Young and Profiting with Hala Taha - Chris Voss and Steve Shull: Charge What You're Worth, Lessons on Sales and Negotiation From the Field | E223

Episode Date: May 15, 2023

When an injury forced former Miami Dolphins linebacker Steve Shull to change his game, he pivoted into finance and real estate. After he read the book Never Split the Difference by Chris Voss, Steve completely transformed his coaching company and redesigned his programs from scratch. Since then, Steve and Chris have been working together to help real estate agents save their time and energy. In this episode, Chris and Steve will cover some of their favorite sales hacks and negotiation principles in their new book The Full Fee Agent. In this episode, Hala, Chris, and Steve will discuss:  - Steve’s career pivot from football player to real estate agent - How Chris and Steve started working together - How emotions influence our decision-making - The 7 essential truths of human behavior - How to be “the favorite” or “the fool” - Possibility vs. Probability  - Why free consulting is a fool’s tactic  - Why compromise is never equal - And other topics… Chris Voss is a Former FBI Hostage Negotiator and the CEO of The Black Swan Group Ltd. Before becoming the FBI's lead international kidnapping negotiator, Christopher served as the lead Crisis Negotiator for the New York City division of the FBI. During Chris’s 24-year tenure with the Bureau, he was trained in the art of negotiation by not only the FBI, but also Scotland Yard and Harvard Law School. He is also a recipient of the Attorney General’s Award for Excellence in Law Enforcement and the FBI Agents Association Award for Distinguished and Exemplary Service. Steve Shull grew up outside of Philadelphia, Pennsylvania. He attended The College of William and Mary in Williamsburg, Virginia, and graduated with a BS Degree in 1980. He then played four years in the NFL as a linebacker with the Miami Dolphins and was one of the tri-captains in the 1982 Super Bowl. A knee injury ended his career in 1983. He then went to graduate school at The University of Miami and received his MBA.  He worked on Wall Street as an institutional fixed-income salesperson for five years. From 1991 through 1993 he sold residential real estate in Fullerton, CA. In his first year with his partner, they closed 53 transactions. In his second year, they were on pace to sell 100 homes when he came up with the idea to create a coaching program, which marked the beginning of his real estate coaching career in 1993. In 2007, he was one of the founding partners of Teles Properties.  Resources Mentioned: Steve’s Website: https://performance-coaching.mykajabi.com/ Steve’s Linkedin: https://www.linkedin.com/in/smscoach/ Steve’s Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/smscoach1/ Chris’s Website: https://www.blackswanltd.com/our-team/chris-voss Chris’s LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/christophervoss/ Chris’s Instagram: https://www.instagram.com/thefbinegotiator/ Chris’s Facebook: https://www.facebook.com/ChrisVossNegotiation/ Chris and Steve’s book The Full Fee Agent: https://www.amazon.com/Full-Fee-Agent-Estate-Professional/dp/1544536631 LinkedIn Secrets Masterclass, Have Job Security For Life: Sign up at yapmedia.io/course. Sponsored By:  Shopify - Sign up for a $1 per month trial period at youngandprofiting.co/shopify More About Young and Profiting Download Transcripts - youngandprofiting.com/episodes-new/ Get Sponsorship Deals - youngandprofiting.com/sponsorships Leave a Review - ratethispodcast.com/yap Watch Videos - youtube.com/c/YoungandProfiting Follow Hala Taha LinkedIn - linkedin.com/in/htaha/ Instagram - instagram.com/yapwithhala/ TikTok - tiktok.com/@yapwithhala Twitter - twitter.com/yapwithhala Learn more about YAP Media Agency Services - yapmedia.io/ Learn more about your ad choices. Visit megaphone.fm/adchoices

This episode of YAP is sponsored in part by Shopify. Shopify simplifies selling online and in-person so you can focus on successfully growing your business. Sign up for a $1 per month trial period at Shopify.com-profiting. When you download the Croger app, you have easy access to savings every day. Shop weekly sales and get personalized coupons to get the most value out of every trip every time,

whether you shop in-store or online. Download the Kroger app now to save big. Kroger, fresh for everyone, must have a digital account to redeem offers. Restrictions may apply, see site for details. Save big on your favorites with the Buy, Fiver more, save a dollar each sale. Simply buy five or more participating items and save a dollar each with your card. Kroger, fresh for everyone. That's one of the first realities that I learned as a hostage to go shader. You see this picked up all the time.

How you do something is how you do everything. People are going to stick to their habits. They're going to make their decisions and evaluate the way they did in the past. They're going to continue to act under pressure. The way they act in under pressure in the past. What they say is not a great predictor of what they're going to do. So what they've done in the past is the most effective predictor of what they're going to do in the future. There's an abundance of people who want to work with you. I don't want to spend my time trying to convince somebody to work with me because the first thing that goes wrong, they're going to be jumping down my throat.

They didn't choose me. And so it just sets up the wrong dynamic. And life is just too short to work with people who don't want to work with you. What is up, young and profitors? You're listening to YAP, Young and Profiting podcasts where we interview the brightest minds in the world and unpack their wisdom into actionable advice that you can use in your daily life. I'm your host, Hallitaha. Thanks for tuning in and get ready to listen, learn and

profit. Chris and Steve, welcome to Young & Profiting Podcast. Thank you, Carla. It's awesome to be here. I love having you guys on the show. Young & Profiters, it's a unique day because today we have not just one, but two fabulous guests to interview on Young & Profiting Podcast. So many of you are familiar with Chris Voss.

He's a regular on-yap. Between my one-on-one interviews and our clubhouse episodes This is going to be the fifth time that Chris is making appearance on Young & Profiting podcast I think that makes his most interviewed guest ever. I think he's the most interviewed guest ever on Young & Profiting podcast and Believe me, it's worth it every single time because we always learn something new and today's going to be no different Chris Voss is a former FBI hostage negotiator. He's the CEO and founder of the Black Swan Group, which provides negotiation training to both individuals and businesses.

