The CLEAR Framework for Better Sales Calls | EP 103

In this first episode of a new series, The 15-Minute Framework, Dr. Kasey Jo Orvidas breaks down the CLEAR decision framework, a tool she originally created for HMCC alumni to use on sales and discovery calls.

She covers:

• What CLEAR stands for and how each step guides a sales conversation toward a confident decision
• Why most prospective clients misidentify their actual problem, and how to help them get to what's really going on without telling them they're wrong
• The difference between ambivalence and resistance, and why trying to "fix" ambivalence too fast backfires
• How most objections come down to autonomy, belonging, or competence, and how to address the real barrier underneath
• Why the same coaching skills used with clients are exactly what make a sales call feel less salesy

If you've ever felt like a sales call turns you into someone you're not, this episode gives you a framework to make it feel like coaching instead.

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Transcript

0:00

a sales call is not about convincing someone to buy. Okay? It's about helping someone make a clear and confident decision, Hello my friends, and welcome back to not another Mindset show. I'm your host, Dr. Casey Joe. My goal with this podcast is to take the science of mindset and behavior change and distill it down into actionable takeaways for you. Together we're gonna unpack research around motivations, self-sabotage, willpower, and so much more, and we're going to take all of that and translate it into strategies you can immediately apply to your health. Fitness, relationships, business, marketing clients, all of the things. But just to be clear, it's not all serious and sciencey around here. We're gonna have a ton of fun too, and I'm so excited to share all of this with you. All right, let's go ahead and get into the episode. Hello, hello. Welcome back to Not Another Mindset Show. I have something different for you today. It's something I'm going to try and we'll see if I'm actually capable of doing it. The idea that I had is to start doing some episodes here and there that I would like to call The 15-Minute Framework. I'm going to have to watch the time because we all know that I can talk, and talk, and talk, especially those of you who are HMCC students and have been on calls with me. Like, you could ask me three questions, and 90 minutes is how long I could spend on three questions. So the goal here, though, is to give you something quick and tangible in 15 minutes. So today, the framework I have for you is something that I came up with for the HMCC alumni group. So if you are an alumni member, you will have heard this before, but chances are you need a refresher because you can only have so much stuff being stuffed into your brain all of the time. So what I have is the CLEAR decision framework, and it's meant to help guide your sales calls, consult calls, discovery calls, whatever, whatever you call them. And I need you to keep in mind, first and foremost, that a sales call is not about convincing someone to buy. Okay? It's about helping someone make a clear and confident decision, and that is what this framework is built around. We really wanna think about how mindset and behavior change does play a role in sales and marketing. My HMCC students out there, you already know mindset and behavior change science really well. Honestly, even those of you who listen to this podcast, and you can probably pretty easily draw some parallels to how you should be showing up when it comes to your content and marketing, and on your sales calls, and talking to prospective clients, and all of that. So sales calls are basically just a behavior change conversation. That's the truth. So the CLEAR decision framework I have: C, clarify the problem; L, link to a deeper meaning; E, explore ambivalence; A, address barriers; and R, reinforce the decision. So I'm gonna do my best in, like, the next 10 minutes here to get through all of those. I don't have a ton of faith in myself, but- This is a challenge that I am here to rise to the occasion for. So C, clarify the problem. Most prospective clients will jump on a call with you and be sort of misidentifying what their actual problem is. You will hear things like,"I just need more discipline. I just need someone to tell me what to do," or, " I know what to do, I just can't stay consistent with it." Underlying those statements are patterns, their environments, their beliefs, and those are the things that are the actual problem, but this person is likely just not aware of that yet. So what we wanna focus on is helping them figure out what's actually going on without directly telling them. If they came to you and said, "I just need to be more disciplined," and you were like, " Well, I'm gonna tell you right now, discipline's not your problem," you, you probably already lost the sale just because you're telling them that what they believe about themselves is incorrect, and you don't even know who they are, and they know themselves far better than you do. So instead, we want to be guiding them to come to a conclusion on their own