How to Overcome the Fear of Selling with Dr. Nadia Brown

In this episode we’re joined by Dr. Nadia Brown. She holds a doctoral degree in organizational leadership and is passionate about using her knowledge to help women become authentic, confident, charge-taking leaders.

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On this episode of the Live. Love. Engage. podcast:

• Why she thought she was the last person who would ever start a sales agency.
• What led Dr. Brown to discover and become passionate about the sales process.
• Why it’s important for women to shatter their inner glass ceiling.
• The critical sales quality necessary for success.
• How women are naturally good at selling (and why women downplay it).
• What Dr. Brown teaches the clients she works with.
• The skill that enables women to do their best work.
• The biggest lesson Dr. Brown learned when she decided to start The Doyenne Agency.
• Why what makes sense on paper may not always be right for you.
• How creating a contingency plan can help you deal with the difficulties that arise.
• The part of Dr. Brown’s work she loves the most.
• What a kudos folder is and why you should keep one.
• The aspect of her life Dr. Nadia Brown is most interested in right now.
• Brown’s sales advice for the listener.

Connect with Dr. Nadia Brown

The Doyenne Agency: https://thedoyenneagency.com/
Dr. Nadia’s Sales Persona Quiz: discoveryoursalesblindspot.com

Quick Links:

• Join the Live. Love. Engage. Community
• Intuitive Business Coaching
• The Live. Love. Engage. Book
• Support the Podcast with BuyMeACoffee.com

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TRANSCRIPT

You’re listening to the live love engage podcast. on today’s show You’ll learn the essential quality that every entrepreneur needs in order to be successful at sales. Stay tuned. I am Gloria Grace Rand, founder of the love method and author of the number one, Amazon. Best seller live love, engage how to stop doubting yourself and start being yourself. In this podcast, we share practical advice from a spiritual perspective on how to live fully love, deeply and engage authentically. So you can create a life and business with more. Influence and income. Welcome to live love, engage

Namaste, and welcome to another edition of live love, engage. And I am delighted as always to have a guest with us on this show. I’m really enjoy meeting some really interesting, talented, amazing people. And today’s guest is no exception. although I did realize, I neglected to ask you how to pronounce your name, but I’m assuming it’s how it’s spelled. It’s Dr. Nadia brown. yep. You got it. Oh, good. Okay. I just was hoping Nadia wasn’t, wasn’t, you know, something different that , it looked like.

So, well, lemme tell you all about Dr. Brown. And so the way, the reason she has that is that she has a doctoral degree in organizational leadership, and she’s passionate about helping women become more authentic, confident leaders who take charge of their careers. And not only that, she’s also a sales strategist, a consultant trainer, and she’s the founder of her own company called the Doyenne agency which

Is a sales agency that works with business owners, companies, and corporations to multiply revenue and awaken the consistent, closer within your sales team, using her proprietary, consistent sales method, which I love that. And that’s what we’re gonna, we’re gonna talk a bit about that today. We’re gonna talk about sales because I know as a woman entrepreneur myself, that when I first went into business and I had, and I realized that

Oh, that meant I had to sell. I kinda, I didn’t didn’t connect that originally. And, and you know, cuz I had preconceived notions about sales and, and I’m sure lots of you listening and watching out there may have had that as well. But I like to start off with asking our guests a little bit about their journey.

So what actually brought you to this point where you are this founder, your agency, cuz also in doing a little research on you, I saw that you not only have this doctoral degree, but you also had, you had like a BS degree in computer engineering. I did. So you’ve, you’ve come a long way from that. So I’m curious to know what, you know, what, what is this journey that brought you here?

Oh my goodness. well, I left corporate, obviously. I love corporate and decided to launch your business, similar to what you were sharing Gloria. I had the same thing. Like I was like, wait, what I have to sell now? Like, oh crap. And helping women leaders. And, you know, really be more authentic and powerful in their leadership roles.

