How To Pitch To God with Andrea Gold

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Episode Summary

Today’s guest on The Successful Pitch is Andrea Gold. She’s been in business for over 30 years as an entrepreneur, running her own speakers’ bureau. She really knows what it takes to be successful and to not give up. She has a great expression in here about how to pitch to God. She said, “Don’t be afraid to ask for what you want when you’re negotiating with somebody because you might just get it.” She tells a wonderful story of how that happened for her and one of her clients. She said, “When your power of purpose is bigger than your fear, you then can feel the fear and do it anyway.” I just love that so much. She’s got some real insights on not just being clear with what you’re communicating but tapping in to the unseen factors that make somebody want to say yes. Enjoy the episode.

Listen To The Episode Here

How To Pitch To God with Andrea Gold

Today, I’m honored to have Andrea Gold who’s an entrepreneur and President and Co-founder of Gold Stars Speakers Bureau. She’s been in business for nearly 30 years, which is not an easy thing to do. It’s based in Tucson, Arizona and they provide speakers and celebrities worldwide. She’s also the co-author of several books including The Business of Successful Speaking: Proven Secrets to Becoming a Million Dollar Speaker and Authors Who Speak Sell More Books Using the Platform to Profit. She’s going to share some practical tips and stories so that you can figure out how your dream of becoming a professional speaker or a successful entrepreneur can happen. She really is focused and knows how to provide solutions for corporations and trade associations and governments. She has personally booked thousands of presentation deals worth tens of millions. In addition, she’s negotiated a lot of book deals for the speakers. It’s just one success after another. She belongs to a MeCo Meetings Community with more than 3,500 meeting planners, which is really important because that’s who books the speakers. Before that, she has a degree in Journalism. We’re going to ask all about this. Andrea, welcome to the show.

I am delighted to be here.

One of the things that you and I share is this passion for being a life adventurer and continually to grow and focus on ourselves. I think that really is what makes somebody a good storyteller. If you’re a good storyteller, I think you tend to be successful in presenting and pitching. Would you mind taking us back to your own story of origin, if you will, when you were in journalism school and becoming a journalist and then said, “I think I’m going to do something else besides Journalism.”

The Business of Successful Speaking: Proven Secrets to Becoming a Million Dollar Speaker

It actually goes back a little before that. I went to a very unique liberal college and it went bankrupt while I was there and I was just a freshman in my first semester. I had to make a very quick decision. Northern Arizona University in Flagstaff was taking in us refugees. I had to declare a Major, and in the original college, we didn’t have declared Majors so I declared Journalism because I like to write. From there, I actually did very well in Journalism. I’m still in touch with my teacher by the way, who’s 80 years old now. He’s wonderful and he’s still working. The guy is great. I did well in that. Then afterwards, I ended up searching. I went through a whole period for a decade and a half of looking for what to do. I did not fit the mold of climbing the corporate ladder. That was not me. I wanted more freedom and I didn’t want to be stuck in a room. I ended up working for everybody all over the place. I even did an archeological dig overseas with the Israel Museum. I spent time in India on my spiritual quest. I worked in places, I worked in Crete. As a matter of fact, I was thinking about you with your pitch. Probably you talk about pitching and selling, but for me, one of the funniest pitches that I ever did was in Crete, Greece.

I was with a British friend and we met there. We both wanted to get some labor, some work. We went to this courtyard that looked like an amphitheater and there was a bar with all these agricultural farmer guys. They were sitting in this amphitheater where the seats go up, up, up. We were on the bottom as if we were the entertainment. We stood there and I practiced the word for work. It’s douleiá, something like that. The British guy, being a guy was going to say this, because it was more of a masculine world. He freaked out and he got very scared. I stepped up to the plate and I said, “Douleiá,” and I pointed at him and I. The farmers just looked at us like we’re crazy. One of them, actually in a very strange way, asked us to come over. We didn’t understand anything. He didn’t know any English, we didn’t know, any other Greek. There was a bartender who helped us to a deal. I don’t drink but he gave us some Ouzo. That was to seal the deal and I didn’t want to be disrespectful, so I had it. We got the deal and we ended up doing labor which was cucumbers, peppers. We had this beautiful setting in a plastic arena. It was like a greenhouse but very large, it was professional. It was right next to the water. It was just beautiful. It was October and we did that for a while. I actually worked unofficially as a laborer. It was great. Let me tell you, you can only do so much crouching in a day. I have great respect for these people.

