03:09 Sales is the first act of coaching

04:23 How you prepare determines your success

09:40 Speed to lead and why it matters

12:46 Follow up with leads — or lose them

18:11 Own your pipeline

20:07 Disqualifying prospects

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Dan Uyemura: [00:00:00] If you think sales is slimy, you're approaching it completely backwards. Welcome to the PushPress Podcast, where gym owners learn to dodge bad advice, crush their competition, and actually make money doing what they love. Let's get after it. This podcast is brought to you by Nice Trail Mix, which is indeed pretty nice.

I've eaten like half a bag, only in 4,286 calories of Trail Mix. I'm gonna need some trail mix while you open this episode. All right. So today, or not today, this episode we're gonna talk about sales, the four letter, five letter word. No one likes sales. And how, um, I'm of the opinion that it is not only the most necessary component for all tran commerce to happen, all customer satisfaction is rooted in this first step of sales, but it's also the most broken process in all of business.

I'll, I guess I'll unpack that and then we can dive into the episode. You can gimme your feelings Since, uh, this is kind of, you know, coming more from your [00:01:00] background and your world, there's quite literally never been a time where I've desired something. That didn't mean I had to go into a sales process for it.

Now, there are some things like Amazon or whatever, that have been completely engineered to allow the sales process to happen. Self-service, self-discovery, self information gathering, and self-purchase. Usually speaking, the more high ticket, the thing is, the more likely you're gonna be in a sales transaction with a person who is selling you on the other end.

Nick Reyes: Yep. The more complex the, um, the product typically. Yes. 

Dan Uyemura: And there's this interesting dichotomy between, I want some, let's just use a car for an example because this is the easiest one for everyone to imagine. I want a new car. I need a new car. I drive to the car lot. I see car salesmen circling. I get outta the car, I see them playing roshambo for who gets to talk to me.

I see a dude approaching me and start [00:02:00] asking me leading questions and I immediately want to leave, but I need a car. Like that is broken in and of itself. 

Nick Reyes: Yeah, and I think to double click on that, that picture that you're just painting in my head here and it's like I also chose that car lot. A particular car in mind.

So I've got a high level of interest already. 

Dan Uyemura: Yeah. 

Nick Reyes: Like, 

Dan Uyemura: like you didn't just randomly drive to a car a lot. 

Nick Reyes: Yeah. Like the days of like, lemme just roll up to the, I don't know. Me Mighty Ford Yeah. Is done right. It's like, you know, you want an F-150. 

Dan Uyemura: Not only do you want F-150, but you want like the Raptor trim or whatever you've already decided.

Yes. 

Nick Reyes: You need a little more information to push you over the edge to get you past your own mental hurdles. Yeah. 

Dan Uyemura: Yeah. But the minute they start asking you questions, you start playing these games of like, I'm gonna guard my information. I'm not gonna tell you who I am. I'm like, you are gonna, you're out to get me.

Mm-hmm. [00:03:00] I think part of that is their fault and part of it is the consumer's fault. Like it, there's a, it's just broken. 

Nick Reyes: Yes. That's the easiest way to say it. It is. Uh, you said something to me the other day that was, uh, I thought, I thought it was an interesting parallel for our, our audience to hear, which was that the first act of coaching is sales.

And if you really think about. About that for a hot second. It's like, you gotta understand why they're here. You have to understand, uh, what they're looking for. Like you can't even begin to coach someone to a result in your gym unless you understand these things. Mm-hmm. And that just comes with asking questions.

Mm-hmm. And they don't need to be sleazy questions. I think to your point, that puts someone on the guard. You just have to understand the human in order to serve them. 

Dan Uyemura: Yeah. It doesn't matter if they're training in the gym or buying a car. There is a pain point that needs to be solved [00:04:00] and there are details to those pain points that help somebody solve them faster or better.

