Steve Landrum: Building Sales Teams That Win – The Mindset, Systems & Leadership Behind Growth

Intro: Broadcasting live from the Business RadioX studios in Houston, Texas. It’s time for Houston Business Radio. Now, here’s your host.

Trisha Stetzel: Hello, Houston. Trisha Stetzel here bringing you another episode of Houston Business Radio. Today’s guest is Steve Landrum, principal of Etowah Sales Solutions and seasoned sales leader with more than 36 years of experience driving business growth. As an outsourced VP of sales through Sales Acceleration, Steve helps businesses across industries determine, build and realize their full potential. Over his career, he’s doubled company sales to to record levels, expanded distributor networks internationally, and coached sales teams to lasting success. A Georgia Tech graduate, certified sales leader and two time president Circle Award winner. I’m almost done, Steve. He is passionate about servant leadership and equipping teams with the skills and mindset to win in today’s competitive market. Steve, welcome to the show.

Steve Landrum: Well thank you Trisha. Wow. What a what an opening. Wow. I mean, I just feel like I’m family with you. Well that’s awesome.

Trisha Stetzel: You are. Absolutely.

Trisha Stetzel: I am so excited about having you on the show today, Steve. And you have so, um, so much in depth knowledge in this sales space, which I will have to say, most of us struggle with, whether we’re good at it or not, good at it, or want to learn more, we all have room to grow. I’m so excited to have you on the show. So, Steve, tell us a little bit more about you and then we’re going to jump into the business stuff.

Steve Landrum: Well, I appreciate that. I always like to make a joke that in 37 years of sales, Not all of my hair is gray yet. Uh, and I still got all of it. I still got a full head, so I can’t. I can’t believe it after 37 years of sales. But, uh, I have just had a fantastic career. Tricia. I, uh, I’ve had I’ve had so much fun, I, I came up, um, I was, I was a little bit of the black sheep in the family because all of my family are entrepreneurs. All of them are business owners. And I learned a lot from my grandfather. I watched my dad run a business. Um, I was kind of a black sheep. I went into corporate life, so I, I went into corporate life and kind of kind of climbed the ladder that way. And, you know, the, the school of hard knocks going through corporate life. But I learned so much, and I am one of the fortunate few that can really say I had fantastic mentors along the way. Uh, two, two especially, that really, really taught me business, taught me how to do business, how how to talk. They taught me everything of, and I owe it all to them for my success, I really do. Um, not everybody can say that. But, you know, going through my career and just using those lessons over and over and see, see, see how they constantly, you know, yield results and success. I got to a point in my career where, honestly, I was, you know, the travel was, was was tough. It was it was tough, you know, raising families and, um, missing a lot of ball games and missing a lot of events. And the entrepreneur in me, I that always was there started coming out and Covid gave me a reason to do it. And I started this business five years ago. And it’s just been a blessing. It’s been a blessing. So now I get to give back to other business owners, um, all the lessons that I’ve learned and I’m just passing passing those along. That’s what I’m doing.

Trisha Stetzel: Yeah. And I love that, that you’re able to bring these big business experiences and your expertise from being in the corporate space back to small to midsize businesses. And I love that. That’s fantastic. So let’s talk a little bit about Itoa sales solutions. Tell me about your business, Steve.

Steve Landrum: Well, thank you, thank you. Um, it was kind of a it’s kind of everybody says, what what what is that? Well, I actually live on the river. I live on the Etowah River. It’s an Indian name. It means town. Um, in, in, um, in Indian. So, um, I just felt like it was kind of meant to be my little emblem that I use for my business. I had somebody draw a picture of a tree. I just think a tree is so representative of of healthy everything. If the roots are healthy, the trees healthy. And that’s the same thing applies in business. So I had a I had a personal friend of mine who was an artist draw me a little emblem when I launched this business five years ago, and it was a picture of my backyard. It was like meant to be. So it it’s stuck. Um, I loved it. Um, the tree in front of the river. Uh, that’s honestly what I. What I look at out of my window. So I made I made a business emblem out of it. Uh, long story short.

Trisha Stetzel: Well, I think it’s beautiful. And you guys go and check out the logo. We’ll have a link to Steve’s page on the website. It’s beautiful. Is a very full tree with beautiful roots in front of the river. It’s amazing. So let’s talk a little bit about who you serve. Steve, who is your audience. And then let’s dive into a little bit of sales. I think you have some information that would be very important to the listeners today.

