Selling with Hubspot

How Being Honest Can Make You More Sales with HubSpot Sales Director David Torres

• Digifianz • Season 1 • Episode 2

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We guarantee you'll gain a refreshing new perspective on sales with this exclusive chat with David Torres, Sales Director at HubSpot. David flips the script on traditional sales tactics, emphasizing the significance of understanding customer's businesses rather than selling a product. 

He believes that this approach will position you to make accurate recommendations and earn every sale. Plus, he makes a compelling case for the importance of having fun in sales and remaining present in each customer interaction.

This episode also offers a deep-dive into ethical sales practices. David shares his unique experiences of advising customers to consider other strategies, demonstrating his firm belief in honesty and a genuine interest in clients. 

His refreshing approach combines pride in his work, ethical practices, and an emphasis on enjoying your work. It's essential listening for anyone in sales or considering a career in sales. 

We wrap up with some valuable insights on finding the right fit for your customer and the product you're selling. Tune in for these nuggets of wisdom and much more!


🔗 CONNECT WITH DAVID

👤 LinkedIn - https://www.linkedin.com/in/davidstorres19/ 

🔗 CONNECT WITH LUIS & DIGIFIANZ

👤 LinkedIn - https://www.linkedin.com/in/luissilvaball/
🐦 Twitter - https://twitter.com/LuisSilvaBall
💻 Digifianz Website - https://www.digifianz.com/

WHAT IS DIGIFIANZ?

Digifianz is an award winning HubSpot Diamond Partner. At Digifianz, we believe in the transformational power of humanizing business relationships. We believe driving honest, open conversations with prospects, and constantly providing them with value before they've ever bought anything, ultimately leads to better sales and a happier & loyal customer base. That's why we help companies grow with a people-first mentality & strategy.

Speaker 1:

Hey everyone, how's it going? Welcome to our sales podcast. We're here with sales legend David Torres. Thank you for saying that. That's very kind.

Speaker 2:

You are a sales legend. Thank you, I appreciate that David?

Speaker 1:

why don't you go by David or David in English, by the way?

Speaker 2:

I go by David in English, david, david in English, but I've heard people call me David, some people call me Dave.

Speaker 1:

Well, I mean it happens to me like Luis, Luis, Luis, Luis.

Speaker 2:

I could see Luis.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, oh, I get so many Luis.

Speaker 2:

As long as you're insulting me and you're treating me with kindness, I'm okay with that. Okay, which?

Speaker 1:

one do you prefer?

Speaker 2:

I prefer David.

Speaker 1:

David, David. Okay, so we're here with David Torres. David, it's a sales legend. Thank you, David. Why don't you tell us a bit about who you are, what you do at HubSpot?

Speaker 2:

So I'm currently a sales director at HubSpot, but I've been very lucky to have the HubSpot sales school almost guide my entire career. I started out as BDR, cold calling, prospecting real ice cold accounts. Then I became a sales rep selling to companies for many size. Then I became a channel account manager, working with our partners. I became a manager and now I'm a director in the LADAM mid-market business. So it's been a wild ride. It's been 10 years but I'm very happy and very I feel very lucky to have had the career I've had so far.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, you've grown like crazy man. Yeah, absolutely yeah, love it. It's all in tandem, you know it.

Speaker 2:

That's why I love this ecosystem. It's about how do we help each other grow back.

Speaker 1:

Love it, Love it and talking about growing. So we're addressing people here who, like we're talking to somebody who's new at selling. They just started selling. Maybe they're new at selling HubSpot. What's the first lesson that you think they should learn, your first tip for them where to start?

Speaker 2:

So I think when you sell HubSpot, there's almost a it's a double-edged sword, because so much of our demand is people wanting to know more about the product, so it lends itself to you wanting to talk about the product, and that's where that's the trap.

Speaker 1:

I can see that yeah.

Speaker 2:

Because when you learn about the customer's business, you might actually challenge the preconceived notion. When you're able to learn about the customer's business, you might be able to say you know what I see why you want that. I'm actually not going to recommend that. But when you know HubSpot, all you do is talk about HubSpot and there's 80% 90% of the decisions going to happen independent of you, outside of the conversation that you're having in that moment in time. So if you don't have the opportunity to learn about their business, you're going to find yourself without options and when you don't have options, all you can do is try to pressure to close, say, oh, I have special underquarter pricing for you, and you're going to go down the gauntlet of all the reasons why they need to buy from you and you're going to annoy the prospect. And then you're going to be frustrated, you're going to be angry, you're going to say, well, what else can I do? And that what else can I do stems from you didn't learn, because the product is so good that you thought you didn't have to learn.

