The 2 Little-Known Brain Triggers That Landed My Client a $200 Million Deal
In his groundbreaking book Activate Your Brain, Scott Halford lays out the Five C’s of neuroscience—five triggers that, when activated, increase the chance of success in any pitch, proposal, or conversation. They are: control, certainty, completion, choice, and context. Today, I want to focus on just two: control and certainty—and how they played a major role in helping my client close one of the biggest deals in the history of their industry. Having just keynoted their annual sales meeting, the…
Golf’s Most Elusive Title Escaped Rory McIlroy for 17 Years—Until He Changed One Thing
For 17 years, Rory McIlroy chased one dream. He had already conquered the PGA Championship. He stood atop the U.S. Open. He lifted the Claret Jug at The Open. But Augusta—home of the Masters—always found a way to say no. In 2011, he led by four heading into Sunday. The golf world expected a coronation. Instead, he shot an 80 and finished tied for 15th. The dream shattered. In 2022, he returned with brilliance, firing a final-round of 64—tying the…
How I Turned a Market Collapse Into $1.2M in Sales—and You Can Too
Tariffs are dominating the headlines, and the fear keeping business leaders up at night—loss of control, loss of security. Nobody knows where this is headed. That kind of uncertainty crushes confidence, and when confidence disappears, people pull back. But if you have been in business long enough, you have seen this before. Back in 1983, I was with Control Data, a Fortune 100 company. We had two main markets: mid-frame computers and disk drives. Then laptops hit. Mid-frame sales collapsed…
Top Producers Win with Torpedo Bats
Want to know how the Yankees crushed 19 home runs in just five games? It wasn’t luck—it was leverage. Talk to any exec in pro sports, and they’ll tell you that at the top, the difference between elite players is razor-thin. So how do you gain a competitive edge? If you are the New York Yankees, you swing torpedo bats. These bats are built using analytics and physics, each custom-designed based on where a player tends to hit the ball….
The $200M Sales Secret: One Simple Question That Changes Everything
As a top sales consultant and keynote speaker, here’s the million-dollar question that can double your business in two years: “What are the three results you need to generate from your next supply agreement?” This is what I call an issues-based question—designed to prompt someone to think about their future and what truly matters to them. It creates the emotional connection you are looking for while triggering oxytocin and dopamine in their brains, fostering engagement and interest. A major multi-chemical…
The One Question That Turns “Maybe” Into “Yes” (You’re Not Asking It!)
As a top sales consultant, I’ve successfully shown organizations on six continents how to gain velocity in their sales efforts by asking the right questions. Here’s an example: A major financial services firm called me in to review their numbers. It took their advisors five sales calls to close a new investor, and they knew they could reduce that to a three-call cycle. Their advisors would close more business and earn significantly more money. After we showed them how to…
They Were Failing… Until This One Simple Shift Made Them $88.5M
Duolingo, a player in the ed-tech space offering language learning services, was stuck in a rut with their company’s revenues. They offered a free version of their product to compete against other players like Babbel, which used a subscription model to sell their products. Duolingo gave their product away for free, calling it “freemium” to differentiate themselves. But it wasn’t working. So they went back to the drawing board and asked themselves: What is the number one issue people have…
8% Growth in a Struggling Market? This Fast Food Giant Reveals the Magic Formula Behind Its Success!
Today, several sectors are experiencing downturns due to economic factors. But in the fast food industry, even when demand is soft and year-over-year revenue declines, there is one fast food brand that is growing at a very fast rate. Guess who it is? Drum roll, please… Taco Bell! That’s right—Taco Bell. Taco Bell is forecasting 8% growth this quarter at stores open for at least a year, far outpacing its fast food rivals. How are they doing it? They are…
The #1 Cold Outreach Mistake That’s Costing You BIG
Ever get a message that starts like this? “Hey Ron, I see that we are both in the same business of helping clients grow. We help consultants like you generate at least 25K a month.” Delete. Why? Two reasons. First, if the only thing personalized in your message is my name, it’s not personalization—it’s a copy-paste crime. And trust me, I’ve seen the same template a hundred times. Second, he and I are not in the same business. He helps…
Forget AI—This Human Skill Sealed a $200M Deal (And It’s More Powerful Than You Think!)
Will AI replace salespeople? Here’s why it won’t happen. One of my greatest success stories as a top sales consultant was helping a client create a strategy and execute a plan to turn their biggest account – the largest user of their products worldwide – from a three-year bid on the lowest price to a 10-year negotiated deal worth over $200 million. The key that led to this transformation was not AI. If AI had been available then, sure, it…
DOGE Efficiencies – The Silent Killer of Sales Growth
Everyone is talking about efficiencies these days, but let’s talk about DOGE efficiencies when it comes to sales and leadership. You know what’s not efficient? Having a sales department that doesn’t actually know how to sell, a team that isn’t sharpening their skills, or worse—a group of veterans who are just phoning it in, still relying on the same strategies that worked five or ten years ago but are completely irrelevant today, and leadership that fails to inspire peak performance….
The Super Bowl Strategy Every Top Sales Consultant Knows (But Most Businesses Ignore)
In this past Sunday’s Super Bowl, the Kansas City Chiefs were trying to accomplish something no other team in the NFL has ever done—win three Super Bowls in a row, a “three-peat.” And guess what? They didn’t do it. Why not? Well, if you’ve read futurist Dan Burrus’ book “Techno Trends,” you’ll see that in his research, he found that when companies introduce a new competitive advantage or offering, their competitors quickly re-engineer it to beat them at their own…