But obviously I needed to overcome this big sales hurdle. And I often shared that I was, I’m the least likely person that would ever lead a sales agency because I didn’t like sales. I was just like, I don’t know how I’m gonna do this business, but I just wanna do the work that I love. And, you know, someone else deal with the selling.

Well, that didn’t happen. That is not my story. I had to figure it out. And through that journey, there were quite a few things that I learned in that, one was I actually do like sales once I figured out how to do sales my way, but I also realized that there were some parallels in the challenges that women who were in mostly in corporate were dealing with in their leadership roles, that a lot of women in business were dealing with

When it came to sales and, I have to give credit where credit is due. So I have some very loving friends who gently and not so gently nudged me into like, girl, you need to really think about sharing your knowledge and your approach to sales with others and really supporting them. And that was the beginning of the conversations around launching a sales agency.

Oh, that’s awesome. Now you, you mentioned there’s, some similarities there in, in the corporate world and, and business. Can you elaborate on that a little bit? What, what are you talking about there? Absolutely. So one of the things that I talked a lot about before I started doing so much about sales was shattering your inner glass ceiling.

So in corporate, you hear a lot about the glass ceiling. Which we don’t even have time to dive into all of that, but trust that there are there, there are challenges and opportunities. And a couple things though that I noticed was that while there are definitely challenges that women face, I’m not, not downplaying that at all.

I also started to find out that because we knew that there were these challenges that were in place. There were those times when we would say no to ourselves first or we wouldn’t speak up, or we would start to buy into these stories that we’ve been hearing sometimes even before we were old enough to work.

Right. And so it was, you know, how do we, how do we get out of our own ways? So it better equips us to then be able to deal with the challenges that are very present. And when you look at sales, a lot of times we had those same issues that some of that just carried over for those of us were in corporate.

We weren’t pricing as competitively, weren’t willing to talk about the money or ask for the sale. We would sometimes tell ourselves no before our prospect had, you know, so we started to see those similarities between the two. Yeah. That’s and that makes so much sense. And, and I understand that because it is.

Selling is challenging. You know, we, there’s this idea that, well, there’s the stereotypical salesperson, you know, the, the car salesman and, and, and I think people then think, and especially even women that, well, the only way I’m gonna be able to be successful is I’ve got to sell to them as opposed to inviting people in to, to.

Invest in your, to enroll in what you’re you’re selling. And I, I know I had to go through this too, because I just, yeah. I had a lot of these things, the same and the same issues with even not pricing. And it comes down to, you know, valuing yourself. I think a, a lot of that and not, not valuing yourself enough.

But you talk about that there’s there’s. In particular, a, a critical sales quality that we need to have if we wanna be successful. What, what is that critical quality that all, all people, but probably even women in particular need to have if they wanna be successful. Well, there’s one did not talk about a lot.

That’s courage. I feel like we need a lot of courage to, to deal with just what you’d said, you know, the pricing. That discomfort to be willing to extend the invitation. I wouldn’t even add to be willing and courageous enough to sell like you. And that is one of the things that I wanna help women with is you don’t have to sell, like you said, the used car salesman.

And I think we all think him for excuse car salesman I get. And so it’s just like, you know, how, how do I sell like Nadia, how do I show up to each and every conversation as, as who I am and invite people into my work. And for those times when it’s not a good fit, because I think that’s also one thing that we have been mistaught if you will, is that every single person, if they’re human and they’re breathing, they’re fit and that’s not always true.

and so going into those conversations with different expectations, And being prepared to say, you know what, Gloria, I don’t think this is a good fit right now. Right. And then I would be more than happy to refer you to someone in my network and being okay with that, I think is definitely also part of that, that process.

Yeah. That, that is a, a good lesson that I know. I know I had, I had to learn because again, it goes back to, I think. You hear so much about, well, you know, when you’re in sales, you’re gonna hear no a lot and you’re gonna have to learn to deal with rejection, but if you can flip it where you are actually.

Rejecting someone, you know, nicely, but in a way, realizing that, yeah, you’re not, maybe you’re not a good fit and it could be that they may be a good fit later, but maybe they’re just not a good fit right now. And to be okay with that. what else do you think is more, cuz I have, I have an idea of, I think part of it also stems from really being, as you said, courageous, but also I think confident about what it is that you’re selling too.

