Full Transcript

Sari 0:00
Welcome to your Food Business Success. This podcast is for early stage entrepreneurs in the packaged food industry ready to finally turn that delicious idea into reality. I'm your host, Sari Kimbell. I have guided hundreds of food brand founders to success as an industry expert and business coach, and it's got to be fun. In this podcast, I share with you mindset tools to become a true entrepreneur and run your business like a boss, interviews with industry experts to help you understand the business you are actually in, and food founder journey so you can learn what worked and didn't work and not feel so alone in your own journey. Now let's jump in!

Sari 0:47
Hello and welcome back to the podcast. Pura Vida everyone! I am still in Costa Rica. I am one week away from leaving where I'm at right now in Nasara and moving to a new location. I feel like, after three weeks, I just finally got the handle of things and know where things are at, and like, have my bearings, and it's like, oh, now I'm leaving, but I'm actually really excited for what is next. And I feel like there was both the like getting the hang of just working away from my usual office, and you being in another country and not speaking the language, and all of those things. And then there's like, just the specific learning, you know, just learning the routines of where I specifically am. So I kind of had two things to overcome in January, and now I feel a lot more confident, if you will. Calm, competent, to go to the next place. So that's exciting. I went to the farmers market today and wanted to buy some things to, you know, little tokens, keepsakes, some jewelry for myself and for family and friends. And it was just so fun to be like, oh, I live here, right? I get it. I've seen this, some of the same people. I know, my little tuk tuk driver. I'm like, hey, there you are, you know, and we chat, and it's like, I'm becoming part of this community. It's been really fun. I'm going to tie it all together, because I was just at the market, and I was watching people sell, right? I was watching how then different various vendors were showing up or not showing up. And I see this all the time. You guys know, I own a farmers market myself, and I see it all the time in the vendors there. And then, of course, all of the people, all of our members that I work with in Food Business Success, in Master Your Business, and the members in Fuel, where I see the fear of selling and the treating the word sell like a four letter word, right, really avoiding it. And so first, I want to talk about what I think are the core objections to selling. Like, why do most of us, now, there are some people that are just, it seems like they're just natural born sellers, and they aren't. They don't come across as sleazy, or too salesy. They're just really good at having those conversations and putting you at ease. And next thing you know, you're like, yes, take all my money. I want what you have to offer, right? But most of us do not grow up with a healthy respect for selling. It is often, you know, looked at poorly. And, you know, there's a big negative bent on being salesy or pushy or that kind of stuff, right? And trying to get things from people. And so what I see is that a lot of founders kind of shrink and hide and forget that they are in business, and you have to learn how to sell, and sell from a place of generosity, of abundance, of value exchange, and I'm going to talk more about that. But I think the objections like, why we don't like it. Number one, there's just the obvious one of like, you're going to hear no, and that fear of rejection is strong for many of us. It doesn't feel good. It sucks to hear no. And we can take it so personally, right? We have this personal attachment to what we make or what we offer, and it's a part of us. I sometimes refer to as like, you're a baby, right? So you have this thing that you are so passionate about. You take it so personally, and when someone says no, it feels like a criticism of your baby, of your creation, right? And we worry about being judged of people. As humans, our biggest fear is that we would be ostracized, that we'd be pushed out of the group. And sometimes we can feel like we're being too pushy, or we worry that our friends and family will be like, can you please stop talking about your product, your business, like I don't want your granola, or that they're only buying it. And sometimes they are only buying it because they want to support you. But yeah, there's this fear of failure, fear of public failure, right? Like you're at a farmer's market, it's a very public area. People are going to tell you no, maybe you're going to stores, and that can be a public space, and you're going to hear no. And it's weird, because email is both like a private space, because it's going to, you know, it's like one person and it's coming from you to them, obviously it goes to more than one person, but only one person at a time is reading their email. And yet somehow that feels even to some people, even scarier than making in person, right? What if they unsubscribe? What if they reject me? What if they have negative thoughts about me? They think I'm being too pushy, they think I send too many emails, right? So it's just this overall fear of rejection and fear of judgment. Then there's the imposter syndrome, where we're going to compare ourselves to others, we're going to question whether our product is good enough, you know, good enough for the price. We worry about criticism from people in the industry, and we may come in just feeling like, who am I, right? Who am I to charge $12 for my granola? I'm a home cook. This is a hobby business, or I've never run a business before, so we can often come in with this sense of like, who am I? And feeling like a fraud or an imposter, just overall, a general price discomfort and a discomfort around talking about money. Many of us struggle to talk about money, and I really respect, I really appreciate. We have some people in our membership who are super open about finances. And I think that there's a certain freedom when you just finally let it go and you're like, this is what it is. Let's just start talking about it. Like, why do we all hide our numbers? And the more I think we can break down some of those barriers, at least internally, with safe groups of other people, where you're learning, like, it helps to just take away some of the mystery and the competition. And you're like, oh, let's just talk about numbers as if they're just facts and they're neutral. And we take away all of the, you know, all of the drama that we add to numbers around the price and our sales and money and all of that stuff, right?