Steve Landrum: Well, I appreciate that. Um, you know, my my target, you know, really who who I want to help the most and who I can make the biggest impact on. You mentioned a second ago, Tricia, are the small to medium sized businesses. And really, I just define that in revenue size. You know, I’ve worked for businesses as low as $1 million in revenue. Um, they’ve got to have something going on, you know, to, to to be able to afford at least some kind of help from me. Uh, so a million bucks in revenue is, is typically the bottom, bottom side. And I’ve worked for companies as big as $80 million. Um. Um, it gets more complex the bigger the company, for sure. But everybody has sales problems. And I’ll share I’ll share some stats in a little bit, um, to that effect. But I’m agnostic. Any any kind of B2B business is fair game. Um, and I’ve worked in many, many sectors already, uh, serve lots of different industries already with my business. Um, and I’ve just had a, had a blast because sales principles, even though each engagement’s different sales principles can be applied to any kind of business. Great sales principles.

Trisha Stetzel: Yeah, that’s so true. And I mentioned it earlier. We all struggle a little whether we’re good at it or not. There’s always room for growth. So where do we start, Steve? Let’s dive right in.

Steve Landrum: Well, you know, in this digital age, Tricia, you know, we’ve got so, so many tools and everybody’s trying to figure out AI. And we live in a digital world that’s full of emails and, you know, my inboxes. I’m sure yours is too, you know, jam packed every day. And how do you keep up with the with the emails and the messages and the, you know, and all of those kind of things. But I’m going to go back and I’m going to get, you know, for lack of a better word, a little bit old school. And I’m going to go back to a couple principles I really want to talk about. This doesn’t apply just to salespeople. This applies to any kind of business person. Anybody with any kind of business, whether that’s B2C or B2B, can use these principles, and they’re timeless. They never they never they never stop giving if you practice them. So let’s talk about a couple if that’s okay. Okay.

Trisha Stetzel: Yeah, please.

Steve Landrum: Well, so. So I have, um, you know, I’ve done a lot of profiles over the years, you know, aptitude profiles, and I’ve, you know, I’ve tested and taken those myself. And one of the interesting qualities I have is the ability to win others over. So in a profile assessment, it’s called a woo woo win others over. So but that is a principle any business person should, should try to endear to and try to to hone that skill. If it’s it’s it’s foundational. So, um, one really, really cool principle associated with becoming a woo. And this is this is a little bit counterintuitive, but to get someone to like you, you have to get them talking about yourself. Let me say that again. You’re not doing the talking. You’re doing the listening, but you’re getting that person talking about themselves and the you. And you’re using their name often in that conversation. And it’s subconscious to that person sitting across from you, uh, whether that’s in a virtual meeting or whether that’s in person. But if you’re saying their name over and over and over, subconsciously they’re saying, this person is really interested in what I’ve got to say.

Steve Landrum: And that in turn endears them to you. You win others over by getting them to talk about themselves. Um, it’s an old sales principle. And every, every salesperson I’ve ever coached and managed, I’ve had some great ones. Um, I get them to say, uh, stop. Stop this and open these, ask questions and listen, get that person talking. Yeah. Um, it’s been it’s been a real, real interesting principle. And I’ve seen less and less people using it, to be honest with you, Tricia. Um, but if you get if you, if you get to know the person, if you really get to know the person and let them tell you about themselves and there’s a, there’s a, you know, there’s this trust and you gotta, you gotta knock down a wall or two to do that, man. You’re, you’re off to the races in with a great relationship that’s being built. Um, and I always remind people about this ratio and I didn’t design this ratio. I think the good Lord above designed this ratio. You got two ears and one mouth. You got two ears and one mouth, so use them accordingly in a conversation.

Trisha Stetzel: I love that, uh, you know, I have always believed that just being naturally curious and asking good questions and allowing that person to tell you about themselves builds rapport. I love when people ask about me. So, Steve, am I doing a good job of woo right now?

Steve Landrum: You are saying my name often and I think I’ve used your name already about 4 or 5 times. So I think we’re off to being being good friends for sure. It’s just an old principle that works. It’s it’s it’s timeless. It’s timeless.

Trisha Stetzel: It is. We all love to hear our name. Okay, so that’s number one. We’ve got one mouth and two ears for a reason. So talk less, listen more. What’s next Steve?

