In May of 2022, I had the fantastic opportunity to be a guest on Nathan Chanski’s podcast, “Passion with Purpose.” We talked about sales for over an hour—from my philosophy and approach to sales, to how I prepare for the sales call, even to how I tackle upselling and more. Over the next few months I’ll be posting parts from that conversation that I feel are important to share.

You can listen to the full podcast here.

*The dialogue has been edited for clarity and brevity.

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Nathan Chanski: Walk us through how you do sales calls. What's Ellie's approach?

Ellie McMakin: We will get on the call. I greet them warmly, welcome them and say:

“Your time is valuable to me. I want to really make sure that this call is focused on your needs and what you are really excited about. Before I dive in, could you please let me know if you have any questions or comments or concerns?”

I say it where it's nothing more than just trying to make sure I'm putting them & their concerns first.

Now, there’s two ways they can react. They're either like, “Oh my gosh, yes, I have this question.” Or there's an alternative, which happens when people tend to be price shoppers. They'll say, “Well, you know, I don't know. I'm not sure what to ask.”

What I will do in that case is go in asking them guided questions to try and figure those things out. Like I said, their pain-point is the pitch; trying to figure out what is important to them is the entirety of the first part of the call.

And so, if they come to me and they're like, “We don't have any questions. We're just ready to dive in and learn more.”

I'll say:

“Great. Well, really quickly I wanted to know: when you guys think about the context of your wedding day or your photos, is there something that you genuinely are the most excited about? Is there a moment that you're really excited about or a particular person that you're just really stoked is going to be there?”

Inevitably, assuming that they have had enough time to think about what they want in their wedding, they'll say, “Oh my gosh, I'm just so excited to walk down the aisle,” or “I'm excited for the chance to be getting ready with my girls in the morning,” or “My dad is flying in, and I haven't seen him since the beginning of COVID.”

Once they say that, I ask them additional questions to really try and understand how I can best highlight that for them.

And please know, I always reference this in the context of weddings, but this can be for newborn photographers. This can be for any type of photographer. When you're able to ask them those questions, often, you will find something that they're curious about or want to know more about or are concerned about. That's where I always meet those with an introduction to my process.

It's a very big contrast to what the call was like before, where I was like, “Okay guys, this is what you can expect.” I very much tell them everything they need to know in just a very gentle, conversational way.

When I am responding to those comments or concerns, I always give a full in-depth example. It's really easy to be like, “Oh, don't worry. I got you. I'll make sure to get those photos.” It's really easy in the moment to forget that one time that you really showed up and did just that really well and what the outcome was, but that’s what they’ll remember.

I think people tend to shy away from that because they're worried that it's going to come off braggy or it's going to come off like they think they're hot stuff, and it's not that at all. It is just to further contextualize how they can be the hero of their own story. And storytelling is the best way to win people over in a very kind, nurturing way.

So, the context of the entire call will be: asking guided questions, trying to figure out what's important to them, and then using story like examples to illustrate how I could really show up and win the day for them.

Nathan Chanski: That's so awesome. People don't really know the reason that they want to be on the sales call sometimes, or the reason that they would actually book. But sometimes if you can bring it out of them, you can discover it without even them knowing. Once you actually figure out why they showed up and all that good stuff, then you can really navigate the rest of the call, through that lens.

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If you’d like more help with your sales calls, check out my sales training, “Effortless Ethical Sales”—or for even more in-depth guidance, consider The Business Conservatory program, an all-encompassing membership program to help creative business owners level up their business.

For more from Nathan Chanski, you can follow him on TikTok or on Instagram.

Stay tuned for more updates from this conversation!

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