He's also the best-selling author of the classic business and negotiation book Never Split the Difference. Chris recently co-authored the book The Full, Fee, Agent with Steve Schull, whose our second guest on today's episode and Steve Schull is a retired American football player. He used to play on the Miami Dolphins as a linebacker. When an injury forced him to change his game quite literally, and he pivoted into finance, then real estate, and then found his calling when he started coaching other agents. So together, he and Chris put together an eight week negotiation course for real estate professionals, and they've been working together ever since. Now they have this new book, The Full-Feat Agent. And in this episode, we're going to be

covering some of my favorite sales hacks and negotiation principles from the new book. It will include some classic negotiation material that we've learned from Chris in the past, as well as some brand new material, which I'm super excited to dive into, like the difference between the favorite and the full, the Oprah rule, and the seven essential truths of human behavior. And while some of this conversation is especially relevant to real estate agents, these tactics are going to apply to anyone no matter your industry. Okay, so let's get started. We've got a lot of ground to cover and I'm going to get right into it.

As I mentioned, Chris is a regular on YAP. We've covered his story before, so we're going to focus on Steve in the beginning of this interview. And I want to begin with Steve's come-up journey. So you started your career in the NFL like I mentioned. You spent some time in football, but it got cut short. You ended up pivoting to business. So can you share more about that transformation story? The journey that led you into real estate and how you first came across Chris's work? Great. Well, as you mentioned, I played four years in the NFL and in the injury ended my career like it does with so many guys in the NFL.

I went back to University of Miami, got my MBA. From there, I went to Wall Street, worked on the government desk at Solomon Brothers, and then decided to make a big pivot in my life and moved out to California and started selling residential real estate. This was in 1991, a long, long time ago, partnered up with an existing agent in our first year together.

We sold 53 homes, which is a lot. The average real estate agent sells four homes a year. And in our second year, we were on track to sell 100 homes. And I came up with the idea of creating a real estate coaching program. At that point in time, there was no such thing as real estate coaching that started in 1993 and then 2016, 2017, I forget year, what year it was, seven years ago. One of my clients went to a book signing in Malibu that Chris was doing for the book, never split the difference, they bought me a copy and I started reading it and as I was reading the book, it became very obvious to me that everything that Chris was talking about applied to real estate 100%.

And I had a big lightning bowl moment. I had been the guy in real estate who had been trying to take out a motion and boil everything down to fact, logic and reason. And in reading the book, I realized you cannot overcome a motion with fact, logic and reason. And in reading the book, I realized you cannot overcome emotion with fact logic and reason and emotion, specifically fear of loss is what drives the decision making process. So I reached out, I got a hold of Chris's son, Brandon, and we had a conversation and then Brandon said, let's get Chris on the phone. And we set up another call, got Chris on the phone.

And that's when we decided to do a eight week negotiation course. And then we did more courses and then ultimately we ended up collaborating for over two years and wrote the book, The Full Fee Agent. It's amazing. And I'm always curious to know from the other perspective in terms of Chris, what made you feel like you should work with somebody like Steven, you're already a well accomplished author, you co-wrote a whole book with him. So there's some value there that you saw. I'd love to hear about it. Yeah, it's actually one of the underlying principles of the full fee agent, one of the titles that we experimented with for

that was the trusted advisor. Like you follow the guidance of the people that you trust, who's core values you line up with, and you trust. I mean, you go ahead and jump in trusted advisor for me. In this case, with my son Brandon, he's always been a trusted advisor, trusted collaborator, since he was old enough to correct me about something I was doing wrong. And he said, look, this guy Steve's show you got to talk to him.

I mean, he's our kind of human being, hard work and high integrity, get stuff done. And I'm like, all right, that's all I need to know. Talk to Steve the first time in the intention of collaborating. He hit all those core values, and he's always been an extremely easy guy to work with. A very focused, listens well, thinks well, great critical thinker, and been just a pleasure

to work with ever since. So trusted advisor recommended me to him. I was ready to go. Yeah, and I have to say I read the book and I really enjoyed it. And I found a lot of value, even though I'm not in the real estate industry. I was finding myself thinking about all the ways that I could use these different tips and tricks in my own sales negotiations outside of just real estate. So really great work and I can't wait to really dive into it. So speaking of the book in the beginning of the book, one of the first

things you write in there is how you do business is more important than how much business that you do. Let's start off with Chris. What does that statement mean to you? It's really about orienting yourself for long-term success. You can get a lot done in a day if you gorge yourself on dopamine-producing substances, legal or illegal, caffeine, cocaine. You can get a lot done.

It's going to completely burn you out and it's going to destroy you. What's a better approach that's sustainable, which will make you wealthy over the long run. And that's what this, how you do business is more important than how much business you do. Because you will do a lot of business once you get into sustainable habits, keep you alive, keep you healthy, keep you happy, and then your life is a pleasure as opposed to being miserable.

Totally. And I really can't wait to talk about the full and the favorite and the differentiation between that and how we can save so much time and focus knowing that trick. I'm so excited to talk about that. But before we do that, Steve, you alluded to the fact that you didn't really bring emotion into your conversations prior to learning Chris's work. You felt like you just needed to talk with facts, logic, reason to close a deal, and then you realized that you actually had to embrace emotion after Chris's work.

There needs to be an emotional component to your negotiations. So let's talk about why that was such an important lesson for you and how you were negotiating prior to Chris's work and then how that changed once you learned how to use tactical empathy and things like that. Well, as a coach, I see my job as positioning people to succeed. And prior to Chris, I thought I was doing that. And I was having a lot of success. My clients did extremely well. However, again, what I was doing is analyzing everything and figuring out, okay, let's make it factual, let's make it logical, let's use reason

to get to whatever outcome we need to get to. And then in reading Chris's book, the realization, the truth was, that's not how people make decisions. They don't make decisions based on fact, logic and reason. They make decisions based on their emotions and again specifically the fear of loss. Most salespeople have been trained to pitch opportunity, gain, benefit their whole life. That's not what really moves people.