of what is actually going on. The same way that you coach should be how you sell. So some example questions for how this could sound: What feels hardest for you right now? Or what have you tried before? What has worked? What hasn't? Or what barriers really tend to keep showing up and keep getting in the way? So you see here, instead of it just being like, "Oh, discipline's your problem," it becomes, what are some other questions we can ask to get below that? L is for linking to a deeper meaning. Okay, please know that people don't just buy solutions. I feel like this is talked about constantly all the time in marketing and sales content, that people want to buy a solution to their problem, and that's like the main thing. The truth is they invest in how they want to feel and who they want to become. They invest in the transformation, not just the solution. I mean, the solution's still part of it, but I think we're, we're giving too much credit to just the solution. So we want to link to a deeper meaning. How can you connect the problem that they're going through that they're describing to you or the solution that you have to something that's personally meaningful for them? You can think about important aspects like values, identity, or where their motivation is currently coming from. And you could ask them, "Why is this an important thing for you to do right now?" Or, "What would change for you if all of this felt so much easier?" Or even how would life look different if this wasn't a struggle for you anymore? Link to a deeper meaning. Okay, E is explore ambivalence. Ambivalence is a big word that we use in HMCC all the time, and it's often confused with resistance, I think. That if someone wants to change, they want to do something, but then they're also at the same time arguing against doing that thing, arguing against making those changes. That is ambivalence, and it is a normal part of the change process. It is not resistance. So when we think about that, most people on a sales call, they wanna make a change. They signed up to work with you, or applied to work with you rather. They want to do this. They wanna make a change in their life, but they probably will also come to you with like, "Here's all the reasons why this is hard, or why I feel like I can't do it, or why I probably shouldn't do this even though I'm here telling you that I want to." And that is something that we need to see as just part of the process, and make sure that they know that and that you see it that way. That's where this E for explore ambivalence comes up. Because if you try to override or brush off the ambivalence or hesitation or the cons to changing that are coming up for them, that is when you get resistance. So in that case, it was kinda actually your fault if you're experiencing that. So instead, we want to explore it. But be careful how you go about this, because often people who are getting on sales calls are a little bit in the defensive mode. They're preparing for you to try to convince them, to try to push them, and they're in this place of already maybe not being 100% sure that this is something that they wanna do. So we want to make sure that they're not feeling like you're just talking them into it, and instead you're exploring the reasons why they may want to do this and why not. So keep in mind, we want to stay curious instead of trying to correct them, or please don't be trying to convince them. Curious instead of convincing and correcting. It's a good three C framework. I'm gonna hold onto that. So we wanna help them build awareness of the benefits and costs of changing, and the benefits and costs of not changing. We want to do both, both sides, not just reinforcing the benefits over and over again, 'cause I know y'all are really good at doing that. So some questions to ask. If anything, what might make you hesitant to hire a coach? This is an investment, and I don't wanna downplay that. What thoughts come up for you when you think about the decision to move forward? Our brains need to feel safe in order to make a decision like this. It's a biological thing. Are there any concerns that are coming up for you right now? See how you're, like, actually exploring everything that's going on, not just jumping to here's all the benefits, here's all the reasons why you should do this. Explore it. Okay, A is for address barriers. With this one, we need to first and foremost kind of reframe the idea of handling objections because it's really about just collaboratively navigating barriers with your prospective client on the other side of this sales call. We're not just handling their objections. And I've talked a lot about the idea of basic psychological needs on the podcast. If you're an HMCC student, you should probably know these by heart: autonomy, belongingness, and competence. And we need to feel those things in order to feel motivated and stick with things and want to do things. So those objections that you hear on sales calls, it's usually just because one of those psychological needs is being neglected or is just missing from the conversation entirely. Whether that is something that you're paying attention to or