Steve Landrum: Well, let’s let’s stay on that subject of of a good name. Let’s, let’s let’s stay on the subject of a name, okay? Because, you know, if you think about it, Tricia mo, I’d say 99.9% of us. We have a name because it was given to us. Right? So we didn’t pick it. We didn’t pick it. Somebody gave that to us. So if somebody gave that name to us, think of it as a as a gift. Right? What are you going to do with that gift? Are you are you going to abhor it, you know, and make it good? Uh, are are you going to are you going to lessen the name that’s been given to you? You are are you going to, you know, dirty, dirty it up, so to speak. And there’s an old proverb that I love. There’s an old proverb that it was taught to me by my grandfather. He believed in this principle. He was a contractor. He was a home builder. One of the entrepreneurs that that had an influence on me. Um, but it goes like this. It’s Proverbs 22 one. It says a good name is to be desired more than great riches. Good name is to be desired more than great riches. In that order. So business people always want to be associated with with a business person that’s got a good name, they always do.

Steve Landrum: Who to be associated with a creek or, uh, you know, or, you know, somebody who’s a, who’s a rookie out of something, or he’s always trying to use words to craft. You know, an ulterior motive or something when you build that good name for Tricia, I’ve seen it over and over. Build your reputation and your name and what it stands for. The riches. Come, come. Do you want to be associated with somebody they can trust? A good name. It’s just. Just that simple. It’s time and again a timeless principle, I see. And I, and I share this for a reason. Because I coach and see a lot of great, great skilled young salespeople and what they what they really want to what they’re trying to do. They think they gotta go out and they gotta, they gotta they’re thinking about money and how much they can make and and all these, all these things except the fact of building their name and reputation and in that relationship of whoever they’re trying to to, to build to if you do it. If you do it right, uh, it’s gold. It’s absolutely gold. Uh, and it’ll pay dividends from you for years and years and years.

Trisha Stetzel: Um, so what is it, a name? It’s good to. So two things I picked up, Steve, is it’s good to use a person’s name when you’re having a conversation. It builds trust and rapport. But the name of your organization or your business can also be very meaningful and build trust. Did I get that right?

Steve Landrum: You did. You did. The business name is important for sure, Tricia, but everybody knows me for Steve Landrum. Steve Landrum’s business. Right. Trish Trisha Stetzel business can you know, I like Trisha Stetzel. I’m. I’m going to do business with her. Not at all. Solutions. Everybody wants, you know, my name. The person’s name. That’s what you got to work on. That’s what you got to work on. Okay.

Trisha Stetzel: Mm, I love that. Okay, Steve, we’ve had two great lessons here. What do you want to tell us next?

Steve Landrum: Well, I’m going to stay on that theme one more time. One one. One little tag on lesson. Uh, for for for a second, uh, if I may. When you’re, when you’re building your name and when you’re building your reputation, you know, try, try to define what your core values are and try to try to communicate those people. People want to know who you are and what you stand for. Right? And and you know, some core values that are always great. You know who whoever you are and who, whoever, whatever the business stands for. Honesty, trustworthiness, likability, smarts. You know, uh, are all virtues that that any client, any client, any business that you’re doing business with will tell others about any of those virtues. People will say, yeah, Steve got that or Trisha Stetzel got that. You should check them out. Uh, those are those are just great virtues. But know your core values and communicate those to. Because trust is earned. Trust is earned. It takes time to earn trust. It does. It takes time to earn trust as you’re building relationships. But it can be lost just like that in an instant, for sure. Yeah.

Trisha Stetzel: That is so true. All right, I have more questions for you, but I know people are already ready to connect with you, Steve. So I’d like to pause for just a second here and allow you to tell us what is the best way for folks to connect with you, if they’re interested in doing that right now?

Steve Landrum: Yes, ma’am. If you’ll share, I’ve got a website that I shared. You can go. There’s plenty of places that you can click and, um, see content. Uh, connect with me as far as email or phone number on my website, uh, or my email address. Um, you can you can certainly email me, uh, as well as laundromat sales acceleration. Com so thank you for asking.

Trisha Stetzel: Yeah, absolutely. And you guys, just in case you need the spelling on that, the back end of it is sales acceleration s a l e s x e l e r a t I o n. And that’s how you’re going to find Steve. Okay. I want to roll back into you talked you open up the conversation about AI. And as you’re taking us through these old school principles, as you called them, I’m curious about how we use these old school principles when we’re meeting people on line. Steve.