Mm-hmm. And this is, there's so many analogies to business, to, to being a coach. It is, it is nauseating. It's also crazy to think that like connecting those dots should be easier for people. You know, sales is just coaching. 

Nick Reyes: Yep. So. Let's jump into the five tactics that will immediately level up your sales program.

Number one, prepare like a pro. There are things that the best sales teams, the best sales organizations do that don't really exist in many fitness businesses. Um, the one that ca came, comes to mind as we started preparing for this episode was battle cards. So a battle card is essentially a tool that anyone, uh, [00:05:00] doing in sales, uh, or anyone in sales does that understands who they're talking to, where they're coming from, what are the common mental hurdles that they're gonna have to get over in order to, you know, buy into your product or your service.

And so, you know, for, for a gym owner, it might be. A battle card on, I've got a person coming into my gym that's never done any type of fitness. What's their mindset? They're scared. Um, what questions do I ask them? They're gonna be different questions than the person who's coming from another group fitness gym, or a 24 hour access gym, or, you know, like a lifetime or something like that.

Mm-hmm. So the battle card is that quick reference card that will help you get ready. You know, for that person that's walking in the gym. 

Dan Uyemura: Yeah. And I think in general, when it comes to, uh, again, think of this as pain [00:06:00] diagnosis, the sales process, the more information, you know, the better. And a lot of the stuff can be unearthed naturally through conversation, pre-consultation, you know, and it can be, feel very natural.

And I think this is part of the preparation stuff, and this could even inform your battle cards, but it would be like. Let me, lemme just walk through this and I can, where my brain is going, but like, Hey Nick, uh, why are you coming in? Right? You can start asking these questions, dah, dah, dah. Eventually you find out like you're coming in because you feel like you're hitting middle age and your metabolism's slowing down and you wanna fight that great.

All true. That wasn't just random. Um, and you know, so like imagine you play that out and you get like two or three good foundational gems from the, from the lead. You should have a battle card for every one of these things, right? Or you could even say like, Hey, what do you, and what do you anticipate to be kind of like a problem?

Oh, I dunno if I can afford it, cool. Pull out that battle card. Right? And you can almost [00:07:00] assemble a personalized battle card based on the fact that like Nick has metabolic concerns, he has financial concerns, and he has time concerns. He's a busy dad. Mm-hmm. Ready to go. I don't think most people do that.

Like, first of all, you're not prepared ahead of time. But I don't even know if they unearthed it during the conversation. But imagine if you were ready when they came in to already know 80% of the conversation you need to have. 

Nick Reyes: Yep. Absolutely. So preparing does encompass, uh, other things such as like, you know, Dan booked a consult.

Who's Dan? I should probably, I don't know, maybe see if I can find him on LinkedIn. Oh, he's a CEO of a company. Hmm. That's different. I gotta, I gotta know that he's probably gonna be busy. Cool. I wonder if I have any connections with him. Oh, look, we have seven mutual friends on Facebook. You know, prepare, uh, internally a PushPress.

We call it pre-flight, re uh, our pre our pre-flight checklist. Mm-hmm. It's like, what are all the things that you're gonna prepare for before that consult walks into the gym? [00:08:00] Do you have your battle card ready? And then the other part of preparation is, are you. Well rehearsed to handle that consult, you know, whatever your lead intake process is in the gym.

That might be. Have you done any role playing lately with your team? Uh, maybe you are prepared so you have a high close rate in your, in your fitness business, but none of your, the rest of your staff does, even though you ask 'em to do sales. So are you doing role playing with them? Are they preparing ahead of time?

So like the best sales orgs prepare for their consultations? 

Dan Uyemura: Yep. You wouldn't believe. Um, I go into a lot of gyms and I've, I've moved around a bit. So like, I've done consultations at a lot of gyms. No, maybe not a lot, a lot. But enough, the amount of preparation I can tell that goes into sales at, at least the gyms that I've walked into, almost zero.