Sari 8:17
And so a lot of times we don't always feel very confident about like this is the price, and some of that maybe comes from you haven't actually done your work to really understand your cost of goods sold and what you need to be charging, and what's your break even point, and what are your all your expenses. So some of it is probably coming from a legitimate place if you haven't done that work like a business owner, and it can sometimes feel like you're trying to take people's money. You worry about feeling, like seem coming off as greedy or take, take, take, get, get, get. You worry that you're going to get judged as expensive, right? And that somehow expensive is a bad thing, but it's not. Like expensive to whom? It's totally relative, right? What's expensive to one person is like nothing to somebody else, and we're trying to compete on price rather than value. And I see so many people miss price where they need to be because they're trying to compete with a grocery store product. It's like, you can't charge $4, $5 for your granola, like you just can't, whatever product it is. You very often cannot compete on price until you reach a certain scale, right? But who I'm talking to right now are those early stage entrepreneurs, like you're just launching, you're getting to 100k, maybe you're starting to scale beyond that a little bit, but it takes a long time to be able to bring down your cost of goods sold enough that you would be in line with that same exact price that you would be at a grocery store. And then I know sometimes people worry about coming off as salesy, pushy, inauthentic, because it doesn't feel very authentic to be asking people for a sale because you've never done it before, but the reality is, you make offers all the time. You are selling all the time. Hey, do you want to come to lunch with me? Hey, how about we go here? Hey, will you take out the trash for me? Those are all sales pitches. You are asking somebody to do something for you, with you, and so you are selling all the time. And if you think about if you can come from a place of like it would be really cool to hang out with you and for us to have lunch together. Is that something you'd like to do? If you think about selling more like that, then that's more authentic. And if you use more of that voice, right, a little more friendly voice, it's going to come off so much better, like you don't have to adopt some sleazy, you know, creating false urgency, somebody else's voice. You can do it in your own authentic way, and you don't have to worry about becoming too commercial. You get to choose. That's the beautiful thing about being a business owner. You get to decide. But I will tell you, you're not going to be in business very long.

Sari 11:41
Are you thinking about what's next for you in 2025? how you want to launch your business or scale your business, and finally, make this the year that you go 10x? It matters the type of goal that you set. It matters why you set it. And to help you, I am making my 10x goal workshop totally free for the next few weeks. To get access to this incredible workshop that helps you understand why New Year's resolution type goals never work, and how to do them better so that you actually achieve more than you set out to do. Go to foodbizsuccess.com/10x-goals. I'll also put the link in the show notes below. 2025 can be your year to go 10x.