The big takeaway from that is if you want something, whether it’s to pitch to get hired, pitch to get someone to join your team, pitch to get a new client, you must be passionate and committed to the outcome. The way you said that word in Greek, let them know, “I’m not taking no for an answer.” It’s really interesting. From all those adventures, how did you get into, “I’m going to help speakers get booked and I’m going to teach them what to do?” How did that all come about?

There were many jobs in between. I was in Tucson, Arizona at that time. I’m still here. We were helping a person named Dottie Walters who had a speakers’ bureau. I was asked by a TV anchor friend. I was doing little local booking of my husband who speaks and he’s an author and this TV anchor. I didn’t know anything about the world beyond that. I didn’t come from a meeting planning background. Dottie Walters was coming to town, the TV anchor said, “Could you help her get some bookings to promote her book?” I said, “Sure.” I didn’t know this woman. I didn’t know anything. I didn’t even have contacts in the media locally but I actually made them. I booked her on TV and radio and newspaper. We went around all day and we drove her around. At the end of the day, she said, “You should start a speakers’ bureau.” I said, “Okay, what’s a speakers’ bureau?” I really didn’t know. She’s one of the originals. From there, my husband and I started a speakers’ bureau not really knowing what it was. The first two years were, if you were to look at our Social Security statements, they looked like zero. I always say we had a minus zero income for a few years. Any success that I have now did not come from straight success. They say that your instant success may take twenty years. Mine took a few years.

There’s a spiritual side to the story, call it a miracle or whatever you want. Long story short, we were down to our last month of mortgage payments that we could afford to pay. We had started the business out of our pockets. I said, “This is it.” It was New Year’s Eve. I had a little talk with God and I said, “Look here,” and I’m very direct. It’s a pitch to God. I have no shyness about this whatsoever. This is part of our life. I said, “If you want me to succeed, then you need to make this work because I’m doing everything I can. Otherwise, I’m going to have to get a job.” It was New Year’s Day and there’s no work. We had gone to see a consultant, just to back pace a little bit. We saw a consultant a few months before. We gave him thousands of dollars and he gave us advice. We implemented a few things but nothing had happened yet. New Year’s Day passed, the first work day began and we started getting calls. It was just like that and we took off from there.

[Tweet “”How To Pitch To God””]

Do you think some of it has to do with the analogy of planting some seeds and sometimes it just takes a while for them to come to fruition and you just have to trust the process as it’s happening if you’re doing everything you can?

No, it was so time specific. I would say the consultant’s work in what we did, we had done a mailing. That specifically, it wasn’t the two years of work. It was specifically the mailing which back then was a good way to do it. I wouldn’t do that today but it worked.

It’s finding something that works. If what you’re doing isn’t working, you need to pivot and find something else to try as opposed to just giving up. Do you have a story of a speaker knocking it out of the park, exceeding your expectations, the event planner’s expectations that you could share with us?

Let me just tell you one that just happened that really made me happy, and there’s a lesson in it for those that are listening. We’re talking about pitching and stories. I have a client that I’ve worked in New York State for a very long time. They book a number of speakers a year. We have a real friendship that goes back a long way. I won’t mention names but they wanted a very famous football player. It’s somebody that’s revered in the industry; retired but still revered. He put down all the things that he wanted and there were quite a few things he wanted from this person. He wanted an appearance and he was going to go a certain restaurant and then he wanted him to speak the next day. He’s like, “Do you think we could do all these?” I said, “Here’s the lesson, if you don’t ask, you don’t get. If you ask, you may get.” We just found out that we got. He got everything that we asked for. I’m very pleased about that. We have a happy client. It’s going to be a year before we know how the ball player does. Does he hit it out of the park or kick it out of the park? We won’t know yet but I’m sure we will.