Oh yeah. How, how, what do you think, how does that play in as well? It plays, it’s a big part of it. we tend to, and I, I know these are broad generalizations, but I have found that we as women actually have a very natural, innate ability to sell. I think we start to shrink and make it more complicated when it’s our work, when it’s our service, you know, and then it’s about us.

And so not all the tension is on us. and it’s like, uh oh, but, you know, when you think about the, the things that we’ve called a girlfriend or a sister or a mom about a sale, or, you know, whatever. we didn’t stop and pause and have all these conversations that we have now about it. It was like, I know she has a need.

I know where that is. I’m connecting them, done. And so I think that when we learn to work through all the muck in our minds, but like you said, sometimes it’s definitely rooted into confidence. I teach to take the shift off of you and really start to focus on how people are different as a result of working with you.

Because now we can start to assign values. We can really put a lot of words around it that, and many times doesn’t really reflect on us. They get to work with us. Right. But it’s not all on us. And we get to really start to see the, the greater value instead of placing like, you know, charging your worth and all that kind of stuff, which can bring up all these other connotations.

It’s like, no, let’s take a moment to think about how are your clients different as a result of working with you and just write out everything. And some of those are very tangible. A lot of times there are, some of them are intangible, but what I found is that with most women, there is this ripple effect.

Like when they change their clients, their clients go on to have an effect on other people. And so it’s like, whoa, wait a second. And so honestly, working with me is like priceless. So I could never really charge you enough to work with me. And then you go into the conversation completely different. Because you’re like, yeah, I’m amazing.

I, I love that. And that is such a empowering way to look at it that I, I love that. And, and I think it also goes to, something that I had a mentor talk to me about one time as well is the fact that when you really are putting, putting the emphasis more on this transformation and, and putting the emphasis on the client and, and the needs that they have.

If you are not looking to help them and to be able to sell your, you know, service, whatever it is to them, you’re doing them a disservice because they’re, they need what you have. And if you don’t offer it to them, then you’re depriving them of that. Yes. And sure they can get somebody else, but it’s not gonna be the same as from you because we’re all unique.

And we all have our, our particular way, and we’re gonna appeal to certain people and maybe not appeal to others. Yes. And we have to be okay with that as well. Right. Yeah. One of the things you also talk about is the importance of finding your lane and, and trying not to do it all. I know I’ve, I’ve done this in the past.

Can you explain why this is so important? I don’t know a woman alive is not busy, so I think that it is important for us to really get support. Probably sooner rather than later, I think we tend to, to, to default to wait till the last second and now I’m drowning. but it, it enables us to do our best work.

And then when you think about, as your company begins to grow, like whatever your vision is for your company, It’s like, oh, wait a second. There are things that I need to now delegate so that I can show up more powerfully in this way, whatever that way is for your business. And I’ve just found that when you don’t get the right support and you’re trying to do it all, it eventually leads to burnout.

And so this amazing business that you have, and these amazing transformations you’re providing, you’re now resenting. You don’t like your clients, you don’t like to come to your work. You’re like, wait a second. So, and I’ve been there. I realized one day I was like, wait a second. I absolutely hate everything about this.

What happened? I used to enjoy it and it was just like, oh wait, I’m doing too much. And I need to start to let some things go. So it frees up my brain space, my energy so that I can show up more powerfully in my work. Well, that’s interesting that you mentioned that, cuz actually what I was gonna ask you about next is, is what has been like one of the lessons, big lessons that you’ve had to learn in starting in your own agency now, you know, in switching from corporate to, to being a, a small business owner in your own right?

Oh my goodness. So many. So many lessons, one lesson I I’ve learned is the power of focus. So when I made the decision to shift the business and we launched this agency, we had one offer. And I know that makes a lot of people cringe, cuz you’re like, what about all the money you’re leaving on the table? And I get it but at that time, I was so uncertain about quite a few things.