Sari 12:37
If you don't figure out how to start selling in a way that does feel authentic for you. So this is where I used AI. And I think this is a great example of how to use AI. I fed in my thoughts and what I was really trying to say. And then I asked AI to put it together for me in an acronym. And I love what it came up with. So I love AI when we can use it properly. I wanted to come back to this four letter word, right, and give you something that you can remember of like, how do I sell better? So we're going to call this the SELL framework, right? S, E, L, L. So I asked it to come up with an acronym. Okay? So the first thing is, S, right? Share your story. Start with the why. Why are you doing this? What recipe are you creating? What problems are you solving? Who did you make this product for? Make it personal. And I know so many of you resist this because you're like, then I might be judged, right? Of course, yeah, we're judging all the time. You're judging people all the time. I'm judging people all the time. You're judging me right now, as I'm putting this out there. But I promise you that your people want to align with your why. They want to align with you. And again, you're not going to compete on price. You just won't. And so for you to have effective selling, focus on your why. Focus on why you are doing this, your journey, how it connects back to their benefits as a customer when they use your product, when they eat it, drink it, use it, whatever, right? Also showing that you really care. You care about them. You care about their journey, you care about their life experience, and letting customers see your passion, sharing your wins and your losses, creating memorable moments like sharing some of you. And you can just think about other people that you might follow, like think about brands or influencers and things like that, that you are really attracted to. They're probably being more vulnerable than ones that are just like, hi, buy our product. Hi, it's all about the product, and it's never about them, right? And to give you guys an example of a brand founder who I think is doing a really great job at this because I get her emails, and she has been in my programs now for, gosh, I think, like, a year and a half, and she's coming back into Master Your Business. So I want to give a shout out to Amber with Daddy's Homemade Syrups. I think she is just really shining in this sell framework. So she's sending emails, she's posting content, go and follow her Instagram, get on her email list. But she is sharing these stories where she's making it personal, right? She's building emotional connection, like it could just be all about the syrup and pouring it in your coffee and putting on your pancakes or putting it in your cocktails, but she makes it personal. When she does that, because she's doing that, it's going to attract her audience, her raving fans and her loyal customers. Okay? E is for educate with enthusiasm. So teach people, let them know. Like I just got an email from Amber, I think maybe even just today that was talking about why natural syrups right, and telling me, teaching me about all the nasty stuff that's in other syrups, and why they do it the way they do it, right? So that is value that she's giving me, she's teaching me, and I'm like, oh, I didn't know that. I never thought about that, right? She's sharing cooking tips, and, you know, just inspiration, ways that I can use the syrup. So that's a lot of value. She's answering those questions for me, of, like, why don't you have sugar free syrup, right? And she's trying all this stuff to, like, really educate people. Like, here's why we're so excited about syrups, right? And let me tell you all about them. Danny with Peak State, who's a coach inside Master Your Business, is great at this as well, like building out different blogs. And this really helps your SEO. When you can build out blogs that identify like tiny, little niche things that you're educating people about. And if you're at a farmer's market booth, like, you're going to say the same thing over and over again, but every time, do that with enthusiasm, educate people like, here's what's in regular syrups. Did you know that? Did you know there's dyes? You know there's high fructose corn syrup? Did you know there's these chemicals, like, whatever it is, and here's what makes us different, right? Those are powerful. That's where people have these little emotional ahas, and they're going to be like, yeah, I want to learn more like, and sometimes it takes a long time, right? I have people like, I literally had somebody who's going to start coaching one on one with me, and she's like, I have been following you for two years, and you just never know how long the sales cycle is going to be. Like, I don't typically buy a lot of sweets, right? So in Amber's case, I probably wouldn't normally be her customer. However, I might see her at the farmer's market. I might hear her story. I might get educated. And even though I don't buy, I couldn't buy, you know, I might not buy for years, but I see her at all the markets, and then when I have like, a friend or a family member who I know, like, loves Irish cream or loves caramel or whatever, right? Loves something in their coffee. I'm going to be like, I know where to go, right? I want to get that person who's visiting something that they're going to love. And so now I'm going to like, I'm like, oh yeah, that Daddy's Homemade Syrup. That's where I want to go. That's the right syrup, right?

Sari 19:03
So you just don't know how long these things are going to take. And you know, trends happen. It might be a certain flavor that you introduce that finally catches. I'm like, oh yeah, that lavender syrup. That's what I've been eating my whole life, right? Okay, the first L is, listen and learn, so you want to pay attention to feedback. What gets them excited? What are their concerns? What are those common questions that you get? And you really want to be paying attention to that, and don't just brush them off, but start thinking about, how can you in your education, going back to the E, how can you start answering those questions? What do you need to change just slightly in your marketing materials to maybe help people get it from the first you know, help them get it earlier? You also want to be paying attention to body language, like, how do they respond? How do they react if they're trying the sample, right? What gets them excited? And lean into that. You really just want to be paying attention, listening and learning, and then use their feedback to improve. This is not about getting it perfect the first time out. You're going to become a master seller by trying things, by getting those, by "failing", right? That you're going to learn because you're failing forward. So you're going to make adjustments. You're going to refine your messaging. You might even make changes to your product based on feedback. You might make changes to your labels, your marketing materials. So listen and learn.

Sari 20:39
And then the last L is lead with value. This one is so huge, and I think this is one of the things that people miss, because they make it all about them. Like, I want to get money for my product, it's all about me, me, me. Instead of you got to lead with value. Got to put it, make it all about your customers. Lead with service. Sell with service. Right? Focus on the benefits, not the features. What are the benefits of this syrup? How is it going to improve my life? And you know, it's not going to heal anything, but it's going to enhance my experience. It's going to make things faster. I'm going to feel better. Like, focus on things like convenience or how it does maybe help your life like, feel better if you have a product that's like a better for you product, what are you avoiding, right? And focus on feelings. People buy with emotion. We think that we're these logical creatures, but we're not. We always are buying from feeling states, from emotions, and then we justify later why that was a logical choice. So you need to tap into that, because you are most likely more expensive than what they could find in the grocery store. So leading with those benefits, what makes it worth this premium dollar amount?