[Tweet “Don’t be afraid to ask for what you want.”]

I had another one too. You talk about the wins and the losses in the business of pitching, which is really selling. I had another one recently which really, you could call it a win-loss-win. A win is we booked this celebrity speaker to begin with and the client was so excited. We got who we wanted. Then I get a call that the speaker had to have an emergency surgery. It was very sudden and unexpected. We had a loss and the meeting was in five days. Bureaus deal with this. This is keeping us on our toes. It’s rare but it does happen. We’re good backup when it does happen. I immediately spent my whole weekend working on who’s going to take over and I pitched. My heart is all about who are we going to get to replace this speaker. Who had a certain industry specific focus and a celebrity no less? We found the right person. I found a few different choices but there was one that stood out and he was also available and willing to do it at the same fee, because you have that prospect to consider. The client actually thought it was a great idea, vetted it out and booked that person. The person just spoke yesterday. It was a win for everybody. That was very dramatic. It was a huge amount of time, just a big time block all at one time getting it done. That’s what you do as an entrepreneur. You have to think on your feet. You’ve got to be there and you’ve got to back up your client and back up your speaker, in this case.

Also have some resources to have a Plan B in case Plan A falls apart. I think that’s where a lot of people don’t do the planning. Obviously, your years of experience in having those kinds of connections pay off. It’s also willing to work hard. You were willing to work over the weekend to find the right choice in the last minute.

Just put yourself in their shoes. If you were the client and your keynote speaker all of a sudden is not coming and you had promoted this person, I can’t even imagine not having someone. I gave options somewhere in the industry and somewhere outside the industry but they were all excellent and they were all good choices. We actually found somebody who is an industry specific, perfect person and a celebrity. It was right on the money. It was very fortunate. It doesn’t always work out that well.

It’s nice to hear when it does. The other thing I really take away from what you said, Andrea, is you put on what I call the empathy hat. You put yourself, in this case, the client’s shoes to imagine what it would feel like and that’s what motivated you. I know for myself when I do that, when I’m pitching, it makes all the difference in the world. It’s no longer about, “What do I need? What do I want?” It’s, “What do you need? How can I help you? It must be so frustrating. You must be so stressed out right now thinking this isn’t going to happen. How can I help and solve that? We’re in this together.” That combination of empathy and collaboration is really a recipe for success.

[Tweet “Empathy plus collaboration is a formula for success.”]

I was thinking about what we were going to end up talking about because we’re organic and we’re flowing here. Your point exactly is what I wanted to say. You said it, it’s your story but it’s my story too. Because I do work from caring and I’ve been accused of caring too much. I’d rather care too much and do a great job than be accused of being just not fully there for the client. There’s no in between. You either are there or you aren’t there. Your actions will speak louder than your words. What you do and you don’t do for your customer will show. The one thing I would suggest in any kind of conflict or confrontation or any kind of problem situation you may have, doesn’t come up often for me but occasionally, communicate. Always get on the phone and talk because there may be a misunderstanding.

Another piece of advice is never assume. We could apply it to this never assume that you know everything that’s going on. You don’t know why a person feels as they do. You don’t know why they think as they do, so communicate. That’s just a little thing. Never assume that people know everything just on the details when you’re talking about a meeting. Never assume that they know everything about the speaker you’re proposing, in my case, or about whatever it is you’re selling: your product or your service. I feel very strongly about the whole entrepreneurial aspect. I’ve been in business a long time. I think there are some things that either a person knows or they don’t know. There are certain things you can’t train on. I know from training people. You want to hear a little test on sales?

Sure.

I had somebody who was excellent in customer service. I had hired him and he was a great guy. He was smart but he could not get the information that we needed. There were five points that we needed to make sure that he did a good job such as, “Is there a budget for a speaker?” Important, relevant, quick to get things; it’s a quick question. He couldn’t do it. I wrote up a list, “Here are five questions. I want you to just read the questions and fill in the blank at the end.” I gave him a bunch of copies. He could not do it. He was not a stupid guy. It was just how brains work. Either you could do this or you can’t. Your state of being is actually going to come through. This is the core of everything I stand for. Who you are, your integrity, your values, your clarity, that’s a biggie. Your clarity about how you see the customer’s needs and how you can fulfill them is really what makes or breaks a very good salesperson.

