About Drewbie Wilson: Drewbie Wilson is the Founder of Call The Damn Leads, where he empowers sales professionals through innovative tools like an e-commerce platform, a robust CRM, and educational resources designed to maximize success. Drewbie is a mindset and sales expert dedicated to helping individuals and businesses unlock their full potential. With a focus on personal growth and proven strategies, he has empowered countless clients to achieve remarkable success. Through his books “Crushing The Day” and “Social Media Mastery,” Drewbie shares insights on overcoming limiting beliefs, implementing effective sales systems, and mastering marketing techniques. Check out the latest episode of our Conversational Selling podcast to learn more about Drewbie.
In this episode, Nancy and Drewbie discuss the following:
- Description of the “call the damn leads” approach
- Why people avoid picking up the phone and calling the leads
- How to crush the day by calling the damn leads and create a version of success that makes them happy
- The number of leads that should be called daily and the importance of tracking metrics
- The importance of understanding the value of your time and using it wisely
- Drewbie’s advice to someone just starting in sales to overcome their fears
Key Takeaways:
- Everything in life has always come back to sales, for me personally.
- The one thing that I can always count on to get me a result in sales is to pick up the phone and call the damn leads.
- Sales is not always the most fun job, as there are many rejections and a lot of work.
- People want to do business with people. They don’t want to deal with robots.
- You have to keep filling the pipeline because if you go and harvest everything without putting anything new in the dirt, there will be nothing to harvest a little bit later.
“I like to take it one step further and look at it as I’m a servant first. We don’t have to get too into the religion or spiritual side of things. But ultimately, I look at myself on this planet as a servant first. And so, I’m going into every conversation looking at how I can serve this individual and leave them better off than when I entered this situation, whether helping them with a product or service or sharing some wisdom or knowledge. And to me, I think that’s a big differentiator; when you can get into a service-first mindset, you’re not calling to sell someone. You’re just calling to help. And it feels less transactional. And that’s where you can build relationships. And I’m sure you’ve talked about this before, but people buy from people they know, like, and trust. And I think that trust comes from the ability to communicate, “Hey, I understand you, and I want to help you,” because that’s why people do business with anyone. They want to get out of pain or get into pleasure. And so, if you can help to be the conduit for that situation, then the transaction is easy to occur.” – DREWBIE
“So, I started thinking about time, where I’m spending it, and what I’m spending it on, which led me to understand that I get to choose my own work. I get to pick how much my time is worth, where I spend it, and where I invest it. The difference is I must have the skillset and the confidence to show up and deliver that to someone else who’s going to be willing to pay me for my skillset, for my time, because time is our one true resource. You cannot buy it. You cannot win it in a poker tournament, as much as we’d love to get a box on Christmas or a card on our birthday. It never goes that way. So, that conversation sent me down a path of realizing that I get to decide what I do daily. And I get to decide where I spend my time, who I spend it with, and what I spend it on to know the kind of return I will get on that investment. As a sales professional, we aim to help prospects understand that the value of what they will receive far exceeds the price they will pay. So, when you can have that conversation with yourself about your time, it’s amazing what you can truly start to accomplish.” – DREWBIE
“Know what your time is truly worth. At the end of the day, that is the one thing I can encourage anyone to take stock of. What is your time worth now? And what would you need it to be worth to live the life that you want to live? It’s a matter of increasing your skill set or spending more time working doing what you do great. That’s it. It’s always a matter of what your time is worth. Where are you spending it? What are you spending it on? And who are you spending it with? Because that’s what’s going to end up being the recipe for the life that you get to live.” – DREWBIE
Connect with Drewbie Wilson:
- LinkedIn:https://www.linkedin.com/in/drewbiewilson/
- Call The Damn Leads: https://callthedamnleads.com/
Try Our Proven, 3-Step System, Guaranteeing Accountability and Transparency that Drives RESULTS by clicking on this link: https://oneofakindsales.com/call-center-in-a-box/
Connect with Nancy Calabrese:
- Twitter:https://twitter.com/oneofakindsales
- Facebook:https://www.facebook.com/One-Of-A-Kind-Sales-304978633264832/
- Website:https://oneofakindsales.com
- Phone: 908-879-2911
- LinkedIn: https://www.linkedin.com/in/ncalabrese/
- Email: leads@oneofakindsales.com
Voiceover: You’re listening to The Conversational Selling Podcast with Nancy Calabrese.