I was just, I just need to figure this one thing out, but what I found is it actually allowed me to go through those iterations faster to make my mistakes, to tweak it, to really refine it a lot faster than I think if I had started out with like three different offers. so that was that’s one big lesson is understanding the power of focus.

And obviously that looks different for everyone. The other thing was to really honor who I am like my, my unique style, like Nadia is Nadia. There are certain ways that I really like to work with people. And there have been times over the years that I would try to force myself to do something. Because my coach suggested it or because the numbers made sense.

That’s a big one for me. Oh, the Nu, well, that makes perfect sense on paper, but it doesn’t make sense for Nadia to do it that way. Right. And so to give myself permission, to really show up in my business and operate in my role. In the areas that really make me shine. And if there’s an offer that we want to, you know, to offer, to create, or provide to clients, then it may require me to get support or hire team to do some of those pieces or all of those pieces, because it’s a great offer for clients, but it’s not.

It’s not best for Nadia to do it. So, but to be okay with that, cause sometimes our egos get in the way and we, we tell ourselves a story that I have to be the one to do it because I am the business owner. I am the creator and that’s not always true. So I’ve learned to, you know, hire people that are better than you and I let them do their part and let them do it well.

Yeah, absolutely. And, and we forget, I mean, if you look at successful companies that are out there, even if they started small with one person, the reason that they’re successful and the reason that they’re still in business maybe today, you know, years later than when they started is because they did realize that yeah, we have to.

Let other people in and be able to let go of some of those tasks. And, and, and I love how you said, get people who are, you know, even smarter than you, or, or certainly smarter than you in certain areas, to be able to appreciate that. You don’t have to do it all. You really don’t and, and there’s no, it it’s so much better when you don’t and you’re gonna grow a lot faster, and easier.

And I, I love finding ways that I can do things easy and relaxed. Yes. I, I, I think that’s awesome that you’re talking about that. If someone listening to this, you know, and is there any way that they could get it wrong, even though, you know, they’re, they’re hearing this, but, but maybe they, you know, is there any way that they could get it wrong and, and, and then what would they do about it?

What do you think? Well, I guess there are ways that you could get it wrong. but I, I wanna reframe that because I think one of the things that we as business owners get to do, a lot of times we are doing things we’ve never done before, we get to create things that don’t exist and then bring that to fruition.

And so I think part of the blessing and the curse in that. We get to create things that don’t exist and bring it into fruition. So there’s not always a blueprint there, you know, there are the ways we would like them to go. So I think, you know, a couple things that I would share with that, because I think that there are.

typically two schools of thought that I’ve seen, you have those that are just like, okay, I have enough and I just go for it and you figure things out and you tweak it along the way, which I think is a definitely a great ways for us to do business. But you have to take the time to evaluate. So when I’m in that mode, I just call it, we’re in a, what I call experimentation time.

And the things that we’re putting out on social media or in our newsletter or the offers is all a big experiments. And I just wanna see how people respond. I personally have to have a conversation with myself and go something like that, so that I give myself permission to screw it up. Right. so, because if I go into that, like, this is the offer, this is it.

This is… Then I tend to not have that same level of flexibility and forgiveness with myself. I’m like, Nope, we failed. It’s a complete. And it’s like, no, no, no, let’s learn a lesson. So, and in that, you know, we have regular audits, regular times where we’re evaluating the results and really taking time to kind of pick apart the things that worked, the things that didn’t work as well.

And given ourselves that time and space, which I think is the best way to go into it. Now I get that. We’re also talking about time, we’re talking about money. You know, we’re talking about relationships. Cause sometimes the offer is a big bomb in our opinion, and clients didn’t have a reaction. I get all of that, so I’m not negating it.

But I think that when we understand it’s part of the process, and if you need to, put in your contingency plans. So what would I do if, so again, if for whatever reason this goes sideways, you now know how you’re gonna handle it. And it’s better to do that before it goes sideways and you’re not emotional.