Speaker 2:

But this is where I think my biggest tip all this to say you have to earn every sale and it could be the biggest sale in the world. It could be the smallest, but you have to earn every single sale. And the way that you earn every sales, by learning about the customer, by recognizing that there's actually a really cool business here. There's people that are doing such interesting things like I've never owned let's call it a logistics broker, never have. I've never owned a solar panel business, but I can learn from individuals who have, and there's something so nice about getting to learn about what people do, because it just makes you Fascinating.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, it's interesting, it's more.

Speaker 2:

it makes every day just a little more enjoyable, and I'm here to have fun, like I love getting quota, I love overperforming, but I also want to have fun, independent of my result. And when you focus on learning and getting to know the person you're working with and getting to know how their business makes revenue and how it takes, now you find yourself in a position where having funds a little easier and that phones less heavy and you actually appreciate a lot more what you do. So that's my biggest tip Don't focus on the product, focus on learning.

Speaker 1:

And I love it and I love what you're saying about fun. So we were just talking about that a little bit and you're saying how I mean you can easily get caught up in the anxiety of looking at your numbers, your sales quotas, that number that you have, that you have to hit, and you get lost in that and you forget to have fun and you kind of miss out on that sales. Could you elaborate a bit on that?

Speaker 2:

I think so much of sales can feel like been there, done that like God. The same conversation has the same questions and the same, and it can become something that you kind of take and go on autopilot, like that's where sales becomes a trap. And you can't let yourself do that, because if you're doing the same thing over and over again multiple times a day, you're going to go insane. You're not going to have fun, you're going to feel like God, this is the same conversation. But a lot of that stems from how active are you in that moment? Are you present? Like so much of life is about enjoying that moment, right, like I think, when I'm with my wife. I know that I don't always get to spend as much time with her as I love to, but the moment I do get to spend there, I'll be present in that moment. So I have it in me to be present. Why don't I do that when I suck? Why don't I do that with every single meaning that I have?

Speaker 1:

You're always like thinking about the next step, thinking about oh man, I got a closest. You're not living in there, you got to be present.

Speaker 2:

Because if I'm not present, my prospect knows it. Oh yeah, and if they might not call me out on it? But they're not paying attention to it. So again, you have to earn every sale. How in the world are you going to earn a sale where you're not even paying attention?

Speaker 1:

Absolutely. It goes back to what you were saying, man, like you got to learn about your prospect so you can actually enjoy it. Because, I mean, if you're just talking about your product, like yeah, I'm in love with Hopspot, hopspot's great, and this is why you need to have Hopspot, then you're not really connecting with that person, you're not understanding what's driving them, what's their challenges, which is what's going to be intriguing for you, because their challenges, their problems, are different problems from everybody else.

Speaker 2:

And the cool thing is, their problems might actually educate you for another prospect that you're going to meet down the line.

Speaker 1:

Love it.

Speaker 2:

And you'll be able to say actually, I spoke with this prospect a few weeks ago or a few months ago, Is that happening to you at all? And they might say how do you know? And now you're not the Hopspot expert, but you happen to be a business expert that just so happens to know about Hopspot, and when you end up in that second world, you do a lot better.

Speaker 1:

I love that. What you just said. It's just, it's totally a different mindset, like you're not just a salesman, you're like a business consultant who happens to know Hopspot, who happens to be selling Hopspot at this time. But I'm actually more involved with the business and I want to get to know more about your business and how we can help you out, and Hopspot just happens to be able to help you out with that.

Speaker 2:

And that, to me, is a lot more fulfilling than just going down a checklist of questions so I can try to negotiate a price and then, when you ghost me, now I have to pressure you and I'm calling you and I'm doing all these things that I really don't want to do because I need to hit the quarter, of course.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, that totally makes sense and on that, have you ever had a situation where you did not?

Speaker 2:

recommend.

Speaker 1:

Hopspot to anyone, based on what you heard from their experience.