Sari 22:11
Make clear offers. I cannot tell you. You know, I see hundreds of vendors in my market go to other farmers markets. It drives me nuts when people do not state their prices confidently and just have them somewhere, right? People don't like to ask you how much things are. That puts them, that kind of creates discomfort, just like you don't love talking about money. Don't make people ask. Make it clear. Present options clearly, guide their decisions, you know, like do some of the work in writing to help facilitate an easier buying process. And, of course, creating compelling packages. This is about creating win wins like one bottle of syrup might be, you know, a pretty high premium, but put together a nice little bundle of 2, 3, 4 syrups, and now you're going to be saving more money. You're now going to be having an even better experience where you can have all these different options of flavors, and the whole family will love and on and on, right? Could be gift options, could be punch cards. Like there's lots of ways to create packages that feel very valuable to people and remember that creating experiences, whether it's through an email or whether it's in person, that is value. I go to farmers markets because I want an experience. I want to be sold to, and especially when people are using the sell framework, right? So putting sell into practice, share your story, educate with enthusiasm, listen and learn, and lead with value. And just final thoughts, I remember, selling is about service. When you come from a servant heart, when you come from that energy, it's going to make a huge difference in how people receive it. So just remember, it's not about you anymore. Yes, you have your business, and you have your, you know,all the things that you're worried about, but when you get into a selling situation, get into a place of abundance, get into a place of generosity, and remembering you are providing a service. You are providing value, and all people are doing is exchanging something that they value their money, time, service in exchange for your product. We're just trying to find people who are a match, and that's what selling is all about.

Sari 24:51
So I want to give you a couple of practical examples on how you can apply the sell strategy into different scenarios. So let's pretend you're at a farmer's market. As you're offering samples, you can be sharing your story about your why. Why did you start this business? You can educate your customers about the unique ingredients. You can to ask them questions about how they cook or what their routine is like, and find ways to add value, to show, to demonstrate the value of your product, and of course, leading with your best value proposition, like leading with value and not being afraid to make an offer to say, how many can I wrap up for you? We have this amazing bundle, would you like it? Like, make an offer. In your email marketing, Share behind the scenes stories. Share your personal story. Educate in your emails about recipes, about ingredients, like the same kind of things. People want to know this stuff. And you can always do surveys. You can ask for responses, like getting engagement from them, and then lead with very clear, very simple, valuable offers. And again, all we're doing is just making an offer. We're letting people know like, hi, here we are. I'm going to give you a chance. Give you an opportunity, if this is the right time, if you need syrup or you need olive oil. We were just in Master Your Business, and one of our participants has an olive oil company, and she was saying, it's just amazing, like, I just need to send an email, and people are like, thank you. I needed this olive oil. Like, thank you for reminding me that this exists, and there's a lot of noise out there, right? Which is why I know you all don't like it, but it's why you have to send so many emails. I know sometimes people are like, you send too many emails, and I'm okay with that. You can judge me. You can say, you can think your thoughts, but the reality is, you're fighting through so much noise, right? There's so much competition for attention, and many people you send one email, think about yourself like maybe you're filling up your car tank at the gas station, or you're in line at the post office, and maybe you actually see the email. Or maybe you never see it at all. Like, there's a lot of emails that just don't even get through. Or, you know, I have one inbox where I get a lot of my offers that I don't even see it, you know, at all. Like, a month will go by and I'll be like, Oh, sometimes I'm like, Oh, darn, I would have actually really liked to take advantage of that sale. And so remember that you are competing for people's attention, and you're going to have to remind them more than is comfortable and it's okay to ask, and some people are going to unsubscribe, and that's okay. We get to let them and go find the people who want what we have to offer. And with store buyers, let's say you're pitching your product into stores, share your brand vision, share your story again, educate them about the market opportunity. Like, let them know how your syrups are different than the ones that are currently on the shelf, how the ingredients make it such a higher you know, more premium product and better for you product. Listen to their store needs. Like, really pay attention. What are they telling you? And when they tell you things, ask that, ask yourself, why are they telling me this? Really try to get to like, what is their deal, right? What is important to them, and then see if you can speak to that. And then, as much as possible, lead with data, lead with your data story and solutions that you are providing, so that they understand like your partners, and let them know that you want to be partners with them. You're not just going to drop product off and then be like, see ya! Like you're going to be in it with them. You're going to help products sell. That's the value that you're offering. All right. So go out and sell with service. If you think about selling as a service, that you're doing people a favor by letting them know you exist, by telling your story, by listening to them, by enthusiastically educating them, and you're leading with value when you put that sell strategy into place, then you will start releasing some of that anxiety and the fears and the imposter syndrome and all those things we talked about at the beginning. You will start releasing that. And you'll start showing up and making offers and not making it mean anything about you or your product, and not taking it personally, and then you can just go out and grow the business. So go out there and sell. Until next time, have an amazing week!