What moves people is fear of loss. And so that, again, in reading, never split the difference. That truth kicked in. I made a 180 shift and it's definitely transformed my business and it's transforming the lives of the people that we coach. On a double tap on that for a second. So Chris, I know you're an expert on this. How do emotions drive our decision-making as humans? Well, first of all, double tap.

I mean, that's a firearm special forces term. Like if you go on a really hit the target, you got to put two browns in it at the same time. So I like that you want a double tap this. You're an assassin in disguise. I didn't realize that, but it makes sense to me. You make your decisions based on what you care about. And there's been some interesting studies. You know, there was a book that came out probably good solid 20 years ago

But it's relevant the cards air and which basically said that people when they lose their ability for their emotions They don't play with their logical side of their brain They can't make good decisions now they can follow directions It's really easy to follow directions and this came up because people would have brain surgery and it would interfere with different points of their brain if they were moving tumors from specific areas of the brain. Then they were pronounced by then the standards of time of cognitive abilities to be cured and go back to work. And they would go back to work, unable to make good decisions and they'd be debilitated.

And the insurance companies were not paying them to be debilitated when in fact they were. They were disabled because they had lost their ability to make good decisions. So your emotions are how you evaluate and make decisions. The reasons why they continue to put these people back to work initially was because they could follow directions like they if they would say organize the boxes in a room from biggest to smallest,

perfect, do it quick, easy no problem, do this follow set of directions. But how should we organize the room? They would be like, I don't know, size, color, I don't know. People couldn't make decisions because decisions are triggered by what we care most about across the board. And that's really the unavoidable reality of emotions and decision-making.

No matter how many people try to articulate, I've seen something called compassionate reason or some people that are determined to be dispassionate. And I'll call them out and I'll say, looks like you're very passionate about being this passionate. The passions are there regardless. We use emotions to make our evaluations. What do we care about? And the facts logic and reason flow from where we've already made the decision. I can't wait to dig deep around that.

But first, Steve, I'm curious to understand in real estate, how do emotions drive decisions? Can you give us some examples? Well, every seller, they want more money for their home than their home is actually worth. And they believe their home is better than every other home. And they don't care what the facts say. They live in their home.

They love their home. And they have feelings about their home. Saying, you know, buyers, they want what they want for half the price. And they're completely justified based on their feelings. And so every buyer is operating off of an emotion, every seller is operating off of emotion, and every seller is operating off of emotion. And the thing that Chris's book, the thing that he's teaching, tactical empathy, the skill of making people feel understood. It's the missing piece in all of sales. Stephen Covey got very close when he said seek first to understand before being understood. However, making people feel understood, that's the game changer because no one can really hear

what you're saying until they feel understood. And if I get jumped back because I'm thinking of examples when Stephen and I have coached people, like emotions driving a seller's decision, what's probably the main biggest factor on what a seller wants for his house? What is brother-in-law God for a house that has one more bedroom or one more bathroom? The brother-in-law has got a house with more amenities, it's actually worth more, but the seller's going to go down to flames if he doesn't get a price. It's at least as good as what his brother long got.

And I have to imagine that since buying a home is like maybe you do it one, two, three times in your life, it's a really important decision. So your emotions are also running really high because it's going to be one as a buyer, especially one of the most important decisions of your life. One of the things, one of Chris's great lines, hopes and dreams are on the line. And that's what every real estate salesperson needs to understand. The sellers, hopes and dreams are on the line. And the buyers, hopes and dreams are on the line.

And most importantly, their hopes and dreams are not based in reality. So you as the salesperson, you've got to sell reality to someone whose hopes and dreams are not based in reality. That's the challenge. And that's what the book is all about. How do you do that?

How do you sell people on reality when their hopes and dreams are not based in reality? Let's hold that thought and take a quick break with our sponsors. Young and profitors, do you have a brilliant business idea but you don't know how to move forward with it? Going into debt for a four-year degree isn't the only path to success. Instead, learn everything you need to know about running a business for free by listening to the Millionaire University podcast. The Millionaire University podcast is a show that's changing the game for aspiring entrepreneurs. Hosted by Justin and Tara Williams,

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of human behavior. You guys may not know this, but I love human behavior. We talk about it all the time on the podcast. It's one of the reasons why Chris has been on five times because he's one of the most notable experts in the world when it comes to influence negotiation human behavior. And so I was really excited to see these seven essential human truths in the book laid out so clearly. And the reason is because we're going to have an easier time understanding and predicting the behaviors of people in our negotiations knowing these truths. And so I actually

organize the interview around this. And so I'm going to rattle off one of these seven essential human truths. Chris, I'm going to let you do the honors in terms of telling us what this essential truth means. And then I'm going to ask some follow-up questions related to sales and business for each one that I think will be relevant to my audience. So essential truth number one, the best predictor of the future behavior is past behavior. Chris, what does that mean? Yeah, you know, that's one of the first realities that I learned as a hostage to go, Shader, predicting anybody's behavior. And you see this picked up all the time. How you do something is how you do anything.