I agree. I have found that if you cannot be clear and concise and if you confuse people, they always say no. They won’t admit that they’re confused, they’ll just say no and you don’t know why.

Authors Who Speak Sell More Books

That’s true. I’m going to take it a little step further though. When I talk clarity, I mean awareness. I mean your intuition. I mean all those unseen factors that you may not even realize you use but we all do. Who doesn’t walk in a room and feel goosebumps and something’s not right. We all have this ability but you can develop it and you can use it to help people and that gives you more sales. It gives them exactly who they need or what they need depending on what it is you sell. I feel really strongly about it. Talk about personal growth, the more that you can develop yourself and the more powerful, clear, aware person you are, the better and more effective salesperson you’re going to be. Your pitch is going to be very in-tuned. It will be pitch-perfect.

That goes to your whole branding, your tagline: “Our word is gold.”

I have a story about that. While we were new, we hired an advertising person and it costs a few thousand dollars for what we were doing. It had to do with their catalogue, etc. in the old days. He was worried about the bill. He said, “I want to make sure that you pay us.” We’ve never reneged on a bill. We have a perfect record. I said, “Our word is gold. You will have your money.” Of course, we paid him. That stuck. He looked at me and he went, “Oh my God, that’s your tagline.” We’ve never changed it. Integrity is number one. There is a great temptation in business for sales people to sell what gives the salesperson the most income instead of giving the customer what it is they really need. In my world, what that looks like is not to push the most expensive speaker on a client when someone else might be a better fit. To have the ethics, the integrity to suggest both, let them choose but you can say this one really is what you’re looking for.

They trust you to have their back because everyone’s afraid of making the wrong decision.

There’s so much fear in the world of sales. From the salesperson’s side, they need to get rid of it. I want to add one thing. When I was starting out, I’ve never had training on sales in the beginning. I’m now around all these sales speakers so I learned just by being around the materials and through the years. When I first started, and if anybody is listening who’s just starting out in business, I want you to hear this well. I was terrified. I wasn’t the most fearful person. I’m not a wallflower. I had no training of how to approach people, what to do and how to make a living out of it. I did it anyway. I have a saying, “Face your fear and do it anyway.” I would get on the phone and I’d do it and I was terrified. I’d cry sometimes. People weren’t always nice but I got over it. I realize they don’t know me. It’s not personal.

I’m a big believer in not taking rejection personally. The way I have found to do it myself in my own sales career is to realize that just because they say no to me and no to what I’m selling, doesn’t mean I’m not valuable. It certainly doesn’t mean my product or service, or in your case, your speaker isn’t good. The Four Agreements says don’t take anything personally. To apply that to selling, that’s the number one reason people don’t go into sales or burn out is because they’re taking all the no’s really personally. If we can help people in this episode, that’s one of my big mantras when I go out and speak is, how to not take it personally.

When you go to a restaurant, they give you some sorbet sometimes to cleanse your palate in between courses. I said, “You need a sorbet to cleanse your mind from the no before you go talk to somebody else.” We go in with that no energy and that no mindset, “The next person is probably going to say no too,” you’ll just be a self-fulfilling prophecy. If you can cleanse the palate in your head by calling someone who’s happy with what you sold them or offered them and just took some customer service follow-up before you make that next new attempt to get business. It really makes a difference on the energy that’s exchanged between people.

I totally agree with that. That goes back to my whole thing about personal growth. You must feel very good about yourself despite whatever the outer influences may be. You will get run over occasionally only if you allow yourself. I’ve had moments where I can’t believe that these people are doing this or saying this. I’ve caught clients lying to me. I knew they were lying. Once in a while I’ve called them on it because for me that’s horrendous. It’s like pick your battles. What I’ll do in a case like that is you should have a thing, a device, whether it’s a book or a saying or something where you could come back and ground yourself again. For me, I have a hummingbird feeder outside of the office and I look at the birds. I actually go out there and they know me. I talk to animals by the way, and they do respond. I don’t know if it’s vibes or I’ve got some of the language down, who knows? Anyway, I’m pitching to them.