And that's giving, probably giving them something like I wouldn't, [00:09:00] wouldn't be wrong probably to say zero, like didn't even know I was coming. Some of 'em like, oh shit, who are you? I'm like, I was just chatting with you on your little automated chatbot like you were, you just told me an hour ago how excited I was that you were, you were that I was coming.

You don't even, you clearly didn't even know I was coming. Very telling. So yeah, be a pro, know who's coming when they're coming, make sure people are prepared, what they might talk about, what they're worried about, and be prepared to talk about it. 

Nick Reyes: Yep, absolutely. There's nothing more impressive than, uh, the red car carpet treatment when you're going to buy something, which means.

You have to know what appeals to that person. You gotta know what they're looking for. So yeah, prepare like a pro. Number two, uh, speed, ma speed to lead matters. 

Dan Uyemura: I think you can say speed matters, but Yes. Uh, in this case too. Speed lead. 

Nick Reyes: Yep. And so what we're talking about here is, uh, it's that feeling where, you know, uh, I wanna buy, I wanna buy, uh.

Cam wants a three row SUV. [00:10:00] My wife wants a three row SUV, and so reached out to a couple different dealerships, same, same, same brand to just see what they had. The fastest one that responds to me and answers my questions the most thoroughly is way more likely to earn my business than the one who.

Responds 24 hours later. So, uh, I mean, data shows that there's like a nine x uh, higher conversion rate if you have a sub five minute reply on lead inquiries. Now that first one can be automated, but you've got quickly follow up with their response, you know, and like pick up the chain. 

Dan Uyemura: Yeah, the automation just buys you some time because people know when they're not talking to a real thing.

Maybe a ai AI can solve that going forward. Maybe as of now. Um, there's also something here about your intent to buy or your intent for next action. I would even say, because [00:11:00] in the gym scenario, you're not buying a membership by chatting in or calling in your, your intent is a, probably an in gym, let me take a look.

Consultation, whatever you wanna call it, tour, whatever. Whatever your, your, however high your intent is for the next step intensifies how fast things are gonna happen. Because in the gym scenario, like in the car scenario, you're probably gonna buy, 'cause A GMC, whatever is A GMC, whatever doesn't, you know, the nuance thereof is very, you know, not much, but for a gym there who knows?

What gym is what? So the next, the, the only thing they're trying to shopping for is the ability to come to your gym. And if you reply in 30 seconds, they're probably gonna come to your gym right there and there or set the appointment so that they'll come. Um, and so it's kind of like if, if it was a low intent inquiry, speed doesn't matter as much.[00:12:00] 

For the most part, when people are reaching out for information on your gym, their intent's pretty damn high. 

Nick Reyes: And if you get them booked for that consult or that time in the gym before the other, uh, you know, business or your competitor, your competitor, I use that term like loosely, but has even had a chance to reply.

Dan Uyemura: You can close the deal before they even have the Yeah. 

Nick Reyes: Right. A reply and, and even if they reply, but you've already got the deal or the, the, at least the consult booked. There's a chance they don't even bother booking a consult with that other business because, or they No. Show it. They've probably got x amount of hours in their brain that they're like, I'm only gonna spend so much time figuring out this option here.

Suck all the oxygen out of the room. Right, 

Dan Uyemura: exactly. Yeah. Take, just take, take all the deals by being fast. 

Nick Reyes: Yep. 

Dan Uyemura: Yeah. 

Nick Reyes: Uh, so the next thing that I've, that really pro organizations do well is they follow up. And, uh, what that means, and I see this in so many fitness businesses, which is [00:13:00] where Dan comes in, uh, he does a consult and for whatever reason, he, he doesn't buy.

Okay, well, I take that as like, well, whatever. I'll put him in my lead nurture, and that'll be the end of it. That does not work, like plain and simple. The, the, the, when, when I say follow up, it is like set a cadence to manually go back in and groom your, you know, your, uh, your lost deals or your prospects and say like, Hey Dan, it was great seeing you, you know, yesterday.

