us, Hey, you know, do you have a policy or language in your uh your broker carrier agreement that says if a Carrier double brokers that you will not use them again. And you know, the answer is like procedurally, like, yeah, like if a carrier is a double broker, is like we're gonna do not use them, put them on our our, you know, our forbidden list, essentially. And you know, our we've got software, technology, and processes in place that if that were to happen, um, in addition to our contract saying that, we just wouldn't use them because they're gonna fail our rules, and we have a a procedure that doesn't allow for us to use fraudsters like that. So um I'm not gonna go to a shipper and ask them, hey, have you guys been double broker? Or have you like how many times have you gotten your loads double brokered and had to pay? It's more so like you can pitch it as, you know, I was talking with somebody else, and um, they were concerned because they've had a couple of loads that they ended up paying twice on because they gave it to a broker, and the broker ended up loading a truck that double brokered it, and um they paid the broker, and then the some random carrier comes around and and uh asks me for payment, or they booked a truck directly who rebrokered it and never paid that other carrier. All kinds of scenarios. And um, you'd be surprised because I've I've had this conversation like three or four times in the last couple months where like customers are like like they feel the pain of you know the fraud on their end now because if it happens once or twice, it's like, okay, you can go blame the broker. But if there's a trend and a traffic department or traffic manager is, you know, giving their freight out to people that are continuously having these issues, whether it's stolen or double broker, whatever the case might be, it could just be that they're giving it to someone who's like they're late or they miss the pickup or whatever, right? Driver issues. Um that that can impact their job performance, their level of happiness at their job, right? And um, so if you can kind of pitch it as like somebody I had this conversation with somebody else, and here's what they were dealing with. If they've had those issues, they're probably gonna echo it right back to you, right? The same way that we're like, you know, hey, this other customer of mine and it you know is dealing with issues with um, you know, rates right now or capacity out of Nogalis or whatever example you used, um naturally, as a human being, they're going to, if if they are feeling the same way or dealing with the same kind of things, they're gonna be like, well, yeah, that's happening here too. Right? I don't think there's anybody who, um, if you were to, you know, if you were to ask them like, oh, like, is if there's anything you can improve with your current job or like your experience with work, uh, I don't know anyone that would be like, no, it's absolutely perfect. I wouldn't change anything. Everyone has their opinion on what they would do differently if they could have it, if they could wave a magic wand and make something change, there's something that they would change. Believe me when I say that. So you just gotta find a way to get to what that thing is.

SPEAKER_00: 49:55

Well, here's the other one I'll use. Somebody says that to me. Everything's fantastic, absolutely no issues. It's running as smooth as I've ever seen it. I always kind of joke and I'm like, that's fantastic. Are you guys hiring? I'd love to work in a transportation department where everything goes away as planned. I'm like, you gotta have the best job in the country. And I'll chuckle. And then usually they will feel like, well, my job's not that easy, and they'll come back to me with a problem. And they'll be like, Well, you know, we didn't have two or three trucks pick up yesterday. And we have the normal headaches where the brokers say there's a truck and there's not. I'm like, Oh, where are you running into that at? Oh, and then they'll tell me the lane. So even when they tell me it's good, I agree with them and we'll joke and be like, Oh, that's fantastic. You guys hiring, I'd love to be able to get a job over there. They will usually defend their job and come back to me with their problems and be like, Well, my job's not that easy. Here's where it's actually hard. I'm like, oh, thanks. Like, I don't have to ask the question to get the information, right? Like, you can get them to share it with you just by sharing other stories, like you've said, or even just agreeing with them because people want to defend their value in their company and will literally share, well, all the these are all the hard things I do. Okay, great. That's what I was trying to figure out anyway. Like, hey, maybe this would help. Because the other, I think, really simple thing you can use over and over again is like, I've talked about this a lot, but it's like called going for no or just like a takeaway, which is every time I offer you something, I'm immediately going to take it away and be like, hey, listen, Nate, like I don't know if it would even really be a fit to work together at any point in time. I think it might make sense, but like that's why I was calling. Because when I say that, it takes the pressure out of it, meaning like you feel like I'm not going to ask you for a load and then we can just talk normally and I'm not trying to sell you something. But where it's also valuable is three minutes into the call, you say to me, Well, Ben, like we're not on burning any brokers until like April. Hey, Nate, like I said, I don't even know if we'd be a fit to work together come April, but I just wanted to chat with you and see if maybe it makes sense somewhere down the road for us to see if that works, right? Yeah. Every time you push me away, I go, look, I had no expectation of working with you right now. I'm genuinely just trying to connect and see if this does make sense at some point, which is true. And also all of that makes your job so much easier because now you're not selling people, you're actually just connecting with human beings, right? You're just talking to people. Because at the end of the day, like what we joke about it's like our job shouldn't be called sales, it should be called rejection because you get rejected far more than you get accepted. So it's also more important to not internalize rejection and to beat yourself up over it because it makes it harder to have the good calls. And the less stress you put on the situation, the easier the whole job is.