Nancy Calabrese: Hi, it’s Nancy Calabrese, and it’s time again for Conversational selling – the podcast where sales leaders and business experts share what’s going on in sales and marketing today. And it always starts with the human conversation. Today we’re speaking with Drewbie Wilson, the meme lord, the renowned branding expert and creator of the revolutionary call the damn leads approach and action. A taker with his finger on the pulse who focuses on service to others above all else, leading him to produce more than seven figures in revenue, no matter what industry he’s worked in. Not one to turn away from a challenge, he looks to get out of his comfort zone as much as possible. A servant first, operating with the utmost integrity and humility, but not afraid to tell it like it is. Confidence and empathy are his superpowers. Welcome to the show, Drewby. I’m going to love this conversation.
Drewbie Wilson: Nancy, thank you so much for having me and to the listener. Thank you for being here with us. I am grateful you’re investing a little bit of your time to be here with us today. And you’ll hear me talk a lot about that time is our most valuable asset. So, I’m excited to be spending a little bit of it with you here today, Nancy. [1:31]
Nancy Calabrese: Awesome, awesome, awesome. Okay, call the damn leads approach. What is that about?
Drewbie Wilson: Well, it’s really a mantra for doing the work. I have been in sales for a little over two decades now. I’m coming up on my 36th birthday and I grew up in the streets selling anything and everything. As I got older, realized I didn’t want to be dead or in prison. You know, I got married, had a beautiful young son. Everything in life has always come back to sales for me personally. And the one thing that I can always count on to get me a result in sales is to pick up the phone and call the damn leads. And so ultimately for me, it’s, it’s kind of extended into many areas of my life, personally and professionally, but it is, it’s just a mantra for doing the dag gum work. And that’s what a lot of people are avoiding, unfortunately. So, I just like to shoot them straight and tell them what it’s going to take. [2:31]
Nancy Calabrese: Yeah. Why do you think people avoid that?
Drewbie Wilson: Well, we could get into a couple different theories I have but first and foremost I think people are afraid of rejection which is one thing that prevents someone from picking up the phone and calling leads I think there are situations where someone is selling a product or service that they don’t 100 % believe in or trust which is hard because if you have to sell something to someone that you don’t believe in, there’s no confidence. And honestly, without confidence, it’s hard to deliver that enthusiasm or get someone else to have that faith and belief in it. And so, you know, on top of that, there’s something I think there’s that’s called imposter syndrome. You may or may not have heard that term before, but it’s that idea or feeling where, you know, you’re afraid to step up in front of someone or have a conversation because you don’t know everything. You know, we could go deep on how to me that’s a theory of integrity. But ultimately, I think the biggest thing is people get in their own way. [3:34]
Nancy Calabrese: Yeah, you know, when I think about picking up the phone and calling the leads, I think of it as phone networking versus face -to -face networking. And, you know, when you go to a networking event, you’re really meeting strangers, right? Shaking their hands, but you don’t know them. And picking up the phone is the same concept. You may not know them if it’s, say, a cold call or a lead that somebody gave you, but it’s a form of introduction. What do you have to say about that?
Drewbie Wilson: I like to take it one step further and look at it as I’m a servant first. You know, we don’t have to get too into the religion or spiritual side of things. But ultimately, I look at myself on this planet as a servant first. And so, I’m going into every conversation, looking at how can I serve this individual and leave them better off than when I entered this situation, whether that’s helping them with a product or service, sharing some sort of wisdom or knowledge. And to me, I think that’s a big differentiator is that when you can get into a service first mindset, you’re not calling to sell someone. You’re literally just calling to help. And it feels less transactional. And that’s where you can really build relationships. And I’m sure you’ve talked about this before, but people buy from people who they know, like and trust. And I think that trust comes from the ability to communicate, hey, I understand you and I want to help you because that’s why people do business with anyone. They want to get out of pain or get into pleasure. And so, if you can help to be the conduit for that situation, then the transaction is easy to occur. [5:28]
Nancy Calabrese: So, describe to the audience how to crush the day, yes, by calling the damn leads and creating a version of success that makes them happy. How will that make them happy?
