“What I did was I kind of threw some hooks out there. But, you have to be aware and listen for any information they volunteer.”

Twist the knife. I'll tell you where I learned this thing. So I remember having this job and I was sitting there at work and this guy came up to me. He starts talking to me about… I don't even remember what he was talking to me about. But he starts talking to me about it and trying to get my opinion on the subject. And so I kind of provided some opinion and then he started picking at it and picking at it and asking me all these questions.

The next thing I know, I'm sitting there defending something that I couldn’t care less about. And I was like, like, how in the world did I just get sucked into something that I don’t care about? The problem is, as soon as you start down that path, there are all these social triggers that come into play. Since I had already committed and I started talking about it, I became consistent. I didn't want to look like an idiot by saying, "Dude, I don't even agree with any of this stuff. Why are we having this conversation?” Because somehow, he already got me so committed that it just seemed dumb to back out.

And so, I call this "twisting the knife”. It's how to pick at someone's interest and get them to sell to themselves.

Tell mini stories

So you go knock on a door and somebody's like, “No, I'm fine. I'm not interested in solar.” “Okay, cool. You're a dentist, huh? Oh yeah, you're making a million dollars a year? Oh snap, I'll bet you're getting hurt on your taxes, right?”
“Oh yeah, I'm bleeding out.”
“Oh snap. What's gonna happen if you don't find some tax breaks?”
“Oh, I have to give the government $300,000.”
“Ooh, that sounds like a lot. Do you wanna do that?”
“No, no, no, I don't wanna do that.” “Do you realize solar has these tax credits?”
“No, I didn't.”
“Yeah, so you'd probably get $50,000 back (or whatever it is.)”
“I would?”
“Yeah.”

Twist the knife, like, “Would that be better?” You start twisting the knife. “Yeah, let’s sit down and have a conversation.” Doesn't matter what. Pick whatever it is.

I'm sure you guys could think of examples. When I go out and I’m selling solar, I really don't know that I'm selling solar. I've identified their hot topic and then the solar usually comes along with whatever they wanna buy. It's strange 'cause the end product is either solar or solar and batteries, but what got them there was different.

Identify the customer's hot interest (the knife)

How do you find those hot topics? Just ask questions. There was an older gentleman that we were talking to. When we were talking, he was like, "I'm older." He wasn't really convinced that the solar would do him a whole lot of good since he was getting older. I'm like, "Oh, okay." I mean, I'll tell you what’s got people interested. It's not so much about savings anymore. It's about security. What I'm discovering is that people are trying to figure out what's going on in the world. They're trying to figure out how to protect themselves. As soon as I said that it’s about security he goes, “It would be the battery that's of more interest to me.”

He volunteered the information. What I did was I kind of threw some hooks out there. But, you have to be aware and listen for any information they volunteer. There's a good chance that it's something they're passionate about or interested in.

Stories to find fun hot topics. Stories I use. Somehow I tell a story about security. I figured out how to tell a story about taxes. I figured out how to tell a story about savings. In fact, Britt and I knocked on the door of the guy the other day and I was trying to give him multiple chances to see if we couldn't just hook him and get him interested. What I like about having my iPad is that my pitch is organized on my iPad and it's also organized on my phone. So I jumped in my solar slides and I would tell a story. I might see he had this huge rate increase and say, “Let me explain what it is.” I started showing him that they were losing all this money. I'm like, “So that's just gonna drive rates up.” It made him pause because I provided him with evidence. That was a story but he still didn't bite. Then, I started telling him about how we lost our nuclear power plant story to see if he would bite on that. I showed him that slide. He didn't quite buy yet. So then I came in here and I showed him the details of the coal fire plants getting shut down. As I was doing this, He actually started sliding in buying questions to the conversation. Then I came in here and I believe I showed him this. I'm like, "Yeah, here's what the United States looks like. Two -thirds of the United States doesn't have enough power on the grid now." And all of these stories were really fishing expeditions to identify a hot topic.

Twist the knife

As soon as I could identify a hot topic, I would pull out the knife, start twisting it, and then start trying to peel back the onion by asking questions: Why is this important? How will this help you? What would happen if you do fix this?

In one particular case, we were talking to somebody who wasn't particularly interested in solar. They just weren’t. So somebody wasn’t particularly interested in solar, but they said that they were interested in batteries. Well, as soon as they said that, it identified a hot interest that that individual had, which I refer to as the knife, boom, there's your hot knife. Then I want to start twisting it in their bones and getting their attention, getting them to wiggle and start committing to it. Then you can come on this side and you ask “Hey, why is that important to you?” and “Why do you want batteries? What's got your interest? What happened, what's your backstory?” In response, they're like, “Well, I want batteries because I saw what happened in Texas when the power went out for two weeks and I don't want to have that experience. Oh my gosh, what would happen if you had your power out for two weeks? Oh, it'd be miserable.” And you're like, “Yeah, it would, right?” Then you start picking at it and picking at it. It's like, “Wouldn't your life be better if you could figure out how to solve that problem?” And after they've committed and they've gone down the story, it's gonna be very hard for them to come back and say, “I just made that up, I don't care.” And since I've gotten them so committed, what would happen if it doesn't get solved? Twist the knife, and they very well may buy solar just because they want a battery. That set the stage for the conversation.

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Julie Da Silva

"When I was working at Costco as a front end supervisor, I felt stuck. I was making $60K/yr after 5 years. In the 1st month with Ask Solar Mike I made $17K and $38K the next month!"

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