People are going to stick to their habits. They're going to make their decisions and evaluate the way they did in the past. They're going to continue to act under pressure, the way they acted under pressure in the past, or the way they act under pressure is going to be the same as they act, react normally, only it's going to just be more intense and more obvious. And psychologists hate that. The first time I looked it up, every psychologist said, we hate this and it's true. And there's a difference between what people say and what they do. And this is really focused on what people are doing. You know, you've heard the phrase, how you act speaks shout so loudly in my ears. I can't hear what you're saying. What people

say and what they do, don't always align. And what they say is not a great predictor of what they're going to do. So what they've done in the past is the most effective predictor of what they're going to do in the future. If they relied on a trusted advisor on how to make up their decision in the past, then in the future, if you're not the trusted advisor, then they're not going to rely on you. They're going to gather information from you, but they rely on their trusted advisors because that's how they did it in the past. So basically what you're saying is that it's unlikely that someone is going to do a different

behavior in a sales transaction or conversation than something they did in the past. So if we can find out how they acted in the past, what they did in the past, it's a good predictor of what they're going to do this time around. So Steve, in a real estate conversation, how would you use this to your advantage? What would you do? You mentioned it, but we haven't gotten into it yet. The whole idea of being the favorite or the fool. And this has been a real game changer in real estate. Most agents think that they win or lose business based on their presentation and to a lesser degree based on the commission that they charge. However, in reality, when a potential seller picks up the phone and calls an agent and says,

we're thinking about selling our home, they already know who they're going to work with, where they're leaning strongly in a direction. It's not about presenting and convincing them to work with me. It's figuring out am I the favorite or am I the fool? And one of the ways you do that is find out in the past, how have they chosen a real estate agent? Did they work with someone they knew? Did they work with someone who was referred to them? Did they work with a total stranger? Did they work with a number one agent in the area? So one of the things you're going to do in that initial conversation, I'm curious, in the past, how did you figure out who to work with in terms of who was your real estate agent? And that'll be a

real clue as to how they're going to pick their next agent. That's one small example of how that comes into play. Chris any other ideas there? No, that's completely on, especially when there hopes and dreams are on the line to expect them to make a decision differently this time on one of the five most stressful moments in their entire life differently than they did last time. Now they're going to engage in the same behavior. Okay, essential truth number two, there's no such thing as a fully open mind. That's the harsh reality of human nature. And you decide you're going to buy something. Do you go to the person that sells it first?

Like, you want to buy a car. Do you go straight to the car salesman and say, which one should I buy? And then go with what that car salesman says say, which one should I buy and then go, which one that car salesman says, or do you start doing your own research? You start narrowing down the issues. Do you start gathering information? And when you go to the car salesman or the software salesman or the computer salesman,

your mind is no less than 50% made up, anywhere from 50 to 100% made up. Usually about 70% made up, which means, you've gathered enough data, you no longer have an open mind. If your mind is 70% made up, the harsh reality of that is, you no longer have an open mind.

You're 70% of the way through your decision making process. And it's really harsh for everyone who likes to think of themselves as fair and open minded. I think of myself as fair and open-minded. I think of myself as fair and open-minded. But by the time I start talking with the vendor, the seller, the salesperson, of whoever it is that I'm after, my mind is all but made up. Because I'm a human being.

There's no getting around it. Yeah. And some people might think this sounds like a bad thing, but especially on the sales side, it's actually a really good thing because it helps ensure that we're not wasting our precious time if we're able to evaluate if somebody is actually already making up their mind to, for example, not work with us. Or if we know that they are going to work with us, that we do focus our time on closing

that deal because there's a high probability that they're going to become our clients. So it is really important to understand. time on closing that deal because there's a high probability that they're going to become our clients. So it is really important to understand and it brings us to the fool in the favorite that we've been teasing the whole episode. And it's something that I've never heard before and I really loved hearing about it. And as an entrepreneur, I realized that this is so true and it made me realize a lot of things that I went through and never really had like a name or anything to call it. And so you guys write the key to building a great business is learning to tell the difference

between possibility and probability. So Steve, can you help us understand the full and the favorite? Well, let's go back to the example of you get a phone call from a potential seller. Most real estate agents, they think, well, that person has an open mind. It's going to be a level competition. And if I can go in and give a better presentation, then the other agents they call, I can get the listing. So they're going to put an hour of prep time in or two hours or more, then they're going to go out to the listing appointment. And it's going to be another two plus hours.

And then they're going to come back and they're going to have follow up and they're going to have 24 hours or 48 or 72 hours being on pins and needle, waiting to find out what the answer is. Well, we've short circuited that to a 15 minute, what we call a pre listing zoom call, where we get on the phone with that potential seller, and in 15 minutes or less, we can find out whether we're the favorite or the full. And what we're coaching our agents to do

is focus on high probability activity, meaning we live in a Las Vegas world. We live in a world of probabilities. And what we wanna do is is we want to focus on those opportunities where our chance of getting the businesses 80% or more the favorite. And we want to stay away from those opportunities where our chance is 20% or less. We're coaching our agents to sit at the 80% table, not the 20% table. If I go on 10 appointments, I want to get 8, 9, or 10, rather than go on 10 to get 2, 1, or 0. And most agents aren't

thinking in these terms. They think the playing field is always level. It's never level. No one ever has an open mind. Everyone has personal preferences, meaning even if I'm interviewing three complete strangers, I come to the party with my own personal preferences. I'm going to like one over the other before they even open their mouth. And so, again, rather than spending all this time chasing after business we're never going to get in 15 minutes, we can figure out who we are. And how, if you allow me, cause I wanna hit this possibility

versus probability thing again, from a different illustration. I heard Sam Harris talk about this year that they different contexts, but it's the same thing. Possibility versus probability, because I love possibility. I mean, I love opportunity.

I love places like New York cause the possibility there is endless. A possibility versus probability. You're flying a jet plane through a storm and your instruments have all gone down and you're not sure what to do next. Now, somebody comes up from the back who's gonna give you some advice.

And you check with this person, are they a pilot or not? Have they ever flown in a storm or not? Now the person wants to give you the advice is never flown as never flown in a storm. Now is it possible that this guy could be right? Is possible. But are you gonna take his advice? That would be a really bad idea just because it's possible to somebody has no reason for giving you good advice would have it. I think that really does help us really clearly understand there's an opportunity cost to

going after too many deals, right? We're wasting our time, we're wasting our focus, we have less time to work on the clients that do actually want to work with us and it's actually an uphill battle to work with somebody who didn't want to work with you to begin with. And so brings me to my next question, why should we not try to convince people to work with somebody who didn't want to work with you to begin with. And so brings me to my next question, why should we not try to convince people to work with us? Chris, I'll give it to you and then Steve. It's good if you're a massacred.