Speaker 2:

A very long time ago there was a school I've done this multiple times, but this one's the first time I did it, which is why I remember it more often and they were trying to teach English and they had. I asked them cool, so tell me about the business? And they're like yeah, we have one big area. I'm like cool, how many locations do you have? They're like we have two locations. I'm like cool, and how many students can each location hold? And they're like, oh, about a hundred students. I'm like okay, where are you now? They're like we're at 98. I'm like, sorry, 92. So I'm like oh, so you're really eating eight more students. Why don't you just go across the block and just put little brochures? That seems to me like a better strategy than having to invest time, effort, energy. That seems like an easier path and the prospect goes well, yeah, I guess that's what we can do. I'm like yeah, why don't you try that first? Do that first, and if that doesn't work then we can talk. But I have a feeling that's gonna work and it worked right. Never heard from them ever again. They're happy and good for them. So I've had that happen.

Speaker 2:

Then I've also had situations where there was a customer who said, hey, I'm really intrigued in HubSpot's automation and it would have been an awesome ticket price for me, but then I realized that they were trying to use my product as a core engine to their product. So I'm like guys, so what are you gonna do if HubSpot decides to increase pricing tomorrow? They're like well, we can't do that. I mean like great, because your use case you need to develop this on your own. Like you can't be using HubSpot intellectual property to make your product tick, otherwise you really don't have a product. And that's a company that unfortunately did not make it. They did go under because I kept tabs on their progress. It was a startup, they had good funding, it was a good idea, but it's just.

Speaker 1:

A lot of startups. They don't make it. Yeah, it's not always gonna work out.

Speaker 2:

But it taught me to think about huh, is this company really gonna survive independent of me? Like, is this a good use case for me? So it does happen, but again, it's all about having options.

Speaker 1:

And I think it's great that you've had those experiences where you've been willing to tell people you know we're not the right fit for you, because just going with that honesty into that, into that conversation, that puts you in a position where when you do recommend them, you're actually you're believing it yourself, like you trust it. You know that you're recommending it because that is the best option for them. So it makes you feel better about yourself, doesn't it?

Speaker 2:

I think there's an element where I wanna be proud of the work that I do Exactly, and I wanna be proud about the way I look myself in the mirror and the way I say, hey, did I do a good job today? And I can't do that if I know I'm just trying to convince somebody or if I'm just gonna live in the moment. Pressure maybe lie.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, I can't do that. You know, those are the terrible sales practices that give people, like give salespeople a bad name.

Speaker 2:

And that's not selling and it's still your spirit. Yeah, it makes me feel crappy about myself. Absolutely nobody wants to do that.

Speaker 1:

Yeah, those are like terrible salesmen who do that Exactly Psychopath.

Speaker 2:

I mean at this point, this is when I saw many salespeople don't succeed. Yeah, so it's doing it the harder way, but doing it the harder way, the way that it forces you to learn the right way Like you're taking an interest in your client and your prospect.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, and I think they appreciate that too, and I always think like it's almost like working out right. Sometimes you're in a position where I know like if I'm doing it the other way, I know that I can do it my way, I can do it sloppy and I'm gonna be able to deadlift whatever. But if I wanna progress beyond my current limitation, it's not gonna work out that way. I'm gonna have to learn some good form. I'm gonna have to sweat the details. I'm gonna have to really think about what I'm doing.

Speaker 1:

Or you can take steroids and cheat the way and you can cheat and then that comes back to bite you. It does.

Speaker 2:

Yeah, and that's where you get a customer who four months down the line not even three weeks down the line they're saying, hey, this is not do what you said it would Absolutely. And there's like well, now we're butting heads and now it's more. It's not worth it.

Speaker 1:

Absolutely not. It's always better to do things the right way. Make sure you're in good fit, listen to your client and make sure that what you're selling actually makes sense for them, and sweat the details and, as you said, I mean, if you really pay attention to it, you're gonna have more fun, it's gonna be entertaining for you and, in doing so, you're gonna provide more value to them as well. Exactly, and you're gonna feel better about yourself.

Speaker 2:

I love it, and that's what I'm here to do. I'm here to be happy. I'm a human in this world and you have that happy energy about you.

Speaker 1:

That's something I love about you, man You're always like with a smile, this great energy. Look, that's awesome.

Speaker 2:

I get to help businesses grow. That's a fun thing, Like I love this game right. Like we get to be that difference maker for a business where they can hire people, where they can expand into a different job Like that can change lives.

Speaker 1:

Why not enjoy it? I love it, man, you know it. You know it. Love it, dude. Okay, so one last lesson for people who are listening here. It does have fun.

Speaker 2:

You really do. You got to have fun. If you're not having fun. You're probably not in the right area.

Speaker 1:

Okay, great lesson, man Love it. Thank you. All right, thank you.