Uh, if you have any further questions, you know, like, again, do your follow up process. But then in day three, Hey Dan, just wanted to see check in. Did you ever make a decision on a gym to go to? I. Day five, day 10, but like put in the pace of following up, make it authentic. The, again, another area where like automation probably falls flat.

AI mainly can, can probably solve in the future, but like what [00:14:00] did I learn about Dan in that consult? When that I can then input and inject into each of those follow-ups so that it's not just a generic automation workflow. Yeah. You know, but you gotta follow up. 

Dan Uyemura: Yeah. I mean, pretty, pretty plain and simple.

And I do think this, this falls into the administrative tasks that a lot of gym owners either don't delegate away or take the time to do. Um, but if I had to bucket some of the more impactful things you can do in terms of ROI for time, it's follow up and like, uh. Probably one of the, the next topics you have, which is, is like reaching back out to ex, ex leads, dead leads.

Yep. Ex members. 

Nick Reyes: Yep. Uh oh and real. One other really important note before we move on to the next one here, which is like, don't rely on just one medium of following up. So don't just send email, send text, send email. Uh, voice notes are super powerful as well because those are as [00:15:00] authentic as it comes.

Mm-hmm. There's no faking that. Right. And they 

Dan Uyemura: can hear your passion or whatnot. 

Nick Reyes: And. Emails get buried, texts get buried, voice notes get buried. But depending on the person's own, you know, individual workflow, time of day texts might get mar get buried where an email doesn't so like mix your modalities Anyways, that's a super technical thing.

Dan Uyemura: Yeah. You know what, before we go on, one thing, one thing I do wanna point out is like, again, kind of relating everything back to what we talked at the top of this podcast, which is like, these are all acts of coaching and. I think there could be some hesitation on that one with like, I don't wanna nag them, I don't wanna be a salesperson to nag them.

But I think the reframe you have to have is if you own a gym and you're doing fitness, I hope to God that you actually believe what you do will change someone's life if they show up and work with you. So how you have to look at this is that person approached you for a reason. They had a void in their life.

They weren't feeling good about something. They needed help. And if they [00:16:00] aren't, haven't found the help and they. Aren't gonna find the help and you let them die on the vine, you are actually allowing them to continue down the path that they were seeking to fix anyway. Right? So if you believe in your product, which I know you do, if you're listening to this, you're actually hurting them by not following up and not closing deals and getting them into your gym and working with them.

Nick Reyes: Yeah. Uh, fit Fitness is hard con, uh. Joining a community-based gym can be intimidating to, uh, to some individuals. It, and I think that's a disconnect too, because we're in it. Mm-hmm. As gym owners, we are like, what? How is this intimidating? I got a group of people that high five each other. It's the most welcoming place ever.

But that's what, that's your world. That's what you see. Just someone walking in out the street, they're a stranger. They don't know all 150 of you, you're just a bunch of weird people that high five each other. Like, why do I wanna go join that? So, 

Dan Uyemura: and, and for most people who come from other like global gym, 24 hour type gym situations, it's [00:17:00] actually inverse to what they're used to.

Nick Reyes: Mm-hmm. Which is headphones 

Dan Uyemura: on have one on, I do my thing, I have two friends that spot me. So it's, you've actually gotta understand that, that not only is it. Foreign to them, it might be offensive to them. 

Nick Reyes: Yep. 

Dan Uyemura: Or, or, yeah. Just hard to deal 

Nick Reyes: with. And, and the reason just to, to put like psyche and preconceived notions on a battle card for someone who's coming in from one of those other gyms, like understanding that area Right.

And just meeting it head on. Mm-hmm. But you know, you're right, it's not about putting pressure. So in that same example, when Dan walks from the gym and doesn't buy, it's not like, don't send him an offer. To come in and join, like see if you can unpack why they didn't just help them find the right avenue, you know, and understand, put yourself in them shoes and, and understand that it's difficult.