If you want to torture yourself, if you want to put you through a lot of unnecessary pain that's not going to get you anywhere. I'll apply a concept that I picked up from a buddy of mine, Joe Polish runs a genius network. He talks about half versus elf. Elf is an easy lucrative and fun. Half is hard annoying, lame and frustrating. And he says, don't work with halves, do work with elves. So my company we involved this in our methodology and I tell my team, walk away from the halves

because they're getting in a way to elves. But the interesting thing before they would walk away on their own that collected some data and of the haps that we closed deals with, two things were true. It took us no less than twice as long to close the deal and implement it. Anywhere from two times to five times as long.

But let's say it was only twice as long. So you fight that uphill battle and you win, you just took a 50% cut and pay. Secondly, the halves don't repeat. So you took a 50% cut and pay to work with someone that you were never going to work with again. Neither of those two things make sense. Yeah, it's so interesting because as an entrepreneur, you're sort of taught, and even just any sales person, you're taught to follow up, follow up, follow up, convince them, right? But I look back on my own journey of all the I have a social media agency and award-winning agency. We do great work, and I think about all my worst clients were people that I really fought to be like, to have them join me. And now that I read your

book, I realized that I was starting off on the wrong foot to begin with. And that's why I was starting off from a really weak place trying to convince them to work with me. It always works better when somebody's excited to work with you. Steve, what are your thoughts? There's no lack of people who want to work with you. There's enough people out there. There's an abundance of people who want to work with you.

I don't want to spend my time trying to convince somebody to work with me because it sets up a very different expectation. If I have to convince them, that means they were thinking about working with someone else. And so I have this great presentation and I convince them I'm the person. Or most likely I've lowered my fee as part of that effort to convince them I'm the person. Or most likely, I've lowered my fee as part of that effort to convince them. So now there's some resentment on my part, whether I want to admit it or not.

And then the first thing that goes wrong, they're gonna be jumping down my throat because I convinced them to go with me. They didn't choose me. I convinced them. And so it. They didn't choose me. I convinced them. And so it just sets up the wrong dynamic. And life is just too short to work with people who don't want to work with you.

Stop convincing altogether. Yeah. Don't ever do it. And one of Chris's great sayings, I love this, is if you're explaining, you're losing. If you're explaining, you're losing. If you're explaining, you're losing. And it's not about explaining your value. It's about, do they perceive you as a trusted advisor or not?

So a quote that I think really brings it all home from the book is, it's not a sin to lose business. It's a sin to take a long time to lose business. So let's move on to how we can focus on these high probability opportunities and not waste our time being the full. And I know you guys mentioned something called a cold read in the book. So what questions should we ask ourselves to understand whether we're the full or the favorite?

I ask yourselves, well, how can I fearlessly find out early on without hurting anybody's feelings? Because I'm not going to to ask the gentleman questions, how do I allow myself to find out early on whether or not I'm the favorite of the fool? If you don't want to try it, you're holding yourself hostage. I mean, release yourself because you're the one that's holding you back. And this scares the heck out of so many people. If they can get over this hurdle, if they can just put themselves in a mindset to find out, then they are going to be a long way towards using these skills because it's about releasing yourself in many ways. Steve, would you agree? Absolutely. And this is a concept that I really resonated with because in football, this is what we were trained to do.

Read the situation, read and react, read and react. And we would get a scouting report, a scouting report every week about this thick that had all the other teams tendencies in that book. You know, if we were on the 20 yard line, they came out in a brown formation and it was third and four, 28% of the time they're gonna run and four, 28% of the time they're

going to run this play, 22% of the time. They were all, again, these tendencies. So you had to learn, you had to memorize all these things. So when you lined up, you were reading before the ball was even snapped, what you thought was going to happen. This pertains in real estate. There's lots of clues. And you're looking for the clues.

You just have to know what you're looking for. No one knew that there was a favorite and a fool. The moment you start looking for the clues, they're all over the place. And again, this is all about saving time. Like you just shared, it's not a sin to lose business. It's a sin to take a long time losing business. And the real reason why real estate agents work seven days a week is because they don't work five. If they actually worked five days a week, actually worked, rather than spending time chasing after business that they're not going to get,

they wouldn't have to work seven days a week. they wouldn't have to be on call 24-7. So I take sales calls all the time. They usually start with some sort of discovery call where you try to figure out what's the client's problems, can I help them, can I not help them. So what are the things that we can do in that conversation to know whether we're the full of the favorite? What are the things that people do or save that will give us clues? The first thing is to just ask what isn't the most horrifying question for everybody until they understand how good it is, and that's to say the other person, you got a lot of options out there.

I mean, I got solid competitors, you could go to them, they got great resumes. Why me? That is like the magic phrase. I mean, it's an emotional intelligence surgical strike. Why does certain things to people that are vastly different than what is normally portrayed out there? Why is it's an emotional intelligence surgical strike? You should never ask why unless you want them to defend you, because why always triggers defensiveness, which is the bad advice. Find out there why is good advice,

but it doesn't tell you that you shouldn't ask them why, except if the why is about you, and you are going to get an unguarded honest answer, or you're not gonna get an answer. And if you don't get an answer, why you, there ain't no why for you, there at all. We'll be right back after a quick break from our sponsors. Your dog is an important part of your family.