So then you can say, oh, well, this is what we said we would do. And you can just make it happen. But It’s hard to not get caught up in making mistakes in business, but you’re going to make them. This is true. And, and I saw somewhere, somebody, somebody talked about fail and gave a new definition for fail. It was first attempt in learning.

Yes. I love that. Yeah, I do too, because, because it’s, that’s it, you know, I mean, when you were a kid, you didn’t immediately walk. No, you fell down several times. Riding a bike. You probably fell down a couple times too. You know, you weren’t weren’t. You have to find your balance and it’s the same thing with business.

You’re also gonna have to find, maybe not so much balance I’m, I’m starting to learn more. I, I like the word harmony, because I think this idea of like life / work, you know, or balance is kind of, almost impossible to achieve, but if you can have maybe things working in harmony, then, then, then, you know, because sometimes you’re gonna wanna spend more time maybe with your personal life and, and let something.

Not go perhaps, but you’re gonna want to scale back a little bit. And, and that’s when perhaps you get somebody else to be able to take over something or you get a system in place that is gonna handle something absolutely. For you. So you’re not doing it all yourself. Yeah. What, what gets you really excited about the work that you do?

Oh gosh, helping my clients make money. I love it. Oh my gosh. It excites me when we set a goal and they hit it or we exceed it and they’re just like, oh my gosh. Cause again, you know, I get to support them. And sometimes it’s an idea or an offer they’ve never made before and to see it work, it’s like, so yes, I love that.

That never gets old. Yeah. I. That keeps you passionate about your business doesn’t it? When you can see that? Yeah. Oh yeah. It’s like, yes, this is working. It’s so exciting. And I think that’s an important lesson for business owners to remember as well. Is that again, it’s about focusing in, on your clients.

So if you can remember that you’re in this to help them transform. And when you get to see that, then that becomes this positive reinforcement that you can maybe help you to overcome when you do have those setbacks, you can remember that. Oh yeah, they did. They did benefit from this. Okay. I gotta keep going.

yes. And I encourage you when I was in corporate, I had what I called the kudos folder. And it was all those emails and, you know, atta girls that I got just for mostly at the time it was for my annual performance review. Cause I never remember what the heck I did all year. But then I was like, oh wait, I should translate that in my business life because you do have those days.

And you’re like, nothing, I, I’m not making a difference. Nothing I’m doing is working. It’s so funny. Like we’re just like, nothing I’ve ever done is worked and it’s like, seriously, Nadia like credit it out, but then you have your client testimonials, you know, your feedback. You’re like, oh, That did work.

Okay. I’m just having a day, but I’ll get a break. yeah, absolutely. Well, it’s it’s unfortunately our, our brains are hardwired to seek negative. And so we do have to have some ways of being able to overcome that. And, and yes, I recommend that to my clients as well is to keep that, you know, a gratitude folder keep, keep testimonials handy because there are gonna be days where you’re gonna need to be able to.

Pick yourself up a bit and get going again. Yes. And it’s not just for your marketing, it’s for you. Yeah. Your own mindset, which is so important in being able to be successful.

What are you curious about right now? Ooh. Cause, okay. This is probably gonna sound strange, but there, one thing I’m curious about right now is how to be a good mom. Ah, and like you said, I love that word harmony how to make, find that harmonious balance between motherhood and business. Because right now I don’t feel like we’re there yet.

well, that’s you know, that’s something to work on. How, how may I ask how old your child is or. She is six. Ah, okay. Yep. She’s six. But, the unique part about our journey is. By bio biologically. She is my niece. We just adopted, we just finished our adoption process earlier this year. So she’s only been with us for half her life when she was three.

She, she came to live with us. And so it was definitely a very abrupt leap into motherhood. Oh wait. What just happened? We don’t have any biological children. So we literally went from an empty house to wait, what is happening. So, yeah. So it’s been those life lessons of. Oh, wait, hold on. Wait, gotta integrate. Gotta do this. Gotta make this adjustment. So I haven’t, I have not mastered it at all. So that’s where I am right now.

well, I’ll, I’ll tell, I I’d love to tell you that it gets easier. And, and it does a bit sometimes, but, but. You know, what I will say is that there are moments of such joy and fun that you’re gonna have a lot as you’re going on. And, and at least you didn’t have to deal with the, you know, you know, trying to.