Drewbie Wilson: You know, I, well, I appreciate you asking. This is one of the things, you know, those mantras crushed the day before it crushes you called a damn lead. Again, it’s kind of a, all comes back to doing the work and what I have learned, you know, if you go and check out, I’ve written a couple of books or if you, you know, listen to some of my other podcasts that I’ve done, I talk about at one point in my life, I weighed over 300 pounds and I had to go on a really big physical weight loss journey. At one point I was very unhappy, unfulfilled in my job. So, I had to go on a personal development journey. And for me, crushing the day is where it all started to, hey, I’m going to wake up and I’m going to be intentional with my time first, because at one point in my life, and some of you may relate to this, I was very reactionary. The alarm went off, so I got up and I did the things and then something happened. So, I did the thing. And then there was another fire that I had to put out in another fire. And I was just reacting to everything that came at me instead of being proactive and intentional. And so, crushing the day is if I know I wake up on time, I read, I meditate, I focus on gratitude, and then I go do the things that I know need to be done first. That to me is crushing the day. And if I can avoid the negative news, the toxic, politish, you know, political nonsense, things that go on and, and avoid the toxicity of social media. Well, those are the things that will crush you. If you’ve ever opened up the news first thing in the morning and its bad news, bad news, bad news, maybe one small clip of a good thing, but then right back to the bad news, it’s easy to let that energy kind of just throw your whole day off. So, to crush today is really to just be intentional with your time know that you’re doing the things that are moving you forward towards the life that you want. And ultimately, that’s what’s going to create happiness because you’re going to get the result that you’re looking for. [7:39]
Nancy Calabrese: Yeah, well, you know, and, you know, as it relates to sales, I think it’s important to focus on the activities that you can control each and every day that will help you move the bar, right? Get closer to hitting your goals. I’m curious, is there a story the audience would find interesting? You sound like you’ve had a real interesting life so far.
Drewbie Wilson: Nancy, I could tell you about 10, 12 hours worth of stories if we had all day, but we only have about 18 to 20 minutes for the sake of time. So let me start with this. at a point in my life, like I said, I grew up in the streets running and gun and doing all the things we’re not supposed to. So, I’m very blessed to even be here to begin with. But there was a conversation I had with another Nancy, funny enough at one point where I was starting to learn marketing. I was great at sales, and I realized, hey, if I don’t learn how to generate my own leads, I’m always going to be limited by what’s provided to me. And not that I wasn’t doing okay, but as you know, good will steal from great every chance it gets. So, I decided to go out and learn marketing. And I was like, if I can just get more leads, I can sell more stuff and make more money. So that’s what I started doing. And I had a little success with that. And this wonderful woman named Nancy, she reached out to me, and she said, Hey, Drewbie I see you’re, you’re using this software that I’m also using. How much for an hour of your time to show me a few things on what you’re doing. And what a humbling question that was for me, because at the time, you know, I grew up 10 bucks an hour was kind of grunt labor. Like that’s what you made. If you didn’t have any education and you just did like hard labor, you made 10 bucks an hour in sales at the time. I think I was making 25 bucks an hour. So, I was like, you know, for a kid who barely graduated and came out of the streets, like that’s not too bad. However, if I was working overtime or on a holiday, they’d pay me double time, time and a half. So, I’m doing this set like hourly mindset math. And I realized, okay, well my time’s worth $50. And Nancy says, well, I’m gonna give you 75. I thought that’s amazing. I’ll take it, right? I’m not gonna say no to that. That’d be silly. And so we have the call. She sends me the Venmo for 75 bucks. And I remember messaging my wife and going, this is amazing. How do I do this? Like three times a day. And I would make in one day what it takes me a week to make currently. So, I started thinking about time and where I’m spending it and what I’m spending it on, which led me to understanding that I get to choose my own work. I get to pick how much my time is worth and where I spend it, where I invest it, the difference is I must have the skillset and the confidence to show up and deliver that to someone else who’s going to be willing to pay me for my skillset for my time, because time is our one true resource. You cannot buy it. You cannot win it in a poker tournament as much as we’d love to get a box of it on Christmas or a card of it on our birthday. It never goes that way. So that one conversation sent me down a path of realizing that I get to make the decisions of what I do every day. And I get to decide where I spend my time, who I spend it with and what I spend it on to know the kind of return I’m going to get on that investment. And as a sales professional, our whole goal is to help prospects understand that the value of the thing they’re going to receive far exceeds what the price they’re going to pay is. So, when you can have that conversation with yourself about your time, it’s amazing what you can truly start to accomplish. [11:39]
Nancy Calabrese: Yeah. Wow. That’s really awesome. Is there anything in particular you want me to spotlight about your company and what you do?