Dan Uyemura: Yeah. And this is where I really lean into the whole, it's the first act of coaching business. Because if you send that text with salesman hat on your tone and your, everything about that [00:18:00] text or that message can be different than if you send that text as like, I genuinely care and I just wanna see what's going on.

Mm-hmm. There's gonna be a big difference in how you communicate there. 

Nick Reyes: Yep. Absolutely. Uh, so the next one, own your pipeline. Uh, when we say own your pipeline, what it really means is you have to understand who are the new prospects, you know, who are the prospects that you've talked to that didn't buy within the last day, week, month, year.

Uh, who should you be following up with? Um, who's getting automations, who's not, you know, just own every one of the leads and treat them with respect because at some point they came to you looking for you to help them out of their rut. Mm-hmm. Looking for you to solve a pain. And so I do think there's maybe a little bit of a disconnect of like, I need more leads.

I need more leads. I need more leads, instead of, I need to do more with the leads that I have [00:19:00] and understand them. Like, I actually care. 

Dan Uyemura: I think the, the big underpinning here, maybe the big eyeopener that you guys can have here is your leads are not your active leads, right? You're, you probably have a thousand leads right now, but you think you have four.

You know what I'm saying? Mm-hmm. And it's like for every member that quit, quit your gym 9, 12, 15, 18 months ago, their life has changed since then. Maybe they quit for a reason, A that has been solved now. Yeah. And they are sitting at home wishing that they can come back to a gym just waiting for an invite.

Mm-hmm. Right. Yep. You'd be shocked. Like if you, if you, this is gonna be my, like, one of my newer challenges to gym owners. Like, if you just open up your CRM every day and send two emails to old people, old members, or people who never joined, and you just ask 'em like, how have things been for you? I'm just curious.

I'll bet you once a week you're gonna get someone who's like, I was just thinking about joining a gym, so perfect that you emailed me. Uh, let's just set up a time. 

Nick Reyes: Yep. Yep. Own your pipeline and do it with au with authenticity, uh, [00:20:00] being willing to serve. Mm-hmm. Which is what, it's why we even get into the business.

Right. So, uh, the next one I think is an interesting one, uh, which is you have to be willing to disqualify people with confidence. And so this is actually something we practice at PushPress quite often, which is. You have to know who not to sell to. Not everyone's gonna be a good fit for your business, and you shouldn't try to serve everyone.

So if you run a gym that is focused on adults in the, you know, busy parents from, you know, 30 to 50 years old or whatever, and some dad walks in and says, Hey, my teenage son's trying to play D one baseball, can you help him? Like, can you help him? Sure. Is it gonna distract from your core offering? Probably.

And is there someone else better suited for it? Well, if you're focused in [00:21:00] on a completely different avatar mm-hmm. Guarantee you there's someone better off and you will do better, have a better reputation for service, which will, you know, go miles if you say, Hey, I don't think that we're a good fit. Uh, Nate, him, Phil from PSP three down the street.

That's all he does is train kids who are looking to play college athletics. 

Dan Uyemura: Yep. Yeah, the, I mean, there's two things to this. One, the amount of goodwill you get for actually referring someone to the pain point solution that they need versus what you sell will pay back in dividends over time. That's playing long-term games because that person is gonna immediately trust you to the degree that they will send everyone that they think qualifies for you to, you happen to us all the time at PushPress.

Mm-hmm. Oh, you told me to go with this competitor, but I'm sending people to you now because I trust you for that reason. I trust that you're gonna handle my friends with respect and dignity like you did with me. Right? That's number one. Number two, which is actually something that needs to be pointed out 'cause you're gonna have to have [00:22:00] very strong conviction to deal with, is the minute you tell somebody in a situation where they expect you to be selling them a yes answer, the minute you tell 'em no, they're gonna immediately want to work with you.