Give your baby a bath and, and being terrified that you’re gonna, you know, drop this, this kid. So at least, you know, you, you avoided that. And cuz I had that. That’s true. That was terrifying. You know, just doing this, you know this because they’re so dependent, you know? Yes. Now three year old there, she was probably already getting some, you know, independence and so I’m sure that’s.

That’s been challenging. So, but it’s, it’s all good. I will tell you, I’ve got two grown children now and I they’re, they’re amazing. And I’m very blessed. And, so I, I think you’re on a wonderful journey and I wish you all the blessings for it. So, and I see you got a little mom back there on your desk.

Uh something. Oh yeah. That’s that’s awesome. My mother’s day card, I was like, oh yeah, I gotta let that soak get a little bit. Yes, absolutely. That’s so cool. let’s see, is there anything else that you think would be worthwhile before we finish up here today to share, any other words of wisdom regarding either the, the sales process, helping, helping business owners with that, or, or anything even just general advice that you give, maybe you share with your clients to help them?

I would say from a sales perspective, one – make the system and process your own. So spend, take a moment to think about how you want clients, prospects to feel going through that journey. And then implement the systems and processes to make that happen. There’s a lot of great advice out there, but I think when we make it our own, that’s when it truly becomes a lot more powerful because then people, they feel it along the way, and they know that they’re not just another number to you even before they become a client.

And. So I think it’s probably more important these days now than even in the past, because there’s a lot going on these days. That’s for sure. Yeah. And, and that, that is the thing is that there’s a lot of, there’s a lot of competition and, and there always has been, and there always will be. But you know, when you do focus in on you and the value that you’re providing for your clients, then.

That’s half the battle right there. And, and you, you can, as long as you keep focusing on that, then you’re, you’re gonna get there. But I, I love how you do say it is important to come up with your own process, because sometimes we do get too caught up in following what this expert says and that expert says, and then it doesn’t, you know, we follow it to a T and it doesn’t work for us.

And we’re like, oh, I must be doing something wrong. Yep, yep. You gotta put you in it. So I’m totally for it. Like Gloria mentioned. I have a degree in engineering, lots of formulas. so I get it. And in business you have to insert you, your values, your personality gotta make it your own. Yeah, definitely. If someone has been listening to this today and would like to know a little bit more about, you know, how your process and what you do with clients, how can people find out more about you?

Where’s the best place to go? One place is our website. That’s the Doyenneagency.com. we also have a quiz to help you learn more about your persona and maybe some of the blind spots that you may encounter in sales. And so you can do that at discover your sales blind spot dot com. Very good. All right.

Well, I will be sure and have that information in the show notes. So if you’re somewhere listening to this in your car or something, and you don’t have a pen handy, just go to live love engage podcast.com when you have some time and then you’ll be able to get that information. And, yeah, so this has been really great and you are a delightful person and I, I can see that you really do care about your clients and, and I see why you are a successful salesperson in your own right.

So I appreciate you being on the show today. Thank you so much. Thanks for having me. Thank you. Yeah. And I wanna thank all of you for watching and for listening to the podcast. And I really appreciate it. And if you’ve got some value out of this today, I hope that you will share the podcast with a friend, tell people about it.

And of course, leave a rating. You know, wherever you listen to this, like apple would be great. I appreciate those as well. And until next time, as always, I encourage you to go out and live fully, love, deeply and engage authentically.

Did you know that a majority of entrepreneurs tend to discount the importance of their work and a good number feel their success is simply due to luck? I know from personal experience, that self doubt can keep you from having the kind of life and business you desire. That’s why I’ve created a free guide called uniquely you how to move from Self doubt to self love in four simple steps to claim your free guide. Go to live love, engage.gift that’s live love, engage dot g-i-f-t.