Drewbie Wilson: I mean, I think the most important about my company, you know, call the damn leads. Our whole goal is just to be a reminder for sales professionals and business owners everywhere. Listen, sales are not always the most fun job is a lot of rejection. It’s a lot of work. It’s a lot of nos, but at the same time, it’s so fulfilling. There are so many amazing things that can happen. It doesn’t matter where you come from, what background you have, if you’re willing to trust the process and do the work to call the damn leads, you can have any life that you want. And so that to me is the spotlight. It’s not about me or the company. It’s about the individual who’s listening to us today, investing their time to learn something that could help them better their life. So, to me, if you want to spotlight anyone. Spotlight the listener for investing a little of their time with us today so that they can learn and grow because they’re the next future They’re the ones that I hope to get to listen to at some point because I always want to learn as well. [12:47]
Nancy Calabrese: Yeah, that’s really cool. Do you have a recommendation how many leads should be called on a daily basis?
Drewbie Wilson: You know, I have a personal metric that has worked well for me for the last 10 years in like regular sales. And it’s this, I always look to make at least a hundred outbound contact attempts a day. And that could be phone calls, text messages, emails. You might send, you know, direct messages on social media, Facebook, Instagram, LinkedIn, wherever. You might also do in -person meetups, right? But a hundred attempts every day to have a conversation. Cause out of those hundred attempts, my goal is to have 10 good conversations. That means that I’ve built rapport. I’ve gone through all of my pre -qualifying questions to determine if this person is a good fit for our product or service. And then I’ve made a, a presentation to move forward with the next step. So, it’s kind of like I’ve made an offer. Maybe I’ve sent a contract, maybe not, but we’re moving forward in the next process of those 10. I want to get two sales. And so, it may sound like a lot of Nancy, right? 110 to is like, my gosh, that’s a lot of work every day. But the truth is out of a normal month, I’m working anywhere from 20 to 22 days, right? For, you know, Monday through Friday, maybe a Saturday here and there, about 20, 22 days a month. So, during those workdays, I want to get two out of the three of those metrics on any given day. And I know that at the end of the month, it’s going to add up to success because you might make a hundred contacts and not have a lot of conversations, but you might close a couple of deals or you might have 10 good conversations and close to sales, but you don’t have a chance to go and make a hundred contact attempts. I understand time is very limited. You must have a real good conversation, it takes 20 minutes, 30 minutes, sometimes longer. So, it’s all a matter of just hitting those metrics on a consistent basis. Because if I’m doing that day after day after day, I’m planting a few seeds on this day, then I’m nurturing them, then I’m harvesting them, then I’m planting some new seeds where those were harvested, right? You’re consistently filling the pipeline. And that’s the key to long -term sales are you have to keep filling the pipeline because if you just go and harvest everything without putting anything new in the dirt, well, there’s going to be nothing to harvest a little bit later. So, it’s always about finding that balance of a hundred, ten, two, and getting two of the three of those on any given day. Hopefully that made sense. [15:37]
Nancy Calabrese: Yeah, wow. I mean, and do you actually track those metrics?
Drewbie Wilson: Yes, ma ‘am. If it gets measured, it can be improved. And I think that’s a thing that a lot of professionals are missing out on right now is they’re just guessing how much work they’re doing without having a solid tracking or a measurement system. And I could tell you without fail, if you woke up and got on the scale every day, you would notice whether you were doing the work or not.
Nancy Calabrese: Yeah.
Drewbie Wilson: Same thing, if you look at your bank account right now, if the number’s lower than you’d like it to be, it’s because you’re not calling the damn leads. It’s because you’re not doing the work. And so it’s always a math problem at that point. [16:16]
Nancy Calabrese: Well, tell me something that’s true that almost nobody agrees with you on.
Drewbie Wilson: I think that it’s still really important to pick up the phone and call the damn leads. I think a lot of people are saying that, well, texting is better, or emails are better. But at the end of the day, it’s easy to hide behind a keyboard and use AI and all these fancy tools that exist. But you know what’s still the bottom line? People want to do business with people. They don’t want to deal with robots. They don’t like the kiosk. They want to know there’s someone at the other end of that conversation that they can truly speak with and have a relationship with. That’s my belief. Not everybody agrees, but it is what it is. [16:59]
Nancy Calabrese: You’re not gonna replace the human conversation with all this technology out there. It’s just, it’s that exchange of information between two human beings cannot be replaced by AI and all the other things, you know, online. You know, I can’t believe we’re almost up in time. What is the one takeaway you wanna leave the audience with, Drewbie?