Steve Landrum: Yeah, I appreciate that. Um, they still apply in the digital world. So even if you’re not communicating in person or virtually, you know, that’s live Still utilize the same principles as you’re talking to people. Um, say something about your your personal life or, you know, tell them about your grandkids or tell them about where you’re going on a trip in the email. Just, you know, be personal. Everybody’s got five gazillion emails they’re looking at every day. But just make it personal. Make use that person’s name. Tell them about yourself. Tell them you know, have fun. Just be be be real. Is is what it means. Um, so so that’s number one. I mean, using those principles in a digital age certainly certainly means a lot. But I’d like to say to, you know, emails and messaging, especially Tricia, when you’re communicating, it’s so easy to be misinterpreted, right? When you’re not speaking, live with a person. The context of the email, I mean, I was I was asked last week, what did you mean by that email? The time, I didn’t understand the tone of what you were saying. That was a client asking me, and I said, there’s a there’s an email for you. There’s email for you. No, no, no. Uh, misinterpretation. Uh, required. Uh, this is what I meant. But that’s that’s the you know, that’s where we’re at now in a digital age. So the more you can make your emails and your messaging warm, uh, the better, the better in this world we’re living in now. So, um, and make sure you’re clear. Make sure they’re there direct. Make sure there’s no ambiguity in your messaging and the way you’re talking to people. Make your yes mean yes and your no mean no. I’ve always, always said that, too. It’s a, uh. How about that for a principle, right? Uh, uh, old school principle. But just just be clear. Just be clear in, in your messaging because nobody wants to go through a 20 email chain to understand what you meant by your first email. Right.

Trisha Stetzel: Yeah, absolutely. Can I draw in an old school principal? How about we just pick up the phone and have a conversation? Thank you.

Steve Landrum: Oh, you’re a woman after my own heart. My goodness. Uh, that’s that’s it, that’s it. Uh, can I have a phone call with you, or can we jump on a virtual call and talk? Simple as that. Yeah. Or.

Trisha Stetzel: Yeah, absolutely. Because there’s so much language around this, right? Or even over the phone. Just verbal is so much better than written because we don’t know if yes means yes or no means no all of the time because we communicate differently.

Steve Landrum: That’s right, that’s right. Um, you know, I’m, I’m, I’m a big believer in professional networking, and I’m, I’m, I’m fortunate to be part of, you know, some great groups or around my community. And, you know, when we do reconnects, when we get back together in between meetings. Uh, Tricia, always I always tell everybody, do your best to to to be in person, to try to get back together in person and if not in person, virtual. And I’m saying these in order for a reason. Virtual second and then a phone call third. But all all three of those are the big three, you know, don’t don’t settle with an email or don’t settle with text. Um, make it intentional, uh, to to be able to speak, live, live with somebody.

Trisha Stetzel: Yeah, absolutely. You know, we live in a space where people are so much more comfortable hiding behind an email or a direct message or something. Electronic and lost is the art of building a relationship with a human being from the beginning.

Steve Landrum: Right on, right on.

Trisha Stetzel: I’m feeling pretty good right now, Stevie, because I invited you to a phone call first and then to a video call so that we could actually have this conversation. So I’m feeling pretty good right now. Yeah.

Steve Landrum: Great progression, great progression.

Trisha Stetzel: Yeah, I feel like I’m doing all the right things. So let’s talk about what’s next. So we’re building relationships. How important is that compared to what we’re actually putting on the table and selling all the bells and whistles of the product or service that we have to offer?

Steve Landrum: Fantastic question. I appreciate you saying that. Obviously, you know, in business we’ve got to be able to communicate our products and services, right. Any any good business person, any good salesperson has got to have knowledge of what what they’re selling, what what they’re talking about. Right. But I always had a rule of thumb. And again, this is back to some of my mentors that back back in um, back in corporate life that taught me. But they always like to say that 40%, 40% of the success formula comes from the product knowledge. Only 40%. That’s less than half. But 60% of the success comes from your attitude and how you carry yourself and your humor and the conversation and how well that relationship is being built. 60%. So yes, it it does matter. It does matter. We got we got to know what we’re selling for sure. But, uh, I’ll be honest with you, Tricia. You know, when I’m hiring salespeople for clients now, I look for attitude first, I do, I look for attitude first. And I don’t care if they don’t have the skills and the industry that I’m trying to. I will teach them the product skills, but give me attitude. Give me a great attitude and a roll up your sleeves. Um, go, go to go to battle, you know, type type of mentality. And I’ll make that person successful for sure.

Trisha Stetzel: I love that. I think oftentimes we do hire for knowledge and skills versus attitude, and it makes a huge difference when you’re hiring the right person with the right attitude. You can teach the other stuff, right?

Steve Landrum: You can, you can, and I can’t take credit for this principle. I’m going to name somebody who everybody will recognize. But Zig Ziglar, you know, everybody knows that name. Zig Ziglar in sales and and he said, he said, this is so true because I give him all the credit. It’s your attitude, more than your aptitude, that will determine your altitude. I mean, I love that I’ve said that. I’ve said that a million times in my career, for sure. Uh, it’s your attitude, more than your aptitude and other and otherwise, your product skills that will determine your your altitude. That’s so true. It’s so true.