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she didn't just stop there. She was working in nine to five. And at the same time, she built her eight figure company as a side hustle was working in 95 and at the same time she built her eight figure company as a side hustle and eventually took it and made her full-time hustle and her strategic business goals Let her to win the prestigious Inc. 500 award for the fastest growing business in the United States She's built an empire. She's earned a life-changing wealth and on top of all that She maintains a happy marriage and healthy home life on the Kelly Road, you'll learn that it's possible to have it all. Tune into the Kelly Road Show as she unveils her secrets for growing your business. It doesn't matter if you're just starting out in your career or if you're already

a seasoned entrepreneur. In each episode, Kelly shares the truth about what it takes to create rapid, exponential growth. Unlock your potential, unleash your success, and start living your dream life today. Tune into the Kelly Road Show, available on Apple Podcasts, Spotify, or wherever you listen to podcasts. That's so interesting. So basically, you're asking why me because you want to get a gauge of how much they respect you and if they've picked you already and how much research is on. So if they say, if I say, why me and they're like, hallelujah, the number one LinkedIn expert,

everybody knows you make all the influencers on LinkedIn, then I know, okay, I am the favorite. But if they say, I Googled you and you popped up and I'm interviewing three other people, then I might be the fool, right? Or that one or what a lot of people throw back on you, the person who either is taking advantage of you on purpose, and a lot of people are doing it by accident,

they don't mean to be, you know, they're taught, that it's okay, get three bids, but they're gonna say, well, it's up to you to convince me. And if they throw back on you like that or in some fashion, you are the fool in the game. Steve, what are some other things that we can do during this cold read to gauge the situation to understand it for the favor to the fool in the game. Steve, what are some other things that we can do during this call read to gauge the situation to understand it for the favor to the fool or what clues do people give? In the book, we give a very specific outline. A, are they calling you or are they

just calling real estate agents? Once you start listening for it, you'll hear whether they're actually calling you or you're just part of a catacul. That's one. Secondly, do you fit the profile? Meaning, are you the person that they are looking for based on, again, what they've done in the past? Three, can you make an emotional connection with that person? Meaning, can you get several, that's rights by labeling what they're thinking and feeling, getting an alignment

with where they are. Four, and this is an important one, is the conversation collaborative? Are they open? Are they sharing what they want, or are they being very guarded, and they just want to ask questions and get information? And then the fifth thing is actually asking for a commitment. And this was outrageous. We now have agents getting a commitment

for a listing without even going out to the house. They're getting it over the phone in 15 minutes. This is unheard of in real estate. Everyone thinks they, again, have to go through the preparation, go do the appointment, go do all the follow-up. We're having people get that commitment right online because they're the favorite. And if you are my favorite, I have no reason to withhold that information from you. Would it be wrong to assume? It's a simple line. Would it be wrong to assume that we're going to be working together? And when you're the favorite, they say, no, absolutely, we're going to be working together. So those

are five things that you can run through to help determine whether you're the favorite of the fool. I love that. And I know you hinted and teased some strategies that Chris always talks about. And we'll make sure we cover that in the interview as we go along. So let's talk about some fool's tactics that I found out in your book. There's a couple things that people do that are fool's tactics. One of them is free consulting. So why is free consulting a fool's tactic? Yeah, this is another one that took me quite a while to wrap my mind around. I did this for a while, too. And I refer to this as a drug dealer approach. Let me give you a sample of what I could do

and you're gonna get addicted and you're gonna want more. We did that a lot in the early days of black swan and it finally came together because we're coaching private equity firm and they're telling their people because their people want to do the same thing. Here's how we're gonna help you as a private equity firm. Here's a groundwork we're gonna lay out.

And these guys said never, never, never, give them any environmental intellectual property until after they made a commitment to work with us. Because as soon as we give them a taste of what we know, the unavoidable aspect of human nature is you're less valuable. As soon as you give away some of your value for free, you are by definition less valuable. There's no way around that. So the gratitude that you hope for is just not going to come through because it's not mean spirited on the other side. They're human. And you've given them something for free.

So people tend to value things as to what they paid for it. So if it was free, they didn't think it was that valuable to begin with. And secondly, you now have less to offer is ignore human nature at your peril, and there's just no way around that did not give free consulting. Okay, so let's move on to the next essential truth number three. Humans are hardwired to be negative. Yeah, well, there ain't no way around that. I mean, survival, survival wiring, which we've all inherited, the pessimistic caveman survived. With the descendants of the pessimists, they walked by a big dark cave. The pessimist says, you know, yesterday Steve went in there and he never came out. And you know, I'm gonna take that as a hint, I ain't going in either.

Now the optimistic caveman says, you know what? Yesterday Steve went in there and he never came out, but I'm an optimist. I'm gonna go in there anyway, because I'm gonna take that as a hint, I ain't going in either. Now the optimistic caveman says, you know what yesterday, Steve went in there and he never came out, but I'm an optimist. I'm gonna go in there anyway, cause I'm optimistic. And that guy got eaten too. And he doesn't have any descendants. And that's the wiring that we've all in there.

And so there's gonna be a lot of negativity when we have these negotiations and sales conversations cause we're all showing up to them, hardwired to be negative. So Steve, can you explain to us how we can use labels to diffuse some of this negativity? Well, again, most sales people think they need to have solutions. Whenever there's a problem, they feel like they can't discuss a problem without having a solution in hand.

And so oftentimes, they avoid the problem altogether, where they try and sugar coat things or spin things or edit the truth in a way. Rather than, you don't need to have the problem. All you need to do is label how someone is thinking and feeling. And if you keep labeling, that's gonna defuse the negative emotions. And then you're gonna let them process and let them come up, because again, it's their decision. When there's a problem,

what you need to do is lay out the landscape. Here's what's going on. Here are the options. Here are the consequences. And then you simply put it back on them. How would you like to proceed? And most salespeople think they've got to solve all the problems. You know, you don't have to solve the problems.

A, you don't have the ability to make decisions for people, only they can make decisions. And we have a whole chapter in the book, put responsibility where it belongs. And if your home isn't selling, it's because you're not willing to either lower the price or stage your home in the right way or do certain things. It's not that the agent isn't doing their job. You're not doing your job. However, I as the agent take all that on me. Somehow, I'm not doing what needs to be done.