Drewbie Wilson: To know what your time is truly worth. At the end of the day, that is the one thing that if I can encourage anyone to truly take stock in, it’s what is your time worth now? And what would you need it to be worth to live the life that you wanna live? Because it’s a matter of increasing your skillset or spending more time working doing the thing that you do great. That’s it. It’s always a matter of what is your time worth? Where are you spending it? What are you spending it on? And who are you spending it with? Because that’s what’s going to end up being the recipe for the life that you get to live. [18:04]
Nancy Calabrese: Yeah, I guess now you’ve triggered another thought. How does somebody figure out what their time is worth?
Drewbie Wilson: So, it’s a math problem, like everything in life. Here’s what I always tell my clients. This is usually the first thing that we do when we start working together is take all of the money that you made last year as a total. So, your day job, if you work a W -2 job, take all of that money. If you have a side gig or you have, you know, little hustles that you do where you make a couple bucks on the side, even if you’re not reporting it, I’m not here to judge you. I’m just saying take all that and add it up because you spent the time to earn that money. Maybe you have one of those spicy websites where you share pictures of your feet or something. I don’t know. I’m not judging. Just take all the money that you made and add it up as a total. And then you want to divide that total by 2000. And here’s why. Because if you worked a typical job, Monday through Friday, nine to five, 40 hours a week, you’d work 50 weeks a year. Cause you get your two weeks of vacation time, blah, blah, blah, blah, blah. That would be an average individual. If you’re here with us today, you’re not average. You’re taking the time to learn and grow. So I already know you’re not average, but if you were, you’d work 2000 hours a year. So quick math, if you made a hundred grand last year and you worked 2000 hours, your time is worth $50 an hour. That may not be terrible, but here’s where I really trip you up, Nancy. Let’s say I put on a black cape, and I come knock on the door and I say, Hey, congratulations, Nancy. My name is death. You have 24 hours left to live. Your time is worth $50 an hour. Here’s 50 bucks. I need you to come with me. What are you gonna say? [19:49]
Nancy Calabrese: No way Jose!
Drewbie Wilson: I mean, I could think of several different, you know, very, very mean things that I would want to say to that person if they were me in that situation. However, here’s what I know. A lot of people are operating as if they have an unlimited amount of time. Nobody knows for sure when that their end of their clock runs out. No one can say for sure, but everyone still runs around and says, I’ll do that later; I’ll do that thing when; I’ll take that trip after. But how you know for sure you’re going to get there. And so, the thing that’s interesting to me is that at a certain number though, you’re going to be willing to exchange that hour because you realize money is a tool, is a resource that we use to get the things that we want in life, to share the things that we want with the people we care about. So, you just must determine what is that number for me that I’m willing to exchange my time for. And if it isn’t like the monetary dollar amount, what does the exchange have to be for me? Like, what do I have to get out of that time invested for it to be worth it to me? Because maybe your time is invested with your friends, with your family, at church, doing good for the homeless, whatever it is that brings you joy, I encourage you to do that. But know, what is your time worth and what’s the return on the investment that you’re getting for it? [21:12]
Nancy Calabrese: Wow, powerful stuff. How can my people find you?
Drewbie Wilson: The best way to find me, you can go to calledadamleeds .com. You can just Google call the damn leads. We’re on every social media platform that you could find us on, whether that’s Facebook, Instagram, YouTube, I hit all the major places. So, wherever you like to hang out, go to call the damn leads. You’ll find us. We’re there. We’re always giving away tons of valuable content for sales professionals. And more than anything, if there’s something you heard today that you got value out of, I’d love to hear about it 30 days from now and see how it’s truly affected your life by implementing because that’s the most important part. You can hear it. You can think it’s awesome, but if you don’t take action on it, unfortunately you won’t get the results. So let me be the reminder for you that if you heard something great, the first thing you should do is go take action and review this episode for Nancy and let everybody know that you appreciated her taking the time, energy and effort to make this show possible because as a host myself, Nancy, I appreciate that you go above and beyond to share your time and your resources. So, if anyone got anything of value, do me that favor first, go follow Nancy and share the show because that’s what’s going to help us get in front of more great people. [22:29]
Nancy Calabrese: Love it, love it. Drewbie, you are fantastic. And actually, I want to be on your podcast. I went on your website. So, I sent you a note earlier. Folks, reach out to Drewbie. He’s an expert. I love Call the Damn Leads. We have a lot in common. So, for all of you people out there, pick up that phone and make it a great sales day. [22:55]