Trisha Stetzel: That’s beautiful. All right, so you took us old school today. We’re back to relationship building. Really connecting with humans on this, like, real ground level. We’ve got a few minutes left together today, Steve. So what? What is it about sales, or are there some statistics out there? I know you said you had some for us force, or there are some things that you’d like to share with the audience today specifically around that topic.

Steve Landrum: Yes, yes. Thank you. Tricia. Um, I know these stats and I think they’re accurate because that that I’m about to share. Uh, because we, um, through the organization that that certifies me sales acceleration. We have surveys from over about 5000 business CEOs. These are all their answers. And this is what they tell us. This is what they tell us. So this should make people I don’t know if it makes people feel better because everybody’s in the same boat or worse. But I’m just going to share. So when it comes to sales strategy, a business sales strategy, these are again from CEOs, 85% of CEOs say they do poorly at it. Sales strategy. In other words, uh, do we know where we’re going? Do we know what what our target audience is? Do we have a value proposition? Do we know how to communicate it? Uh, do we know our competitors? Do we know how to track our sales activity. That’s what I mean. 85% say, no, we don’t do that very well when it comes to sales analysis, which means do we have goals and quotas matching where the business really needs to go overall, does everybody have clear, clear directives about all of that? Um, can we capture that with metrics and reporting? 93%, 93%? Trisha say we’re terrible at it.

Steve Landrum: 93% of businesses say say they’re bad at it. Two more, two more sales math methodology, in other words, is the sales process really defined? Does a salesperson really know what steps they’re going to take to get that, to get that sale, whatever it is, product or service? Um, do they capture it in a CRM? Do they capture their their sales activity recording so we can measure, right, and talk about things? 95%, 95% of CEOs said, no, we don’t. We don’t do it. Or if we do it, we do it poorly. 95%. And then one last one. Um. Nobody on boards properly? Very few companies on board. They’re they’re people. Much, much less they’re salespeople. They just kind of throw them, throw them to the wolves. And, um, the stat there is 90% of CEOs say, no, we we we don’t do that. Well, uh, so don’t feel alone, folks, that if you feel like you’re not doing well in sales, you’re in the same boat. Everybody needs help.

Trisha Stetzel: Wow. Which is why we need Steve in our life. I’m just saying, we need Steve in our life. Um, alright, so, my friend, we are at the back end of our conversation. I know you have lots more that you can give to our audience, and I would love for people to connect with you. You guys. As usual, I will have all of Steve’s contact information in the show notes, so you can just point and click if you’re sitting at your computer. If you’re driving, please wait till you get home and then you can point and click and get in touch with Steve. But I have I think there’s one last old school thing that you can share with the audience as we leave our time together, and it’s about the follow up. So can you tell me one more old school thing that you’re doing with people as a follow up that might have to do with a pen and paper? What?

Steve Landrum: Oh, what a setup. What a what a perfect setup. Alright, Tricia, nobody does this anymore. Nobody does it anymore. Have you. When’s the. I’m going to ask just a general question to everybody about the whole audience. When is the last time you took a note or a piece of stationery and wrote a handwritten note to the person for whatever, whatever they did for you? When’s the last time everybody’s done that, right? And I want I want you to think about something. When is the last? Think of the last time you receive something from somebody, a handwritten note. And how did that make you feel? It made you feel great. Everybody loves it. So in this digital email crazy messaging world we’re living in, take the time to do a handwritten note and I promise you that person will have a hard time throwing it away. So do it, do it.

Trisha Stetzel: I still have some of those notes laying around here, because I have a hard time throwing them away, and I can check the box that. It’s only been about four weeks since I sent a handwritten note, because I, I think I’m taking, uh, yeah. It’s, uh, you’re right. It take it’s hard. Right? It’s hard.

Steve Landrum: Takes time. It takes.

Trisha Stetzel: Time.

Steve Landrum: Takes time.

Trisha Stetzel: Be intentional which makes it full. Yes. It makes it so meaningful. Steve. Oh my gosh. Thank you so much for joining me today. I love these old school lessons. I hope that everyone takes at least one action from our conversation today to go do some old school activity.

Steve Landrum: Loved being with you, Tricia. Thanks a lot.

Trisha Stetzel: Great. Thanks again. That’s all the time we have for today, guys. So if you found this conversation with Steve valuable, please share it with a fellow entrepreneur, a veteran, or a Houston business leader ready to grow. And be sure to follow, rate and review the show. Of course, that helps us reach more bold business minds just like yours. In your business, your leadership and your legacy are built one intentional step at a time. So stay inspired, stay focused, and keep building the business and the life you deserve.