And agents do this all the time. So it's learning to put responsibility where it belongs and where it belongs is on the decision maker. Can you guys give me like a real life example or just any sort of example of labeling and how it works, how you would use that to diffuse negativity, maybe, Chris? You know, and I love that Steve brought the staging thing up because it's a problem for a lot of sellers. They don't want to stage their house. Now, an agent is telling me about this one time and she's thinking to herself,

all right, so what are the likely emotions that going through because they don't want to stage your house? And as soon as they start staging their house, suddenly they feel like they're guest staging their house, suddenly they feel like they're guest in their house, as if they don't live there. And the king, you know, king of the castle, king or queen of the castle, they don't want to be made to feel like in their own home that their guests are there in intruder. So she just says to them, exactly that. She throws a label on it. Like it seems like you're reluctant to stage your house because it makes

you feel like an intruder and you're on a home. It makes you feel like you're a guest that has to get out of the way. And it seems like these people that you've never met before suddenly have more right to be in your house than you do. Those were all labeling the emotions and the dynamics that the sellers predictably going through based on, you know, how does this make no sense? What are they seeing this? What kind of craziness is going on in their head? Well, what would you feel like if you got to get out of your, if you got to remodel your house for strangers that you've never met and you got to get out of there every time somebody wants to go? Suddenly, you're, you're a guest, you're the intruder in your house.

She throws this out at them and they literally go, that's right. I guess we do need to stay in your house just by putting a label on the stuff that they were going through. And because you mentioned it, and I think Steve mentioned it too, what's the importance of hearing that's right? What is what is that tell us? That's right. Is what people say when what they've just heard is a truth, unequivocal, unvarnous, just the truth truth and they can embrace it. They're not obligated to. They freely embrace it. It's what people, the emotional connection that Steve talked about before. It's an indicator of the beginnings of emotional connections or really solid emotional connections. And versus your right, you know, you need to stage your house because your house isn't going to

sell. You start explaining, given all the reasons, well, when you're explaining, you're losing, how do you know you're losing the other person saying you're right? Of course, that's right. Such a little nuance, but you're right means that they don't feel understood, and they're just kind of shushing you, right? Exactly.

That's right means you understand me, I'm aligned. Yeah, that's right. All right, essential truth number four, You understand me. I'm aligned. Yeah, that's right All right, essential truth number four the fear of loss is the primary motivator of human beings also known as the prospect theory What does that mean? Yeah, well Steve? I know you hit this all the time So I'm gonna ask you to knock this one out sales people are trained to pitch Benefit gain and opportunity. It's the whole idea of getting a yes.

If you're in sales, how many times have you been taught? Get the yes. Get the yes. And by reaching for yes, what you're actually creating is resistance. People love to say, no. No makes people feel safe and protected. And so, you know, we haven't touched on this,

getting in asking no oriented questions. And we want to play to the no. Would it be impossible? Would you be imposed? Would it be too much to ask? And people have a hard time not saying no. And so you phrase your questions in a way where no serves you. And this is a great tool.

The most basic example is now good time to talk or is now bad time to talk. You're gonna get a much better response to is now bad time to talk than is now good time to talk. Yeah, I love that. I know that has to do a lot with people wanting control, right? So they'll be in control when they say no first. This is a hack I use all the time from Chris is getting people to say no because I know that it makes them feel in control like they're making their own decisions. And that's why it's so powerful. Chris would love to understand

in terms of the actual fear of loss being bigger than the fear of powerful. Chris would love to understand, in terms of the actual fear of loss being bigger than the fear of gain, I'd love to understand that. Well, yeah, and then, and let's do a solar example, it's got the house overpriced, and they're worried about what they'll lose if they cut the price. And to get them to think about a different loss would be how much is it cost you

to leave your house on the market overpriced? Because suddenly now you've got them thinking about a different loss. And it is the tipping point for decision making. And when people can't see things the way you do, I guarantee you they're seeing a different loss than what you are. And that's one of the challenges for real estate agents. In a sales a number of years ago, a gentleman was selling retirement packages, benefits to companies. And they said, look, if you let us handle your retirement accounts, we'll get a 20% higher rate of return. That's pitching game. The same pitch otherwise, let us take a look at your retirement accounts. All right, so don't go with us and it's going

to cost you 20% every day. Do nothing. Don't lift a finger and it's each and every day that goes by. It's gonna cost you 20%. It's the very same proposition, but one is about what you're gonna gain and the other is what is inaction going to cost you and you need somebody to take action. They're far more likely. Again, these are percentages. This is a Vegas world. They're much more likely to change their approach, change their decision if they're focused on a different loss.

Yeah. So basically, the main thing that we need to understand is when we're trying to convince someone, we should focus on what they're gonna lose, not necessarily what they're gonna gain. And a lot of us have been taught, value, value, value, give all the ways that they're to win, but it's really about what are they going to lose if they don't work with you Exactly right. It's the it's not the only driver of decision-making. It's just the biggest one Okay, so let's get to you essential truth number six people will die over their autonomy

And why don't we talk about these no-oriented questions? will die over their autonomy. And why don't we talk about these no-oriented questions, since I know that's relevant? Well, that was, you know, that to me, and then I'll hand it off to Steve. The first clue about why hostage-to-go-shation applied to every aspect of life was Jim Camp's book in 2002, which was a business book, start with no. He just lays out, and he states in his book, people will die to preserve their autonomy. And I remember thinking at the time, that's why we have hostage-to-go-shed as in the the time, that's why we have hostage to go, she had us in the first place. Because people were getting killed right and left

because law enforcement had show up around the house and say, come out, it will kill you, which is to take away somebody's autonomy. And that's effectively what they're saying when swat surround you. And we had swat for years. And people were dying right and left refusing to come out over nothing.