SPEAKER_01: 52:39

Yeah, the last thing I'll say is like, and this sounds generic, but like read the room. Like, and I say that like if like let's go back. I I use the example of like early COVID days when like any every customer is having very similar issues. Like they can't get a truck to they I shouldn't say they never can, but like a common issue is trucks falling off and falling off last minute because they're chasing higher paying loads, right? You're probably gonna read the room on that one and and not use the approach of like, oh, I don't know if we're a good fit to work together. It's in that case, like you're definitely a good fit to work with them. And we're gonna get right to the point on on what the issues are. Um, but like, for example, if if your last call with somebody, all they did was throw you objection after objection after objection, well, read the room and like, you know, go into it with the mindset of like this guy just clearly seems like he doesn't want to do business with me, or whatever the case might be. Or as if you had a really good conversation with somebody and you know they they gave you very clear and obvious um issues that they were having, you know, it's it's relevant to that call. So and if you get into a um like there's like the awkward conversations where someone like just doesn't talk because they just want to get you off the phone, like just move on. There's you're gonna make a hundred phone calls, like don't waste your time trying trying to force something out of somebody who it just clearly isn't going anywhere. So um and to your point of like it should be called rejection, like yes, you are going to have way more um lat or way more non-conversations than actual good conversations. So take it for what it's worth.

SPEAKER_00: 54:16

The last thing, too, that I want to share this. I heard this this week and it was I thought it was really good and even related to sales, is a Roger Federer interview. And like during his peak, when he was arguably like one of the greatest tennis players of all time, right? For whatever this time frame was he was referencing, it was like a decade or whatever, he only won 54% of his points. Meaning, like the greatest tennis player during that time span, and arguably you could argue that a couple other people were close, but like he still only won 54% of the time, right? And when we see people that just win championships over and over again, you think there's just so much difference between them and number two or three. And it's really just a few percentage points, make a huge difference, right? And what he talked about in the interview is like, he's like, what was far more important for me to be really good over a long period of time was very quickly either letting go or not internalizing my screw ups. Like a forced air, I hit the ball out of bounds, I shouldn't have done that. He's like, Because when I could shake those off, I was able to win the next point because you're really just trying to win one more than you lose, right? If you win 51% of the time, you could be like the greatest in your career. So most people think they need to overhaul everything. And I just think it's a really good reminder that like 1% better every day will lead you to a fantastic career in almost anything you do. You don't need to change everything you're doing, learn completely different things, like just get a little bit better every day and work on not internalizing the negatives. And little by little, the negatives bother you less, the wins start to stack up a little more. That's what a year in sales looks like, or a career in sales. It is not closing whales every other week because you're this, you know, wizard manipulator, psychological mastermind. It's just you get a little bit better at connecting with people, asking a couple more questions. And when you get yelled at and told to F off, like you just kind of move on and go to the next one, right? So, like it really doesn't have to be super complicated. It really is just getting a little better than you were yesterday. And by the end of that year, you're a hell of a lot better than you started with.

SPEAKER_01: 56:27

Yeah, if you can get to the point where you can if when you have a bad call or someone tells you to F off or hangs up on you, if you can just kind of laugh it off, that's a really good mentality to be able to get into it and be like, huh, I guess that person wasn't having a good day, right? That's it.

SPEAKER_00: 56:41

And and I think that's so true, right? Because the last thing I'll kind of wrap on is like, this is not new for anybody listening to this. If you have one friend, I don't care how old you are, this is what you did to connect with that human being. Whether it's in elementary school, middle school, high school, college, your professional life, this is what we do every day and have been doing it for thousands of years as people. You connect with somebody you don't know, you little by little get to know them more, little by little they trust you more, you trust them more until ultimately like you guys can trust each other, right? You do this all the time. People think when they're sitting in the sales seat and they're now on the phone, they need to do this completely different thing. The reality is, is if you're more just like yourself and people you have friends or acquaintances and people like talking to you, like you're already good at this. You're just trying to be somebody you aren't in this other scenario. And it actually makes it harder, right? Like if you just are yourself and connect with people the way you would if your cousin or your best friend introduced you to somebody else at a party or whatever, this is the same thing. You're just doing it over longer periods of time, and you have to write down what happened so you can remember it because you're just doing so much more of it than you do in your normal day-to-day life, right? Like you don't have to overcomplicate this.

SPEAKER_01: 57:56

Agreed. Agreed. It's a relationship business. All right. Well, good discussion. Um follow-ups, man. Yeah, that's good. We we have done a lot on prospecting, but the follow-up is someone once said it was like the uh the FU money is in the follow-up. I always thought that was Kevin Hill. What's that? Kevin Hill used to say that.

SPEAKER_00: 58:17

Kevin's coin, but yeah.

SPEAKER_01: 58:19

Okay, there you go. Shout out. We haven't had him on in a while. All right, good stuff. Final thoughts, Ben.

SPEAKER_00: 58:24

Whether you believe you can or believe you can't, you're right.

SPEAKER_01: 58:29

And until next time, go bills.