not, it, it could be happening. Autonomy, belongingness, and competence, which one of those is being neglected or missing from the sales conversation? So for example, some common objections and how you could address the barrier within. Let's say their objection is time."I don't know if I have time for this. I don't know if I'm gonna be able to do this. I'm traveling. I have all this stuff coming up in my life." You could say, "What would make this feel manageable with your current schedule as it stands?" If the objection is around money, you could ask, "What would need to happen for this to feel like a good investment for you?" If self-doubt is the objection, they don't really know if they can trust themselves to follow through, which is so often the real thing, the, the core objection . Even if they're saying time, money, or something else. You could say, "What would you need to feel confident that you'll see results? What makes you feel like you wouldn't?" And now we're really getting into some juicy stuff with that. Okay, lastly, R is reinforce the decision. The key question to ask here is, based on everything we talked about, what feels like the right next step for you Try to be prescriptive in your offer. Try to really make it clear that you are paying attention, that based on XYZ very specific thing they shared with you, here's what I generally would recommend. We spend six months together. I think that that could get you from point A to point Z. Don't literally say those things. Like explain to them future pace what's going on. Be prescriptive, be intentional with what you say, rather than just,"All right. Sounds like you're a great fit. Let's do six months." Doesn't work as well. So if they don't want to move forward after you have that conversation, ask them what they plan to do on their own. And this could actually be an opportunity for you to provide some focus areas for them and say, "Hey, no worries. Feel free to take some time to think about it. Maybe something will shift in the next month or so," based on very specific thing that they shared with you. Bring that back into the conversation. And maybe give them like a high level what they need to focus on, those focus areas. Not necessarily a how to. Don't start coaching them on the call. But that also gets them to kind of see and feel like what it would be like if they were to decide to hire you as a coach. So you could also send them, maybe you have some free resources, some podcast episodes you've done, something like that, to kinda just like keep them in your world and also still give them something. So if they say, "Yes, but not now," we get that a lot, right?"I don't think now's the time. This seems really great. It seems like something I wanna do, but I just can't do this right now." Then confirm when you're going to follow up, and then leave them with something in the meantime, again, whether it's that like high level, "Here are some focus areas. Here's a couple things I'll send you" And overall, with this entire clear framework, what we are aiming to do is reduce uncertainty, reduce cognitive overload, reduce perceived risk, and reduce any internal conflict that they are facing, while simultaneously increasing clarity, self-efficacy, autonomy, and connection with this person So, okay. I, I think I did, I think I did all right. We may have been a few minutes over 15, but honestly I'm pretty impressed with myself. The way I kept looking at the time, like,"Okay, you could go deeper in this, but don't. 15-minute framework, Casey." Okay. I hope you enjoyed this. I would love to hear what you think of it. I'm, have a couple more 15-minute framework episodes planned, but I'm hoping that this is, like, a fun little give you something quick rather than hearing me drone on and on and through research study number 12 on a podcast episode. But please let me know. I super appreciate you being here as always, and I'll see you next week And that's a wrap for today's episode of Not another Mindset show. If you enjoyed today's episode, don't forget to hit that subscribe button so you get notified of the next one. Because if you're anything like me, if the episodes aren't popping up for you automatically, you'll keep forgetting to come back to the show even if you really, really enjoyed it. So go ahead and hit that subscribe button and make it super easy for you and of course. If you wanna see more episodes just like this one, I'd love for you to let me know by leaving a review. I know, I know it's super annoying to do, but the few seconds that it takes means the world to me and also ensures that I can keep providing free education and value to you. And just to sweeten the deal, I am going to be picking a random reviewer every single month to receive a free workshop or product from me. If you're looking for more free resources or just wanna connect, hang out, chat a little bit, come find me on Instagram. I'm Coach Casey, Joe over there. That is where I hang out the most in the land of social media. Alright, my friends, that is all I have for you this time. I so appreciate you being here and love to see you prioritizing your growth. I'll see you next time.