And that was about people's preservation for autonomy. And so that's why this human nature thing applies to everything. And then Steve has picked up on them very quickly as soon as he saw this stuff, particularly the North-Earned Questions he was talking about before. I used this hack all the time, especially if somebody's ghosting me, like if I'm in a sales conversation and somebody goes to me, I'll be like, were you giving up on your LinkedIn journey or something? And then they'll be like, no, no, I'm sorry a sales conversation and somebody goes to me. I'll be like, were you giving up on your LinkedIn journey or something, are you like, and then they'll be like, no, no, I'm sorry, I just missed my email the last few days.

It always gets them, they always respond. Yeah, nice. So as we wrap this up and we're running, we're at a time. So essential truth number seven, vision drives decision and then we'll wrap up this conversation. How people see the future is how they're gonna make up their mind. The future, since it hasn't happened, it's an illusion.

It's in everybody's head. But you got to understand how to see in the future. And that's the whole purpose of the labels, the mirrors, the tactical empathy, everything. And as Steve said before, it's seeking first to understand is not enough. Seeking first to demonstrate what your understanding is. Because then of course, you're trying to figure out what their vision of the future is. And then trying to flesh that out with them by being a sounding board,

by discussing it with them, by throwing them at at them, what you think they're seeing, they're either gonna tell you you're on track or they're gonna correct you. Now, you can understand where you have to go. Do you have to try to get them to see a different future? Again, because it's all imaginary, anyway. Or are you happy with what they're seeing at the time?

People are going to take action going forward as to how they see the future playing out. Fusion drives decision. Okay, to close out this interview, I'm going to ask you guys a question that we ask all our guests on the podcast. And that's what is one actionable thing our young and profitors can do today to become more profitable tomorrow. And I know this book is for real estate agents, but let's take it wider to just sales in general. What's one actionable thing our listeners can do today

to become more profitable tomorrow? Let's start with Chris, then Steve. Use this sentence before you give anybody a pitch an idea, say, you know, before giving my perspective on this, here's what I think your perspective is. And lay out what you think their perspective is, and you can't give your pitch until you've got a that's right out of them. The trigger point is that's right.

But then you can go forward, until you get it right, you're on weak ground. Oh my gosh, that's such a good tip. Steve, what about you? The most important decision you can make and the best way to make more money is charge what you're worth. Most people are reluctant to charge what they're actually worth because they're afraid they're going to lose business if they do. And there's something that I call the adjustment standard We adjust to the standards we set in life and this is why we wrote the book the full fee agent The most important decision for real estate agent is what fee am I going to charge and when I make a decision to charge a full fee

I've got to adjust everything up to that. I've got to become better at what I do. What most agents do is they lower their fee and they adjust everything down to that lower fee. And so charge what you're worth. I love that. And great way to segue into the full fee agent, your new book, where can everybody find it? That's on Amazon. You know, the best price, the best location to pick up a book is always on Amazon. Follow on stuff if you wanna learn more

about what we can do for you, how we can coach you, whatever you're in, whether you're in real estate, whatever you're in, likes one, LTD.com, B-L-A-C-K-S-W-A-N, LTD.com, so website, follow up with me or Steve, whatever you need. We're going to be there for you. Awesome, and we'll stick all your links in this channel so people can find you easily. Thank you guys so much for joining us today on Young and Profiting Podcast, and I really enjoyed your book. Thank you. Thank you. You guys know how much I love having Chris Voss on the show.

He officially holds the record in terms of number of appearances on YAP, and rightfully so, because he always brings the value. In this time around, I was really fascinated by his negotiation tactics and how they work in the world of real estate. Something that really stuck with me from this interview was the idea of the fool and the favorite. One of the biggest sales misconceptions is that we have to change people's minds and convert hesitant prospects into paying customers.

But that's not always the best tactic. If you have to convince someone to work with you, that means they didn't already see you as a trusted advisor. So they're going to question your capabilities as soon as the first thing goes wrong. You'll save yourself a lot of time and a lot of stress if instead you seek out prospects who already see you as the favorite, who want to work with you. All my best clients are people who are excited to work with me and knew that I produced great work before they actually met with me. And the clients that I struggled the most with are always the people that were hesitant to work with me

and people that I really tried to convince to take a shot on me and my company. Like Steve said, life is too short to work with people who don't wanna work with you. So stop wasting your time on potential customers who see you as the fool and instead put all that energy towards prospects who already see you as the favorite.

Remember this line, it's not a sin to lose business. It's a sin to take a long time to lose business. I hope you guys enjoyed this episode. If you want to learn more about negotiation, sales strategies, and influence in real estate, be sure to check out Chris and Steve's book, The Full Feat Agent, and the Link is in the show notes. Thanks for listening to this episode of Young and Profiting Podcasts. If you listen, learn, or profited from this episode, be sure to drop us a five-star review on Apple or your favorite podcast platform.

And share this podcast with your friends and family. So many people would love this podcast if they just knew about it, so make sure you share YAP by word of mouth. If you like watching your podcast videos, you can find all our videos on YouTube, and you can also catch me on Instagram at YAP with Hala or LinkedIn by searching my name, it's Hala Taha. Big shout out to our amazing YAP production team you guys are crushing it. This is your host, Hala Taha, aka the podcast princess, signing off. [♪ OUTRO MUSIC PLAYING [♪

Are you looking for ways to be happier, healthier, more productive, and more creative? I'm Gretchen Rubin, the number one best-selling author of the Happiness Project. And every week, we share ideas and practical solutions on the Happier with Gretchen Ruben podcast. My co-host and Happiness Guinea Pig is my sister Elizabeth Kraft. That's me, Elizabeth Kraft, a TV writer and producer in Hollywood. Join us as we explore fresh insights from cutting-edge science, ancient wisdom, pop culture, and our own experiences about cultivating happiness and good habits. Every week we offer a try this at home tip you can use to boost your happiness without spending a lot of time, energy or money. Suggestions such as follow the one-minute rule. Choose a one-word theme for the year or design your summer.

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