It worked in Greece and so now it’s just a different language, right?

Yeah. Anyway for me, the birds it’s nature, it’s away from people for a moment. I love people but it gets me back to what’s real. You really have to a good self-esteem. That comes back to your own personal growth. One more thing I want to add is your purpose. When you get on the phone and you’re pitching or you’re selling, the main thing should be, “How can I help this customer?” That’s the number one driving force. If it’s anything else, you’re going to come across as false. You may do okay but part of you is going to know you’re false. Some part of them is going to know you’re false too. Let’s be direct, cut to the chase, be authentic.

Something I like to do is have fun. I will tease my people mercilessly if we have a good relationship and they understand. I make sure they understand I’m teasing. We have a lot of fun. It’s just my nature and I do it for my own entertainment as well as whatever fun we could have in the process of doing business. If you were asking, “What’s your pitch? How do you stand out?” I didn’t create this. It just naturally evolved as I felt more comfortable in selling. Frankly, I have a perspective on selling that selling isn’t selling at all. If you’re really helping somebody, it’s so much higher than selling. Selling is a contrived, pushing thing to me. This is something I’ve just arrived at through the years. You are hearing. You are listening. The best sales you could do is listen and then fulfill. Listen, ask questions if needed, fulfill.

What you just said that selling is pushing, I believe that storytelling is the new way to be engaging. When you tell stories, you’re magnetic. You pull people into the story as opposed to having to push your message out. That’s why I’m such an evangelist for teaching as many people as possible how to become storytellers. Then we get off that self-esteem roller coaster. We’re feeling good if we get a sale.

Something I do, has nothing to with sales at all, my nature is to share as much as somebody wants to hear. I’m in heaven that we’re sharing here. I’m happy for everybody who’s listening. I want you to get something out of this. I’ll kick your butt so you do. The main thing is we want to help people and we want to do the best we could do. That’s not sales. I share about travel adventures. I like to travel. I’ve had adventures. I’ll share that and the insights I’ve gotten if anybody wants. I’ll even share the photos. The pitch isn’t always directly about the product or the service. In a way, you’re sharing yourself. I guess that would be called selling yourself even though I don’t. Everybody I contact, I want to pull up with me so we go up together, rise up together, whatever that means; to be better together, to enjoy together. There’s no separation between us. Even though we think we’re all different and separate, that’s only our ignorance frankly.

You said something earlier I want to go back to. We agreed that the confused mind always says no. Then you said it’s not just the clarity, it’s the energy exchanged. There are some unseen factors like your intuition. I talk about there are three unspoken questions people have when they’re listening to you pitch. I want to go through each one and just get your quick take on it. The first one is people are asking themselves when they hear you pitch, “Do I trust you?” What is your tip on how people can come across trustworthy even if it’s not in person? What is it that people can do either in person or on the phone to become more trustworthy?

Another way that you could develop trust, to answer your question, isn’t necessarily in that first conversation. It’s how you follow up.

It’s a tall order to communicate yourself to another on the phone and virtually, and in today’s world, by email. That’s even harder. I know some speakers do a pitch themselves by video and they’ll do a personal pitch. That’s an idea that you could do because you’re making an effort. That takes time. You’re sharing of yourself. A short video pitch in today’s world, I’m talking about twenty seconds, can really convey a sense of you. Also, telling a few stories if there’s time of how you’ve handled a similar request before. It shows credibility, so there’s a trust there. Things will come up depending on the case by case that you could share. It could be just a phrase that you throw in that shows, “I’m there for you.” I’ll tell you one thing. My client, the one where I just provided the emergency speaker who just spoke and said, “I’m going to write you a huge testimonial letter.” I’m very grateful for that. He’s so grateful and he’s so happy. There’s a huge trust. Another way that you could develop trust, to answer your question, isn’t necessarily in that first conversation. It’s how you follow up. Are you reliable?