If you genuinely feel that they're not for you, you cannot buckle at that point. This is the red velvet rope in front of the club situation, like in the toilet paper during Covid situation. Like people want what they can't have as rational or irrational as that is. 

Nick Reyes: Yeah. Yeah. I laugh because, uh, we see this in our sales team where, you know, we, we will get a demo and our sales team will say like, Hey, we're just, we're not a good fit.

We don't, we don't do that thing well that you. Are adamant. You have to have, and they'll, they'll say, oh, they'll, they'll be taken back by and they'll go, well, can I just have a free account then? Let me play with it myself. Yeah. And then next thing you know, like they're, they're trying to, the customer's trying to figure it out and it's like we tried to tell you the answer's no.

So that it does, it [00:23:00] does work. You're right. It is, 

Dan Uyemura: that is actually one of the biggest sales hacks that like, can be manipulative and you should not do for manipulative reasons. Correct. But just on the flip side of if you're trying to be a good person and tell and do people right, you have to stand by 'cause they're immediately going to wanna work with you the minute you tell 'em you're not a good fit for me.

Nick Reyes: Yep. Uh, the other piece of saying no though is that it. It protects the community, right? So if, if you become distracted trying to do something that trying to serve someone you shouldn't. If your coaches are now trying to figure out how to help little Timmy the baseball player, instead of helping you know, Dan the dad, then they're not gonna do Dan, the dad the, uh, the correct service and all of a sudden, like, they're gonna get frustrated and it doesn't do anything well for your business.

Like, sure, you made an extra couple hundred bucks. 

Dan Uyemura: On that note, I'll actually add another one too. There could be someone who's perfectly qualified in terms of like what you do, but you notice something in them that makes you realize they are not a good fit for the business. Mm-hmm. Right. Like they exhibit, like they might tell you outwardly like, oh, I've been a member of three other gyms, but I keep having [00:24:00] problems with the community.

Like I keep getting in these stupid fights with people or I don't know, whatever it might be. Gotta say no there too. Yep. Right. Which is gonna make them wanna work with you more. Same thing. 

Nick Reyes: Yep. Absolutely. Culture matters. Yep. Um, no toxic cultures. Uh, anything else to add here, Dan? 

Dan Uyemura: Um, no, I think these are five good tactics.

I actually have a lot more thoughts. We can build more podcasts around them, but sales to me is a fascinating subject matter for that whole, it is a necessary but broken area, and I think it's actually much easier. It's, so, it's, the reason it's really fascinating to me is 'cause it's required, it's broken.

Nobody wants to do it. If you know how to do it, you can do it very ethically and easily and effectively with just some very simple mindset shifts on how to approach sales. A hundred percent. It, it went from being the thing. One thing I'd never wanted to do at PushPress to the one thing I look forward to doing every day.

Yeah, yeah. 

Nick Reyes: This is the part of, this is one of the parts of the book. I'm like so excited for people to read. 

Dan Uyemura: Yeah. Because it is the biggest pain point, I [00:25:00] think. A 

Nick Reyes: hundred percent. Okay. 

Dan Uyemura: So let's close it up with a question like we normally do. I want you all to look at your businesses and be honest with yourselves.

If there's one belief that you hold onto with sales, one misconception or one conception that you have that potentially is holding your gym back, what would that be? Let us know. Send us an email podcast@pushpress.com. Let us know the one misconception that you have with sales that is holding you back right now.

Thanks for listening to another episode of the PushPress Podcast, where we help gym owners, entrepreneurs and fitness enthusiasts thrive with actionable insights, inspiring stories and strategies for growth. 

Nick Reyes: Don't forget to follow the show to stay updated on new episodes. And if you're ready for more, join our free Facebook community for gym owners.

Check the show notes for the link and we'll see you next time. Keep raising the bar for your business and community.

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