It goes back to the integrity. If you say you’re going to do something, email someone, you do it. The trust thing really is a gut thing. It’s the fight or flight response, “Do I trust you? Is it safe?” Then we move up to the heart, which is likeability. That’s the second unspoken question that people have when they hear you pitch. I know empathy is a big factor in getting people to like you. Do you have any suggestions on how we can improve our empathy/likeability?

For me, since most of what I do today isn’t on the phone anymore, it used to be, your writing skills and how you approach somebody are going to be critical. I think getting on the phone once in a while is a good idea. I’d like to hear a voice once in a while. Not all clients have time to speak or talk on the phone. It’s good if you can. For likeability, for me, it’s teasing and also really genuinely having an interest in the client’s life. I look for common denominators. I’ve lived all over this country and I’ve done all kinds of stuff that you can’t even imagine. If you go to my LinkedIn page you’ll see I call myself The Woman of the World. I can say, “I was this. I did this for ten years.” I did an archeological dig. I inoculated turkeys on a farm in Israel in a kibbutz. I actually was in an active warfare. I lived in some bomb shelters. I’ve done all these things. I actually was a technical editor for the military. All these make connections with people because there’s either somewhere they lived or something they’ve done or somewhere they’ve travelled that I’ve probably done too. We have that common denominator, that is a huge likeability factor. I find it a lot of fun. To me, that’s totally the reward of doing this business, is the connection.

The big takeaway here is people like people who they have fun with. They think they’re going to have fun if they hire you as a speaker and you’re going to make the audience have fun, that’s great.

I just want to say with the fun part, you’ve got to be grounded too.

Now we go from the gut to the heart and then to the head. The third part of this unspoken question is, “Will this work for me?” I love to tell stories that pull people in so that they can see themselves in the story of someone else that you helped, an audience or another client. Once you get people to be in the story with you, then that’s answering that question, “Will this work for me?” What are your thoughts on that order, first of all? Do you like that we don’t start off with the numbers and then try to get people to like and trust us? We start off with the trust; the gut, the heart, the head?

I don’t know if there’s one order. I like what you’re saying, how you’re clarifying each point, but I think it comes in a flow and in all different orders. I deal with clients that they just want to cut to the chase. Then we get to know each other. There are people that shocked me. They seem so serious, then I do a little teaser thing and they just totally warm up.

You bring out the best in people, don’t you?

I don’t know, or the worse, but I have fun. The main thing is we get business done.

[Tweet “The power of your purpose is greater than your fear.”]

Are there any last thoughts you want to have? The time goes so fast with someone like you.

For everybody listening, this is what I want you to hear for the entrepreneurial aspect. I already told you face your fear and do it anyway. It’s okay to be afraid. Once you do it, that’s how you overcome fear. It’s okay to be afraid. It’s not a weakness. The next part, and probably the high-level aspect thing I want to say here, is the power of your purpose is greater than your fear. That’s something that has helped me through the years. That’s my own quote. I seem to come up with these quotes. The power of your purpose is greater than your fear, and I want to leave you with this, life is an adventure. I want you to map yours out today. I’m talking about your work, your play, your whole life because it’s going to go by very fast. I want you to make the most of your life, have fun.

We certainly had fun talking with you. If people want to follow you, you have your website of Gold Stars Speakers Bureau, GoldStars.com. On there, you can find all of your wonderful products including The Business of Successful Speaking. People can follow you on LinkedIn and Twitter, @AndreaGold. I can’t thank you enough for sharing your insights, your passion for life and most importantly, your authenticity has really come across. Your authenticity is really something that stands out with this empathy and collaboration as the secret formula to success.

Thank you. Here’s to your success.

Thank you so much.

Links Mentioned

• Gold Stars Speakers Bureau
• The Business of Successful Speaking: Proven Secrets to Becoming a Million Dollar Speaker
• Authors Who Speak Sell More Books Using the Platform to Profit
• MeCo
• LinkedIn
• Twitter Andrea Gold
• The Four Agreements

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